South African Choral Music (Amakwaya): Song, Contest and the ...

238 Competition: Perfonnance, Meaning and Motivation
various members of the choral community will be given, largely in the words of the performers
themselves. Some critical comments will then follow:
In order to understand this development, we have to reconsider our discussion of the role
played by choral singing as a symbolic expression of black middle class identity (see Chapter 4.3.1,
page 112). Increasingly competitions became a platform for expressing the ideas and ideals of a
national culture. For a people largely without political or economic power, artistic excellence and its
exhibition became symbolically significant. An intense focus on competition is also noticeable in
other South African musical communities. Joseph Shabalala, leader of the internationally renowned
isicatham!Ja group, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, remembers:
In 1966 was the year when we first went to the hall for performances. During the years 1964-1965 we
just practiced after work, but we were not engaged in performances. Even then, going to the halls, I did
it because my group-mates were constantly begging me since they wanted to test and measure their capabilities,
since they have been practicing for so long that we should also go to other people and also enter
for competitions to test ourselves. s
The widespread interest in contest amongst various forms of South African performance culture
has its roots in the ttaditionallife of South African black communities.
5 Shabalala, J. quoted in V Erlmann, 1996: 290.
Figure 9.1: 5choof choir competition, Bizana, Eastern Cape, Mqy 2000