Wednesday 3 November 2021, 7.30pm
Delighted to welcome back Stella Chiweshe to OTO after the release of new album "Ambuya!“ earlier this year.
Despite the lockdown and all that jazz, it's been a busy couple of years for the 74-year-old Stella Chiweshe. She played a solid amount of these "socially distanced" pop-up open-air shows, streamed concerts over the interwebs, prepared the reissue of her first internationally released album „Ambuya!“ (originally from 1987) and worked on a crowdfunding campaign securing money for her new centre of traditional Shona arts in the Zimbabwean countryside.
Still a breathtakingly powerful and highly spiritual performer, Chiweshe reclaimed the throne of the "Queen of Mbira" after the release of a collection of early singles named "Kasahwa" on Glitterbeat late in 2018. Her traditional "Mbira" music (the word is both categorizing the instrument and the style) is a medium to establish contact with the spirits of the deceased ancestors and thus also able to bring about community among the listeners.