Arts Review

Written by: Tiisetso Tlelima

All roads lead to a picturesque farm on Swaziland’s Ezulwini Valley for an invigorating and jam-packed three-day music, theatre, art and multi-cultural festival this weekend. The festival, Bushfire, attracts over 10000 visitors from Southern Africa every year. Previous festivals have seen performances from top African musicians such as Bra’ Hugh Masekela, Johnny Clegg, Habib Koite, Busi Mhlongo, Vusi Mahlasela, Pops Mohamed and many more. This year’s festival theme is based on a Rumi poem called One Song’, which embues the festival vision of tolerance, respect, unity and harmony irrespective of our differences. Festival goers can expect to see BLK JKS, The Parlotones, Babu, Moreira Project and more on the bill this year. The festival takes place at the astonishing venue, House On Fire - an outdoor Afro-Shakespearean ‘Globe Theatre’ from May 28 to May 30. Arts Review caught up with festival director, Jiggs Thorne to find out more about the festival.

What makes Bushfire different from other Southern Africa festivals?
“What sets Bushfire apart is that we are able to grow and develop this amazing space, House on Fire, on a daily basis. This gives us the freedom to explore new ideas and generate this incredible fantasy environment that is home to this festival. Very few other festivals in the world have the ability to consistently mutate, and present a lot of opportunities. It also has a very eclectic programme - drawing on a broad range of performance with different appeals, that brings different people together. Its part of our philosophy at House On Fire to create harmony in contrast. It’s also a festival with a conscience. We give 100% of our profits to a local NGO Young Heroes www.youngheroes.org.sz, who support a large number of orphans in Swaziland.”

That’s interesting. Why has Bushfire decided to raise funds for the Young Heroes foundation as opposed to other NGOs in Swaziland?
“Bushfire has supported Young Heroes since its inception. It’s a wonderful idea that a festival can be more than bringing performers together and having fun. There is a social mandate that one can explore if one sees the opportunity. Young Heroes is a very special NGO. Swaziland has over 100,000 orphans and nearly 20,000 child-headed households. Young Heroes provides food and clothing to many of them. We hope the partnership will continue to generate more awareness about the critical orphan problem here, and will move people to promote change.”

Great! How did the festival come about? What’s the aim of the festival?
“Nothing’s static. Your ideas and concepts grow. Bushfire was born out an existing programme at House On Fire. We needed to grow our offerings, create a bigger stage and bring more people to Swaziland to experience the amazing experience that is House on Fire. The philosophy is 2 pronged: Bushfire not only aims to develop the arts in Swaziland, but also highlights and raises funds for some of the more critical social needs of the country.”

How is the festival grooming young artists?
“We are extremely excited about the latest addition to the festival programme. The Bushfire Schools Festival on Friday 28th May which is a whole day of interactive workshops and performances by top international artists for Swazi school children. The aim of the event is to work with the government to inspire young Swazis and to start an ongoing growth of the arts which has to start in our schools. There has been a series of outreach performance projects during the last 3 years of Bushfire and several skills share projects in the community. Bholoja is a great example of how young talent has been nurtured the way it should be and we hope to help more young Swazis realise their full creative potential.”

The festival line-up seems to include more South African artists than Swazi artists. Why is that?
“We are a relatively young industry in Swaziland. Development of the arts is an ongoing process and we are hoping to generate more world-class acts through this amazing platform. There are over 250 local artists performing at the festival this year. Although not all featuring on the main programme, there are a lot of groups who will perform on the festival lawn, on the open mic stage and in the Swazi ‘Cultural Village’ that will be created for the weekend. Bholoja, Swaziland’s biggest star at the moment, will perform on the main stage, as well as Thobile ‘Makhoyane’, a rising local talent and Temaswati Project (a collective of 10 Swazi female voices).”

What are the highlights for this year?
“A personal highlight for me is having Coleman Barks at the festival. Rumi’s poetry has been a constant source of inspiration, having Coleman, (who is the foremost authority on Rumi’s works) performing at the festival means a great deal. I’m also very excited about Babu. Their Afro-asian fusion echoes a lot of the dynamic cross-fertilization of the House On Fire philosophy. Temaswati Project is a local highlight. It’s great to see this project taking off, especially with the imminent release of their debut album.”

Besides music, poetry and theatre, are there other activities festival goers can do during the three days?
“Bushfire also has film screenings, traditional dance performances, lectures, circus, an interactive drum workshop, a fair trade market, global food fair, there’s an open mic stage and a dedicated kids play zone. There’s plenty for the whole family.”

For more info visit www.bush-fire.com