Mzaza on the Art Boat | Brisbane Festival
“Encore! Encore!” gently demand a chorus of scattered voices from the audience in the aftermath of effusive applause. Understandably so. Mzaza’s set had lasted no longer than twenty minutes up until that point when that request, or rather, friendly protest was made. We wanted more. A bit more, at the very least.
“Is that legal, production team?” asks Pauline Maudy teasingly, almost ready to oblige. She is the lead songstress, confident in her artistry. Her impish sparkle is hard to ignore. She is playful and powerful. A captivating mix of irresistible charm and undeniable talent. The members of the six-piece band of masterful musicians have a really quick discussion before treating us to one more number. Lucky us.
This is precious world music which we are privy and privileged to witness in this intimate setting. The stage constructed on the bow of Brisbane’s Art Boat has encapsulated the ethos of folk music. The platform is within reach and a connection between the performers and the viewers is established almost instantaneously. I bear witness to dancing bodies in my midst whose hips are swaying and eyes closed as if in a trance, transported elsewhere while their feet stay rooted to the floorboards. Mzaza’s folk music, predominantly inspired by French-Balkan sounds, is aural and oral storytelling of and for the people by the people.
Refreshing, fiery, lively. The songs serve as odes to the extraordinary ordinariness of the everyday person. “I am the metro ticket puncher. The man that you don’t see,” were the first lines Maudy opened to. A fast-paced anthem embodying both the pent up frustration and the much needed cathartic release of the invisible worker. ‘The Birth and Death of Stars’ is the brainchild of Bosnian-born double bassist, Goran Gajic. Dedicated to the memory of Maudy’s late grandmother whose views on life, death, and nature have left an indelible mark on her consciousness, Maudy encourages us to relinquish control of the inevitable- the eventual passing of our loved ones.
Though sung in French, the songs are resonant on an emotional level. Love is after all universal. Maudy informs the crowd that she hails from France. The minor details reveal a bigger truth. Migration is one of humanity’s long-standing traditions and there is so much visceral beauty to experience when we embrace multiculturalism. The uniqueness of Mzaza’s rhapsodic offerings lies in its sheer existence – a testimony to the confluence of seemingly disparate elements and instruments which create seamless conversations among the artists as well as between them and the listeners. Violinist Greta Kelly’s passionate execution of the band’s original pieces is wonderful to watch and although it differs greatly in terms of how the other musicians (the percussionist, the accordionist, the guitarist, and the double bassist) deliver artistically, the synergy they share truly strengthens Mzaza’s ability to deftly navigate an exciting musical terrain of their own making.
Maudy sets the context for the band’s chosen final song. It is about a man on a motorbike who dies in a fiery wreck. “The only love he knew was in the womb,” she adds. These words are poignant and strike a chord with me. At a cellular level, all of our lives did begin in the wombs of our maternal grandmothers and all of us present were in the same boat literally and metaphorically, sharing time and space.
Images of Lindy Lee’s ‘The Sphere’s aboard the Art Boat. Credit: Atmosphere Photography
In that moment, I am overcome by a sense of kinship with my fellow passengers and though they are complete strangers to me, they are, first and foremost, sentient beings and souls of this world. Upon reflection that night, that feeling brought to mind an invaluable quote by Kaniyan Poongundranar, a Tamil poet and philosopher who lived in Tamil Nadu during the Sangam era (6th century BCE to 1st century CE).
‘Yaathum Oore Yaavarum Kelir’
Paraphrased in English, it means that every citizen in the world is my kith and kin.
Brisbane’s Art Boat was more than a thing of beauty as it cruised on Maiwar that evening. We moved across melodies and water bodies in more ways than one. The Art Boat was a vehicle of creative expression and the universality of humankind. Like the request for an encore, it demanded that we paid attention to all that surrounded us externally and filled us internally. The sky above demanded that we looked up at the stars, the waters beneath demanded that we considered its temperament and its stories inextricably linked to Aboriginal history and mythology. Visual artist Lindy Lee’s ‘Spheres’ demanded that we paused to appreciate beauty standing boldly before us. So did the stunning riverside homes which lined Breakfast Creek, Newstead, and Teneriffe. The haunting soundscape designed to facilitate mindfulness demanded that we listen to the unfamiliar so that we may be more open to receiving what may be foreign at first. The act of demanding never felt more mesmerizing than this magical night on the serpentine Brisbane River.
