Final bow to performers felled by Covid
Lost: Lord Antony Sher, Franz Marx, Jonas Gwangwa and Dawn Lindberg. ANDRÉ HATTINGH: GOODBYE POEM BECOMES BIG PRODUCTION
Imagine a stage with Broadway-style performers in A Chorus Line, costumed and filling the auditorium with powerful, musical narratives. Actor and music legend André Hattingh did exactly that when she composed a big stage feel tribute to fallen South African stars, lost to the world due to Covid.
Gathering of the Stars was an 18-month journey that Hattingh felt compelled to follow. She said her heart was broken during the pandemic when during the height of Covid many of South Africa’s most prolific artists and entertainment industry personalities succumbed.
The song and accompanying video were produced on a shoestring budget with the help of industry colleagues, friends and friends of friends.
Hattingh said: “I have lost at least 16 close friends during lockdown. I was thinking, oh, gosh, this is just so sad. And my heart was just rolling over and bursting and I thought, gosh, what am I going to do now? And this is what happens to me, and I found inspiration in the sadness.”
Gathering of the Stars started off as a poem, an ode to the departed, to say goodbye.
“I put the poem on Facebook, and it became a wonderful beginning for the project after a pal read it and suggested that it could make for a great song.
“I suddenly started singing, singing that we’re gathering the stars. The show will still go on.
“And it just came to me, all the words for the chorus. I started dancing it in the kitchen.
“My husband heard me, and he said, ‘Hey, André, you must do something with it’.
“And it became the first step, really, in my pursuit to produce the song.”
Hattingh captured the soul of the performing arts in her lyrics, the bed of melody beneath it resplendent of a large-scale stage production in the tradition of the great American musical.
It’s powerful and emotional, authentic and sincere. It wasn’t easy to take the song from the kitchen to a releasable outcome though.
The pandemic prevented gatherings and Hatting didn’t have the funds to invest in its production.
Eventually, through the goodwill of her extended network, everything fell into place. The music video was recorded at Theatre on The Square.
Hattingh said that during the final edit of the music video names had to be regularly added as more and more stars faded.
The final production sees a memorialised list of entertainment industry luminaries such as Lord Antony Sher, Dawn Lindberg, Franz Marx and Jonas Gwangwa.
She hopes that the next edition of the Naledi Awards will feature her song and perhaps even the Academy Awards.
She said: “I Googled tribute songs at the time and there was really nothing, anywhere in the world, that either spoke of the losses in show business or even remotely celebrated those who have died in the industry.
“The Oscars always play such inappropriate songs when paying tribute to someone.
“I hope someone on the Academy will find my song and, next time around, use it to remember those who have died.”