If you want to see a performer who is full of musical instruments and power, take the F train to Second Avenue, walk a few blocks to the New York Theater Workshop, and take the Kacomasomi.Dreaming ZenzierHer tribute to South African singer and activist Miriam Makeba, born Zenzier Miriam Makeba.
From the 1960s to his death in 2008, Makeba pioneered a form widely known as world music. Singing in Xhosa, Swahili, Sesotho, Zulu, and English, Makeba spread African songwriting to the American and European audiences and earned her the nickname Mama Africa. Throughout her life, she spoke to the purpose of social justice, especially the purpose of black South Africans living under apartheid. On her stage, at the New York Theater Workshop, in collaboration with the National Black Theatre, Kacoma in a marigold dress with a sunrise-like voice screams through her 76 years of her turbulent life. Play.
Makeba was a vocal shapeshifter that could win in virtually any genre, including folk, jazz, American songbooks, and afropop. In her voice, Kacoma also has its chameleon-like quality, transforming her loud and bright voice with husky breath, vibrant swells, and the Xhosa click sound that Makeba was famous for. Her song seems to be as easy as it is clever and as easy as it changes. “Dreaming Zenzile”, directed by Lileana Brine Cruz and music director Elbe Sambu, is best understood and enjoyed as a gift of Kacoma’s love and dignity, from generation to generation, from one artist to another.
But as a theatrical work, “Dreaming Zenzile” struggles between competing forms of recitals, dream plays, memory plays, and biographies. The naked set by Riccardo Hernandez, illuminated by Lee Jao’s brilliant light, suggests a concert stage that is less useful with the mediocre projections of Hannah Wasileski’s wave, flower and rainbow abstractions. Is this an auditorium or an astral way station? Is it the afterlife? Due to the lack of style and thematic power to define Blaine Cruz’s best work, the show feels less story-like than tone poetry, which can take a long time in the first half. It takes an hour to make a young Miriam professional debut.
The music amplified by the four choruses (Aaron Marcellus, Nalady Mashiro, Pumzier Sojora, Findy Wilson) and the four bands is electrical, enhanced by the supple and elegant choreography of Marhani Forte Sanders. Often fun, I feel the shock of sharp joy. .. However, the interaction of book passages with unsubtitled Makeba songs rarely feels essential. Why these songs, at these moments? In contrast, there are also songs on the button that are influenced by Kacoma’s emotional jazz. Really, they are all buttons. Those who arrive without a workline may get lost.
A brief touch on some core themes such as asylum, responsibility, and limits, but most of the major life events on that subject, “Dreaming Zenzile,” are mostly in this kind of work. I am withholding what I want. The relationship between her experience and her work, how the performer’s life shapes and influences her art. This desire is not always fair or wise. The relationship may not exist. Sometimes it’s too diagonal to analyze. However, the audience is denied this connection because “Dreaming Zenzile” is too fond of symbols and abstractions.
Only at the closing moment, which occurs just before Makeba’s death, the show achieves a kind of cohesion and vitality. Throughout, Makeba has released her voice, hoping that others will be released, and has taken on the burden of her activities with her stubbornness and calmness. Finally, she announces her costs.
“Do you know what it is to be the first?” She says, choking. “Do you know its weight? Loneliness?”
Asking a woman to represent the entire continent has always been too burdensome. Mama Africa? That was impossible. With Makeba giving birth to it for a long time, and with such elegance, it is a mystery and a gift. At its best, “Dreaming Zenzile” is a gratitude note written with gratitude.
Dreaming Zenzier
Until June 26th at the New York Theater Workshop in Manhattan. nytw.org.. Execution time: 2 hours 15 minutes.
