What makes SA jazz so special?

About 10 years ago, at an intimate soirée at my apartment, an acquaintance of my best friend asked me how I could stand listening to something that sounded like cats fighting on a thorny hedge. He was referring to my love of jazz, more specifically, one of the greatest improvised jazz albums ever created: Coltrane’s Giant Steps. Instead of retorting, I smiled, cranked up the volume and asked my best friend to call his acquaintance a cab.

Love it or hate it, the intoxicating effect of jazz is difficult to describe. Asking a jazz lover to explain what they feel when listening to jazz is about as useful as asking a fish to describe what it feels to climb a tree.

But if I was to try and explain it, I would have to go back to 1995 and my first outing to Kippies Jazz Club, at the Market Theatre in Johannesburg. That night Hugh Masekela blew the air out of me and I was hooked. But while that’s where my introduction to jazz began, the musical genre goes as far back as the 1920 – although some may say it goes back even further than that.

What we do know, however, is that South Africa’s love relationship with jazz officially began in the ‘50s with one of the first major bebop groups, Jazz Epistles, comprising trumpeter Hugh Masekela, saxophonist Kippie Moeketsi, trombonist Jonas Gwangwa, and pianist Abdullah Ibrahim (known at that time as Dollar Brand).

The Jazz Epistles brought the sounds of America bebop – created by artists such as Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, and Thelonious Monk – to Cape Town with Moeketsi modelling his sound and style on Charlie Parker’s. It was also not unusual to find a local jazz artist imitating not only the music but also the look and style of Cape Town Dizzy Gillespie or Charlie Parker.

Since those heady, high-fashion and uncertain political times, the South African Jazz scene has had many elements contribute to its evolution and development, mostly from America.

Late Professor Hotep Idris Galeta said in an article he wrote for Cape Town’s All Jazz Radio: “The most prominent and significant of these being the rich eclectic cultural diversity of the country’s inhabitants and the influence of African/American musical culture upon it over the years.”

So it stands to reason why the Cape Town International Jazz Festival serves as Africa’s preeminent annual event for jazz musicians from around the globe to converge in an unforgettable melange of jazz styles – even if it is just for two nights.

Affectionately referred to as “Africa’s Grandest Gathering”, the festival is the largest music event in sub-Saharan Africa.

Festival director Billy Domingo from espAfrika, the events company that owns and manages the Cape Town International Jazz Festival, told The Citizen: “The festival started because they felt there was a need for a gathering of this kind. It is Africa’s grandest gathering because it embraces the complete continent and the world. That’s why we have artists from all over the continent and the world performing.”

The annual event, which attracts over 37,000 “Festinos” (jazz festival goers) from around the globe is famous for its star-studded lineup – and this weekend’s 20th anniversary celebration proves to be just as unforgettable as previous years with the likes of Chaka Khan, Alfa Mist, Gypsie Kings, Jimmy Dludlu, Jonathan Butler, and Sipho Hotstix and many more.

The Cape Town International Jazz Festival runs from this Friday, March 29, to Saturday, March 30, at Cape Town’s world-famous International Convention Centre. Tickets are available through Computicket, Shoprite, and Checkers.

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