🔗 Share this article

“When you speak about the legendary singer in the nation, it’s akin to referring about a royal figure,” states the choreographer. Called the Empress of African Song, Makeba additionally associated in Greenwich Village with renowned musicians like prominent artists. Beginning as a young person sent to work to provide for her relatives in the city, she eventually became a diplomat for Ghana, then the country’s official delegate to the United Nations. An outspoken campaigner against segregation, she was the wife to a activist. Her remarkable life and legacy inspire the choreographer’s new production, Mimi’s Shebeen, set for its UK premiere.

A Fusion of Movement, Sound, and Narration

Mimi’s Shebeen merges dance, instrumental performances, and oral storytelling in a theatrical piece that is not a straightforward biodrama but draws on Makeba’s history, especially her story of exile: after relocating to New York in 1959, she was barred from South Africa for three decades due to her opposition to segregation. Subsequently, she was excluded from the US after wedding activist her spouse. The show is like a ceremonial tribute, a deconstructed funeral – some praise, some festivity, some challenge – with a exceptional vocalist Tutu Puoane at the centre reviving her music to dynamic existence.

Power and poise … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In South Africa, a shebeen is an unofficial gathering place for locally made drinks and lively conversation, often managed by a host. Her parent Christina was a shebeen queen who was arrested for illegally brewing alcohol when Makeba was 18 days old. Unable to pay the penalty, she went to prison for half a year, taking her infant with her, which is how Miriam’s remarkable journey started – just one of the details the choreographer learned when studying her story. “Numerous tales!” exclaims she, when we meet in Brussels after a show. Her father is Belgian and she was raised there before relocating to study and work in the United Kingdom, where she founded her company Vocab Dance. Her parent would perform her music, such as the tunes, when she was a child, and move along in the living room.

Melodies of liberation … the artist performs at Wembley Stadium in 1988.

A ten years back, Seutin’s mother had cancer and was in medical care in the city. “I paused my career for three months to take care of her and she was always requesting Miriam Makeba. It delighted her when we were performing as one,” Seutin remembers. “There was ample time to pass at the hospital so I began investigating.” As well as reading about Makeba’s triumphant return to the nation in 1990, after the freedom of the leader (whom she had encountered when he was a legal professional in the era), she found that she had been a breast cancer survivor in her youth, that her child Bongi died in childbirth in the year, and that due to her exile she hadn’t been able to be present at her parent’s funeral. “You see people and you focus on their achievements and you overlook that they are facing challenges like everyone,” says Seutin.

Creation and Concepts

These reflections went into the creation of the show (premiered in Brussels in the year). Thankfully, her parent’s treatment was successful, but the concept for the piece was to honor “loss, existence, and grief”. Within that, she highlights threads of her life story like memories, and references more broadly to the idea of uprooting and loss nowadays. While it’s not explicit in the show, Seutin had in mind a second protagonist, a contemporary version who is a migrant. “And we gather as these alter egos of characters linked with Miriam Makeba to welcome this newcomer.”

Melodies of banishment … performers in Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the performance, rather than being intoxicated by the venue’s home-brew, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in harmony with the musicians on the platform. Her dance composition includes multiple styles of movement she has absorbed over the years, including from African nations, plus the international cast’ own vocabularies, including street styles like the form.

Honoring strength … the creator.

Seutin was taken aback to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the group were unaware about the singer. (She passed away in 2008 after having a cardiac event on stage in Italy.) Why should younger generations learn about Mama Africa? “I think she would inspire the youth to advocate what they believe in, expressing honesty,” remarks Seutin. “However she did it very elegantly. She’d say something poignant and then perform a beautiful song.” She wanted to take the same approach in this production. “Audiences observe movement and listen to melodies, an element of enjoyment, but mixed with strong messages and moments that hit. This is what I respect about her. Since if you are being overly loud, people may ignore. They back away. Yet she did it in a manner that you would accept it, and understand it, but still be blessed by her ability.”

• The performance is at London, the dates