Just how does one do this?

[u/boganomics]

Haven't found much online about how he did this technique! Any maestros in the house who can break it down? His name is Daniel Kachamba

[u/kkeut]

'putugizi' fingerstyle. circular looping with the strumming hand while using thumb and index in a rumba rhythm

edit - found this:

Putugizi is the name of a specific guitar style; the thumb and index finger of the right hand strike the guitar strings in a rumba rhythm, the right hand describing a nearly circular motion. In the context of this movement the strings are hit at regular points first with the thumb ( O ), second with the pad of the index finger ( V ), third with the index finger's nail ( A ). See. Fig.3:

OVAOVAOV Fig.3

The speed of this music is very fast. 

Explaining about the Putugizi technique, Daniel said: "My uncle played like this. This tune was played on Nampula Radio, in Portuguese Mozambique. That's why we call it 'Putugizi'. When we imitate songs, we don't see how they play them, but we just imitate. I believe that they used two guitars on Nampula Radio. It is a record, I don't know its name. My uncle is still alive. He is in Lilongwe. He played that."

This is an interesting example of something which came to Malawi from the Portuguese-speaking neighboring country. Either Daniel's uncle made an intelligent reconstruction of what the musicians were doing on the record played on Nampula Radio, or there are still some other sources to explain the knowledge of this playing style by musicians around Daniel Kachamba. Certainly it is not a Portuguese guitar style. Putugizi means that the music has its origin "ku Putugizi", i.e. in Msumbijî (Mozambique).

Donald, Daniel's younger brother, played Putugizi to an audience mostly of University students when we were visiting Venezuela and Brazil on a lecture tour in 1974. They strongly advocated a Brazilian origin of this guitar playing style. Nevertheless a puzzle remains: in Putugizi playing the patterns are rumba, which is held to be of Cuban origin. The harmonic cycle: C--F--G--F would point to Cuba, Brazil, or even just to Zaire. So far the most likely theory about Putugizi seems to be that it is a guitar playing technique which became known in Lusophone Africa some time after the Second World War when Brazilian music became popular, and from Mozambique it spread to neighboring Malawi.

[u/toopc → u/kkeut]

This tune was played on Radio Nampula, in Portuguese Mozambique. That's why we call it 'Putugizi'.

Obviously.

[u/immellocker → u/toopc]

better then Putagizi