Mkhumbane

Mkhumbane is a folk musical in three acts by Alan Paton and Todd Matshikiza. "Mkhumbane" is the African name for Cato Manor.

The original text

A cantata for 200 voices, dealing with life in Cato Manor outside Durban. Based on a story by G. Naidoo. Todd Matshikiza composed a score ranging from a slick, westernized cabaret number, through "blues", "laments", and concerted numbers, to a highly exciting witch-doctor's "smelling-out" dance.

Performance history in South Africa

First performed in 1960, opening in March and playing for a few months before closing because of police harassment. It was decided to use a cast recruited from actual inhabitants of "Mkhumbane" (the African name for Cato Manor) and to dispense with a "pit" orchestra, employing instead a choir of more than a hundred voices. Produced by The South African Institute of Race Relations. Directed by Malcolm Woolfson. Musical Direction by Todd Matshikiza. Choreography by Dorothea McNair. Decor by Carol Marais.

Mkhumbane closed only after a few months in Durban. Of the play, David Coplan in In Township Tonight says: Though production difficulties, police harassment and mixed reviews combined to allow Mkhumbane only a short run, its particular uses of theme and musical dramatics made it an important forerunner of the popular working-class township theatre of the 1970s.”

Sources

Drum July 1950: 72; Kruger 1999: 96

https://www.flatinternational.org/template_volume.php?volume_id=158

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