Ayanda Sikade

Clement Gama03/02/2023

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There are countless music festivals all over the globe and what makes each one unique, is its story and what it stands for. The 1969 Summer of Soul festival is remembered for how it celebrated Black history, culture, music and fashion in the cultural pot of Black America, Harlem.

This Saturday, the Marabastad Jazz Festival takes place within the halls of the South African State Theatre’s Malombo stage. It will be a day to honour those creative spirits of Marabastad who were relocated to single-race townships further away from the city centre by the white regime. It will be a time to tend to the dead. To honour the dead and their dreams, thoughts and their pain, as per Gabi Motuba on her new offering, The Sabbath, which comprises vocals, a string quartet, trumpet and Malombo drums. This performance will serve as a launch ahead of the album’s release.

The Marabastad Jazz Festival emerges from a rich history that includes warrior King Kgoshi Maraba Ledwaba I, the diverse melting pot of Marabastad, and its artistic ebullience before forced removals took hold. With prominent figures from Tshwane’s jazz, blues, and Malombo traditions, the inaugural edition is sure to become a staple in the city and worldwide. Also filled to the brim with the harmonic laments of Norman Chauke, Azah Mphago and Ayanda Sikade – the festival is a rare curatorial triumph.

Chauke has composed a song titled, Marabi a ko Marabastad for the occasion which will be played for the first time at the festival. “I grew up listening to my father, who was a jazz artist, and his band members rehearsing in our garage on weekdays preparing for their weekend gigs,” Chauke says. “They played a lot of Marabi music, and from that young age, I knew that I wanted to be a jazz musician. This is where I first learned to play the piano and other musical instruments,”

Mphago will pay tribute to Marabastad through various visual and musical interpretations. This Pitori man of thought is a Pan Africanist expert percussionist, vocalist, conservationist and sonic healer whose music uses trans-disciplinary creative practices of ritual performance, clinical improvisation, pedagogy, activism, theatre movement and multi-media.

Present on the day will be Zim Ngqawana’s drummer of choice, Ayanda Sikade. The revered composer and collaborator holds a deft touch that moves audiences in unison. “Sikade isn’t a flashy drummer given to crescendi and ten-minute ooh-ya solos. He’s a quiet, precise musician with a light touch on the sticks and an even lighter one with the brushes. He rides his kit easy, not hard. When you hear a cymbal or drum-roll, it’s deliberate punctuation, not listen-to-me volume,” says jazz critic and scholar, writer Gwen Ansell on Sikade’s playing and style.

The event will be hosted by revered writer and author Percy Mabandu. Produced by Project Forty, Spotlight Creations and Khwerha Ye Afrika Projects, the festival is not only an aural feast for music lovers but a time to remember some of the foundations of South African jazz’s marabi and classical sounds.

Tickets available HERE!

About Marabastad

Marabastad was a culturally diverse community, with the Hindu Mariamman Temple arguably being its most prominent landmark. Like the residents of other racially diverse areas in South Africa, such as District Six, “Fietas” and Sophiatown, the inhabitants of Marabastad were relocated to single-race townships further away from the city centre. These removals were due to Apartheid laws like the Group Areas Act. Unlike Sophiatown, Fietas and District Six, it was not bulldozed, but it retained many of its original buildings, and became primarily a business district, with most shops still owned by the Indians who had also lived there previously. Some property was however owned by the city council and the government, resulting in limited development taking place there. In addition, a large shopping complex was built to house Indian-owned shops. The black residents of Marabastad were relocated to Atteridgeville (1945), the Coloured residents to Eersterus (1963), and the Indian residents to Laudium (1968). There are plans to revive once-picturesque Marabastad, and to reverse years of urban decay and neglect, although few seem to have been implemented as of 2005.
*Tickets to this great mark in history that not only seeks to celebrate but to preserve the heritage of South Africa can be bought via Webticket and through the South African State Theatre at R200 per ticket. Get your ticket now on:

The Marabastad Jazz festival is set to become a hallmark annual event, showcasing South African jazz talent. The festival is powered by PESP through the National Art Council and the Department of Sports Arts and Culture is a tribute to the once vibrant, multicultural, and multiracial slum called Marabastad.

