Abdullah Ibrahim and the paradox of SA’s potential outcomes

On April 12, just about a month ago, I made a last-minute decision to fly to Cape Town to attend one of only two local performances of Abdullah Ibrahim’s “The Water from the Ancient Well” tour. Given that the incubation of our young democracy will once again be tested on May 29, it seemed particularly joyful to bear witness to one of SA’s greatest talents returning to the hallowed spaces of Cape Town City Hall, where he made his musical debut about 70 years ago, to perform live in front of almost 1,000 people.

After arriving 20 minutes early for the 8pm start to imbibe the sense of delight at being in the presence of other jazz admirers, I had the opportunity to see the paradox and predicament of SA’s future playing out within a relatively benign administrative failure.

I had bought my ticket from Ticketpro only the night before after seeing an advertisement for the concert that appeared in Business Day opposite an insightful piece regarding the electoral court’s recent decision to allow Jacob Zuma to stand as a candidate in the upcoming elections, written by the publication’s former editor, Peter Bruce. It seemed particularly irksome, then, that when I arrived at City Hall, it was to discover that the entire Row I, in which, according to my ticket, I was meant to be seated, had somehow been omitted in the layout of the floor. That is to say, physically there existed no row between rows H and J, though I and about 30 other people had been allocated seats there.

In the great flurry of activity as people entered the hall, I found myself observing with some displeasure a heated exchange between those people who had similarly realised that their seats did not exist, and the Ticketpro personnel who were desperately trying to find substitute spaces in which to place them at the sold-out concert.

By the grace of good luck, I was eventually seated in Row B, mere metres away from the stage, on the left of which was positioned a grand piano, and the grandmaster himself. The performance that ensued was beyond anything I’d previously witnessed, even by Abdullah Ibrahim himself. In my replacement seat, I was so close I could see his thin fingers trace the notes of Mannenberg, somehow fusing them with Tchaikovsky, Charlie Parker and Miles Davis in a kind of disjointed free-jazz style that echoed the groundbreaking album Bitches Brew. The double bassist and trombonist were at their peak, but the drum solo was the highlight of the evening.

Minor effect

At the end of the performance, the musicians waited on stage with patient respect for Abdullah Ibrahim as he slowly rose from the piano seat and took his place beside them to thunderous applause. When the standing ovation had finally ended and silence filled the room, Ibrahim raised his right hand across the right side of his face and began an incantation of a woeful slave song, instantly reminding me of the haunting stream-of-consciousness passages that appear in Toni Morrison’s classic Beloved, evoking the journey slaves endured aboard crowded ships from Africa to America. It was achingly beautiful.

As I left, making my way out through a crowd energised by the verve of the concert, it struck me that the administrative blunder with which the night had begun, though glaringly disruptive and even representative of a potentially destructive failure of systems, had ultimately been minor in its effect.

And it occurred to me that in some uncanny way, the events of the evening had somehow epitomised the current situation in SA at large. On the one hand, we have such incredible opportunity for original and authentic beauty, and yet on the other, this potential can so easily be undone by the indolence of poor administration.

When the day arrives on May 29, as difficult as it might be, we may have to put aside our frustration and anger with the failures that we have been subjected to, and vote with hope, peace, and joy in our hearts.

• Buckham is founder and president of Johannesburg-based international management consultancy Monocle Solutions.