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“If you talk about Miriam Makeba in South Africa, it’s akin to referring about a queen,” remarks Alesandra Seutin. Known as the Empress of African Song, the iconic artist additionally spent time in Greenwich Village with renowned musicians like Miles Davis and Duke Ellington. Starting as a young person sent to work to support her family in Johannesburg, she later served as an envoy for the nation, then Guinea’s representative to the UN. An outspoken anti-apartheid activist, she was married to a activist. This rich life and legacy inspire Seutin’s new production, Mimi’s Shebeen, scheduled for its British debut.

The Fusion of Dance, Music, and Spoken Word

The show merges movement, live music, and oral storytelling in a stage work that isn’t a straightforward biodrama but utilizes her past, especially her experience of banishment: after moving to New York in 1959, she was prohibited from South Africa for three decades due to her opposition to segregation. Subsequently, she was banned from the United States after marrying activist Stokely Carmichael. The show is like a ritual of remembrance, a deconstructed funeral – some praise, some festivity, part provocation – with the fabulous vocalist the performer leading bringing Makeba’s songs to vibrant life.

Strength and elegance … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In South Africa, a shebeen is an under-the-radar gathering place for locally made drinks and animated discussions, usually managed by a shebeen queen. Makeba’s mother the matriarch was a proprietress who was detained for illegally brewing alcohol when Makeba was 18 days old. Incapable of covering the penalty, she was incarcerated for six months, taking her infant with her, which is how her remarkable journey started – just one of the things the choreographer discovered when researching her story. “So many stories!” says she, when they met in the city after a performance. Seutin’s father is Belgian and she was raised there before moving to learn and labor in the UK, where she established her dance group the ensemble. Her parent would perform Makeba’s songs, such as Pata Pata and Malaika, when Seutin was a youngster, and move along in the living room.

Songs of freedom … the artist performs at the venue in 1988.

A ten years back, Seutin’s mother had cancer and was in medical care in London. “I stopped working for a quarter to look after her and she was constantly requesting Miriam Makeba. She was so happy when we were performing as one,” she recalls. “There was ample time to kill at the hospital so I began investigating.” As well as learning of her victorious homecoming to South Africa in the year, after the release of Nelson Mandela (whom she had met when he was a legal professional in the 1950s), she found that Makeba had been a someone who overcame illness in her youth, that Makeba’s daughter Bongi passed away in labor in the year, and that because of her banishment she hadn’t been able to attend her own mother’s memorial. “You see people and you focus on their achievements and you overlook that they are struggling like anyone else,” says Seutin.

Creation and Concepts

These reflections contributed to the making of the production (premiered in the city in 2023). Thankfully, her parent’s treatment was effective, but the concept for the piece was to honor “loss, existence, and grief”. Within that, Seutin pulls out elements of her life story like memories, and references more broadly to the theme of displacement and dispossession today. While it’s not explicit in the performance, Seutin had in mind a second protagonist, a modern-day Miriam who is a traveler. “Together, we assemble as these other selves of characters connected to the icon to welcome this young migrant.”

Rhythms of exile … performers in the show.

In the show, rather than being inebriated by the shebeen’s local drink, the multi-talented performers appear possessed by rhythm, in harmony with the players on the platform. Seutin’s choreography includes multiple styles of movement she has learned over the years, including from Rwanda, South Africa and Senegal, plus the global performers’ own vocabularies, including street styles like krump.

A celebration of resilience … Alesandra Seutin.

She was surprised to find that some of the newer, international in the group didn’t already know about the singer. (She passed away in 2008 after having a heart attack on the platform in the country.) Why should younger generations learn about Mama Africa? “I think she would inspire young people to advocate what they believe in, speaking the truth,” remarks Seutin. “However she did it very gracefully. She expressed something poignant and then perform a lovely melody.” Seutin wanted to take the same approach in this production. “Audiences observe dancing and listen to beautiful songs, an aspect of enjoyment, but mixed with powerful ideas and moments that hit. This is what I admire about her. Since if you are shouting too much, people won’t listen. They back away. Yet she did it in a manner that you would receive it, and understand it, but still be graced by her ability.”

• The performance is showing in the city, the dates