THE STORY
In the late 40s and 50s, Sophiatown was an island-township defying apartheid. Surrounded by white suburbs, an administrative fluke over time had created a vibrant area where Black people could own freehold rights. It was a thorn in the hide of the rabidly segregationist Nationalist government, which had been elected to power in 1948.
Sophiatown was the Harlem of Johannesburg. A creative fusion of music and politics, it was the place where the coolest gangsters ( The Americans) lived, where black sporting celebrities - mainly boxers- lived, where a new generation of black writers, photographers and journalists hung out. Artists such as Gerard Sekoto lived there for a time and painted its streets and shebeens. There was a time when Sophiatown was the strongest branch of the ANC and Nelson Mandela lived in the area. Mandela and Tambo ran the only Black law firm in Johannesburg over this period - an era that has been described as an 'Age of Innocence', where it seemed possible that the multi-cultural nature of Sophiatown might gradually extend, spill over the boundaries of Sophiatown and apartheid.
It was a golden era for music - jazz music, as Abdullah Ibrahim describes in the film, is the source of all the musics, whether marabi, kwela, mbaqanga, and radiating out from Africa to the global African diaspora. This film brings together, for the first time in 40 years, the stars of that era : The Manhattan Brothers, Dolly Rathebe, Dorothy Masuka, Thandi Klaasen, Abigail Kubeka, The African Inkspots, and those who were young talents, such as Hugh Masekela, Jonas Gwangwa and Abdullah Ibrahim (then known as Dollard Brand) making their mark in avant-guarde bands such as the iconic Jazz Epistles.
The film is punctuated by performances of popular songs from the era, freshly re-arranged and presented in two concerts, the first at the historic Church of Christ the King - monument to Old Sophiatown. It is the music which elicits many of the stories that build the narrative of Sophiatown - memories drawn from musicians, former gangsters and journalists, and the lyricism of the gangster turned national poet, Don Mattera. We are first taken to Sophiatown by Nelson Mandela. His description is given further perspective by a foreigner, the renowned photographer Jurgen Schadeberg, who captured the most emblematic photographs of Sophiatown in the fifties, for the magazine DRUM.
Archive draws us back to Sophiatown in its heyday, with Miriam Makeba singing Lakutshon'ilanga and the writer Can Themba's views on liberation. Nelson Mandela describes the burgeoning campaigns defying apartheid and the role of musicians within the struggle and Dolly Rathebe muses on what might have happened if he had asked her to marry him. The film is never didactic, always personal. By 1955, Sophiatown becomes the key target in the governments strategy for 'Grand Apartheid' - a policy of divide and rule, in which blacks were forcibly removed from the city, split into 'tribal' zones quite alien to them and effectively scattered to the winds. The people of Sophiatown fought valiantly but as Mandela describes, " the Government had force …they would have shot them like flies".
And once Sophiatown is destroyed, an ersatz Sophiatown is re-created for the stage, in a musical that selected from the greatest talents of the era. King Kong travels to London and to Royal Command Performances but the artists are forbidden to talk politics. They get their first taste of "brightness on the other side" (Dorothy Masuka) and many of them, such as The Manhattan Brothers, resolve to stay in exile. Meanwhile back home, the situation is getting bleaker. The Sharpeville Massacre in 1960 is followed by an extended State of Emergency and the banning of the ANC and the PAC and all forms of gatherings. It becomes impossible to stage performances as groupings of more than three people are banned by law. Nightclubs and performance venues are forced to close and the musicians' livelihoods are at stake. Many chose exile - Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela, Abdullah Ibrahim, Jonas Gwangwa to name but a few. Those that remain are forced to struggle for survival through the Dark Years. Dolly Rathebe becomes a Shebeen Queen - selling liquor and dagga - others "died in the face of this onslaught". By 1962, most of the musicians were gone - abroad or underground and Nelson Mandela was caught and imprisoned.
It was the end of an era.
THE FILM
Little Bird's first South African production, SOPHIATOWN has won the award for Best Documentary at the Cape Town World Cinema Festival 2003. The announcement was made at a gala evening on Sunday 16 November. The festival, which forms part of the 8th Edition of the Sithengi Film and Television market, showcases World Cinema, with Africa at its heart.
SOPHIATOWN celebrates the great popular jazz music of the 1950's in South Africa; a rich tradition deserving international attention. Director Pascale Lamche, traces the music, uncovers the artists who created it and the unique culture in which it thrived, concentrated in Sophiatown, Johannesburg's own Harlem, which fuelled by liberation politics until its destruction by the Apartheid regime.
