Bonga “I help to place Angola in the world”

Bonga  “I help to place Angola in the world” He makes Angolan music for 40 years, has nearly 500 musical themes recorded and “many miles on the road”. Bonga, whose voice identifies with Angola, has always been attentive to the reality of his country, preserving and disseminating the Semba musical style. He is keen to highlight: “Just like Brazil has Samba and America has Rock, Angola has Semba. It is the music I heard in the cradle”. His musical path was marked by his respect to “origin, tradition and pulse of the Semba”, taking it and spreading it around the world.

Stages

23.07.2012 | by Marta Lança

Sérgio Afonso The boy with the camera and the camcorder

Sérgio Afonso The boy with the camera and the camcorder And he answers that the production company that he is part of, Generation 80, was born under a very good star: “there is a crisis in the world, money is for some people ever more difficult to get, but technology is also more at hand for everybody. There are advantages in these days of bureaucracies and problems getting a foot in the door – you don’t need an investment of millions to work in this field and to make a film with a camcorder.”

Face to face

23.07.2012 | by Marta Lança

African Music is going to get an ever higher international profile

African Music is going to get an ever higher international profile He paid a visit to studios in the musseques (local neighbourhoods), he had talks with producers to give support for his Akwaaba Music, a digital platform dedicated to African music and pop culture, providing visibility for quality people in music who don’t have the structure needed to go far in the business. In the last 3 years, Lebrave has produced works with more than 70 artists from 15 African countries and has been working on the development of a global network covering the production of contents, digital distribution, marketing and licensing.

Face to face

23.07.2012 | by Marta Lança

Occupy Wall Street: Carnival Against Capital? Carnivalesque as Protest Sensibility

Occupy Wall Street: Carnival Against Capital? Carnivalesque as Protest Sensibility While some commentators and journalists have dismissed Occupy Wall Street as carnival, lawmakers and police officers did not miss the point. They reached back to a mid-nineteenth century ban on masking to arrest occupiers wearing as little as a folded bandana on the forehead, leaving little doubt about their fear of Carnival as a potent form of political protest. New York Times journalist Ginia Bellafante initially expressed skepticism about 'air[ing] societal grievance as carnival,' but just a few days later she warned against 'criminalizing costume,' thus changing her condescension to caution as she confirmed the police’s point: masking can be dangerous, Carnival is serious business.

Stages

21.07.2012 | by Claire Tancons

Crossing Music's Borders: 'I Hate World Music'

Crossing Music's Borders: 'I Hate World Music' I hate world music. That's probably one of the perverse reasons I have been asked to write about it. The term is a catchall that commonly refers to non-Western music of any and all sorts, popular music, traditional music and even classical music. It's a marketing as well as a pseudomusical term — and a name for a bin in the record store signifying stuff that doesn't belong anywhere else in the store.

Mukanda

20.07.2012 | by David Byrne