South Africa Liberation Day: Dorothy Masuku
Saturday, April 27, 2002, 2-6pm

P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center and CrossPath Culture are pleased to host a performance by the internationally acclaimed performer Dorothy Masuku. One of the most popular and influential musicians in Africa, Dorothy Masuku has been performing for more than forty years and remains a driving force in the contemporary South African urban music scene. With Masuku’s performance on April 27th, South African Liberation Day, P.S.1 marks the closing of its current exhibition The Short Century: Independence and Liberation Movements in Africa, 1945-1994 on May 5th and celebrates the last colony - South Africa - to achieve independence.

The concert event will take place in the courtyard of P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, located at 22-25 Jackson Avenue in Long Island City, New York. New York-based musician Djo Bi Irrie Simon begins 2:00 pm with traditional West African drumming, followed by DJ Fumi, who crosses Afrobeat sounds with new and traditional global music in a new vision of African music. Dorothy Masuku’s performance will begin at 5:00 pm. In case of rain, performances will be held indoors. The event is free of charge for all visitors.

Dorothy Masuku was born in Zimbabwe, but soon moved to South Africa, where she established her musical career and is now revered as the "First Lady of Song." She began her recording career in 1951 singing her jazz-inflected marabai tunes: a fusion of swing and Zulu melodies, sung with great force and intensity.

Her earlier songs, most notably "Kutheni Zulu," were hard-edged and political, and in 1961, she was forced into exile from South Africa. As an exile, she worked on the cabaret circuit in London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Tanzania, Malawi, Uganda and Zimbabwe. She returned to Southern Africa in 1980 and ignited a revival of Southern African jazz. Along with Miriam Makeba and Hugh Masekela, Masuku performed in the travelling road show African Jazz and Variety and in the South African Broadway-style musical King Kong. She continues to write songs for Makeba and Masekela, and her hits such as "Madiba" and "Pata Pata" (the first African song to reach America's Top 10 pop charts) are a realization of her belief in music’s role in independence movements. Masuku received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the South African Music Awards in 2001 and is nominated for three South African Music Awards this year, including Best Jazz Album, and Best Female Vocalist. She will be honored by the AfroPop Radio Network with an induction into the AfroPop Hall of Fame at a benefit concert at the Bottom Line on April 29th, where Masuku will perform with Bonnie Raitt, Thomas Mfume, and the Mahotella Queens.


This event is organized by P.S.1 Contemporary Music Advisor Lokke Highstein and P.S.1 Director of Education and Public Programs Anthony Huberman with CrossPath Culture.

For more information about CrossPath Culture, please call Cannon Hersey at (212) 664-9795.

For more information, please contact Carolyn Bane in the P.S.1 Press Office: T: (718) 784-2084 ext. *827/ F: (718) 482-9454/ e-mail: press@ps1.org