Editions Esengo was a record studio in the Congo, which is noted for assembling to their label Rock-a-Mambo, African Jazz, and Conga Jazz, three of the great powerhouse bands of Congolese rumba. Esengo is taken from the

Lingala Lingala (Ngala) (Lingala: ''Lingála'') is a Bantu language spoken in the northwest of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the northern half of the Republic of the Congo, in their capitals, Kinshasa and Brazzaville, and to a lesser degree in ...

language, and is the word for "happiness" or "joy." In 1956, a Greek businessman, Dino Antonopoulos, sought to start a new music publishing firm in Leopoldville ( Kinshasa). He established the enterprise by purchasing material from the recently defunct

Opika Opika was an early record label in the Congo, which recorded and promoted African pop, guitar, and rumba - not only from the Congo, but from Cameroon and Ghana as well. The label also recognized the value of ethnographic recordings, which were fea ...

record label and recruiting Loningisa guitarist and composer Henri Bowane to be artistic director of the firm. This proved to be a great blow to the

Loningisa Loningisa was a studio and record label based in Kinshasa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (then known as Zaire). Loningisa was made famous by the emergence of the Soukous, African rumba band OK Jazz, whose music became popular, and a big i ...

recording label, as Bowane brought with him such amazing talent as: Jean Serge Essous, Philippe Rossignol Lando, Saturnin Pandi, Liengo Honoré, Augustin Moniania "Roitelet." In 1957 Bowane was able to convince saxophonist Nino Malapet, then a player for Editions Loningisa and member of OK Jazz, to defect and join Essous and Rossignol, as well as other members of Esengo, to form Orchestre Rock-a-Mambo. Meanwhile, the Esengo firm managed to enlist Joseph Kabaselle's orchestra African Jazz as well as Paul "DeWayon" Ebengo's Conga Jazz creating a remarkable stable of performers.

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