Namibian traditional music and dance ensemble
Director – Dr Perminus Matiure
Since 2007, the organisers of the Orient festival have been going on cultural expeditions across Africa in search of living, authentic local musical traditions. Over the past few years, they have spent a particularly large amount of time in Namibia, where they discovered this exceptional folk ensemble.
Namibijos dykumos žvaigždės is a group of performers brought together by Dr Perminus Matiure, an ethnomusicologist and lecturer at the University of Namibia. Perminus brings the most talented musicians and dancers from different regions of Namibia to the Orient festival.
The concert programme features songs, dances and stories of the Oshiwambo, Aawambo, Tswana and Kavango peoples. Audiences will hear multi-part makwaira choral singing, traditional songs and rhythms accompanied by the mbira, nyunga-nyunga mbira, traditional drums, rattles and the chipendani, a mouth bow.
This concert is not “world music” adapted for European audiences. The organisers of the Orient festival discovered these performers while travelling through Africa itself, and their programme offers a chance to hear Namibia’s living traditions of music, dance and storytelling as they exist today.
The voices, rhythms and dances of the Namibian desert — together in one special evening at the Orient festival