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“Discussing about the legendary singer in the nation, it’s akin to referring about a queen,” remarks the choreographer. Referred to as Mama Africa, the iconic artist also spent time in New York with renowned musicians like Miles Davis and Duke Ellington. Beginning as a young person sent to work to provide for her relatives in the city, she eventually became a diplomat for Ghana, then the country’s official delegate to the UN. An vocal campaigner against segregation, she was the wife to a Black Panther. This remarkable story and impact motivate the choreographer’s latest work, Mimi’s Shebeen, scheduled for its UK premiere.

The Fusion of Movement, Sound, and Narration

Mimi’s Shebeen merges dance, instrumental performances, and oral storytelling in a theatrical piece that isn’t a simple biography but draws on her past, especially her experience of banishment: after relocating to New York in 1959, she was prohibited from her homeland for 30 years due to her opposition to segregation. Subsequently, she was excluded from the US after wedding Black Panther activist Stokely Carmichael. The show is like a ceremonial tribute, a reimagined memorial – some praise, some festivity, part provocation – with a fabulous South African singer Tutu Puoane leading reviving Makeba’s songs to dynamic existence.

Power and poise … the production.

In the country, a informal gathering spot is an under-the-radar gathering place for locally made drinks and animated discussions, usually managed by a host. Makeba’s mother the matriarch was a shebeen queen who was detained for producing drinks without permission when Makeba was 18 days old. Unable to pay the penalty, Christina was incarcerated for half a year, taking her infant with her, which is how Miriam’s eventful life started – just one of the details the choreographer discovered when studying her story. “So many stories!” exclaims she, when we meet in Brussels after a performance. Her father is from Belgium and she was raised there before moving to learn and labor in the United Kingdom, where she founded her dance group the ensemble. Her South African mother would sing Makeba’s songs, such as the tunes, when Seutin was a youngster, and move along in the living room.

Songs of freedom … the artist performs at the venue in 1988.

A ten years back, Seutin’s mother had the illness and was in hospital in London. “I stopped working for a quarter to take care of her and she was always requesting the singer. She was so happy when we were singing together,” she remembers. “There was ample time to pass at the facility so I started researching.” As well as reading about her victorious homecoming to South Africa in the year, after the freedom of the leader (whom she had encountered when he was a young lawyer in the 1950s), Seutin discovered that Makeba had been a someone who overcame illness in her youth, that Makeba’s daughter the girl passed away in labor in 1985, and that because of her banishment she hadn’t been able to be present at her parent’s memorial. “You see people and you focus on their achievements and you overlook that they are facing challenges like anyone else,” says Seutin.

Creation and Concepts

All these thoughts went into the making of the show (premiered in Brussels in 2023). Fortunately, her parent’s treatment was effective, but the concept for the piece was to honor “loss, existence, and grief”. In this context, Seutin highlights elements of her life story like memories, and nods more broadly to the idea of uprooting and loss nowadays. While it’s not explicit in the performance, Seutin had in mind a additional character, a modern-day Miriam who is a migrant. “And we gather as these other selves of personas linked with the icon to greet this newcomer.”

Rhythms of exile … musicians in Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the show, rather than being intoxicated by the shebeen’s local drink, the skilled performers appear possessed by beat, in synthesis with the players on stage. Her choreography includes various forms of movement she has learned over the years, including from African nations, plus the global performers’ personal styles, including urban dances like krump.

Honoring strength … Alesandra Seutin.

Seutin was surprised to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the cast were unaware about the artist. (She died in the year after having a cardiac event on the platform in Italy.) Why should new audiences learn about the legend? “In my view she would inspire young people to advocate what they are, expressing honesty,” remarks the choreographer. “But she did it very gracefully. She expressed something meaningful and then perform a lovely melody.” Seutin wanted to take the similar method in this work. “We see movement and hear melodies, an aspect of entertainment, but mixed with powerful ideas and instances that resonate. That’s what I respect about Miriam. Since if you are being overly loud, people won’t listen. They back away. Yet she did it in a way that you would accept it, and understand it, but still be blessed by her ability.”

• The performance is showing in the city, the dates