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“Discussing about Miriam Makeba in South Africa, it’s like speaking about a royal figure,” states Alesandra Seutin. Referred to as Mama Africa, Makeba also spent time in New York with renowned musicians like Miles Davis and Duke Ellington. Beginning as a young person dispatched to labor to provide for her relatives in the city, she eventually served as an envoy for Ghana, then Guinea’s representative to the UN. An outspoken campaigner against segregation, she was married to a activist. Her remarkable story and impact motivate the choreographer’s new production, Mimi’s Shebeen, set for its British debut.

The Fusion of Dance, Music, and Spoken Word

Mimi’s Shebeen merges movement, live music, and oral storytelling in a stage work that is not a straightforward biodrama but draws on Makeba’s history, particularly her experience of banishment: after moving to the city in 1959, she was prohibited from South Africa for 30 years due to her anti-apartheid stance. Later, she was banned from the United States after wedding Black Panther activist Stokely Carmichael. The show is like a ritual of remembrance, a reimagined memorial – some praise, some festivity, some challenge – with a exceptional South African singer the performer at the centre reviving her music to dynamic existence.

Power and poise … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In South Africa, a shebeen is an under-the-radar gathering place for home-brewed liquor and lively conversation, often presided over by a shebeen queen. Makeba’s mother the matriarch was a shebeen queen who was arrested for producing drinks without permission when Miriam was a newborn. Unable to pay the fine, Christina went to prison for half a year, bringing her infant with her, which is how her remarkable journey started – just one of the things the choreographer learned when researching Makeba’s life. “Numerous tales!” exclaims Seutin, when we meet in Brussels after a performance. Her father is Belgian and she mainly grew up there before moving to learn and labor in the United Kingdom, where she founded her company the ensemble. Her parent would sing Makeba’s songs, such as the tunes, when she was a child, and dance to them in the living room.

Melodies of liberation … the artist sings at Wembley Stadium in the year.

A ten years back, her parent had cancer and was in medical care in London. “I paused my career for a quarter to look after her and she was always requesting the singer. It delighted her when we were singing together,” Seutin recalls. “I had so much time to kill at the facility so I began investigating.” In addition to learning of Makeba’s triumphant return to South Africa in the year, after the freedom of the leader (whom she had encountered when he was a young lawyer in the era), she found that Makeba had been a someone who overcame illness in her youth, that Makeba’s daughter Bongi passed away in labor in the year, and that because of her banishment she hadn’t been able to attend her parent’s funeral. “Observing individuals and you look at their success and you forget that they are struggling like anyone else,” says the choreographer.

Creation and Themes

All these thoughts went into the making of the production (premiered in Brussels in 2023). Thankfully, her parent’s treatment was successful, but the idea for the piece was to celebrate “death, life and mourning”. Within that, she highlights threads of her life story like memories, and references more broadly to the theme of displacement and dispossession nowadays. Although it’s not overt in the show, Seutin had in mind a additional character, a modern-day Miriam who is a traveler. “And we gather as these other selves of personas linked with the icon to welcome this newcomer.”

Rhythms of exile … performers in the show.

In the show, rather than being intoxicated by the venue’s local drink, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in synthesis with the musicians on the platform. Seutin’s choreography includes various forms of dance she has learned over the years, including from African nations, plus the global performers’ personal styles, including street styles like krump.

Honoring strength … Alesandra Seutin.

She was taken aback to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the group were unaware about the singer. (She passed away in the year after having a cardiac event on stage in the country.) Why should younger generations learn about the legend? “I think she would inspire young people to advocate what they believe in, speaking the truth,” says the choreographer. “However she accomplished this very elegantly. She’d say something poignant and then sing a beautiful song.” She wanted to adopt the same approach in this work. “We see movement and hear melodies, an element of entertainment, but intertwined with strong messages and moments that resonate. That’s what I respect about her. Because if you are shouting too much, people won’t listen. They back away. Yet she achieved it in a manner that you would receive it, and hear it, but still be blessed by her ability.”

• Mimi’s Shebeen is at London, the dates