Jesse in The Living Room

The Living Room in Maboneng is a fresh rooftop venue offering Urban-Eco Café Cuisine, Plant Art and Urban Design; a showroom for green design and lifestyle.

Designed, built & growing by the hands of the Tiakaya Designs team, the truly organic space is constantly evolving as season’s change, plants grow, and new creations come to life. The space boasts prototypes of vertical gardening solutions, and there is a shop which sells potted plants, gifts & jewellery.

The Living Room is like an oasis in the sky, a veritable Hanging Gardens of Babylon. And a super cool place to watch the sun set over the cityscape.

The cafe has  a nice tapas menu

Plant shop!

 

 And there's a full bar for sundowners.

Down it goes.

Ah, nothing like a blue sunset ...

We were there to see and hear Jesse Clegg, the son of Johnny Clegg  and as you would expect, a very talented musician, songwriter and performer.

Acoustic and (almost) unplugged - there was some amplification. He was awesome!

I love Japanese lanterns.

Nice backdrop too of the Telecom tower and Ponte City with its Vodacom billboard. Another fun night in the CBD.






 

with Graham Parker after he performed Live @ Drew's

The intimacy of the setting and the incredible view reminded me of an actual real living room where I heard and saw musicians perform in NJ. About 10 times a year, Drew Eckman, a former associate editor at Newsweek magazine, invites musician friends - who are usually in town anyway to perform live in New York - to come over to his house in Ringwood, NJ and perform in his actual living room, a venue he calls Live @ Drew's.

picture windows overlook the lake

Drew has a log cabin on a lake in the country with a large central living room overlooked by a second floor balcony. He removes the furniture and sets up rows of folding chairs for about 60 to 65 guests to come and hear live music. Guests bring a snack and something to drink and leave a little something for Drew to pay the artist and also the cleaning lady the next day.

In both cases, the more intimate setting makes it feel less like a concert with an audience and more like a musician performing with a small circle of friends. Nice.

The Living Room is located on the top floor at 20 Kruger St, right in the heart of Maboneng.

Le Zulu Blanc

photo by Anne Walsh Wertz

Johnny Clegg is a music legend and one of South Africa’s most celebrated sons. He is a singer, a songwriter, a dancer, an anthropologist and a musical activist whose infectious crossover music, a vibrant blend of Western pop and African Zulu rhythms, has exploded onto the international scene and broken through all the barriers in his own country. In France, where he enjoys a massive following, he is fondly called Le Zulu Blanc – the white Zulu.

I saw him perform a couple of his most famous songs at the Nelson Mandela Memorial Tribute at the Nelson Mandela Foundation Centre of Memory, including Asimbonanga, my favorite Johnny Clegg song. He was one of a long line of performers and speakers who were there to celebrate the life of Nelson Mandela. His performance left me wanting more.

photo by Anne Walsh Wertz

The opportunity arose yesterday as part of the Old Mutual Music in the Gardens concert series at the Pretoria National Botanical Gardens on a beautiful winter's day. Ah, you gotta love winter in Gauteng! Temperate climate pleasant enough for a picnic in the garden on a Sunday afternoon.

Johnny was born in England to an English father and a Zimbabwean mother and was brought up by his mother in Zimbabwe. He moved to South Africa after his mother married a South African journalist when he was seven. Johnny's mother was a cabaret and jazz singer and his step-father a crime reporter who took Johnny with him in the the early 60's into the townships, exposing him to a broader cultural landscape than would have typically been available to a white South African boy.

photo by Anne Walsh Wertz

It was in the 70's at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, where Johnny was by then a lecturer in Anthropology, that he conceived the concept of blending English lyrics and Western melodies with Zulu musical structures. This blend was recognised by a South African producer, Hilton Rosenthal, who became the champion of the project and drove it with passion and commitment. He signed up Johnny and Sipho Mchunu (his songwriting and performance partner at the time) to his independent label at a time when mixing music was effectively unprofitable because of the radio censorship of mixed music and mixed bands.

At this time they could only play in private venues as the law forbade mixed race performances in public venues and spaces. Testing the law, they played at universities, church halls, migrant labour hostels and even in the lounges of private houses. The battle ground of public versus private performances was often challenged by the security police who attempted to close these down whenever they could. Many shows were closed down but not enough to prevent the emergence of a substantial following of students and migrant workers.

photo by Anne Walsh Wertz

In late 1979 their first album, Universal Men, was released. The album was a musical journey into the life of the Zulu migrant worker, living and working in the city, but continually journeying home, caught between two different worlds.

