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“Discussing about the legendary singer in the nation, it’s akin to referring about a royal figure,” remarks Alesandra Seutin. Called the Empress of African Song, the iconic artist also spent time in New York with renowned musicians like prominent artists. Beginning as a young person dispatched to labor to provide for her relatives in the city, she later became a diplomat for Ghana, then Guinea’s representative to the United Nations. An outspoken campaigner against segregation, she was married to a activist. Her rich story and impact inspire the choreographer’s new production, the performance, set for its British debut.

The Blend of Dance, Music, and Spoken Word

Mimi’s Shebeen combines dance, live music, and oral storytelling in a theatrical piece that is not a simple biography but utilizes Makeba’s history, particularly her experience of banishment: after relocating to New York in 1959, she was barred from her homeland for three decades due to her anti-apartheid stance. Subsequently, she was excluded from the United States after marrying Black Panther activist Stokely Carmichael. The show resembles a ritual of remembrance, a deconstructed funeral – some praise, part celebration, some challenge – with the fabulous vocalist Tutu Puoane at the centre bringing Makeba’s songs to dynamic existence.

Strength and elegance … the production.

In the country, a informal gathering spot is an under-the-radar gathering place for home-brewed liquor and lively conversation, often managed by a shebeen queen. Makeba’s mother Christina was a proprietress who was arrested for producing drinks without permission when Makeba was a newborn. Incapable of covering the fine, Christina was incarcerated for half a year, taking her infant with her, which is how her remarkable journey began – just one of the details the choreographer learned when studying her story. “So many stories!” exclaims she, when we meet in the city after a performance. Her father is from Belgium and she was raised there before moving to learn and labor in the United Kingdom, where she founded her company the ensemble. Her parent would sing her music, such as Pata Pata and Malaika, when Seutin was a child, and move along in the home.

Songs of freedom … Miriam Makeba performs at Wembley Stadium in 1988.

A ten years back, Seutin’s mother had cancer and was in hospital in London. “I paused my career for a quarter to take care of her and she was constantly asking for the singer. She was so happy when we were singing together,” she recalls. “I had so much time to kill at the hospital so I began investigating.” In addition to learning of her victorious homecoming to South Africa in 1990, after the release of the leader (whom she had met when he was a legal professional in the era), she discovered that she had been a someone who overcame illness in her teens, that her child Bongi passed away in labor in 1985, and that because of her exile she could not attend her parent’s funeral. “You see people and you look at their achievements and you overlook that they are struggling like everyone,” says Seutin.

Development and Concepts

All these thoughts went into the creation of the show (first staged in the city in 2023). Thankfully, her parent’s therapy was successful, but the idea for the work was to celebrate “loss, existence, and grief”. Within that, she pulls out threads of Makeba’s biography like memories, and references more broadly to the theme of uprooting and loss today. Although it’s not overt in the performance, she had in mind a second protagonist, a contemporary version who is a traveler. “And we gather as these alter egos of characters connected to the icon to greet this young migrant.”

Rhythms of exile … musicians in Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the show, rather than being inebriated by the shebeen’s home-brew, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in synthesis with the players on the platform. Seutin’s dance composition incorporates multiple styles of dance she has absorbed over the time, including from Rwanda, South Africa and Senegal, plus the global performers’ personal styles, including urban dances like krump.

A celebration of resilience … Alesandra Seutin.

She was surprised to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the group didn’t already know about the artist. (She died in 2008 after having a cardiac event on the platform in the country.) Why should new audiences discover Mama Africa? “I think she would motivate young people to stand for what they are, expressing honesty,” remarks Seutin. “But she did it very elegantly. She’d say something poignant and then sing a beautiful song.” Seutin wanted to take the same approach in this work. “We see movement and hear melodies, an aspect of entertainment, but intertwined with strong messages and moments that hit. This is what I admire about Miriam. Because if you are shouting too much, people won’t listen. They retreat. Yet she achieved it in a way that you would accept it, and understand it, but still be graced by her talent.”

• The performance is showing in London, the dates