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“When you speak about Miriam Makeba in South Africa, it’s akin to referring about a sovereign,” remarks the choreographer. Called Mama Africa, the iconic artist also spent time in Greenwich Village with renowned musicians like Miles Davis and Duke Ellington. Beginning as a young person dispatched to labor to provide for her relatives in Johannesburg, she eventually served as an envoy for the nation, then the country’s official delegate to the UN. An vocal anti-apartheid activist, she was married to a activist. Her rich story and impact inspire the choreographer’s latest work, Mimi’s Shebeen, set for its UK premiere.

A Blend of Dance, Music, and Spoken Word

The show combines dance, instrumental performances, and oral storytelling in a stage work that isn’t a simple biography but draws on her past, particularly her experience of banishment: after relocating to the city in 1959, she was barred from South Africa for 30 years due to her opposition to segregation. Subsequently, she was excluded from the United States after marrying Black Panther activist Stokely Carmichael. The performance is like a ceremonial tribute, a deconstructed funeral – part eulogy, part celebration, part provocation – with the exceptional vocalist the performer leading reviving Makeba’s songs to vibrant life.

Power and poise … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the country, a informal gathering spot is an under-the-radar venue for locally made drinks and lively conversation, usually presided over by a shebeen queen. Makeba’s mother Christina was a shebeen queen who was arrested for illegally brewing alcohol when Miriam was a newborn. Unable to pay the penalty, Christina was incarcerated for six months, bringing her infant with her, which is how Miriam’s remarkable journey began – just one of the things Seutin learned when studying Makeba’s life. “Numerous tales!” says she, when we meet in Brussels after a show. Seutin’s parent is Belgian and she was raised there before moving to learn and labor in the United Kingdom, where she established her company Vocab Dance. Her South African mother would sing her music, such as the tunes, when she was a youngster, and dance to them in the living room.

Melodies of liberation … the artist performs at Wembley Stadium in the year.

A ten years back, her parent had the illness and was in hospital in the city. “I stopped working for a quarter to look after her and she was constantly requesting Miriam Makeba. She was so happy when we were performing as one,” Seutin remembers. “I had so much time to kill at the hospital so I started researching.” As well as learning of Makeba’s triumphant return to South Africa in 1990, after the release of Nelson Mandela (whom she had encountered when he was a young lawyer in the 1950s), Seutin found that she had been a breast cancer survivor in her teens, that Makeba’s daughter Bongi passed away in childbirth in 1985, and that due to her exile she could not be present at her own mother’s memorial. “Observing individuals and you look at their achievements and you forget that they are facing challenges like anyone else,” states the choreographer.

Development and Themes

These reflections went into the creation of the show (premiered in the city in 2023). Fortunately, her parent’s therapy was successful, but the idea for the piece was to celebrate “loss, existence, and grief”. Within that, she pulls out threads of her life story like flashbacks, and references more generally to the idea of uprooting and loss nowadays. While it’s not overt in the show, Seutin had in mind a additional character, a contemporary version who is a migrant. “Together, we assemble as these alter egos of personas linked with the icon to greet this newcomer.”

Rhythms of exile … performers in Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the show, rather than being intoxicated by the shebeen’s local drink, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in synthesis with the musicians on the platform. Her choreography incorporates multiple styles of dance she has learned over the time, including from Rwanda, South Africa and Senegal, plus the international cast’ own vocabularies, including urban dances like the form.

A celebration of resilience … the creator.

She was surprised to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the cast didn’t already know about the singer. (She died in the year after having a cardiac event on stage in Italy.) Why should younger generations learn about Mama Africa? “In my view she would inspire the youth to stand for what they are, expressing honesty,” says Seutin. “However she did it very elegantly. She expressed something meaningful and then perform a lovely melody.” Seutin wanted to adopt the same approach in this work. “Audiences observe dancing and hear beautiful songs, an element of entertainment, but mixed with strong messages and moments that resonate. This is what I admire about Miriam. Because if you are being overly loud, people won’t listen. They back away. But she did it in a manner that you would accept it, and hear it, but still be blessed by her ability.”

• The performance is showing in the city, 22-24 October