Township vibes of another time

21 October 2011 - 02:19 By Refilwe Boikanyo
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'Kwela Bafana+' actors go through their paces during rehearsals at the Victory Theatre in Johannesburg this week
'Kwela Bafana+' actors go through their paces during rehearsals at the Victory Theatre in Johannesburg this week

Shebeens are a township phenomenon deeply rooted in the history of South Africa. For most of us, they're a place for socialising and relaxation.

Back in the 1950s, a time when police vans roamed township streets enforcing apartheid laws by violently picking up pass offenders, street gamblers and passersby who didn't conform to the oppressive rule, shebeens unified communities.

They served as a meeting place for people to discuss their social and political struggles. They gave black people a sense of identity and offered a platform for musicians to express themselves. Now a musical revived by the Sibikwa Arts Centre will remind us how some of the organising against apartheid happened within those shebeens.

Set in a 1950s shebeen, Kwela Bafana+ portrays the lives of a group of kwela players and the patrons of their music.

"One of the most evocative sounds of the 50s is the pennywhistle or kwela. The name derived from Zulu for 'get up' and the police vans -the kwela-kwela", say the producers in an official press release.

The young men who played the pennywhistle on street corners were involved in their own small way in subverting apartheid rule, acting as lookouts to warn the revellers in the shebeens of the arrival of the police.

"In those shebeens was the vibrancy, the beer and the music that kept the people's hopes alive," say the producers.

Kwela players drew inspiration from American ragtime, jazz and jive, infused it with the harmonies of African choral music and the rhythm of traditional Zulu songs, transforming it into the sound of the township. The music in this production pays homage to popular South African music groups of the 1950s such as The Manhattan Brothers, The African Inkspots and Spokes Mashiane, and the compositions of Victor Ndlazilwane.

This revived play, which was first performed at the Edinburgh Festival in 1992, is directed by Phyllis Klotz and Smal Ndaba. Themba Mkhize directed the music and Todd Twala did the choreography. It features Velephi Khumalo and Boy Ngwenya, who performed in the original Kwela Bafana, and veteran actor Nkosana Xulu.

  • 'Kwela Bafana+' will run at the Victory Theatre in Houghton, Johannesburg, for three nights a week from November 2 to December 10. For more info go to www.victorytheatre.co.za. There will be a preview at Diepkloof Hall in Soweto on October 26 at noon
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