SOUTH AFRICA: Ground breaking musical takes a look at the rich but vanishing indigenous cultures and traditions of the region

Record ID: 454610

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: Ground breaking musical takes a look at the rich but vanishing indigenous cultures and traditions of the region
  • Date: 5th October 2009
  • Summary: VARIOUS OF PERFORMERS ON STAGE
  • Embargoed: 20th October 2009 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Entertainment
  • Reuters ID: LVA1TE9V39CCCOD7D41E1Y3WH6W
  • Story Text: Medu-Nakeng -- a unique production based on the diversity of South African and African indigenous cultural music -- finished on Saturday (October 3) after its two week run at the State Theatre in the South African capital.
    The production -- in its seventh year -- showcases indigenous culture and taps into the spirituality of rural village music practitioners.
    "What we can learn from a show like this one is that people should know where they come from and where they are going -- we should be ourselves and not be influenced by Western cultures," said Grace Matsheka, who came to watch the show.
    Each year the production offers a different spectacle for fans.
    This year's 60-piece ensemble combines both rural village music practitioners and professional musicians.
    Utilising dance, a variety of traditional costumes and African music, the show is a vibrant and living reflection of South African and African cultures.
    "I believe we are civilised, but what was wrong with the way we used to live? Why don't we bring along whatever that we used to have? Those intellectual properties that we have, intellectual singing, cultures and all those things; bring and incorporate them with the recent life that we live. There is nothing wrong with the way we used to live, it's like you become renewed as an African," said one of the singers Busisiwe Mawelele, who says the show has revived her spiritually.
    Medu-Nakeng is a concept of South African Music Award winning Tlokwe Sehume, one of the country's most diverse and accomplished conceptual artists and teachers.
    Composer, arranger, producer, director, poet, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist, Sehume combines his musical skills with the natural talent that is showcased through his playing of a myriad of classical and contemporary instruments, mostly indigenous.
    Sehume plays different African instruments, including percussions, guitar, flute, and keyboards, all instrumental in bringing his socially aware messages to life, through song ,poetry and dance.
    "No, we've actually lost it, it's lost but maybe the most important thing is to try and retrieve it, and the only way to do that is to change the mindset of the young ones that are still growing up, because they're rotten to the core, the verb is distorted and you know, we want to emulate, we want to emulate people who have actually taken over our values, our thoughts, our tastes and given us theirs. We have devoted so much of our time to foreign taste and thoughts and all of that, so it's true, we have lost it, but the only way to retrieve it is to start at the beginning, which is with the small children," said Sehume.
    Influences for Sehume's work all stem from Africa's diverse cultures.
    Sehume is also a founder of the Medu-Nakeng Foundation, an organisation that deals with the development and revitalisation of South African indigenous cultural musics.
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