Umculo tells your story

Umculo is a Xhosa word that means art music and reconciliation. It is also the name of an initiative inspired by a similar programme in Venezuela designed to empower young adults through opera, creative theatre and choral singing.

Umculo aims to teach young South Africans social responsibility and teamwork through

, music journalist, founder and director of the programme. Another objective of the programme is to guide young people by means of creative expression in theatre to a better future.

Apthorp, a South African-born music journalist living in Berlin, Germany, is currently in Potchefstroom as part of an initiative of the NWU School of Music and the NWU Choir Academy®, in collaboration with PUK Arts. They are hosting representatives of Umculo from 4 to 22 April. During this time, several workshops and master classes will be held.

Apthorp said Umculo aims to contribute internationally by combining the resources and skills of the European opera world with the potential and talent of young South Africans. Umculo’s vision is to draw voluntary participants each year to produce professional music productions to inspire social change.

During the visit, Apthorp and fellow music journalist and musicologist prof. Erling Guldbrandsen from the University of Oslo, will also guide artists, students and social media users and creators in developing and honing their skills towards efficient communication through “words about music”.

“There are many different levels in which what we do has a social impact,” Apthorp said to journalism students at the NWU during a visit on 5 April. The productions address social issues such as rape, murder, gender and identity issues and gender-based violence. Each production uses the words and music of opera to do so, she explained.

Apthorp described the productions as “fiction based on reality”. Umculo’s team members encourage learners to tell stories about their own lives. A narrative is then compiled using the different stories.

One particular production, constructed from real events, featured a young girl falling in love with a young man, Apthorp said. “Then the girl is raped by a policeman. She becomes pregnant and the young man is blamed for the pregnancy and murdered because the policeman refused to own up to what he did.” The piece ends on a hopeful note when the baby is born.

“We are not raising tomorrow’s opera stars, necessarily,” Apthorp said. “The learners that we are working with are going on to study education, engineering, and landscaping and that I consider a success. If we’ve motivated them enough to go on and study something, I think we have achieved something.”

For more information about the programme, visit the School of Music’s website at nwumusic.co.za  More information about Umculo is available at umculo.org or Umculo Cape Festival on Facebook.