man: give it up for the pan afrikan peoples arkestra one more time. [cheers and applause] i love this band. man: take it where you want it to go. mekala: at the gig, everybody made a big deal about, you're the leader of the ark, you do it w. and so my response was, "all right. ok. cool." like, what, do you say no to that? no one like asked me to do this, and i didn't ask to do it. i just kind of did it once and then had the opportunity to do it again, did it, and then everyone was like, "hey, you're doing this now. continue to do it." and i could--i went, "ok." renee: when mekala called and said he wanted to come by and talk about the ark, i was pleasethat the ark was continuing because it had pretty much started to die off. everyone was older and passing on. and it's nice to have somebody yng who's been raised around it and who understands the purpose of it and the importance of ito kind of carry the torch. you know, he's got to dit his w, but as long as it's done tastefly, we're ok. yeah. just want the music to be played. that's what's important. me