If you’re drawn to the vitriolic dimension of Rodriguez’s 26-song opus and are tracking reactions to Searching for Sugar Man, you’re probably tempted to respond to the media blitz with a pinch of cynicism. A Wikipedia entry, tweets and a rash of Facebook pages? Tick. Official merch and top-dollar eBay memorabilia? Affirmative. Bandwagoning and profiteering? Maybe, but who the fuck cares? Certainly not Rodriguez. “Fame is fleeting,” is the cold fact that he drops on CNN (video below). It’s his highest profile interview ever. His star has never shone brighter. Yet he responds with an air of cultivated detachment. This is not the man who wrote those songs 40 years ago. He’s even wiser.
Learners show off their moves as the Goema Roadshow reaches Fairmount Secondary
A goema “roadshow” is visiting schools in and around Cape Town as the third season of the Cape Town Goema Orchestra draws near. The multimedia road-show presentation introduces learners to the music of Cape Town through the lens of diversity, unravelling the myriad of cultural influences that have given the Cape a unique language, unique food and a unique musical flavour. Learners are not only reminded of our city’s living musical traditions in the form of the Klopse, Malay Choirs and Christmas Bands but also get to see how contemporary artists have taken inspiration from the streets to produce Goema Rock, Cape Jazz and even a Goema Orchestra.
Cape Town Composers’ Workshop featured guest, guitarist Derek Gripper, performs “Copenhagen” with Mac McKenzie’s Cape Town Goema Orchestra (26 November 2011). Gripper’s solo-guitar arrangement of this composition appears on the SAMA-nominated Sound of Water (2011). More information: www.derekgripper.com
You’ve heard every story there is to tell? How about this one? A Swedish guy makes a documentary in 2012 about a 70s folkster from Detroit who returns from obscurity after discovering that he has a large, devoted audience in South Africa. The film culminates in a cathartic 1998 concert marking the musician’s first significant performance in 27 years to an audience who thought that he had died! The film is critically acclaimed and makes big waves in the US and the UK but, and here’s the rub, nobody in South Africa knows that it exists!
Hilton Schilder and Bien Petersen with guest Tony Cedras at iBuyambo Music & Art Exhibition Centre in Cape Town. This jam combines cajon, bows, trumpet and voice and sees Schilder workshopping an experiment in what he describes as “single-string technology” for his Wikkelspies Padskou. Plans to take this travelling bow show on the road and being conceived and will include the unveiling of a new instrument designed by Petersen and Schilder dubbed the wikkelspies (or “shake-spear” as Schilder will cunningly translate its Afrikaans name for you).
Searching for Sugar Man | Malik Bendjellou | Sweden, United Kingdom | 2012 | 85min
Many attempts have been made to dramatise the incredible shift in global consciousness that came about when the Internet started performing its magic in the mid-90s; when we discovered ourselves across time and space and realised that we were seeing ourselves in each other’s songs; when fiction was replaced by facts that were better than fiction. Few of these attempts can match the true story of an artifact that lost contact with its mothership and was orphaned on a distant planet where it stirred and amused the locals and provoked fantasies about its unknown origin until a technology was devised that would open a line of contact with its creator and reconcile imagination with reality.
Under African Skies | Joe Berlinger | USA | 2011 | 102min
Eminently likeable interviewees including Oprah Winfrey, Harry Belafonte, Quincy Jones, Whoopi Goldberg and David Byrne extol the virtues of Paul Simon’s landmark 1986 worldbeat classic Graceland while the diminutive songwriter assembles his even more endearing South African collaborators Ray Phiri, Bakithi Kumalo, Isaac Mtshali, Joseph Shabalala and Barney Rachabane (among aothers) for a 25th anniversary gig in Joburg that, apart from the 702 shout-out in the trailer above, happened seemingly as stealthily as Simon’s visit back in the 80s. At the heart of the film lies a congenial debate between Simon and former Artists Against Apartheid activist turned TV personality Dali Tambo concerning the sanctity of cultural sanctions in which Simon gibes the sanctimony of the ANC concerning politics and the arts by saying “you’re going fuck the artists like all kinds of governments.” Tambo, sporting Daliesque whiskers, holds the party line but instigates a conciliatory hug.
The African Cypher | Brian Little | South Africa | 2012 | 89min
“W-O-W!” It’s a line from the film and a fair description of what Brian Little has achieved with his sophomore feature-length documentary, The African Cypher. Like its predecessor Fokofpolisiekar: Forgive Them for They Know Not What They Do (2009), the film glazes its subject in hyper-realism and sees Fly on the Wall mapping out territory at the intersection of reality TV and creative documentary. The film is essentially a mix-tape of dynamic dance sequences filmed on location and bathed in epic audio that culminates in a televisual dance-off at the Red Bull Beat Battle. The narrative is driven by less remarkable interviews touching on identity/redemption/salvation through dance but pulls off a turn-around crescendo with a sublime scene that taps into the universal truth of friendship and loyalty. While the word “cypher” in the film’s title refers to a circle of dancers, it also speaks of our voyeuristic compulsion to posit meaning. Although the ethnographic dimension of The African Cypher expresses itself most openly through the director’s voice-overs, the film operates in documentary territory that is unashamedly less interested in observation than cultivated subjectivity.