For more information about the performers please visit:
Facebook: Khwerha Ye Afrika Projects
Instagram: Khwerha
Call: 0813237061

Bonginkosi Ntiwane06/01/2020

It was in May of 2016 that then SABC Chief Operations Officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng, temerariously declared that all the national broadcaster’s radio stations playlists will be dominated by home-grown ditties. The infamous 90% local music quota.

Motsoeneng was like the uncle who in his inebriated state at a family gathering, announced that the whole family should come to his house the following weekend for another get-together where there would be an ubiquity of food and beverages, without discussing it with his frugal wife.

The redundant radio station managers who never seem to sheath their appetite for payola, being the stingy wife in the analogy.

Although the move evinced Motsoeneng’s strange benign for artists, he never thought through the execution of such a catalytic move. In an interview with Nicky B on Kaya FM’s World Show around the same time, Nakhane Touré said one of the problems with the ratio is that listeners won’t be introduced to new music by radio stations. “Instead of hearing one Mafikizolo song a day, we’ll now hear two or three,” said Touré. Of course the Fog singer was making a mere example (he did say he loves the dance duo) but his point was clearer than a pair of new specs.

Of the countless utterances we’ve had to endure from Motsoeneng, I’m pondering particularly on this very one during the Covid-19 lockdown, because I’ve been immersed in South African music of different kinds for the last few weeks and I imagine how South Africa would be sounding like, had Motsoeneng’s wish been carefully granted.

To be more specific, it’s the Siya Makuzeni Sextet album, Out Of This World that has had me imagining a world where South Africans are exposed to their finest talent.

Siya Mukuzeni is an insanely talented artist who delivers her craft with ingenuity, ubuntu, vigour and in what looks seamlessness. The trombonist who also belts out notes has been in the industry for over 15 years now, playing in some of the biggest bands with fine musicians on world stages. She was part of Carlo Mombelli’s Prisoners of Strange ensemble between 2002 and 2011. She was also in the Blue Notes Tribute Ochestra where she played with the likes of Marcus Wyatt, Johnny Dyani and Chris McGregor. Together with another unique ensemble of equally talented artists, collectively known as Spaza, she released an album of the same name a year ago.

With the Siya Makuzeni Sextet, she put together some of her favourite musicians who she enjoys to play with to create a body of work that I believe more South Africans need to hear. The sextet comprises of Thandi Ntuli on piano, Ayanda Sikade on the drums, the trumpet being blown by Sakhile Simani, Sisonke Xoti playing the saxophone and Benjamin Japhta on bass.

There’s often the juxtaposition to bassist Esperanza Spalding because they both are female, sing and play an instrument. They’ll always be comparisons of females, especially in an industry without women in the forefront. Although the groove in their music is undeniable, Siya’s got the juice. That unfiltered African juice form the wells of the Eastern Cape.

Like on the title track, Out Of This World which teems with traditional Xhosa music from the first second, this while embracing modern sounds. Her voice is undeniably infectious as Stevie Wonder’s or Thandiswa Mazwai’s. The song New Age is a reiteration of a sought-out truth, while landing somewhat as a lament. Say Sibusile Xaba’s Uyahlupha. The joint has swing and it serves its purpose.

The seven track album has a fair balance for the padentic jazz ear that prefers songs without vocals, only the sound of instruments dancing. Another one composed by Makuzeni on the album, a Brazen Dream is a good introduction to Jazz for someone new to the abyss that is the genre.

I’m a sucker for great vocals accompanied by some dope show-don’t-tell typa lyrics which take the role of a travel tour guide, when listening to the music. Imagine a congregation singing Moya Oyingcwele in unison, truly in the spirit. It slaps umoya.

