Mozambique: Casimiro Nhussi premières ‘Komba kwa Índico’, broadcast live on International Dance Day

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Mozambique: Casimiro Nhussi premières ‘Komba kwa Índico’, broadcast live on International Dance Day

1:06 CAT | 28 Apr 2022

FILE - Illustrative photo. 'Kwomba kwa Índico' expresses the cultural mosaic of Mozambique in a mixture of music, dance, poetry and theatre. Actress Lucrécia Paco, writer Paulina Chiziane, musicians Muzila, Xixel Langa, Dodó and Stewart Sukuma and dancer Lulu Sala are among the guest artists. [File photo: RM]

On International Dance Day, the Agency for the Support, Development and Promotion of Mozambican Culture (VINA) is presenting ‘Komba kwa Índico’, choreographed by Cassimiro Nhussi, at the Studio Auditorium of Televisão de Moçambique (TVM) in Maputo.

The performance celebrates international Dance Day, marked on April 29 all over the world, and results of a partnership between VINA, Chitará Produções, Televisão de Moçambique and Rádio Moçambique (RM). It will be broadcast live on the main public media outlets across the country.

With a forty-year career as a dancer, choreographer and musician, always concerned with conveying a profound sense of Mozambicanity and Africanness, Casimiro Nhussi presents this time a work meant to inspire joy, perseverance, hope and confidence in the future of the Mozambican people.

‘Kwomba kwa Índico’ expresses the cultural mosaic of Mozambique in a mixture of music, dance, poetry and theatre. Actress Lucrécia Paco, writer Paulina Chiziane, musicians Muzila, Xixel Langa, Dodó and Stewart Sukuma and dancer Lulu Sala are among the guest artists.

The diversity of the performers mirrors the demands of the piece itself, driven by the desire to sing messages on a wealth to be explored, as a country and people.

“The best way to describe this piece is to speak about it as the song of the people. It is the song or the smile of the people. A poem of encouragement, a poem of recognition of the values we have,” says Casimiro Nhussi, for whom, in the midst of various adversities, the people and the country need positive energies to keep going, finding in dance the perfect space to express this feeling.

“This dance is about the importance of raising morale. Of supporting each other, young or old, away from negative thoughts that say that the country is in bad shape. Yes, it is bad, there is no doubt, but let us look at the stair steps ahead of us. Because there are good things, especially at this moment in which we come out of this pandemic. We have to raise our morale, our energy to keep on building the country, because it is under construction. There are these in-betweens, but we have to look at the happy, positive side that the country, not just sadness, terrorism. We have a bright side to look at and be proud of,” Nhussi explains.

Nhussi understands that, in the two years or so of sacrifices to which the pandemic has subjected the whole of society, but also looking at what has been happening in the country in the last five years, the terrorism and socio-economic difficulties, the people still knew how to strive to keep the peace, the hope that never dies.

“We think that, despite everything, we are at peace. Despite everything, we are rich as a country – despite everything, the country is beautiful, and one of the best places to live. Despite everything there is joy, there is freedom. There is this good side,” he concludes.

Casimiro Nhussi is a dancer, choreographer, dance teacher and professional musician. He was artistic director of the National Song and Dance Company. He is currently artistic director of NAfro Dance, an African contemporary dance company based in Canada.

As a musician, he is best known for his albums ‘Xakunamata’, ‘Ho Yala’ and ‘Ximbombo’, and has been nominated five times for the Western Canadian Music Awards.