His 40 year musical career has been rich and varied and he has amassed a long legacy of songs, albums, awards and historic appearances. Johnny Clegg performed on all four of Nelson Mandela’s 46664 Aids Awareness Concerts in South Africa and in Norway. Mandela has joined him on stage during the rendition of Asimbonanga, a song written by Johnny about Mandela (and other struggle heroes) during his period of incarceration. At every live performance of this song, the audience, charged with emotion, spontaneously rises to their feet. During the Cape Town and Tromso 46664 shows, Johnny also performed duets of his work with Peter Gabriel (who was in the audience at the Mandela Tribute last December.)

He has a new album out and if his performance in Pretoria is any indication, his legacy will keep on growing.

The Perfect Tribute to Mandela is to Live His Legacy

I had been looking for the perfect way for me to celebrate the life of Nelson Mandela during these 10 days of national mourning in South Africa and last night, I found it. I celebrated his life at the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory, the foundation whose mission it is to preserve the legacy of Tata Mandela.

The Centre in Houghton, Johannesburg houses Nelson Mandela's private office and is just steps away from Mr. Mandela's final home, and the place where he passed away last Thursday night. The Centre has mounted a special exhibition with photographs and documents and his office was left intact, exactly as it looked the last day he presided there. It is open to the public indefinitely and I suggest you go and see it.




There were places to offer personal tributes. Tribute books to write in, candles to light, a place to lay flowers.

There was the sense of community I longed for. I went with three members of my expat community. Two Americans, Lauren and Julie, and a German, Doris. We shared our own sense of personal community and we shared it with the greater community of South Africa and the world in an intimate, reverential, joyous and spiritual setting. This was not a memorial to the death of Nelson Mandela. This was a celebration of the life he lived.

The keynote speaker was Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu. Nobel Laureate. Statesman. Man of God. The most famous and respected South African alive today. His introduction was amazing! "Some call him 'the Arch'. Some call him 'Des'. Some call him 'the Bish'. Some call him '2 and 2'."

I was prepared for his eloquent speaking, his spiritual aura, his humanity and intelligence. I was not prepared for his wicked sense of humour and self-deprecating manner. He was an absolute hoot. I cannot tell you the amount of times we all belly-laughed with delight with his hysterical anecdotes and insights.

In challenging us to continue the legacy of Nelson Mandela every day, he asked us to wonder, "Where would we be today if Nelson Mandela had died in prison? Where would South Africa be? Where would the world be?" I shudder to think.

There were many celebrities and dignitaries in the audience. Some who were encouraged to give tribute onstage like Madiba's personal lawyer, human rights attorney and close friend George Bizos. And some who were content to merely share in the community. Former Irish President Mary Robinson. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, musician and human rights activist Peter Gabriel!

(Mary Robinson and Peter Gabriel with the German Ambassador to South Africa behind them.)

George Bizos and the Soweto Gospel Choir

There was a fair share of spoken tributes, but the majority of the service was musical. The award winning Soweto Gospel Choir. Legendary South African performers such as Johnny Clegg, PJ Powers and Mama Africa Chaka Chaka. Current artists and future legends like Danny K and Ross Learmonth from Prime Circle.

Mama Africa

I took so much video of the speakers and performances that my camera started to heat up in my hand! I will have to cull them and figure out how to upload some of it to this blog. It is too good not to share.

It was an incredible evening, a perfect tribute, and is now a cherished memory. Doris, who has lived in Johannesburg for three years now, put it best. She said, "It was the most incredible thing that has happened to me since I have been in South Africa." I think many more than Doris share her sentiment.

And I must give a special shout-out to Lauren and her driver, Malcolm. The police presence and security were thick around the Centre and Mandela's home. The streets were cordoned off with limited access and parking. But Malcolm took us right to the front gate, furnished us with umbrellas when it started to sprinkle while we were waiting on line for security to sweep the tent, and whisked us away when the tribute was over! Thank you Lauren and Malcolm!

Today we are invited to watch the Memorial Service on a screen at the Centre. It is being televised all over the world and broadcast on screens in overflow stadiums and public spaces all over Johannesburg. The FNB Stadium can only house 80,000 people and it is being called the largest memorial gathering by international statesmen and leaders ever. Four United States Presidents and 26 Congressmen are in South Africa right now for the service. The crowds will be enormous, the security heavy, the space limited. I think I will take advantage of the Centre's offer and share the experience with my new personal community.


Hamba Kahle Madiba.