The Cosmopolitan Collective launches new documentary on jazz musicians from Pretoria

By CityLife Arts Writer

The Cosmopolitan Collective, birthed during lockdown 2020, has brought together like-minded jazz enthusiasts: collectors and appreciators, dancers, musicians and heritage activists who are collaborating with educational institutions within and beyond townships to innovate new ways of sustaining grassroots jazz cultures.

The catalyst for the formation of this project came out of the first Cosmology concert held at the Wits Theatre on October 30, 2020. Despite the pandemic and the tragic loss of co-musical director Andre Petersen, to Covid-19, the Cosmology concept yielded an unanticipated level of collaboration between colleagues and students in the Wits School of Arts and community-based jazz appreciators from around greater Tshwane, as well as within community structures.

The project has built on the potential that the concert demonstrated for role players who usually operate separately, to work together to sustain community-based jazz gatherings, expression and research. The collective has become a unique, experimental, and developing collaboration between interconnected communities of practice within community-based jazz circles around Tshwane / Pretoria and their networks around and beyond the Gauteng province. 

Recognizing the Cosmopolitan Collective’s contribution to advocating for the creation of platforms for local musicians to perform within under-served communities, a grant from the Music in Africa Foundation (MIAF) has enabled this activity to be intensified in recent months at a series of three concerts.

Footage from the above three events has been edited down into an hour-long broadcast which will be launched online on November 12 at 15:00.

Musicians to be featured in the footage include: The Mamelodi Jazz Jammers, The Badimo Jazz Band featuring Mainline Ngobeni, Tlokwe Sehume and band, Abbey Cindi’s United States of Africa, No Limits and Thabang Tabane and band.

This initiative offers an opportunity for musicians who are not often heard, to raise their voices and creatively package their actions in compelling formats that reach wider audiences.

 To join the broadcast please see the zoom link:

Topic: Malombo Jazz Advocacy Documentary Broadcast Time: Nov 12, 2022 03:00 PM Johannesburg. Join Zoom Meeting https://wits-za.zoom.us/j/99083903087 Meeting ID: 990 8390 3087