A Common Purpose | Mitzi Goldman | Australia | 2011 | 75min
Andrea Durbach & Justice Bekebeke
It’s 1985 in a Northern Cape Town town made socio-political pressure-cooker. An “illegal” gathering meets bullish, trigger-happy police and mob violence sees 25 people collectively charged with the murder of a policeman. A Common Purpose is both a reunion narrative documenting lawyer Andrea Durbach’s return to South Africa (having emigrated to Australia) to visit former death row clients-cum-friends as well as a legal drama that exposes the Kafkaesque legislation of the times.
The film follows the development of the case and, while pointing to the State’s myopic desire to quash dissent, acknowledges but steers clear of the ethical conundrum of mob or retributional violence. It also features an interview with journalist John Carlin, whose book about the 1995 Rugby World Cup sets the cynicism of “Upington 25″ defendant turned Independent Electoral Commission officer, Justice Bekebeke, in contrast with Madiba’s crafty plans for national catharsis. Carlin’s Playing the Enemy (2008) was adapted for the screen in the form of Clint Eastwood’s Invictus (2009).
Jumu’a: The Gathering | Dylan Valley | South Africa | 2012 | 48min
Just when you thought you knew everything about Cape Town, along comes Dylan Valley with a story about a mosque established by a Scottish Shaykh and a community of Muslim hipsters who are into riding waves and drinking good coffee! Jumu’a: The Gathering is not only a window into Muizenberg’s Murabitun community, touching on the characteristics that set it apart from how Islam is more broadly practiced in Cape Town, but also a meditation of the socially cohesive nature of faith communities and the importance of the support mechanisms they provide. What emerges is a picture of an inclusive Islamic movement with spiritual values and practices that are as ancient and universal as they are contemporary and idiosyncratic.
Port Nolloth: Between a Rock and a Hard Place | Felix Seuffert | South Africa | 2012 | 32min
It’s no surprise that the Port Nolloth would appeal to a filmmaker with the eye of a photographer. Hemmed between fierce Atlantic and arid hinterland while negotiating dense fog and endless open skies, the Northern Cape frontier town makes for a beguiling canvas. Yet Port Nolloth: Between a Rock and a Hard Place delivers more than just eye candy. And while the film’s three character sketches document the town’s peculiar infatuation with diamonds, a feeling of liminality pervades, speaking to themes like masculinity, wealth, status and our relationship to higher powers like corporations, God and fate.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
* South Africa * Music * Film * Documentary * Photography * Books * Theatre * Arts * Popular Culture * Social Media *
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
The Cape Town Goema Orchestra and the birth of a new vision for South African music.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Mama Goema - A documentary film exploring Cape Town's most representative music genre.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Want to let me know about your film/album/event? Drop me a line at calum [at] saysomething.co.za
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Want to receive exclusive news, special offers and freebies via email (with easy, automated opt-out)? Drop your details here:
Facebook
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Click on the thumbnail above and "like" PSA to receive and share new posts and invitations to events via Facebook.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
If you’re drawn to the vitriolic dimension of Rodriguez’s 26-song opus and are tracking reactions to Searching for Sugar Man, you’re probably tempted to respond to the media blitz with a pinch of cynicism. A Wikipedia entry, tweets and a rash of Facebook pages? Tick. Official merch and top-dollar eBay memorabilia? Affirmative. Bandwagoning and profiteering? Maybe, but who the fuck cares? Certainly not Rodriguez. “Fame is fleeting,” is the cold fact that he drops on CNN (video below). It’s his highest profile interview ever. His star has never shone brighter. Yet he responds with an air of cultivated detachment. This is not the man who wrote those songs 40 years ago. He’s even wiser.
Learners show off their moves as the Goema Roadshow reaches Fairmount Secondary
You’ve heard every story there is to tell? How about this one? A Swedish guy makes a documentary in 2012 about a 70s folkster from Detroit who returns from obscurity after discovering that he has a large, devoted audience in South Africa. The film culminates in a cathartic 1998 concert marking the musician’s first significant performance in 27 years to an audience who thought that he had died! The film is critically acclaimed and makes big waves in the US and the UK but, and here’s the rub, nobody in South Africa knows that it exists!
Just when you thought you knew everything about Cape Town, along comes Dylan Valley with a story about a mosque established by a Scottish Shaykh and a community of Muslim hipsters who are into riding waves and drinking good coffee! Jumu’a: The Gathering is not only a window into Muizenberg’s Murabitun community, touching on the characteristics that set it apart from how Islam is more broadly practiced in Cape Town, but also a meditation of the socially cohesive nature of faith communities and the importance of the support mechanisms they provide. What emerges is a picture of an inclusive Islamic movement with spiritual values and practices that are as ancient and universal as they are contemporary and idiosyncratic.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
* South Africa * Music * Film * Documentary * Photography * Books * Theatre * Arts * Popular Culture * Social Media *
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
The Cape Town Goema Orchestra and the birth of a new vision for South African music.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Mama Goema - A documentary film exploring Cape Town's most representative music genre.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Want to let me know about your film/album/event? Drop me a line at calum [at] saysomething.co.za
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Want to receive exclusive news, special offers and freebies via email (with easy, automated opt-out)? Drop your details here:
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Click on the thumbnail above and "like" PSA to receive and share new posts and invitations to events via Facebook.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
