Mthabisi Tshuma [email protected]
THE debut appearance of Sofar (Songs From A Room) Harare at Shoko Festival provided a platform for emerging talent from across Zimbabwe to shine.
Sofar Sounds is a global live music platform that features diverse artistes from different genres, cultures and countries. It gives emerging and established artistes an opportunity to showcase their talent to music lovers in intimate and unusual settings.
For Shoko Festival, Sofar Harare curated the lineup for the Opening Night, bringing together Vicky Soulful from Zvishavane, Cingi from Victoria Falls and Harare-based Kuda Rice and Bhanshee. Star FM was the broadcasting partner.
Khumbulani Muleya, the curator behind the project, said Sofar was essentially a mini festival without the big stages.
“It is an intimate, discovery-led experience that adds to what larger festivals already offer. We have a very good working relationship with the team behind Shoko Festival. Since last year, we have been discussing the possibility of partnering by bringing the Sofar (Songs From A Room) platform to the festival. The idea of opening for the 16th edition of the festival was a perfect fit.
“For an emerging platform like ours, a pop-up at a major Zimbabwean festival has long been the dream, a way to grow our presence in the city and across the country. Our participation at Shoko has shown what that can look like in practice. Together, we advanced the same goal of promoting and showcasing unheralded but talented local artistes, giving them a platform, more audiences and more ways to be heard,” said Muleya.
He said the collaboration showed what could be achieved when music platforms worked together to promote local talent.
“Above all, it demonstrates that Sofar does not compete with other music platforms and initiatives; it complements them. Sofar’s intimate, discovery-led format adds to what festivals and other platforms already do and as witnessed through our partnership with Shoko together we worked toward the same goal of promoting and showcasing unheralded but talented local artistes.
“Rather than splitting the audience or the opportunity, this kind of partnership widens both, giving artists more stages and more exposure,” said Muleya.
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