(Above: Shemual Mahabeer)
Over 20 pianists feature in online
Thanksgiving concert to benefit DHC.
On May 27 the Piano Passion Project is
organising a Thanksgiving Concert inspired by Darius Brubeck in aid of the
Denis Hurley Centre featuring 20 amazing pianists from South Africa, UK, USA
and the Netherlands.
The concert will feature: Melvin Peters;
Burton Naidoo; Debbie Mari; Nishlyn Ramanna (UK); Andile Yenana; Neil
Gonsalves; Mark Kilian (USA); Shemual Mahabeer; Sibusiso Mashiloane; Lungelo
Ngcobo; John Edwards; Nduduzo Makhathini; Lindi Ngonelo; Zwelihle Kunene;
Siyanqoba Mthetwa; Zoe Molelekwa; Susan Barry; Roland Moses; Vincent Mthethwa;
Khabelo Witness Matlou (USA); Obakeng Thamage and Mike del Ferro (Netherlands).
(Left: Lindi
Ngonelo)
The event forms part of the weekly UKZN
Centre for Jazz and Popular Music and iSupport Creative Business’ Music
Unlocked Sessions. Tickets R80 each and available on Webtickets, with the option
for patrons to donate more.
The human story of volunteers and organisations
mobilising and working together to take care of the most vulnerable in our
communities is truly inspiring. The concert’s beneficiary is the Denis Hurley
Centre which feeds and cares for the city’s homeless and has been at the
forefront of ensuring that they have been cared for over lockdown. With
enormous job losses being experienced, a great deal more people will be needing
support, relief and care in the near future.
The Denis Hurley is an engaged community
facility which has always supported the arts and works closely with artists and
performers as an integrated part in what they do. Many of the performers in the
Piano Passion Project have worked together with the DHC on previous events and want
to give back to the organisation in their time of financial need.
(Right: Nduduzo Makhathini)
The COVID-19 virus became all too real for
the pianists in the Piano Passion Project recently, when their former teacher,
friend, mentor and colleague in the Project, Prof Darius Brubeck became
afflicted with the virus, and found himself on a ventilator in intensive care,
with doctors giving him a 50/50 chance of survival. For his wife Cathy, the
experience was understandably traumatic, and exacerbated by then having to
quarantine herself. But thankfully, Darius continues to make steady recovery,
is now back home and happily reunited with Cathy.
Given Darius’ miraculous recovery, and the
obvious financial need in our communities, the Piano Passions Project found a
fund-raising thanksgiving concert was in order. The obvious restriction is the
current social distancing measures. So, they opted for an online concert, of
pre-recorded piano performances created especially for the event. The concert
will be two hours in duration, featuring the wealth of piano talent that is in
some way, part of Darius’ legacy here in KZN. The pianists will each present a
set of around five minutes each.
(Left: Neil
Gonsalves)
“Darius is a member of the Piano Passion
Project which is an open collective of pianists mainly with piano lineage to
Darius himself. The older pianists would have been students of Darius’ and the
younger pianists are students of mine or Burton’s. Sibusiso Mashiloane was a
piano student of mine many years ago and the youngest pianists on the bill
would have been taught by him as well.
"So, it’s a multi-generational piano
performance and teaching culture. Darius is central to this story and we are
enormously relieved and grateful that he is recovering. We pay tribute to his
astonishing legacy through this concert,” explained UKZN’s Neil Gonsalves.
For more information email Thulile Zama on
zamat1@ukzn.ac.za
The concert takes place on May 27, 2020:
Concert link will be sent at 18h00.
Tickets R80 available on www.webtickets.co.za and there is an option
available to donate more.
Posts
