In our project “Jazz Against Apartheid” we therefore also see a key for the cultural memory of South Africa

Juergen leinhos

Jazz Against Apartheid artistic director Daniel Guggenheim and the international JAA band has been performing arrangements for 16 compositions of Johnny Dyani since the inception of the band. South African band-leader veteran Easter Cape bass player Lex Futshane will develop a South African repertoire of Johnny Dyani’s work arranged by young trumpeter Sakhile Simani. This will be a stand-alone repertoire.  

All 13 musicians join on stage to perform 13 arranged Dyani compositions. The musicians have the opportunity to rehearse together for two days prior to the start of the festival run and the musicians will workshop and rehearse independently from the commencement of pre-production scheduled to begin two months prior to the South African tour.  

Long history of intercultural artistic work

Vusi Mchunu lived in political exile in Berlin from 1982-1993. He co-produced the African Disapora cultural- literary magazines, AWA FINNABA & ISIVIVANE. As a cultural activist, within the German Anti-Apartheid movement, Vusi toured widely in Germany, London, Paris, Zurich as a poet, presenter against Apartheid and writer.

Developed  the bi-annual Evangelical Church’s Bad Boll Seminary’s “S.A. Literature in English Conference and received stipends to cover his university costs from the Evangelische Studenten Gemende  in Berlin.

GERMAN / SA collaborations include Rock Against Apartheid (Bremen), Viva La Black (1988)  and the 2002 Symposium “Bad Times for Good music?”For the 1988 Nelson Mandela’s 70^th birthday; concert with Louis Moholo’s Viva la Black and the Poetry of Vusi Mchunu.

Vusi participated as Poet and Speaker for the 2002  Symposium “Bad Times for Good music?”; with Louis Moholo, Neville Alexander, Peter Niklas Wilson, in Frankfurt.

I’ve had interracial bands because I believe in the unity of the universe. I had this experience in East London where all the tribes and races played together. So, when I came to Europe I found it normal to play with groups of French, Danish, Swiss musicians… I like to have a Frenchman, a Japanese, a Swiss etc. in the band. It’s like an international family.

Johnny dyani

Jazz is the most democratic music in the world, an ebb and flow, between the collective and the interpersonal connection. 

Johnny Dyani performed this music throughout the seventies and eighties with a diverse group of musicians from South Africa, America, Turkey, North Africa, Caribbean, UK, Sweden and France. 

The repatriation of the legacy has multiple positive benefits: 

• Initiating a spark for an ongoing exchange for further cooperation between South Africa and Sweden
• Profiling the role of South African exiles in Stockholm and generally in Sweden in the fight for democracy.
• Saving the art of exile from oblivion through creating long-term resource of South African cultural memories.
• Mentorship to build education resources and enhance skills transfer.
• Contributing to the living archive, and dynamic knowledge foundation for the cultural heritage of South African exiles, thereby furthering the cause of freedom, equality, social responsibility and humanity through cultural activism. Shedding light on the immense importance and impact in jazz music as a liberating art form.