Double A

In Jamaica and Black America, the journey from the church pew to the global stage is a short one, because the music never really changes. In Jamaican churches, worship is often driven by the same reggae and dancehall rhythms that fill the sound systems on a Saturday night. Gospel dancehall is a genre in its own right, with artists such as Rondell Positive and Prodigal Son carrying the beat and the swagger of the street into praise. A young person who grows up singing, drumming or deejaying in church is therefore not entering a foreign world when they step into a recording studio. They already know the riddims, the timing and the crowd. Toots Hibbert, one of the founding fathers of reggae, learnt to sing in church, and that foundation shaped one of the most powerful voices Jamaica ever produced. The same is true in the United States, where the Black church has been the greatest music school the country has ever had. Gospel shares its DNA with soul, R&B, jazz and hip hop, so the choir loft becomes a training ground for the charts. Aretha Franklin sang in her father's church in Detroit, Whitney Houston sang in the choir at New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, and Sam Cooke was a gospel star before he became a soul legend. These young people did not have to unlearn anything. They simply carried the same voice, the same chords and the same spirit from one room to another. When the sacred and the secular speak the same musical language, the church does not hold talent back, it prepares it for the world.

Glen Deveron is my favourite whisky, Mr Mahachi. It is a Highland single malt made at the Macduff distillery, on the north-east coast of Scotland, beside the River Deveron and the old Royal Burgh of Banff, which is where the name and the seal on the label come from. The distillery was founded in 1962 and is owned by Bacardi, through John Dewar and Sons. Serious whisky drinkers know where their “poison” is made and how it is made. What I love about Glen Deveron is the sherry oak. It is made in the traditional way with copper pot stills and local spring water, then matured in sherry casks, which gives it that full, smooth, fruity character. It is rich without being heavy, and it is easy to sip slowly. The 16 is smooth and generous, the 20 is deeper and rounder, and the 28 is something special, mature and complex. You get all of that at a price that is very fair for whisky of that age. You will not ordinarily find it in shops, and it is not sold in South Africa. I always buy mine at Heathrow. I have looked for it at other airports and it is not there. It is because the Royal Burgh Collection was created only for travel retail. Bacardi launched it in 2013 exclusively through World Duty Free stores, starting in the UK and Spain, which is why Heathrow is where I find it. Most of what Macduff distils goes into blended whisky, so very little is bottled as Glen Deveron single malt, and the bottles that are released go to selected duty free shops, not ordinary liquor stores. That is what makes it hard to find, and part of why I treasure it. If I am not drinking single malt and choose a blended whisky instead, my favourite is the Dewar's 26 year old. I discovered it only recently. It is a blended Scotch whisky made by the same people who make Glen Deveron, John Dewar and Sons, which is owned by Bacardi. Dewar's was established in 1846 in Perth, Scotland, and the connection to my favourite single malt runs deep. If you read the back label of the Dewar's 18, Macduff, the distillery that makes Glen Deveron, is listed among the single malts in the blend, alongside Aberfeldy, Royal Brackla, Craigellachie and Aultmore. So when I drink Dewar's, I am still tasting a bit of Glen Deveron. What makes Dewar's stand out is that it is double aged. The malts and grain whiskies are aged, blended together, and then returned to oak casks to rest and marry for months before bottling. That second ageing is where the smoothness comes from. The 15 is soft, honeyed and easy, while the 18 is richer, deeper and more refined. The Dewar's Double Double 26 Year Old is a different level altogether, and you will not find it in shops. Dewar's says it is inspired by a process the company pioneered in 1901. It goes through four stages of ageing. The malts are aged and blended, the grain whiskies are aged and blended, the two are married together, and then the whole blend is finished in Palo Cortado sherry casks. The result is floral and aromatic, with honeyed fruit, a little spice and a silky finish. It is bottled at 46 per cent in a 500ml bottle. It is sold only at duty free shops in airports, which is where I buy it. The reason is that Bacardi created the Double Double range for global travel retail, launching it at Singapore Changi Airport in 2019 and building it around international travellers. The range has since won major awards, including World's Best Blended Whisky for the 21 Year Old in 2021. Because it is made in small batches and kept for airport shops, you will not see it on the shelves of an ordinary liquor store. I noticed that you wrote whiskey, with an "e", and I replied with whisky, without one, because I am a whisky man. Whisky is Scotch, made in Scotland mainly from malted barley, usually distilled twice in copper pot stills and aged for at least three years in reused oak casks, often ex-bourbon or sherry, sometimes with a peaty, smoky character. Whiskey is the Irish and American style: Irish whiskey is often distilled three times, which makes it lighter and smoother, while American bourbon must be at least 51 per cent corn and aged in new charred oak, which gives it its sweet vanilla and caramel flavour. So the "e" is not just spelling, it tells you the country, the grain, the casks and the taste in your glass. I talked about my favourite whisky, Glen Deveron, a Highland single malt, and my favourite blend, Dewar's, both from Scotland. The third picture shows whiskey from the United States and Ireland. Jack Daniel's Single Barrel Select and Single Barrel 100 Proof from Tennessee, Woodford Reserve Double Oaked and Jefferson's Reserve Very Old, both Kentucky bourbons, and Connemara, a peated single malt from Ireland. The fourth picture is Togouchi, a Japanese blended whisky. The Japanese are big on whisky, and they spell it the Scottish way, without the "e", because they learned the craft from Scotland. Masataka Taketsuru studied distilling there in the 1910s, came home, helped build Japan's first whisky distillery at Yamazaki and later founded Nikka. Japan followed the Scottish methods, and the Scottish spelling came with them. I will end with a funny story. In 2013, I hosted a lunch at my home in Harare for the then Minister of Information, Professor Jonathan Moyo, and the World Bank's country manager for Zimbabwe at the time, Dr Mungai Lenneiye. While we waited for my housekeeper to serve lunch, Professor Moyo looked across at my bar, studied the bottles for a moment and asked, "Are you sure those bottles have real alcohol in them, and not tea?"🤣🤣🤣 Two gentlemen introduced me to whisky. The first was Mr Richard Mashave, a media executive in Harare, now retired, who was much older than me and more than a friend, a mentor. The second was one of Zimbabwe's greatest lawyers, the late Mr George Chikumbirike, who was like a brother to me. I used to spend hours with them, listening to their stories and to history at the Meikles. They had lived through Rhodesia and carried so much of our country's story in their memories. One day I ordered, as I always did, my favourite beer at the time, Zambezi. Mr Chikumbirike turned to me and said, "Chin'ono, if you want me to buy you a drink, I am not paying for that urine. Drink proper alcohol, or stick to soft drinks." That was the day I tried whisky, and I liked it. Whisky is an acquired taste. The first sip can feel harsh, but with time you begin to notice the layers, the sweetness, the fruit, the oak and sometimes the smoke, and before long you find yourself coming back to it. The funny part is that I had lived in Britain for almost nine years and never bothered to try it, even though Scotland, the home of whisky, was right there. It took a Harare lawyer to convert me. That was also when I came up with the idea of having my own bar at home. Over the years, as I have travelled, the bar has become a record of my journeys, a bottle from each country I have been to. Many people look at it and assume I must be a heavy drinker. The truth is that I can go a month without touching alcohol. To me, the bar is part of the furniture, a map of where I have been.