Cultural exchange

Kunzwana Trust

KUNZWANA Trust has been established by Keith Goddard and his fellow trustees Fiona Lloyd, Phillip Marira and Debbie Metcalfe in 1987 as a non-profit-making organisation which fosters the practice and study of indigenous musics in Zimbabwe through the promotion of the work of performing artists and instrument makers for fair reward and the development of music research projects for educational purposes. The aim of KUNZWANA was to encourage the highest artists standards in Zimbabwean music and to provide artists and instrument makers with fair reward for the work they do.

Cultural exchange programme

The Kunzwana Trust has organised numerous festivals, tours and concerts in various parts of Zimbabwe:
May 1988: A festival of traditional music at the Murehwa Culture House, 90 km outside Harare where musicians from surrounding areas met for a day of musical celebration
September 1990 : An exhibition of Southern African Musical Instruments in conjunction with the Ethnomusicology Programme of the Zimbabwe College of Music and hosted by the French Cultural Services
October 1993: hosting of the Austrian Duo Attwenger and organising their Zimbabwe tour sharing the stage with Oliver Mutukudzi & The Black Spirits and with Black Umfolosi. This was the first collaboration with Austria-Zimbabwe Friendship Association
August/September 1994: The Houses of Stone Festival and Festival Trail which brought together musicians and Ethnomusicologists from many different parts of Africa and elsewhere in the world.

December 1995: hosting and organising of a music Safari of a group of artists and musicians from Linz (Georg Ritter, Peter Androsch, Rudi Pfann, Gotthard Wagner etal.), in due course first contact made with Tonga music in Siachilaba

February/March 1996: hosting of Wiener Tschuschenkapelle from Vienna on tour in Zimbabwe and Mocambique in collaboration with Ambuya Beauler Dyoko and Ghorwane

July 2002: hosting of Otto Lechner & Windhund from Vienna on tour to visit the Tonga area and attend Harare Jazz festival

projects ongoing

Kunzwana.net is not only intended as an online archive of past cultural activities but also as an inspiration and resource base for ongoing and future projects. This is in the best sense of Keith Goddard's work and legacy. The drive for cross cultural dialogue and exchange, for promotion of cultural diversity and development is more relevant then ever before. The ongoing projects are calling for support and participation.

Kunzwana # 1

"KUNZWANA comes from the Shona word nzw(an)a which means
‘listening, hearing and understanding one another’." - Keith Goddard

CONCEPT  

Kunzwana # 1 is both a musical journey and cross-cultural collaboration featuring some outstanding and innovative Austrian musicians with their Zimbabwean counterparts.

As a kind of prelude the Austrian artists will visit the group Simonga in the village of Siachilaba in the Binga area along the Zambezi River.  This encounter aims to recognise the traditional Ngoma Buntibe music as highly appreciated musical art form / Tonkunst of the Tonga people, and highlight it again as a source of inspiration.  From there the Austrian artists will take some more impressions and ideas along on their journey to Harare.

At the Book Café in Harare the quartet from Austria will meet some outstanding and open-minded Zimbabwean musicians for an extensive exchange. They will retreat for an intense rehearsal phase with a focus on Mbira music and its derivative forms such as Chimurenga and Mbira-inspired contemporary music styles.  Such dense and creative interaction will result in the formation of the cross-cultural Kunzwana # 1 ensemble, striking a balance between different styles and cultures and ready to excel in performances at the Book Café and Harare International Festival of the Arts (HIFA) 2014, and other venues in Southern Africa.  Further joint performances at music festivals in Austria in July 2014 are already in the pipeline.

Time's Up for Tales of Resilience - Itinerant Story Telling/Story Building in Southern Africa and Austria in 2014

Often it is an individual experience – wrapped up as a story – which eventually allows the reception of a past, the comprehension of the present and the formulation of a future. Furthermore, or in fact precisely because of and through that - stories enable an insight into „The Other“ - a view of the other life, the other culture, the other approach or mindset.  Apart from “The Other,” stories let us see “The Common”, similar values, familiar desires and kindred visions. Through listening to them and trying to understand them, stories make us more tolerant in our dealing with cultural differences and multiple identities, they bring us closer to each other and place the commonalities above the separations.

Tales of Resilience traces stories from people who travel and have traveled between regions, cultures and continents; people who move and have moved between their origins and other worlds. Tales of Resilience documents and shares their experiences, adventures and perceptions. The project archives what these people left behind them, what they have taken with them, what they collected and what they lost along the way.  Whether forced to move or by their own volition, whether for reasons of family, politics, religion or livelihood, the stories are tales of resilience, the many ways in which people react to their circumstances.

Tales of Resilience is an itinerant Story Telling/Story Building project by a group of Austrian and Zimbabwean artists in April / May 2014. The outcome of this collaboration between Time's Up, Austria-Zimbabwe Friendship Association, Pamberi Trust, local artists and art institutions will be presented in Southern Africa and back in Austria.

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