SA music industry in shock after the passing of legend Joseph Shabalala

Shabalala was transferred from a hospital in Durban to a health facility in Gauteng in January, where he succumbed after a long sickbed on Tuesday morning.

Chair of the South African Music Awards (SAMA), Thobela Dlamini, says despite his known illness, the news still comes as a shock.

"It was the saddest news that we received of our legend, of our father."

"We knew that he was sick, but we were still expecting some of the lessons that he was going to teach us," says Dlamini.

He adds that the music fraternity is deeply saddened by the loss of the icon.

"As a music fraternity, especially as a leadership of the fraternity, we needed people like him.

"We needed his wisdom, but I guess we'll have to live with the fact that the little that he taught us, we'll take from it," adds Dlamini.

Ladysmith Black Mambazo first came together in the early 1960s under the gentle guidance of sweet voiced Shabalala. 

His inspiration for the group came to him in a dream in which a choir of children sang and danced. 

Shabalala soon transferred that dream to real life when he formed Ladysmith Black Mambazo. 

They have sold over 1 million copies of their Star and Wiseman album in the UK alone.

Ladysmith Black Mambazo has been nominated for 19 Grammy Awards, taking home the honours on five occasions.

They have also won countless other awards across the globe.

The ensemble -- which has brought a global audience to the traditional Zulu style of harmony-driven singing, known as isicathamiya -- took the Best World Music Album award for "Shaka Zulu Revisited: 30th Anniversary Collection".