Arts writer
ARGUABLY one of the most important events in the history of Afrikaans music culture, the Voëlvry tour of 1989, organised by Shifty Records and irreverent Afrikaans weekly paper Vrye Weekblad, changed the face of Afrikaans youth culture forever.
Join The Gereformeerde Blues Band, Francois van Coke, Valiant Swart, The Kerels, Van der Want- Letcher along with a few special guests for an afternoon celebrating the tunes from those exciting times at the Shifty Heritage Voëlvry Festival at Spier Amphitheatre in Stellenbosch on September 24.
Presented by Shifty Records and the Alliance Française du Cap, the show will also pay tribute to the talents of the late Johannes Kerkorrel and James Phillips (along with his alter ego Bernoldus Niemand).
This musical event will bring to a close another Shifty September, a heritage month tribute to the Shifty Records music label, celebrating the Shifty story of music activism in the struggle for democracy in South Africa. It wasn’t all serious though, as there was also a healthy subtext of partying apartheid into extinction through the power of seditious sounds.
Kicking off Shifty September will be an exhibition curated by the South African History Archive (SAHA) from September 3 at 6.30pm at Alliance Française in Loop Street. Shifty artists Simba Morri and Louis Mhlanga will perform at the opening.
The exhibition, which will run throughout September, draws on historical artefacts from the archives and explores the various ways in which Shifty Records created a musical outlet for South Africans to express their resistance to the apartheid regime, to challenge conscription, and to raise awareness of the plights of detainees, communities under threat of forced removals, and other key struggles for justice within the broader anti-apartheid struggle.
l The festival gates will open at 11.30am. The concert starts at 12.30pm. Tickets: R195, www.capetownfringe.co.za For exhibition information, e-mail culture. cpt@alliance.org.za