The original Mystic Boer is in action this week.
- From his early days as a young Boland punk to Afrikaans blues rock’s legendary Mystic Boer, Valiant Swart has been on a mission to remap South Africa’s folk music frontiers. ‘There’s an awareness that’s been surging for the past three or four years about what’s known as ‘roots’ music,” he says. ‘It’s essentially folk music, you know, searching for the source of things? Music is the great equalizer, the universal language. I think in Afrikaans that’s especially true. There’s such a massive search for identity with Afrikaners at the moment, people are rediscovering the source of where their cultural make-up comes from.” Is this what fuelled his critically-acclaimed collaborations with accordion maestro Ollie Viljoen, Vuur en Vlam (2006) and Wild en Wakker (2010)? ‘Boeremusiek is in my DNA!” says Valiant. ‘I can play it in my sleep. I grew up with it – it’s just part of who I am. I started playing guitar when I was eleven years old.
This is what I do, it kind of defines me. So for me, stuff like the blues, boeremusiek and punk are kind of the same. For the next album I might go straight back and do a straight blues album – or not – I might do a techno-punk metal album. To me it’ll be the same thing. I think it was Billy Joel who sang ‘It’s still rock ‘n roll to me’!” Expect a showcase of the mystic boer’s many sides: from fireside folk balladeer and rooiwyn rocker to English country crooner.
Die Boer, 2nd Floor, Chenoweth Street, Durbanville, November 5, 8pm. Entrance is R90. Website: www.dieboer.com
- Must we wait until our musical heroes pass away before we celebrate them? The news that double bassist Basil Moses is ailing has mobilised the Mother City jazz community to come together for a night of jazz, stories and laughter. Regarded as the ultimate bassist’s bassist, over a career spanning foru decades Moses has anchored the rhythm for everyone from guitarists Herb Ellis, Jonathan Butler and Johnny Fourie to vocalists Mark Murphy and Sathima Bea Benjamin, saxophonists Winston Mankunku and Robbie Jansen, pianists Abdullah Ibrahim and Chris McGregor and more. It’s as a mentor to many of Cape Town’s younger jazz musicians that he is equally loved and respected.
Multi-instrumentalist Dave Ledbetter, Mark Fransman, pianists Andrew Lilley and Mark Goliath, saxophonists Buddy Wells and Dan Shout, guitarists Richard Ceaser and Alvin Dyers share the celebratory jazz soiree stage with songbirds Tina Schouw and Amanda Tiffin, bassist Charles Lazar, drummer Kevin Gibson, trumpeter Lee Thomson, vocalist Gavin Minter and more.
Green Dolphin, V&A Waterfront, Cape Town, November 9, 7.30pm. Entrance is R50 (minimum donation). Tel: 021 421 7471.