Retracing footsteps of township music

Township Music is essentially the Zimbabwean people’s interpretation of jazz. It has its origins in the townships, then the high-density suburbs of Salisbury, now Harare, and mainly in Mzilikazi in Bulawayo in the 1930s. These townships were created for African residents during Rhodesia’s urbanisation.
The documentary follows the publication of a book by the same name by Jenje-Makwenda herself which was an research and insight into the history of township music in Zimbabwe.
Initially, the research consisted of interviews of musicians who had been popular during the 1930s to the 1960s with the objective to better understand the entertainment culture of earlier generations of urban Zimbabweans. Having done the research, Jenje-Makwenda’s passionate ambition has been to document it in the form of a film.
Meanwhile, the Spain Embassy which has been at the forefront of supporting the arts in the country, is “calling for proposals to consolidate its cultural centre as an excellent meeting point, training centre and a place of interchange for the diverse cultural agents and critics from Zimbabwe and Spain,” the Spanish Embassy cultural attache Marina Garcia said in a statement.