Sibuta launches solo CD
Moving from planning to performing again
EAST London music legend Xolani Sibuta launched his first ever solo CD at an afrojazz-pop performance, featuring 45 singers and dancers, at the Guild Theatre yesterday.
As well as launching the new CD, South Cocktail, Sibuta had the performance filmed for a DVD release.
The Daily Dispatch first got to hear of Sibuta in January 2008 when he was hailed as a hero for the work he did in developing young talent in the Border region.
Back then he had written, choreographed and directed a musical production, Twist and Trumpet, featuring local talent that ran at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown.
After being in the background, discovering and promoting new talent, this is the first time Sibuta has allowed himself to be centre front.
His new album, which features the voices of Mutisile Rosi and Zanele Siwayi on some tracks, combines all sorts of African beats, from maskandi and home reggae through to mbaqanga. He defines it as afro-jazz-pop music.
Sibuta who is also known as Mahjive, said he was exposed to music from a very young age and “his love for it has only grown over the years”.
“When I was six years old, my mom bought me a guitar and by seven I was already strumming away,” he said.
“I never cared much for friends, I always felt most comfortable with my greatest asset, my guitar,” he said.
Mahjive confessed that he was so obsessed with his guitar that his mother eventually confiscated it as he was not attending to his school work.
“She wanted me to focus more on my books and she knew how much I loved that guitar,” he said.
While in his early 20s, Mahjive helped form the dance group, Buffalo Dancers, which he led to the Shell Road to Fame, where they were nominated to perform at national level.
Based on this success, in 1992 he was awarded a bursary by Engen and the German embassy to further his studies in all disciplines of music at the Moving into Dance school in Gauteng.
“I specialised in recorder and piano. They fascinated me most at the time,” he said.
After those studies Sibuta returned home as he felt he needed to share his skills and passion in developing talent in the Eastern Cape.
In 1995 when Clarendon and Inyathi Primary were hosting a play which he directed, he met Nosimo Balindlela, then MEC for education, sport and culture.
“The MEC was so impressed with the play that she asked to see me,” he said.
“We spoke briefly, and she told me come to her office so we could discuss a way forward as to how we could take arts and culture to a different level,” he said.
Sibuta said he became an advisor to the department of sport, recreation and culture when they developed the department in 1996. “I am still there,” he said. Sibuta’s focus shifted from direct contact with dance and music groups to a planning role within the provincial government.
“I have no intention of ever moving to Johannesburg, I want to put the Eastern Cape on the map. We have the potential to develop successful musicians here,” he said.
It was only in 2010 that Sibuta started writing music again. “Now I have my own studio at home where I’ve been working on this new album,” he said.
Sibuta told the Saturday Dispatch that he had aimed his music at the general market. “I try to keep my music as African as possible, I don’t let western beats influence me.”
“South Cocktail is a combination of all instruments and beats,” he said. — mbalit@dispatch.co.za
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