July 28, 2003 @ 1:42 pm
South African Jazz: Rhythms of Resistance
CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA - Kwaito, a fusion of traditional rhythms, hip hop and house is wildly popular in South Africa. But jazz? Jazz is huge. I learn this in Sun City, South Africa, at the 9th Annual South African Music Awards. As legends like Hugh Masekela and Hotep Idris Galeta and many more jazz singers and musicians were announced as the winners, seriatim, teens and 20-somethings screamed from the pit - loud and proud. It was shocking to see so many young people feeling jazz, knowing that in America, jazz is the popular music of yesterday.
This observation should have registered a week earlier, when I was surrounded by a dancing crowd of twentysomethings at the North Sea Jazz Festival in Cape Town, South Africa. Maskanda vocalist Busi Mlongo - a middle-aged Zulu singer from Johannesburg - had the crowed on hypnotic lockdown. Her black catsuit, adorned with Zulu regalia, Zulu 'love letters,' and beaded headbands was a show in itself. The bass man in her jazz-funk band kept the tunes groove-centric, as she held the mic with the fervor of an MC in battle. She waxed passionately in Zulu lyrics ranging from South African pride to being lovelorn. She's easily the South African Chaka Khan or Patti Labelle, flamboyant vocally and visually. Five years ago at the North Sea Jazz festival, Busi did a stint with Ghanaian band Osibisa.
In 2003, South Africa celebrates just nine years deep into the country's newfound lives sans Apartheid. Festivities are in heavy abundance. Jazz scored the many uprisings on the path in the country's struggle against Apartheid. The standout jam for youth and adults alike is the festival that musically merges Africa and the world: The North Sea Jazz Festival Cape Town, aka Africa's Grandest Gathering.
"Movies and records brought jazz here," Darius Brubeck accentuates the "here" by pointing to the floor, his eyebrows raised in excitement. Darius Brubeck, a native of Brooklyn and younger brother of Dave Brubeck, is the Director of the Center for Jazz and Popular Music at the University of Natal. His four-man ensemble, called Afro Cool Concept, appeared at North Sea in 2002. As we sit in his Durban office, he explains, "Jazz asserted an antitheses to the sentiments of apartheid, universalizing the human experience."
Who would have known that a music that was the background for uprisings, movements, protests would also be the popular music. "Many of the South Africans who participate in the festival were, ironically, in exile from the country,” explains Hotep Galeta. Musicians like Galeta and Miriam Makeba lived in exile during the Apartheid regime and only recently returned during the '90s, when Nelson Mandela became South African’s first Black president.
Each year, about 32 acts take place in the festival and are indeed as diverse. In 2003, for instance, there's Idia.Arie, American Neo-Soul artist; Mukta of France, a 'world jazz' quartet that uses global instruments from all over to make jazz in the interpretive sense. Guitarist Allou April, a huge session player in Cape Town, and Jimmy Dludlu, another local session player. There's also Soweto saxophonist Moses Khumalo and the house-music-influenced band Herbert. Neo Muyanga, half of the Brooklyn-based duo Blk Sonshine, is there too.
The North Sea Jazz Festival Cape Town takes much of its charisma from its big sister The North Sea Jazz Festival, The Hague, The Netherlands. Created in 1975 by jazz promoter Paul Ackett, this festival became one of the most premier jazz festivals in the world, right up there in the ranks with jazz gatherings like Montreal and New Orleans. The brain behind the North Sea Jazz Festival Cape Town is Rashid Lombard, a South African native who was intrigued by original festival's multi-staged performances under a single roof and was able to bring to the country's most gorgeous coast.
"The festival does not restrict itself to traditional jazz, as it tries to bring out the importance of jazz in other ways, by presenting styles that have been or still being influenced by jazz," Rashid Lombard, Festival Director, says. "It's our belief that other genres like blues, jazz-rock, hip hop, Latin, and funk, for instance belong to the world of jazz."
To facilitate the entrance of talented youngsters into Jazz in particular, professor Hotep Galeta was commissioned to facilitate workshops. A week-long series of classes that cumulates with master classes with the national and international musicians who are to take place at the festival.
"The North Sea Jazz Festival has achieved remarkable success in such a short amount of time," asserted Dr. B. S. Ngubane, Minister of the Department of Arts, Culture, Science and Technology of South Africa. "As we continue to forge a dynamic national identity and strive to build the African union, the collaboration of African artist and our international counterparts situates us firmly in the pool of top global talent."
Article tags: South, African, Jazz, Rhythms, Resistance
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