adminRebecca Nyathi Sunday Leisure Reporter
ALTHOUGH dancehall music has taken the country by storm with many young people falling for it, former National University of Science and Technology students have embarked on a crusade to champion jazz music which they said was equally good and has survived the test of time.
Afrofresh, which started off with four members only and now consist of six members have won the hearts of many in the city, from the old souls to some of the youths who were once dancehall freaks.
The band was formed in 2010 by Nqobile Behane, Makabongwe Ncube, Nkosiphile Sibanda and Tsepo Dube whose passion and common interest in music brought them together.
“We wanted to form the first music club at Nust similar to other universities, which we successfully managed to do and when we graduated we decided not to stop playing Jazz music hence we continued and named our band Afrofresh,” said Blessing Guveya.
Guveya further added that the group members met at school although they were doing different programs.
“At school, we were the school band and we got all the funding from the institute. We performed in different places including at the university’s graduation ceremonies. After we graduated we decided to continue playing because of the passion we have for music but we decided to change the name from Nust band to Afrofresh,” said Guveya.
“Afrofresh was the name we came up with because we wanted to introduce the new and fresh jazz music for the youths to enjoy it as much as the old guys do. In the process of changing we were careful not change it to that extent of making our elders who are Jazz lovers call our work an abomination,” said Makabongwe Ncube.
The band comprises Blessing Guveya (keyboard/vocals) and Nqobile Behane (bass guitar) who are both Marketing and Architecture graduates. The group also has Architecture graduate Makabongwe Ncube (saxophone/percussion and vocalist), Caleb Dube (drums) who studied Automotive Engineering, Sanelisiwe Ntini (lead vocals) who studied Electronic Engineering together with Zibusiso Thabani Chirawu (vocals).
The band members use their professional careers to manage the band and reduce expenses as they will be dealing with the technical issues on their own using their expertise instead of paying individuals.
According to Blessing Guveya, the band composes their own music and sometimes they use copyrights from other artistes.
“We chose to do jazz music because it was the thing that brought us together, we love jazz. We also realised that most people are into dancehall, kwaito and hip-hop, what we wanted was to be unique and introduce something new to the youths”, said Guveya
According to Ncube, the band gets its financial support from the shows they do.
“Most of the shows we do give us an income, which we use to buy our musical instruments and pay for our recordings”, said Ncube
They said they were inspired by The Muffins and Oliver Mtukudzi and have managed to release an album despite the challenges they have been facing financially.
They however hinted that their plan was to build a school of music so as to promote up-and-coming musicians.
“We have many things we hope to achieve but mostly we wish to grow as a band and teach some young people that music is not all about having a voice and the instruments but that there is more to it and for that to happen we have to open a music school,” said Guveya
“We are now working on a single — Nayi which will be released anytime from now,” said Ncube.
The youthful jazz group said they were currently financing their band activities as they have no sponsors to help them.
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