Orpheus McAdoo and his Jubilee Singers make a triumphant return to South Africa under the helm of director David Kramer.
THE FINE ensemble singing in David Kramer’s latest musical is just one of many highlights.
The staging at The Fugard Theatre is richly evocative of times gone by with digitally projected photographs of very specific old buildings creating a rich sense of nostalgia, as do the costumes and sets.
Telling the story of Orpheus McAdoo and his troupe of Virginia Jubilee Singers who travelled around the UK, South Africa and Australia just before the turn of the previous century, this not only features an engrossing storyline, but also a complicated comment on social history.
The historic lesson comes in not only in terms of the progress of the troupe around the countries, but in terms of references like how the Sarie Marie folk song came about. Differences between old-school minstrels, coons and the more religiously-oriented Jubilee singers, vaudeville and even ragtime are also introduced.
Choir mistress Lucy Moten (Levenberg) serves as narrator of sorts, addressing the audience, explaining the train of events. She provides insight into how people may have seen what he was doing, but the story revolves around McAdoo (Poo).
While the ensemble’s singing is very strong, some of them are still stiff on the acting side, something time will sort out. No one character stands out, though Balie and Dladla are noticeable as the comic relief thanks to good timing.
Poo is in fine voice, impressing especially with his rendition of The Mirror. Many of the songs are re-workings of older songs, though Kramer has also written new music, including this one.
Right at the beginning a song entitled Home Sweet Home, sung by Mattie Allen (Kenned) bears a melodic resemblance to a tune from Ghoema. This should not be surprising, seeing as the McAdoo character and his influence on the music of the Cape is mentioned in that musical too.
There is a great sense of poignancy at work here and Orpheus in Africa, so early on in its genesis, is by far one of the most coherent and narratively strong works that Kramer has worked on in a while. Sometimes he takes a while to really hit his stride when starting something new, taking a while to fine-tune a concept. Not this time. This time around the work is narratively cohesive, though the last scene of the ending is extremely abrupt.
While drawing on the conventions of a musical, with people dropping into song every few sentences and even dancing their way out of trouble, Orpheus in Africa also draws on complex themes which still resonate today.
McAdoo struggled to reconcile his need to prove his sophistication, education and worth as a black performer when the mostly white audiences only seemed to want him to play the coon.
Changing audience tastes warred with his sense of dignity and this mirrors the greater contradictions black artists faced at the time – negotiating the conventions of a form which denigrated them while playing to both the white and black audiences who got very different messages from their performances – which is still a complicated issue today.
Had he lived beyond 42, McAdoo may have influenced the entertainment industry of the early 1900s into a very different direction, is the idea you are left with, after an enjoyable evening of song.