Top 10 Things You Might Not Have Known About Thandiswa Mazwai 2019
Top 10 Things About You Have Not Know About Thandiswa Mazwai 2019 – Thandiswa Mazwai is hot news in South Africa and beyond. Striking and sassy, her career came to the national limelight around 1996.
The immensely popular singer shot to fame as the hip member of the equally popular Bongo Maffin. This was one of South Africa’s hardest Kwaito bands.
- Her lyrical compositions include Kwaito, Mbaqanga, traditional Xhosa rhythms, reggae, funk, and jazz. Mazwai straddles the rural and urban, effortlessly blending the modern with the traditional.
2. She is a sister to Nomsa Mazwai with whom they have a healthy sibling rivalry. She is also a sister to the poet Ntsiki Mazwai, who is an author, social activist, producer, and blogger.
3. Born in 1976 in Eastern Cape, Thandiswa Mazwai grew up in Soweto, Johannesburg. 1976 was also the year that witnessed the Soweto Uprising, and she grew up amidst the heavy apartheid-related township violence seen in South Africa in the 1980s.
4. Her parents were both anti-apartheid political activists and journalists. She recollects that their home was packed with articles, books, and full of political discussions. This was the environment that nurtured the young girl’s perspective as an artist.
5. The future star attended Wits University, studying International Relations and English literature. She claims that her inspiration came from her mother, who passed away when Thandiswa Mazwai was only 15 years old.
6. Other inspirations come from the works of people like Steve Biko, Frantz Fanon, Kwame Nkrumah, and Chinua Achebe.
7. The first attempt by this budding musician to get noticed was at the Shell Road Fame to Talent Show. She didn’t, sadly, even make it far as she failed to reach the semi-finals round.
8. After studying for a B.A. degree in international relations and English, she put all her school and church choir experience to great use making her professional singing debut at the Market Theatre in 1993 in a production called SA Love.
9. Thandiswa Mazwai songs are many and varied. Her musical compositions are often deeply political, and they include Mbaqanga, reggae, traditional rhythms, Kwaito, and funk as well as jazz sounds. For example, in 2009 she released an amazing Thandiswa Mazwai ibokwe album which featured songs like Thongo I am ( Iyeza ) and Ngimkhinzile.
10. She began her professional career with Bongo Maffin in 1998. This is counted among the pioneering Kwaito bands in South Africa. The band was widely recognized as the conscious voice for the youth in South Africa.
