Thandiswa Mazwai — NPR Tiny Desk x globalFEST, 2024

A filmed live concert at NPR Music’s Tiny Desk, part of the Tiny Desk x globalFEST series, released April 1, 2024. South African singer Thandiswa Mazwai, one of the most influential voices of the post-apartheid era, performs five songs: “Nizalwa Ngobani?,” “Ingoma,” “Children of the Soil,” “Abenguni” and “Lahl’umlenze.” A major figure of kwaito and world music, she weaves South African rhythms, hip-hop, reggae, jazz and house into a deeply felt set sung largely in Xhosa. Surrounded by her musicians — guitar, bass, drums, percussion and keys — she turns NPR’s cramped desk into a celebration of the “children of the soil” and of freedom. The first edition in which globalFEST artists performed at NPR’s headquarters rather than from their home countries, this recording is a powerful, unifying live document. An essential filmed live concert for fans of world music and contemporary African music, and a striking introduction to Mazwai’s decades-long body of work.