Carmina Burana & Africana make big splash in Windhoek
Zenzeni Haraseb singing a solo in the combined German Namibian performance of Carmina Burana in Windhoek. The show was a run-away success. The next performance is this Friday in Swakopmund as part of the Independence celebrations.
An elated audience, including the Deputy Minister for Sports, National Service, Youth and Culture, Juliet Kavetuna and the Ambassador of Germany to Namibia, H.E. Onno Hückmann, celebrated the stirring festival of Namibian- German choir music with long ovations.
For months, the members of the SingAkademie Niedersachsen lead by conductor Claus- Ulrich Heinke, the Amdi!Khoen choir from Windhoek under the leadership of conductor Engelhardt #Unaeb and the Mascato Youth Choir from Swakopmund conducted by Theodore Cookson had been hard at work to make this ambitious project a reality. They were complemented by Gretel Coetzee’s childrens choir, additional singers, dancers and instrumentalists.
With the Carmina Burana & Africana show, a work was created that aims at fusing Namibian and German art to create something completely new and unique.
The audience in Windhoek was amazed by the mixture of songs of the Carmina Burana with Namibian folk songs. Especially the performances of the Namibian soloists and dancers were widely applauded. The success if this project once again demonstrates the unifying power of music, which is why the German Federal Foreign Office placed such a great importance on this project and supported it in an outstanding fashion. The German Embassy in Windhoek said this week the support of arts and culture is one of the focal areas of German Namibian cooperation and contributes an important part in reducing prejudices and ignorance on all sides.
The participants of the Carmina Burana & Africana Choir project thus became ambassadors of the culture of their countries who learned the music of the others with great passion, enthusiasm and uncounted hours of practising.
Carmina Burana & Africana will perform again on 21 March at 20:00 in the NPS Bank Windhoek Kulturaula in Swakopmund.
Tickets for the concert can be bought at Swakopmunder Buchhandlung for N$100. Tickets for the afternoon concert at 15:00 in the NPS Bank Windhoek Kulturaula cost N$ 50.
