A Visit From Mzilikazi Khumalo

This past week, we had a visit from South African composer and teacher Mzilikazi Khumalo, the composer of Princess Magogo and this season's uShaka. More than a musician, he's a true statesman and was eager for culture exchange with the Chicago community. He held a workshop for Chicago Public Schools choral directors on Saturday and gave a brief talk at the South African Freedom Day celebration on Friday. He was as warm and insightful as I remembered from his 2004 trip when Ravinia presented the American premiere of his Princess Magogo, the world's first Zulu opera.

Some things I learned:

• Princess Magogo was the great-granddaughter of the great Zulu King Shaka in real life
• The "u" in "uShaka" is a Zulu point of grammar. When you are speaking about someone instead of directly to them, you would place the u in front of his or her name. So if I were writing in Zulu instead of English, I would be talking about uMzilikazi.
• Khumalo considers uShaka an epic cantata, and he created it to help set the record straight on the controversial but crucially important king who unified the Zulu tribes into one nation. Shaka has largely been painted as cruel and blood-thirsty, but Khumalo asserts that any deaths attributed to Shaka actually occurred during war.
• Western-style opera has developed a large and devoted following in South Africa. Movies, not so much.

---Nick Pullia, Director of Communications