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Joyful Noise Productions are taking us into a festive and unforgettable 2022 celebrating African Music
5 shows in the first 3 months of 2022 - sounds promising, doesn't it?
Continue to read on to find out more about the artists and to book your tickets.
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The Yoruba Women Choir will be at the Jazz Cafe on 7th January 2021
Described as Africa’s greatest vocal ensemble and renowned as one of Nigeria’s biggest musical exports, The Yoruba Women Choir always delivers a spectacular show bursting with passion and astounding power. Boasting eleven joyful singers who together create exquisite harmonies, the group is also backed by a six piece band playing traditional Yoruba rhythms and melodies that will keep you dancing all night long.
Yoruba Music was highly influential in the development of Afrobeat, Highlife and Afro-Cuban styles, making this an unmissable show for fans of Fela Kuti, Ebo Taylor or Buena Vista Social Club. Click below to book your ticket and get a feel of who they are.
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The Yoruba Women Choir - The Jazz Cafe
This show is a rescheduled show. All tickets from the previous date remain valid. Described as Africa's greatest vocal ensemble and renowned as one of Nigeria's biggest musical exports, The Yoruba ...
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Joyful Noise presents The Yoruba Women Choir on Sat 26 May 2018
Africa's greatest choir THE YORUBA WOMEN CHOIR live on Saturday 26 May in Brewhouse Arts Centre Taunton TA1 1JL.
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Afrocentrics will be a the Richmix on 25th January 2022, more info to come in the New Year.
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The Hi-Life orchestra will be at the Richmix on Tuesday 22nd February 2022, more info to come in the New Year.
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Osibisa will be at the RichMix on Tuesday 15th March 2022, more info to come in the New Year.
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Horns Unlimited will be at the RichMix on Wednesday 23rd March 2022, more info to come in the New Year.
Stay connected for more.
Afrolights - Shine your own light to banish the darkness
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The Afrolights
Christine Natasha Smith (see pic below) is a mother, artist, teacher and what she likes to call 'creator of magic'. The Afrolights are her current project, a dynamic duo (her children) who are on a mission to bring positivity and light to a world where darkness and doubt seeps into corners waiting to infect our youth - but with the right teaching - which the Afrolights are armed with, plus their innate powers, children can find the positivity from within and shine their own lights to banish the darkness.
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Christine Natasha Smith
The Melanin Lunchbox Project
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The Melanin Lunchbox Project
Lindon Rankin, Founder of Melanin Health & Wellness, recognised during the first lockdown that there seemed to be a lack of support for the local BME community.
Melanin Health & Wellness, a Southwark based community group supporting local ethnic diverse individuals and groups, started out of this, delivering shopping and medical prescriptions for the elderly, and then went on to provide culturally appropriate cooked meals for children receiving free school meals within the local BME communities, during the school holidays. This was the start of the Melanin Lunch Box project.
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Melanin Lunchbox Volunteer sorting out boxes that will be handed out to families receiving free school meals
Lindon (see pic below) has also been running (free) Health and Wellbeing sessions, fitness classes and most recently organised community events in collaboration with other community groups, and mental health and wellness programmes, providing opportunities to local people in order to help them to engage and improve both themselves, their lives and their community at large.
Lindon’s aspiration is to empower people, to come together, celebrate diversity, and for all of us to participate in building a more robust community.
“I always seek the opportunity to work with others and I have learnt by pulling together, we achieve together”, says Lindon.
He is pleased to highlight the support received from Berkeley Foundation in partnership with some of their present projects.
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Lindon, founder of Melanin Health and Wellness Project
Akyaaba Addai-Sebo - the architect of Black History Month in the UK
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Photo Credit: CNN
As we celebrate Black History Month in the UK, have you ever wondered who was the mastermind of it. Well, his architect is Ghanaian born Akyaaba Addai-Sebo. After visiting the US in the 1970s and being inspired by the Black History Month US held in February, Akyaaba Addai-Sebo initiated Black History Month in the UK in 1987, which is celebrated in October. Its initial aim was to support Black children sense of self esteem and social construct. October was chosen because it was shortly after the UK summer vacation and was the traditional harvest period and time when African leaders gathered to settle differences and appraise the state of the community.
Akyaaba Addai-Sebo also worked to promote diversity in a variety of roles for organizations including the Greater London Council, African Refugees Housing Action Group, Notting Hill Carnival, and Organization of African Unity. In 2014, he was executive producer of "One Humanity," a documentary on the 1988 and 1990 Wembley concerts for Nelson Mandela.
