Folklore Festival: More than a music festival, a cultural experience
The Folklore Festival is not just a music festival it will incorporate poetry, dance, books, toys and workshops for a jam-packed full-day experience including performance and workshop by Napo Masheane one of South Africa’s leading black female theatre makers and poets.
Award-winning South African playwright Napo Masheane. Picture: popomasheane/Instagram.
JOHANNESBURG – The inaugural Folklore Festival is set to take place at the National School of Arts in Johannesburg on Saturday.
It will feature The Soil, Napo Masheane and Nicky B join Pilani Bubu, Wanlov the Kubolor and Stevo Atambire from Ghana, Papillion Musa from Kenya and Leomile from Lesotho.
The Folklore Festival is not just a music festival it will incorporate poetry, dance, books, toys and workshops for a jam-packed full-day experience including a performance and workshop by Napo Masheane one of South Africa’s leading black female theatre makers and poets.
“My Heritage is what defines every fibre of my body. It’s what allows me to walk and stand on those stages boldly and proudly. I carry 3000 ancestors with me so when I speak, when I do my poetry or when I teach or when I direct, I understand the privilege that I have that my people didn’t have,” said Masheane.
READ: Pilani Bubu unites African musicians for inaugural Folklore festival
To all the music lovers! @folklorefesti is on 1st Oct 22
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Winners will be contacted via DM. pic.twitter.com/33nKdIDi6oNathi RICHBOI Nkosi (@Richboi_II) September 22, 2022
The creative force behind this celebration is none other than SAMA award-winning storyteller Pilani Bubu.
“Folklore is the expressive body of culture shared and preserved by a particular group of people, it is inclusive of the traditional beliefs, customs, and stories of a community, passed through the generations by word of mouth, in the form of tales, sayings, dances, proverbs, jokes and music captured through various art forms,” said Bubu.
Folklore comprises a community’s traditional beliefs, customs, and stories passed from generation to generation by word-of-mouth.
It is a summer of songs composed in blood,
tuned with guns and arranged in conversations.
It is a summer of songs I sing in swelling volumes. ~ Makhosazana XabaThank you for thought provoking and robust discussions by amazing womxn at Tongues of their Mothers @UCT_news pic.twitter.com/nIxQLg52Xj
Napo Popo Masheane (@MasheanePopo) September 21, 2022
“These are peers and very contemporary, artistic voices that are part of this. So it almost feels like these are people who are clear in terms of their identity, their origins their cultural references. People who have not apologetic about using their mother tongue, about preserving our heritage. They are not apologetic about using their art their voices not just to entertain but as a weapon for advocacy,” said Masheane of the artists who will be taking to the stage on Saturday.
The festival is said to be an affair for all ages with Ethnikids, an online bookstore that specialises in children’s books that feature characters of colour in various South African languages.
Hoping to ignite the love of reading in our children and provide diverse material that more children can relate to and identify with.
There she is, Activist Zulaikha Patel #SONA2020 pic.twitter.com/FZhnWkW8Aa
Vuyiswa (@vuyiswa612) February 13, 2020
“Some of the key lessons I hope that parents and children will take from my book for years to come is that Black hair is beautiful, in all the many diverse ways it comes in, there isn’t one blueprint look, black hair is diverse in coils, curls and locks and all of our hair is beautiful. I hope that they’ll also take from my book that there is power in black hair, our hair is more than just hair, and there is a lot of regal and beautiful history that our hair has and that’s what makes it powerful.
“Lastly, I hope that all children who read my book will learn that they can be anything they want to be with their natural hair, their Afro’s and locks do not limit them but are their superpower and they can be anything they want to be with their natural hair,” said Zulaikha Patel.
The organisers said on Saturday youth activist and author of My Coily Crowny Hair’ Zulaikha Patel, HIV activist and author ofI am still Zuri, Nozi Qamngana, 10-year-old child author ofEnough Bullying, Siyavuya Mabece, author of My Family of Superheroes; Zinhle T. Matthews, Editor, translator and author of Chulumanco; Tumelo Moleleki, Amanda Mahlangu and Nonkululeko Nkosi, co-authors of Khanya’s first day at the park would be in attendance at the kids park.
“It’s an absolute honour to be on the Folklore Festival line-up this year, and I believe that it is absolutely important and necessary that we tell our own stories, Africa is a beautiful place and is quite misrepresented. Now more than ever is the time for us as Africans to take ownership of who we are and head to the forefront to tell our own stories and be our own voice” said Patel
The National School of the Arts will perform their highly anticipated African Reflections. African Reflections features the NSA music department and the rebirthed NSA Choir under the leadership of Xolani Noveld.
This exciting performance will bring the Folklore Festival to a heartwarming conclusion.
“The confluence of ideas and energy surrounding the Folklore Festival speaks of the magic of ubuntu. We need to honour and celebrate our cultural roots. Significantly 2022 marks a new era of leadership at the NSA – we are proud to be led by a strong new Principal Mrs Salome Gaelesiwe – the first African Principal; I was appointed new HOD of music at the beginning of the year. It is significant that we are reflecting and honouring our heritage in this way at this juncture of the school’s history. We look inward to reflect and remember. In music, we celebrate the past and the present and look to the future in glorious harmony. This is the NSA’s African Reflection,” said Thabang Phiri.
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