I feel the Holy Spirit’s presence each time I listen to this song-I’m overwhelmed with questions of how this song was conceived. With churches being open now, I believe choir conductors/worship leaders should introduce Moya Oyingcwele emasontweni, if they haven’t.

Out Of This World is just one of many great projects by a South African artist. People need to hear more of this and many other albums. To enjoy them, while simultaneously putting some randelas in the artists’ pockets. True “proudly South African” shit.

Listen to the album HERE

Bonginkosi Ntiwane07/26/2018

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Given that they are on the microphone and talking directly to the audience, soloists will be the ones hogging the attention. While the bassist, who has the thankless job of carrying the music, is relegated to the background.

History has placed Oliver Tambo’s crucial role in the struggle in that precarious position, while an individual is upheld as the messiah of a movement.

In a year swamped with centenary celebrations for the late Nelson Mandela, South African and USA artists plus their politicians will pay homage to the life of Tambo through a double disc album titled Voices On OR- a musical tribute to Tambo.

“To me, movements are always about more than just the person who is sort of the leader or spearhead of it,” says L.A bassist Miles Mosely.

“That person is very important, we know for the freedom fighters, that the work [Nelson] Mandela did is something that the entire world celebrates. But for me, as a bass player who is often times behind the soloist, to me studying the story of Tambo allowed me to understand that he was this foundational character. Somebody who was the kind of earth of the movement and had to explain complicated ideas to the rest of the world- I really connected with that idea. Oliver Tambo was the bass player of the freedom fighters, you know,” says Mosely, laughing.

The Upright bassists talks to Tha Bravado about his his involvement in the project. The vocalist, producer, composer and arranger was asked to be part of Voices On OR after his performance at the Cape Town Jazz Festival last year.

Mosely is an accomplished musician that has worked with Mos Def, India Arie, Lauryn Hill, Terrence Howard and also played on three tracks on Kendrick’s To Pimp A Butterfly.

He also worked on three songs on Voices On OR, one of the songs I got a chance to listen to at the Downtown Studios where the recording takes place, was Roving Ambassador, which has an unmistakable African sound that captures continent’s warmth and enthusiasm.

Miles Mosley_Photo cred Aaron Woolf Haxton

“Unfortunately my lineage was thrown in the ocean. So I don’t know what specific cultures, tribes and traditions I come from. So I try to celebrate as many as I can and I try to understand as many as I can. Some of them ring in my heart and come out on my bass or the piano, a bit truer. That feeling and that sound for that song, is something that resonates deeply with me in my heart.”

He credits this to his time at UCLA, where he studied Ethnomusicology, learning music of the world. “All music, as far as I’m concerned, starts and stops in Africa and African traditions. Everybody says that and keeps it moving. But I really wanted to make sure that it was an inescapable part of it, not something that’s to be modernised or changed.”

The double album is musically directed by renowned singer Gloria Bosman while seasoned saxophonist McCoy Mrubata is tasked with the role of producing. Among others, the project will include Jonathan Butler, Tsepo Tshola, Mandisa Dlanga, Jabu Magubane, Herbie Tsoaeli and Steve Dyer. Performances in the recording will be characterized by interpretations of musical themes based on events around OR’s life. Included will be a composition titled Tambo’s Dance – a song inspired by an event in 1963 where Tambo got so excited by the contents of a document for Operation Mayibuye, that he leapt out of his chair and did a jubilant dance.

Crossing the Limpopo with Father Tambo – blends poetry by Mongane “Wally” Serote, narration by former President Thabo Mbeki and singing by Ladysmith Black Mambazo with music accompaniment from the Beda Hall Double Quartet Band. The band is named after Tambo’s band at Fort Hare, to which Tambo was vocalist.

Forming part of today’s Quartet is Paul Hanmer, Ayanda Sikade, Khaya Ceza, Shane Cooper, Tlale Makhene and Feya Faku.

The US is represented by R&B singer Eric Bennet, rapper Javier Starks and former US president Barack Obama who will be narrating some of Tambo’s life. The project is funded by the National Lotteries Commission and should be out in October.

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