SOUTH AFRICA: The Cape Town International Jazz Festival celebrates with both local and international artists

Record ID: 453896

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: The Cape Town International Jazz Festival celebrates with both local and international artists
  • Date: 28th March 2011
  • Summary: (SOUNDBITE) (English) JAZZ ENTHUSIAST, JAMES GARDNER (MALE) SAYING: "I thought this Esperanza was amazing, I'm now waiting for Hubert Laws, okay, who is somebody I've listened to in my life, jazz is a big thing with me so this a great scene."
  • Embargoed: 12th April 2011 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa, South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Arts / Culture / Entertainment / Showbiz
  • Reuters ID: LVAMR0F31498AASST126OADPY5P
  • Story Text: More than 34,000 fans descended on Cape Town at the weekend to groove to the sounds of musicians such as Grammy winner Esperanza Spalding and '70s disco icons Earth, Wind and Fire.
    The annual Jazz festival has become a pilgrimage point for music enthusiasts across Africa and abroad who come to enjoy concerts and parties.
    This year's festival included celebrated local artists as well as respected musicians from around the world, some of them veterans who have been performing for decades.
    Highlights included South African Feya Faku and his band who mesmerised crowds at the Rosie's stage, American trumpeter Christian Scott and Senegalese legend Youssou N'Dour.
    The mix of artists from different regions and decades seems to be part of the event's attraction, which has built a reputation for catering for a range of tastes and ages.
    "What's nice about international jazz, especially this Cape Town jazz, its not about old, its a mixture of both, its old and new so everyone is catered for and its easy for someone that's in the mid thirties, sorry, you enjoy all kinds of music, that's what gives us the vibe to be here," said Jazz enthusiast Sibo Muholi.
    "For me music is a drug, its like if I'm in a room with music, I just go into a trance you know, I'm just high on music which is really good for me," said another fan, Boitumelo Seitibatso.
    The festival was set up in 2000 and has grown in seven years to become one of the biggest and best known events of its kind in the world.
    And with more artists and more ticket sales than ever before, the 2011 edition was guaranteed to live up to its title, Africa's Grandest Gathering.
    "I thought this Esperanza was amazing, I'm now waiting for Hubert Laws, okay, who is somebody I've listened to in my life, jazz is a big thing with me so this a great scene," said another jazz fan James Gardner.
    Headline act, the American six-time grammy award winners Earth, Wind & Fire played the festival as part of their 40th anniversary tour.
    Crowds packed in to get a glimpse of the old timers at their Saturday concert which sold out before the festival started.
    "Earth Wind and Fire, the 40th (anniversary) was the great, those guys, we enjoyed it so much, we didn't complain," Muholi said.
    The band was so overwhelmed with the response the crowd gave them that front man Philip Bailey said on stage that he had no idea they still had so many fans in South Africa.
    "Its great, its great, its out first time here, all the shows are sold out, they said they all sold out because we're here so its very exciting and we have been hearing about our popularity here off and on and people are saying how come you've never been to South Africa but you know the logistics, playing the right venues you know, that has a lot to do with coming to a big continent like this but its working out, its doing everything we wanted to and now we've got to do our part and make a great show, now we got to get busy now," said the band's bass guitarist Verdine White.
    As the sun set and the final acts played into the evening on Sunday, organisers declared the event the most successful they'd ever staged.
    The event has been applauded by many in South Africa for boosting Cape Town's reputation as a city for arts and culture.
    Others have praised it for the economic benefits it brings, including Calvyn Gilfellan, chief executive officer of Cape Town Routes Unlimited, who said an impact study done by the University of the North West has shown that the festival brought R475 million (700,000 US dollars) to the Western Cape last year alone.
    Questions none
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