The film features Nelson Mandela and such household names from the jazz world as Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba, Abdullah Ibrahim, Jonas Gwangwa and Caiphus Semenya.
The film was produced by Little Bird in association with Ochre Moving Pictures for BBC in association with France 2, TV2 Denmark, Radio Telefis Éireann, IKON and The Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa Limited with the support of the MEDIA Programme of the European Community.

SONGS FEATURED IN "SOPHIATOWN"
Mbube:  'Mbube' (Zulu: The Lion') is the most famous melody to ever come out of Africa. Originally composed by Solomon Linda for his group, the Original Evening Birds, his original 1939 recording was the first African hit record. In 1952, an American 'folk' group called The Weavers (starring a young Pete Seeger) successfully re-recorded it as 'Wimoweh', then ten years later the song was re-arranged with added lyrics to become 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' as by the Tokens. Their hit recording went straight to number one on the US hit parade and ever since that time, the song has continued to earn enormous revenues, most recently as a featured song in Walt Disney's 'Lion King' film and stage production. Linda, alas, died in 1962 and made only a small sum out of his creation but a pending legal case may yet see more money being diverted to his family. It is fitting that on this CD 'Mbube' is covered by the Manhattan Brothers, who have been singing the song for over six decades and often shared the stage with Linda and his group.
Ntyilo Ntyilo: 'Ntyilo Ntyilo' (Xhosa: Little Bird) is a true South African classic, one a small group of 'evergreens' that any local artist with jazz pretensions must include in their repertoire. It was written by Alan Silinga expressly for Miriam Makeba who first recorded it with the Manhattan Brothers in 1954. Miriam's solo rendition on her first American album in 1960 put it on the world map and since that time many other versions have been cut by artists as diverse as Hugh Masekela, Pharoah Sanders and on this CD, Dolly Rathebe. As for the song's meaning, composer Silinga can only say that it is about a bird singing sweetly and inviting the listener to "that happier place" called heaven.
De Makeba: 'De Makeba' was written by Mackay Davashe, one of the finest and most prolific composers of the 1950s and early 60s. He recorded the tune in 1958 with his group, the Jazz Dazzlers, as a tribute to Miriam Makeba. The 'De' in the title is somewhat unusual as this is certainly not an African usage - perhaps the cosmopolitan Davashe was thinking of the French and meaning to say, 'About Makeba'.
Tula Ndivile: 'Tula Ndivile' (Xhosa: Please Keep Quiet) is yet another song first made famous in 1954 by Miriam Makeba and the Manhattan Brothers and then subsequently recorded by Miriam in the US in 1960 (using the title,'Saduva'.) The lyrics tell of a daughter asking her mother's forgiveness - she confesses to not heeding her warnings about bad girlfriends leading to relationships with even worse boyfriends! Strangely enough, the song was very popular among the gangsters of the time who according to legend, would sometimes take control of the stage and force the group to sing it over and over again. In this version, the Manhattan Brothers perform it without the customary female lead vocal.
Holilili: 'Holilili' is another Alan Silinga masterpiece and is all the more outstanding for being representative of a very small group of African lullabies. The title cannot be translated as it represents the gentle trilling of a mother's tongue as she lulls her little one to sleep. The lyrics in Xhosa speak dreamily, in the composer's best allegorical style, of a "voice heard beyond the mountains." Originally recorded by Miriam Makeba's female, close harmony group, the Skylarks, in 1956, 'Holilili' also featured on Makeba's seminal first American album in 1960.
Ndingulova: 'Ndingulova' (Xhosa: I Am A Loafer) is a song about unemployment and tells of the difficulties experienced by anyone who has to sit at home while watching everyone else going to work. Interestingly, although the Inkspots are some of the oldest musicians featured on this CD, they alone elected to record a totally new song especially composed for the occasion.
Hamba Notsokolo: Dorothy Masuka was one of a number of prominent female singers of the 1950s but she alone was as good a composer as she was a vocalist. Her song, 'Hamba Notsoloko' (Zulu: Let's Go Notsokolo), was the hit that catapulted her to fame in 1953 and has remained indelibly identified with her ever since. In it, Dorothy refers to herself as 'Notsokolo' and tells of how she is travelling up to Johannesburg from the Cape, leaving her mother behind and all alone.
Tshona: Tshona (Xhosa: Get On To It) is a tune written by Pat Matshikiza who first recorded it in 1975 with saxophonists Kippie Moeketsi and Basil 'Mannenburg' Coetzee. Although jazz was generally not particularly popular with township audiences in the 70s, something about 'Tshona' seemed to click into place and the recording became a widely known, even anthemic hit. In this version, veteran trumpeter Stompie Manana bravely steps into the shoes of the two, now-deceased sax giants.
