Mixing it up with bassist Mlungisi Gegana

SOPHIATOWN – Eastern Cape-born jazz bassist will be visiting Sophiatown the Mix.

October 12, 2017

Roxy de Villiers 1 minute read

Mlungisi Gegana will be returning to Sophiatown. Photo: Twitter

Sophiatown the Mix will be ending October with a special guest at their monthly Jazz Encounters event series.

Eastern Cape-born jazz bassist Mlungisi Gegana will be visiting the Mix on 28 October.

Gegana has recorded with an array of artists and also received praise from the jazz musician, songwriter and producer, Jonas Gwangwa, for his dedication and passion and his contribution to the South African jazz repertoire.

He has always been seen as an inspiration to young jazz artists, especially to aspiring pre-teens who have dreams of becoming musicians but lack the means.

Gegana is a hard-working musician who started dreaming of a career in music when he was 11-years-old with a three-string guitar made from a five-litre oil can.

He later left his home in Queenstown and headed for Cape Town where he began to play with his band and started exploring his own sound.

After gaining some experience in Cape Town, he moved to Johannesburg and was discovered as a jazz artist.

Although he has always strived to not sound like other artists, when he discovered the music of Johnny Dyani, an anti-apartheid activist, over a decade ago, he started the Dyani project.

The project came after years of research and communicating with other jazz enthusiasts and looks at Dyani’s compositions as well as his story.

The project looks to free and almost decolonise jazz as Dyani strived to do during the apartheid era.

The project aired at the Joy of Jazz Festival which in turn aired at the Sophiatown Heritage Centre in 2013.

Gegana will be bringing his bass back to Sophiatown and it promises to draw crowds from all over Johannesburg.