For further reading: Akyaaba Addai-Sebo - Black History Month 2021
A cosy chat with Noel McKoy about the origins of Black British Music
Flashback to a special interview with Soul singer, songwriter and musician Noel McKoy where he shares with Caro Sika his earliest memories of Black British Music talking about Lovers Rock, Reggae, Soul artists and more.
Click below to watch the interview.
Noel McKoy is a British-based soul music singer. His music is a collection of soul, R&B, gospel, funk and Northern soul. Born in South London, he fronted the James Taylor Quartet in the early 1990s and has worked and duetted with several artists such as Chaka Khan, Gladys Knight, Cliff Richard, Lenny Henry, Jessie J, Mica Paris, Beverley Knight and his favourite - Stevie Wonder, as well as being known as the Dutch Pot owner, a nightclub located in London. He is currently part of the British Collective and also continues to tour and collaborate on a number of musical projects, one of the most recent being an international production with EEDB in collaboration with artists from Brazil and the US called "What are we gonna do? "
Click below to watch the video clip
Click below for more info on Noel McKoy
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Mi-Soul Soulful Sundays Season presents Noel McKoy with DJs Ronnie Herel & Gordon Mac Noel McKoy is an internationally renowned singer, songwriter and producer. With over forty years in the ...
The origins of the Kora
Tiramagan Traoré was a general of the great Soundjata Keïta, founder of the Mandinka empire, also referred to as the Mali Empire at the end of the twelfth century through to the sixteenth century.
The story goes that Tiramagan Traoré went to the heights of Kabul (present-day Guinea-Bissau which was formerly a territory of Gambia) with his griot Djelimadou Woulen Diabate and two hunters. During this expedition, Tiramagan spotted a Jinn, in front of a cave, which is a spirit in a form of a woman, living in the mountains. When she saw the expedition, the Jinn became frightened and took refuge in the cave.
Back home, Tiramagan told Waligelenjan, a descendant of Kamisoko, about his adventure. All decided to leave the next morning with a fishing net in order to catch this famous Jinn. When they arrived on the scene, the spirit woman was sitting in front of the cave. Immediately, the hunters launched the net on her to capture her. She, once more, took refuge in the cave and came out with a Kora. Tiramagan married this very beautiful woman and gave the Kora to his griot since he was a nobleman and wasn't permitted to play it. Djelimadou Woulen then exclaimed: "Nobleman, that's an instrument of ours, which belongs to the Mandika people".
It is from this story that the Kora, a stringed instrument of twenty-two strings with crystal sounds, draws its feminine gender. The first person to play it was this griot. When he died, in his honour, a string was removed. Since this time, the Kora has twenty-one leather strings. From the time of the first griot Djélimadou Woulen Diabaté, the Kora has been transmitted from Father to Son and has known more than 70 generations of griots.
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Here is below an interview that took place at the Jazz Cafe couple of years back with a griot from the Cissokho family "Diabel Cissokho" by Caro Sika. Enjoy :)
Meet musician and entrepreneur MIC ASSASSIN
"Music is my first love, the first thing I actually fell in love with" - Mic Assassin.
Following a 6-month Caribbean holiday which turned into an 8-year hiatus from music, Mic Assassin returns once again with more hunger, focus, and renewed vision.
Musician, Entrepreneur, Director, and Lover of life are the words, which most astutely describe this street-savvy South Londoner. Being disheartened and disillusioned with the politics of the music industry, his time away from music was productively spent setting up entrepreneurial ventures including a visual production company ‘FWD360’ under which Mic directed & edited over 100 projects for global brands, charities, and many grassroots organisations and independent artists.
But what is a man to do when his childhood dream and passion for creating music just won’t go away?
“I thought about it all the time, envisioning myself performing to massive concert venues. I wrote down everything even the thoughts I'm scared to say out loud. I’d hum melodies into voice recorders then start piecing the tracks together. Inspiration can come at any time of the day, I just have to stop everything and be on it when it does”.
From the tender age of 9 rapping in school assemblies to a 16-year-old appearing in magazines like The Face and The Fader, to an 18-year-old setting up his own record label selling CD’s hand to hand, Mic knows the true meaning of dream chasing.
Inspired by the hustle and grind of US / UK Indie labels such as Roc-a-fella, No Limit, So Solid and 57th Dynasty, Mic and his team learned and perfected the art of hand to hand selling moving units of CDs around their Lewisham college campus and outside popular music venues.
