South African jazz legend Abdullah Ibrahim performing at the Cape Town International Jazz Festival on March 27. I can still hear his live performance of ‘Thula Dubula’ in that rasping voice of his, the dialectic between the harshness of the lyrics and the gentleness of the music creating an inner tension and beauty, says the writer.
Dr. Barry Gilder
There is a metaphor – a very visceral image – that has haunted me as the years of our liberation struggle recede. It is of a large dense forest, populated by towering yellowwoods, their tops disappearing into the heavens. Each tree represents one of the giants of our struggle against apartheid.
And each time one of those giants passes on – Mandela, Sisulu, Slovo, Hani and so many others – in my mind I see and hear a giant yellowwood crashing to the ground and dissolving into the soil, leaving another treeless spot on the forest carpet.
And in that forest, there is one special glade, where the trees have been falling too fast in recent years – Keorapetse Kgositsile, Nadine Gordimer, James Matthews, Dennis Brutus, Mazisi Kunene, Don Mattera, Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela, Jonas Gwangwa, Ray Phiri, Johnny Clegg.
