The fitting recipient of the accolade of the 2020 National Arts Festival Featured Artist is indigenous musician Madosini Latozi Mpahleni, best known as simply Madosini.

A series of 11 episodes (one released on each day of the Festival) offers glimpses of Madosini performing in varied settings – from grand stages to intimate rooms, solo and in conversation with other musicians. This series was made under Covid-19 lockdown, a process made even more complicated by the fact that Madosini herself fell ill and was in hospital for five weeks. This meant that filming her was not possible and, as a result, we have relied on existing and archival footage to create this tribute. There are great variations in the technical quality of the material, but they have been chosen to reflect Madosini’s powers as a musician, stage performer, storyteller, and icon of an extraordinary cultural tradition.

EPISODE SIX – HULE HULE
This is a high spirited and irreverent song, performed by Madosini on the Uhadi, first raising the roof in a small venue in Cape Town and then in a very different key at the Whale Well in Cape Town, with Hilton Schilder, Jonny Blundell and Pedro Espi Sanchis in their first outing as Madojazz  (now known as Amathongo).

If you haven’t purchased a ticket yet, click on the play button and you will be redirected to purchasing a ticket. All eleven episodes of this series are available for just R50.  PLEASE NOTE THAT IF YOU PURCHASE A TICKET TO ONE EPISODE OF ‘SONGS ARE LIKE THE GRASS’, YOU GAIN ACCESS TO ALL 11 EPISODES. 

Access the rest of the 11-episode series here.