Gugulethu Jazz Festival

Guguletu’s Sports Complex came alive today with both musical and sports celebrations as part of honouring Human Rights Day in South Africa, 21 March.  It wasn’t just local communities who performed with their bands – visiting and international musicians turned up as well, all hyped up to see and hear each others’  youth jazz and pop bands.  Sponsored by the Amy Biehl Foundation each year, to respect the reconciliation process going on between communities divided and angered by their social and economic situations, youth are brought together to witness each other’s creative growth and talents, primarily in music, dance, and drama.

And did this Sports venue rock!  Various ensembles of the Amy Biehl Foundation music projects demonstrated their instrumental and vocal , ranging from the brass band to the marimbas and saxophones.  Primary school dancers with painted faces entertained with skillful twists and twirls. And several music professors from USA cast their ‘thumbs up’ at the delightful soulful performances.  Popular Gugs jazz singer, Sandile Gontsana,  scatted his way with bassist Benjamin Jafta’s  “Tribes of Benjamin” with lots of swing and original tunes.

Then came on stage a jazz orchestra from the Milton Academy in Massachusetts, USA, under the direction of Bob Sinicrope,  who is also a Board member of the Jazz Education Network, based in USA. His troupe surprised Guguletans with Cape and South African jazz pieces of Abdullah Ibrahim and the late great Winston Mankunku.  These teenagers seemed a bit timid and shy, but I would too if playing my host community’s songs in front of local maestros!!  In the audience was sitting the 40-strong CAFCA members (Committed Artists for Community Advancement) from Mamelodi, young musicians learning the art of jazz, who performed recently at the SAJE mini jazz festival (South African Association for Jazz Education) at the UCT School of Music. Pity there wasn’t time to include their mbaqanga jazz in this multi-cultural gathering.

Linda Biehl, mother of the slain Amy Biehl,  and co-founder of the Foundation with her now late husband, received gifts brought from the Milton Academy as the latter traditionally do when they travel to less resourced hosts. Gifts included instructional materials and CDs. The Foundation also receives musical instruments from time to time

What impressions did the American musicians have of these festivities?  I didn’t have an opportunity to find out. But John Baboian from the famed jazz college, Berkelee School of Music, here in Cape Town to audition South African young artists for scholarships to the School, has plenty of challenge when he and his committee listen to the wizard talents of young musos and try to choose who will win!

Well done, Gugs!

SAJE mini jazz festival

Some more youth-filled surprises occurred on Friday night and Saturday daytime (March 18-19)as the South African Association for Jazz Education (SAJE) held it’s annual ‘mini’ jazz festival at UCT’s College of Music. International artists joined in the festivities as Dutch pianist Mike del Ferro  tinkled the keys with young up-and-coming musicians, professors of music, and students. Ulrich Suesse, a retired German professor from Stuttgart, but now with the University of KZN, featured his electronic music compositions. A highlight for me was visiting jazz bassist and composer, Carlo Mombelli, from JBG who offered extraordinary versions and visions of improvisation using nature’s sounds and the bells and whistles of found objects in our environment, and how to use the ‘loop’ to set up backings and rhythms for one’s compositions.

Friday night’s concert at C7 recital room of the SACM included a host of well-known, and lesser known, musicians:   Singer Sandile Gontsana, a bubbly scatter from Gugulethu with lots of exposure and collaboration with international groups; Trumpeter and flugelhornist Darren English and his band, Avianna, played pieces that combined jazz, folk, and gospel harmonies; SAJE President and woodwind specialist, Professor Mike Rossi, performed with a variety of artists who emerged again the next day, Saturday, to offer workshops and performances.

The highlight of Saturday’s day performances was hearing the very capable CAFCA group (Committed Artists for Cultural Advancement) of students from their music school in Mamelodi. Firstly, an all female ensemble calling themselves ‘The Roses’, with three strings (including double bass – yes, a female!) and trumpet, with one male colleague on drums, strutted their stuff in a few jazzy pieces before joining the larger 22-piece orchestra led by Director and bassist, Jesse Mohale, who was also supported by his brother, Moses, and several other teachers.  Their 40-person group who bussed themselves down from Pretoria provided an  impressive commitment unmatched by the pathetic lack of participation by local students and music teachers, for whom such a jazz educators’  festival is designed !  Other bands performed, such as Dan Shout’s with a new array of musos, one being a female double bassist from Port Elizabeth and now settling in Cape Town.  Interesting that this day featured two WOMEN double bassists, a rare scene in the jazz world in Cape Town at least!  The CAFCA big band blew everyone away with their precision and again, commitment!  Another band from CAFCA was the ‘Odd meter Ensemble’ led by 16-year old Takalane Maraba on trumpet and flugel horn.  CAFCA recruits black youth  with little music experience, and offers instruction three times a week for residents of Mamelodi.  Female students make up about 50% of the total student body.

