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Musik Hip Hop/Rap A message in the music
Musik Hip Hop/Rap A message in the music
| A message in the music |
| Skrivet av Andy Collins |
| 2010-05-04 12:28 |
 It was quite a unique event, when the first ever Swedish hip-hop opera was performed on Wednesday night at Folkoperan in Stockholm. Adapted from the newly released and ground-breaking book 'Afrosvensk i det nya Sverige’ (a collection of personal recounts of growing up in Sweden by Afro-svensk/Swedish young people/youth, collected by author and chairman/employed at Afrosvenskarnas riksförbund, Cecilia Gärding) came to life in front of a filled and exhilarated auditorium. Performed in a classroom context, a teacher versus students format, the teacher was excellently portrayed by the versatile soprano singer Ulrika Skarby, who played a teacher unaware of her social and historic faux pas as she attempted to educate a group/class of African-Swedes with different backgrounds. The stereotype was a reflection that sadly many may recognise in other social situations. The students burst into hip-hop songs as they attempted to educate through music. Pictures projected the uncomfortable truth of Sweden's involvement in the old slave trade, colonialism and added a powerful element to the show. The black South African tenor singer Luthando Qave expressed the feeling of the first arrival to Sweden, which could have been 400 years ago as well as yesterday, in a lowly and melancholy manner and it indeed convey the right emotion. However, banging bass and deep lyrical content were the stable force of the evening with catchy rifts. The band Blacknuss provided the rhythm with their usual effortless class. If there was a fault it was the combination of opera and hip-hop that the show had not fully addressed, and sometimes the songs felt separated from each other. Like: hip-hop-opera-hip-hop-opera, taking turns. However the ensemble, members of Folkoperan's own orchestra, conducted by Jonas Dominique, who also arranged all the music, gave the rap songs some lyrical spice as well as adding depth and accessibility particularly for those who normally loathe rap and hip-hop. For example, an elderly ‘white’ gentleman who sat beside me stood and waved his hands emphatically when asked by the performers. The message in the performance was not lost and the show ended in an emphatic style as Senegalese born Ousmane Camaras twisted, danced and contorted tirelessly to the incredibly powerfully played traditional West African djembe drums. Many of the audience would have left having learnt something despite many of its subjects being commonplace to Afro–Swedes, African and Caribbean immigrants in Sweden. If the hip-hop opera can be taken to other theatres around the country it will be a great tool in terms of the grand social commentary and definitely increase integration awareness.  After the concert at Folkoperan the contributing artists and large parts of the crowd made their way onto the after party. Urbanlife took the opportunity to speak to some of the people who were involved in the project and the performance.  Urbanlife (UL): What was your first reaction when you heard about this project? Clarisse Muvemba (pictured above with Blues), jazz,/soul singer who performed at the event I thought it was a very interesting project, especially because of the texts that the young authors of the book had written. I myself is born in Sweden but my parents comes from Kongo, and I know how it is to grow up in this society so I could really relate to the feelings and frustration that the authors expresses through their texts. Blues, Swedish hip hop legend I got into this project kind of late so for me it was an interesting concept of the youths writing the texts and us performing them. It was also a chance for us to do something musically interesting, something new that was out of the norm. I thought it was wonderful to work with schooled musicians that constantly deliver. So it a great musically experience as well as a spiritual experience. UL: What would you like people to learn from this play? Cecilia Gärding, project leader for the book 'Afrosvensk i det nya Sverige' and singer/songwriter in Khumalo I would like people to get more aware of that we live in a multicultural society that has a historical heritage that includes the slave trade, and we need to acknowledge that. The history of people migrating to Sweden is 400 years old, and if we recognize those roots we have another platform to stand on when we talk about integration and minorities feeling left out in the Swedish society.  UL: How was it to write songs for this hip hop opera?Mike Haines Gärding, singer/songwriter in Khumalo It was difficult at first because usually I do songs in English but when we started it was more or less that someone pushed a button and everything just came out. In the end the project was really good and a lot of people seemed to like it. UL: What did you learn from this project? Pia Kronqvist, CEO Folkoperan I’ve learned how big of an issue that being Afro-Swedish really is and also how much racism that exist in Sweden, and how much this racism really hurts people and our society. I have also learned a lot about African history. |