Ndenzeni Na: Gallo Music Publishers 'Ndenzeni Na' was composed by the late George Makhene, the drummer in the now legendary Father Huddleston Band which also included Hugh Masekela, Jonas Gwangwa and Hollywood actor Zakes Mokae (who played tenor sax.) At the time, the band members were all students at St. Peter's School ("the Black Eton of South Africa") in Sophiatown under the tutelage of Father Trevor Huddleston. Here, Masekela and Gwangwa are both given the opportunity of re-visiting a musical landscape they last viewed as mere youngsters in 1956.
Meadowlands: Strike Vilakazi's 'Meadowlands' is one of the most enduring melodies in South African music. Written in 1956 as a comment on the forced removal of Sophiatown's residents to the newly created township of Meadowlands (now part of Soweto), the lyrics, unusually, are sung in three different languages and taken as a whole, are actually completely ambiguous in their assessment, for or against, the government's action. It is a fact that at the time, the authorities were convinced the song supported their actions while the disgruntled residents were equally sure that it was really sympathetic to their protests. In this rendition, Dorothy Masuka breathes new life into an old standard.
African Magic: Abdullah Ibrahim plays a medley of his most famous compositions, among them, 'Tintinyana' and 'Thaba Bosiu'. This is quite a special recording as he usually only performs these medleys as part of his live concert appearances. Here we have a chance to hear a cross section of the songs that have helped define African jazz over the past forty years. As Ibrahim is considered by many to be Africa's premier jazz musician, this medley can also serve as an introduction to the continent's contribution to jazz development.
Scullery Department: 'Scullery Department' was composed by Kippie Moeketsi, one of South Africa's greatest jazzmen and can be regarded as a protest song. The title refers to the apartheid regulations that forbade African musicians to mix with the white audiences for whom they often performed. When taking up the stage or leaving it, the musicians were forced to go through the scullery and during intervals were consigned to the alleys behind the clubs. According to legend, while Kippie was a member of the Jazz Epistles, he confronted the owner of a restaurant where they were playing and eventually the group was allowed to sit among their audience between sets. Little wonder that all the rest of the band, which included Hugh Masekela, Jonas Gwangwa and Abdullah Ibrahim, left the country soon thereafter to live in exile.
Sophiatown:  This tune is a stark reminder of a painful period for all those people who once called Sophiatown home. That sad day the police trucks loaded up the township's residents and their scant belongings, with the demolition crews close on their heels, is immortalised in the words and singing of Thandi Klaasen.
Yini Madoda: 'Yini Madoda' was a popular song as recorded in 1959 by the Skylarks, Miriam Makeba's female vocal ensemble, partially because it so precisely encapsulated one of the era's most pressing social problems. The title in Zulu, which might best be translated as, 'Hey, you man! What are you up to?' describes the plight of rural families left behind by husbands coming to the cities to find work. The song says, 'Your children are crying', 'You don't send them letters', 'You don't send them money' and finally, 'The cats sleep on top of the stove' (because there's no cooking being done!) On this CD, former Skylark, Abigail Kubeka interprets an updated version of 'Yini Madoda' as a tribute to her former colleagues in that groundbreaking group.

PASCALE LAMCHE entered the television industry in 1982 producing documentaries and working on the production of low-budget feature films for UK's Channel Four. In 1988 she set up the European Union's European Script Fund, the first major initiative for the development of scripts in Europe. She moved to Paris in 1990, launching a venture for international packaging and co-productions backed by partners Miramax and the British literary and talent agency, Peters, Fraser and Dunlop. She subsequently became Director of International Co-productions at Cameras Continentales, a leading French production company. By 1996 she returned to documentaries, producing a number of high-profile and internationally financed films which include : 'Albert Camus: the madness of sincerity' a 90 minute documentary feature on the life, literature and loves of the French literary giant,  'Undressed: Fashion in the 20th century' a major four part series and a 90' feature, on the history of fashion, 'In the Footsteps of Bruce Chatwin' a 2 x 60' documentary feature on the life and work of the charismatic and contradictory author,  'Waiting for Harvey' a 90' comic documentary feature about ambition and filmmaking at the high alter of the film business, 'I was a slave labourer' a 75' documentary about one man's struggle taking on major multinational corporations and the German government in a bid to set the record straight, Fashion Victim : The Killing of Gianni Versace A 90' documentary uncovering our culture's obsession with celebrity.