Festival voor het Afrikaans 2023

The fifth edition of the Festival for Afrikaans will take place in the De Regentes Theatre in The Hague from 24 to 26 November.

This year, for the first time, the Festival for Afrikaans is presenting a concert dedicated to South African classical/art music. The concert, which has been pre-recorded, will be broadcast on Sunday, November 26 at 10:00.

South African classical music has boomed over the past hundred years. In addition to the country’s complex and stormy history, the cultural diversity of the South African population has also been decisive for the eclectic and unique aesthetic palette of the work of South African composers.

The objective of the curation of the programme is to introduce listeners to the wide diversity within the genre. The program is also explicitly inclusive.

The main work on the program is the Concerto “for those who can’t sleep but still dream of dancing” by the composers Dizu Plaatjies and Matthijs van Dijk. The piece is performed by the SA Strings Foundation Festival String Orchestra with Matthijs van Dijk as conductor, Dizu Plaatjies on uhadi and umrhubhe, and David Bester on violin as soloists.

The recording you are about to see was made at the world première of the South African Strings Convention 2023, which took place at Nelson Mandela University in Gqeberha from 17 to 20 March this year. The Concerto was commissioned by the SA Strings Foundation and Nelson Mandela University, in collaboration with Rhodes University and the National Institute for the Humanities.

Other works on the program include “Onskuld” by Prof. Pieter van der Westhuizen (1931-2023), arranged by Lance Phillip and performed by the Free State Symphony Orchestra under the baton Maestro Daniel Boico.

This is followed by two works by composer Hendrik Hofmeyr (1957): “Geen skip strand ooit teen hierdie kus nie” from the song cycle “Skielik is dit aand” from 5 poems by Wilhelm Knobel, which are performed by baritone André Howard, as well as “Orithyia en die Noordewind“, performed by flautist Liesl Stolz.

The next piece on the program, “Komeng” by Mokale Koapeng (1963), will be performed by the Odeion String Quartet. This is followed by “No 2 Allegro Feroce” from the “5 Elegieë” by Arnold van Wyk, performed by the Odeion School of Music Camerata under the direction of Elsabé Raath.

The concert will close with the City of Roses Jazz Ensemble, with the evergreen “Mannenberg” by Abdullah Ibrahim.

The program has been curated by Marius Coetzee, affiliated with the Odeion School of Music at the University of the Free State.

A special thanks to the Vrystaat Kunstefees, the Afrikaanse Taal en Kultuurvereniging [ATKV], the University of that Free State, the Odeion School of Music, the South African Strings Foundation, Nelson Mandela University, and Deon Ceronio Audiologist & Speech Therapist, without whose support the project would have not been possible.