SA music to rock the World Cup
30 June 2006
Popular Cape Town group Freshlyground and other local stars will perform to a global audience of over a billion at the 9 July closing ceremony of the Fifa World Cup in Berlin, where Germany will hand over the hosting laurels to South Africa for the 2010 tournament.
The band will share the stage after the final match with South African musicians Johnny Clegg and Sibongile Khumalo, as well as dozens international stars such as Shakira, Eros Ramazzotti and Youssou N'dour.
"It's a huge honour for us to go and represent South Africa," the group told Die Burger newspaper.
The high-profile performance comes at a great time for Freshlyground, who will be releasing their new album, Nomvula, in Britain, France, Germany and Italy in August. The album has already reached platinum in South Africa.
The group is currently on a concert tour of Germany, after which they'll perform in the UK and Ireland in July, followed by another trip to
Germany and Belgium in August. In October they return home to tour South Africa.
World music
Formed in 2002, Freshlyground is made up of seven musicians from South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. Band members are lead singer Zolani Mahola, bassist Josh Hawks, Simon Atewell on wind instruments, drummer Peter Cohen, violinist Kyla-Rose Smith, Julio Sigauque on acoustic guitar and Aron Turest Swartz on the keyboard. Their music, which they describe as "world music", is an African-flavoured mix of pop and rock.
In 2003 their debut album Jika Jika cemented the band's success as one of South Africa's most successful young acts. Already popular at home in Cape Town, that year saw Freshlyground launching into a far wider arena, playing at numerous music festivals, including the Robben Island African Festival and Harare International Festival of the Arts, where they performed with Zimbabwean icon Oliver Mtukudzi.
Freshlyground have
taken the stage at the opening of parliament to mark 10 years of democracy, the Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation benefit concert, the world-famous North Sea Jazz Festival in Cape Town, the prestigious Villa Celimontana Festival in Rome, and the Aichi Expo 2005 in Japan.
Perhaps their most popular song is Doo Be Doo, but tracks such as I’d Like, Zithande, Things Have Changed, Manyana and Nomvula prove the depth and strength of the band's diverse talents. Last year Freshlyground signed an extensive record deal with Sony BMG Africa, and is planning to take its unique southern African sound into the rest of the world.
SouthAfrica.info reporter
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