In love with the art of freestyling and eruptive crowd energy, Mic entered many "open mic" and Mc Battle competitions winning many of them and eventually being crowned Jump Off’s 2005 UK Street Battle Champion. This journey of gladiatorial words took Mic around the UK and USA where he would cross paths in combat with the likes of Professor Green, Lowkey and Iron Solomon.
The buzz around Mic Assassin grew and lead on to great coverage with live performances and Interviews on Kiss 100 FM (Shortee Blitz & Big Ted), BBC Radio (Ace & Vis, Twin B, Ras Kwame) and Dan Greenpeace (Xfm / Capital radio). His witty off the head freestyles lead Mic to feature on MTV’s Barrio 19 and host a part-time Hip Hop show “Mic Check With Mic Assassin” on BBC’s Asian Network.
Returning back with renewed focus and love for music-making, combining the visual and business skills learned within the 8-year gap period he is funnelling this new artillery into his new music.
With a more mature sound and reflective disposition Mic is open to all possibilities that may come his way.
“The most important thing this time around is having fun, travelling, connecting with people and making the best music I can. I’m legacy-building right now, building a foundation that can outlive me. I have many creative visuals, films, business ideas it’s all one, it’s all me and they intertwine with each other, but music is my first love and I’ve missed it. I am a better person when I'm making music, I feel like me again”.
Click below to download and listen to the new single release:
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Home page of Mic Assassin, a hip hop artist from London. Musician + Entrepreneur + Director
Click below to watch the video
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Meet Franck and Lucia, owner of SACO Superfoods
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Franck and Lucia, owners of SACO Superfoods in Salford, UK
SACO Superfoods is run by husband and wife, Franck and Lucia. They ethically source natural and highly nutritious ingredients from West Africa while empowering small-scale men and women producers in the Ivory Coast.
Through their health food shop in Salford, they promote a healthy, ethical, and sustainable lifestyle in their community. In addition, they support other local businesses by stocking their products to strengthen the local economy and create a welcoming space where customers can learn about the health benefits of African products, do a bit of shopping and relax with a friend over a drink and a healthy snack in their sitting area.
Click on link below to shop at SACO SUPERFOODS and get your 10% Blackoutday discount using Promo Code: BOD10# on 07.07.2021.
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Natural and Ethically sourced products | SACO Superfoods
Discover a selection of natural and ethically sourced products. Superfoods, Cocoa Products, Baobab jams, Chocolate bars, and gift sets. Order online!
Click on link below to find out more about SACO SUPERFOODS
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Health Food Shop | SACO Superfoods Salford
SACO Superfoods offers you natural and highly nutritious ingredients ethically sourced from cooperatives of small-scale women producers in West Africa. Visit our shop or order online
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Meet Joss, the founder of JOSSY CARE
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Joss Simmons, the founder of Jossy Care
Described as the UK's leading "Super Manny", Joss Simmons grew up in a town called Hackney in London, UK and is taking modern childcare to the next level, defying the odds to give back to the next generation.
As a child, witnessing his mother suffer domestic violence had a profound effect on Joss and he knows only to well where many children, who have odds stacked against them, end up. That led him to create his own childcare service, Jossy Care.
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Joss with two of his young learners
His positive approach is what is gaining him the attention of parents, practitioners, the media and as a childcare practitioner, Joss is also keen to address stereotypes in the childcare industry. Hence, Joss has spoken out on the topic of male nannies being refused jobs on the basis of their gender and the difficulty they face.
In 2017, Joss gave his first public talk about his experience and hasn't looked back ever since. Multi talented Joss is now frequently invited to deliver motivational talks on topics such as depression, domestic violence, children and the future.
Joss recently featured in Time out, Hackney Gazette and East London Radio. He has also won the National Diversity Award 2019 and is currently up for Best Social Media Nanny with Nanny UK Nanny.
Click on link below to vote for Joss Cambridge-Simmons as Best Social Media Nanny:
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"Mother Nature," Angelique Kidjo's newest album out now!
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New album Mother Nature out now!
The album "Mother Nature" is a love letter to Mother Earth and all the values that humanity holds dear: truth, trust, love, connection. 'If there's anything the pandemic has taught us, it's that we are all a part of the same ecosystem—this planet is all we have' says Angelique Kidjo.
The song 'Mother Nature' features artist Sting and many other artists guests joined Angelique Kidjo on the album such as: Yemi Alade, Burna Boy, Mr Eazi, Salif Keita, Shungudzo, Sampa The Great, GhettoBoy, EarthGang, ZEYNAB, Matthieu, Chedid, - M - Lionel Loueke, and many more!
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