Description
One of the great proponents of South African Jazz is the late Johnny “Mbizo” Dyani. This bass player, composer and original member of the Blue Notes died in exile in Germany. The visionary impact of Johnny Dyani is a contemporary inspiration and a compositional backbone to the extraordinary Jazz Against Apartheid (JAA) story. The annual event took place in Frankfurt from 1986 – 2024. The mainstays of continuing this event after the death of Dyani were Makaya Ntshoko, John Thicai and Harry Beckett.
From the legacy of Jazz Against Apartheid is born Jazz for the Revolution, an ongoing project that continues and expands the cultural bridge of Jazz Against Apartheid history to nurture and celebrate the friendships forged in exile and solidarity.
The goal is to go Beyond Exile and build a bridge of mentorship and dialogue to create valuable documentation accessible cultural heritage for a young generation of professional jazz musicians who have grown up in the post-apartheid society.
azz Against Apartheid (JAA) was started in 1986 in Berlin by Jürgen Leinhos, now 85 years old, and his Frankfurt-based initiative “Kultur im Ghetto” (Culture in the Ghetto). The first event included musical specialists from the UK, Switzerland and the EU, particularly Germany, joining together in honouring Johnny with the performance of Dyani compositions. Following Dyani’s passing in exile, the JAA performing collaboration has continued with regular concerts in Europe and the USA. In 2021 President Ramaphosa bestowed the Order of the Companions of O.R. Tambo in silver on Mr Leinhos for his commitment to the JAA programme, for his determined stand against apartheid, and for fighting for the cause of oppressed South Africans as an anti-apartheid activist.
The JAA movement has made its South African home in Eastern Cape, since every concert features the compositions of Eastern Cape born bass player, composer and ANC member in exile Johnny Mbizo Dyani. Dyani’s 1979 album was titled “Song for Biko.”
Born in Duncan Village, East London, Johnny Dyani went into exile at the age of 17 with the famous Blue Notes. His globally acknowledged contribution to jazz is remarkable from three perspectives:
- his prolific and collaborative career which illustrates the unity in diversity that is achieved through music;
- his compositions and albums, that brought international attention to the lives of struggle icons such as Steve Biko, Lillian Ngoyi, and Nelson and Winnie Mandela, and
- he demonstrated that the source of jazz was on the African continent.
Sharing the vitality of Dyani’s music to current and future generation, fills the gaps in cultural memory of what artists such as Dyani fought for and achieved abroad. Like those back home in South Africa who were fighting on every front to free themselves from apartheid, thes exiled artists worked in solidarity “for my country, for my people,” as Dyani put it.
The JAA event continues the friendships built in exile, in a kind of “künstlerisch-kultureller Austausch” (artistic-cultural exchange) and is a bridge between geography and history.
This event returns to the Eastern Cape due to the enthusiasm and support of activists and South African living in exile in Germany, Professor Peggy Luswazi and Vusi Macingwane Mchunu. These South Africans in exile enjoyed a direct interaction with the Jazz Against Apartheid project during the many active years of study and work in Berlin, at the peak of the antiapartheid struggle.
The driving force of this cultural exchange is “Nachwuchsförderung,” or the conscious policy and practice of transferring societal values, knowledge and skills to the next generation. As Jürgen Leinhos said recently, noting that South African political apartheid is dead but that the struggle continues: “Overcoming apartheid does not stop once apartheid – being in this case the name and definition of a political system – stops. Since the isolation of political voices and groups that took place not only from the political process, but from education, health care, and other social needs, has not stopped, JAA continues to have legitimacy and a reason to exist.”
Through our mentorship programme with Jazz Against Apartheid we maintain the aim of what Germans call NACHWUCHSFORDERUNG, the nationally recognised tradition and policy by which knowledge and skills are purposefully transferred from the current generation to the next. In this context the veteran Jazz musicians hold capacity building and training jazz workshops directed at interested and upcoming youth from the townships.
Jazz for the Revolution is a profound initiative for co-operation, liberation and musical collaboration between Germany and South Africa. Through this platform musicians may continue to come together to share, inspire and create a fresh collaborative musical experience through workshops and events at the community centres of undeserved communities is a testimony in and of itself.
Through workshops concerts and exchanges a combination of physical and hybrid events unite old fighters for elementary freedoms with new and future generations, thus bridging the gap between geography and history.
Aluta Continua!!!
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