All in One - a music review

Another rich sonorous evening spent a few weeks ago at Cape Town’s avant-guard  Fugard Theater was the All in One concert of maestros, Steve Newman with his four guitars; Errol Dyers playing his usual Capey guitar but also harmonica, traditional bow, and flute (!);  and multi-instrumentalist Hilton Schilder on piano, bow, and mouth piano. Poly-rhythms emanated from this eclectic trio: songs from Mozambique, South Africa, Caribbean, West Africa, Malay, Argentina, and Ghoema.  There was the delightful tango played on the mouth piano; Ghoema traditional; a Canary Island ballad; a Newman Tananas special including tribute to the late fellow guitarist Gito Baloi; an Errol guitar solo; a Ghoema ode to Pollsmor prisoners; a Hilton piano solo;  a trans Karoo Express song with Errol on harmonica, Newman’s four guitars, and Hilton’s vocals as bass with box percussion and shakers. Cultural history of the Cape featured highly this evening – with ‘Abolished Act’ – and ode to the purchase and killing of KhoiSan who hid away.  Another bow song followed about the violence around the mountain we don’t hear.  Lastly, the “Back Yard Strummers” with all three performers  humming their guitars in a gleeful crescendo for the evening!

The Ghoema Orchestra - A Review

If you like orchestral arrangements – high in strings, low on brass and winds – and the indigenous Cape or ‘ghoema’ beat, you’ll like what Mac Mckenzie has put together, and be wiggling in your seats at the SABC Studios in Cape Town. What a unique project, full of conventional and ghoema jazz,with a 25-piece orchestra, and throw in the hang drum of guest Chris Takolon, the singing acoustic guitar of Derek Gripper, and trumpet of another guest Mandla Mlangeni, and you get a cultural symphony of sounds.  Mac’s 25-piece orchestra included two flutes and two double basses, all played by women. With Swiss funding under the auspices of the Cape Town Composers' Workshop, a not for profit organization created to develop young composers, and network international composers, composer Mckenzie has made Ghoema contemporary and distinct. The workshops have enabled young musos, like Mlangeni, to prepare and present their pieces (Mlangeni’s “Tune Recreation Committee” take on the TRC). Stories are distinctly Cape with a banjo, mandolin, and gummie drum added to the traditional symphonic instrumentation.

A stunning duo between Chantal Willie’s double bass bowing, with her vocals, and Chris Takolon’s hang drum opened the show. They conversed through his overtone singing which to me, still remains a mystery of the spirit. Between her chants and his oooommms, I was set up for the evening’s surprises. Versatile Chris also joined other pieces with his flute and sax.

Strings will be strings, and this evening, they tackled complicated runs and harmonies, not always in sync or in tune. But harmonies led in a well known Mac song between the double bass and trombone duo, with Mac’s guitar guiding the conversation with another double bass. Then a cello enters, followed by comments from the t’bone, flute, a violin, trumpet, and sax. Answers again from Mac and plunks from the d. basses. Interesting composition and arrangement, indeed!

Other compositions included upbeat tempos by the trumpet, other rambunctious violin frenzies, flutes singing, mixed with the lively and unmistakable Ghoema beat. A carnival theme, led by the saxes’ groove, brought us to half-time, cheering like at a tied rugby game.

Derek Gripper offered a tribute song to the late trumpeter and another ghoema captain, Alex van Heerden, which was very moving with a light tempered and emotional acoustic guitar and voice calls of the San. The strings brushed softly, symbolizing sounds of earth and running through the sand, like San do. A gripping piece, indeed!

McKenzie had debuted his Ghoema Orchestra No. 1 in August 2010 as part of a  process that started with seed funding from the Cape Africa Platform in 2005. But it was Mac’s days with his ‘Genuines’, a punk rock cult band, that sketched his compositional path from the 1980’s to the present day concerts. "So this is nothing new, it has been coming on a long time. What is new is that now we can do it!" Mac says gleefully. A unique Ghoema groove has been built.

Two more performances are scheduled for Saturdays March 19 and 27 at the Studios, so don’t miss this one!  R150 at the door; R100 for pensioners and students.  Or book through Computicket or by e-mail: composers.workshop.ct@gmail.com or SMS to 072 500 22 04.