/ARTS WEEKLY/THEATRE-AFRICA: Artists Weigh the Success of World Summit

By James Hall Reprint | | Print |

James Hall

JOHANNESBURG, Sep 17 2002 (IPS) - Musicians, performing artists and other entertainers from the Southern Africa region are weighing the success of this month’s World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) held in Johannesburg, and how much attention their talents received.

Another barometer of success: how many gigs came their way as a result of their work at and around the summit.

“We received a lot of exposure at the summit,” says Max Mtsetfwa, whose five-man jazz combo was booked for six performances at a hotel in Sandton, the upscale suburb that was the centre of summit activity. “People not only saw us, but I know a lot of guys who got gigs overseas. The cultural groups got a lot of bookings.”

It turned out that the fabled Egolde, or ‘City of Gold’ that for a century has drawn migrant workers from all over Southern Africa to work in surrounding gold mines, was a good place for music promoters prospecting for African talent.

The economic capital of Southern Africa put on an impressive show as host venue. Making the most of the event were South African performers, from musicians, ethnic dancers, comics and other entertainers whose talents entertained an influx of tens of thousands of visitors.

“We came to experience Africa, and if it were not for the tribal dancers and singers, all we would have seen really is the same shopping malls and skyscrapers you see in any city,” said Doris Hansen, a delegate from Sweden with a non-governmental organisation that deals with gender rights.

In recent years, Johannesburg’s reputation has suffered from crime and a decaying downtown area. The office of the Mayor of Johannesburg ensured that the festive side of the city would be on display with a ‘parallel event’ of art exhibits and musicians performing wherever a crowd congregated.

Artists well known and even legendary locally but of little repute to Europeans were given a latter-day career boost from exposure at the world summit. One was 44 year-old South African musician Johnny Clegg. The “white Zulu” who challenged apartheid-era racial segregation by forming a seminal multiracial band, Jaluka, in the 1980s popularise African music sung in languages like SiZulu and the tongue-clicking SiXhosa. He put on a show at the Civic Auditorium that was billed as “autobiography in music”.

Johannesburg’s mayor hosted 1,000 journalists to one of Clegg’s shows. Most were from out of the country.

“This is more than reporters have ever seen me at one time,” said Clegg, no doubt anticipating reviews in the foreign press that might lead to concert dates.

As the summit’s impact on Johannesburg is being assessed, there is little doubt that the local music scene was given a boost with a sophisticated marketing campaign that saw the distribution to delegates and journalists of 50,000 CDs entitled ‘Joburg: Hits from the City of Gold’.

The 16 songs on the CD comprised a ‘Who’s Who’ of famous recording stars whose careers began in or were synonymous with Johannesburg. They include jazz great Dorothy Masuka, who first exported township music to Europe in the 1950s, and Hugh Masekela, the trumpeter whose ‘Groovin in the Grass’ was an international hit in the 1960s. Sipho ‘Hotsticks’ Mabuse and the groups Stimela and Mango Groove, who refined the South African sound in the 1980s and 1990s, and current hit-makers like Kwela Tebza, also have songs on the CD.

Virtually all the featured artists on the city-promoting CD could be found performing somewhere around the summit. Their recordings were piped into the conference venues during break times, easing the tension of tough negotiations with irresistible ‘kwaito’ (township music) rhythms and tunes.

But the true beneficiaries of the summit were lesser-known musicians who were literally given a world stage to perform on. South African musicians hoped the exposure of their sound at the summit would not only impress foreign visitors, but also earn them respect at home.

“It is about time South Africans wake up to what we have right here, and buy our own CDs and play our own music on the radio,” Mtsetfwa says.

Not just musicians showcased their talents to the 40,000 visitors at this month’s summit. Among the mimes, jugglers and puppet-show artists, who performed at the Venetian-revival plaza behind the Michelangelo Hotel in Sandton, a penny whistle group Sihlangu (‘five’ because there are five members) blew sprightly harmonies out of the narrow flutes that became synonymous with the Johannesburg sound emerging from the black townships in the 1950s.

The group did not receive any bookings to perform in Europe — to their disappointment because their ambition is to embark on such a trip — but summit delegates kept a dish on the ground before them overflowing with rand notes.

Other musicians had issues and not just their careers in mind at the summit.

“The summit was about saving the earth, and I believed that we as artists had to use the opportunity to convey our message on issues important to us,” says Alex Malefe, a jazz saxophonist.

Malefe joined the jam sessions at the Market Theatre that lasted into the early hours of each summit morning. He hoped to hook up with other musicians to record a song about raising the standard of living for Africa’s poor.

South African musician Baaba Maal appeared on television news coverage of the summit to draw attention to rural families who do not have fuel for cooking or sufficient water.

Although widely travelled, having appeared in such concert venues in Europe and the United States as Albert Hall in London and Carnegie Hall in New York, the Soweto String Quartet was still a revelation for many delegates, who watched them perform at such venues as the trendy Pyramid club downtown.

The four-member quartet learned their craft in the city’s segregated black townships during the depths of apartheid, but they surmounted their disadvantages to become unique concert performers with a repertoire of original tunes that combine jazz with classical music.

The impact of Earth Summit II will be assessed for years to come. But no event before permitted so many African talents to be put on display before such a large and influential assembly.

“The summit was about sustainable development, and that is what we African musicians have been doing for years, sustaining ourselves sometimes against the odds, with no money. Now the world knows how good we sound,” says jazz musician Mtsetfwa.