/ 20 February 2004

Legendary love

Valentine’s Day always rings in the undeniable truth for many of us; that we are lonely, miserable creatures. Year after year the day brings no silly white teddy bears, heart-shaped chocolates, pointless arguments or breakfasts in bed.

This year, however, things were different for me. I spent February 14 with a legend and she mothered me to tears.

Thandi Klaasen still triumphs as an unrivalled jazz legend. Her voice is as powerful as it was when she performed with the Harlem Swingsters and Miriam Makeba in the mid-1950s.

I do not love jazz and have harboured a belief over the years that I am far too young to be tapping my feet to a beat I could not follow.

But Klaasen changed all that for me when she did a special performance at Manenberg’s Jazz Café last Saturday night. The room was ambient with the lighting reduced to the level of flickering candles. Nothing was rushed and everyone seemed to be in perfect slow motion. And then the voice came, strong and spiralling like a ballerina caught in an arabesque.

Klaasen enthralled the audience with her rendition of Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me.

“People felt that song because it is my life story. I am alone and lost all my family. The people who listen to my voice are my family now,” she tells me later.

It was difficult to hold back the tears as she continued to perform songs such as Bridge Over Troubled Water — songs that reminded her, and the audience, of the pain she went through after her face was disfigured by an acid attack.

Klaasen’s brand of Sophiatown jazz, which mixes brass sounds with mbaqanga, must have reminded many people of South Africa’s not too distant past. You could almost picture the Valiant sedan, packed with gangsters, pull up outside the club where she performed with Dolly Rathebe.

After five decades Klaasen shows no sign of slowing down. She will be touring in London in March.

She explained: “My strong voice is all I have and sharing this with everyone keeps me going. Singing is a form of love. People should never stop singing. I am what I am because of the audience. If you do not appreciate the people who made you, you might as well perform in front of empty chairs.”

Where most South African artists complain about the lack of reception or appreciation they receive at home compared with their fame overseas, Klaasen has much praise and hope for South Africans.

“South Africa has the best musicians. There is so much talent here and Capetonians are starting to appreciate it,” she said.

I had to confess to her that she made me cry that evening.

“Only you know why you cried,” she laughed when I told her.

I think I cried because I had wished that she would sing the whole night through. But she did not. She left and I, too, had to return to an empty house with no heart-shaped chocolates and without Klaasen’s voice to help nurse me through my self-pity.