Kelebogile

In 2024 spent a day with AI. From interview to sound check to backstage. From frustrating whats-the-point esoteric conversations, to ill tempered and commanding in sound check (he demanded a PR person leave) to a frail rambling of a tired old man backstage after a 2 hour set.

Mahalia Jackson sang Come Sunday at Duke Ellington's Sacred Concert series. AI had a small organising role at the New York concert as part of Ellingtons crew. youtu.be/21x8joCPcBk?si=B4ZY…

Since about then I had a private but arms length relationship with AI. When I hosted a night time show on Cape Talk he'd listen from Munich Germany and call in. "AI, Munich" he'd sign off. Over a period on Sunday mornings he'd text. "Come Sunday, Mahalia Jackson"

But musically, Dollar was perfect. A 2016 surprise pop-up concert in the Cape Town CBD was bliss. Construction stopped. The wind died. Office work halted. And people left their buildings to listen while AI held church.

Adolf Brand's father died when he was 4. “It is not me. My name is Sentso; my father is MoSotho.” It was his grandmother, he went on, “who gave me this identity, so that I could have an easier passage [in life]," he told me.

I know enough around the mind impact of a lack of identity, the impact of apartheid, a life in exile. How a mental state results in partners, children, friends become victims. For ones hero to be less than perfect. Patriarchy must never excused. But musically Dollar was perfect.

Abdullah Ibrahim was a difficult man to interview. He spoke in parable. In metaphor. In metaphysics. You could not pin him down. I later found he was a very difficult. Period. The first time I bumped into him walking anonymously on Plein street circa 2003 he literally growled.