Moving tribute planned for famed Oakland dancer
Ceremony, performance to mark end of mourning for Malonga Casquelourd
By Brenda Payton, STAFF WRITER

It hardly seems possible two years have passed. More than two years.
It was Father's Day 2003 when Malonga Casquelourd, internationally renowned drummer and dancer, was killed in a head-on collision with a drunken driver in Oakland. Casquelourd, 55, was such a Bay Area institution for so long, his presence was so large, it doesn't seem possible he has been gone that long.

But he has, at least in body. On Saturday his family and the numerous artists he worked with will present a celebration of his life, called a Malaki Matanga.

Malonga Casquelourd
Rachel Howard

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Dancer, choreographer

So many admirers flooded Oakland's Alice Arts Center for the memorial for Malonga Casquelourd that the overflow crowd had to wait in the street. Inside, joyful drumming and dancing marked the passing of a teacher friends remembered as angelic.

Casquelourd, a world-renowned ambassador of central African dance, was killed in June 2003 by a drunken driver who made a wrong turn down a one-way street. His unexpected death left a community stricken but also grateful for their years with the smiling man so passionate about the moves of his homeland that he often danced beyond his time allotment as a favorite attraction of the San Francisco Ethnic Dance Festival.