Africa Day 2021 - "The Year of Art, Culture and Heritage"
01.06.2021
On the occasion of the Africa Day, which this year was celebrated under the theme "The Year of Art, Culture and Heritage", Ambassador Andrzej Kanthak met with the well-known South African musician and singer Loyiso Bala.
Loyiso is a member of the popular South African vocal trio The Bala Brothers. The group consists of the three brothers Zwai, Loyiso and Phelo Bala. They have achieved remarkable recognition in South Africa and abroad. The combination of opera voices, rich harmony and energy of rhythm & blues with traditional South African melodies and rhythms makes the music performed by Bala Brothers something completely unique.
Just as their story is unique. The three brothers from the Kwa Nobuhle Township near Port Elizabeth, thanks to the power of their musical talent, were able to break the prohibitions enforced during the Apartheid period and became the first black students of the famous The Drakensberg Boys Choir in the KwaZulu Natal province. They toured half the world with the choir. Today Loyiso fondly remembers the harsh winter he experienced during the concerts of The Drakensberg Boys Choir in Poland and the warm reception that was prepared for the young singers in Poznań.
The Bala Brothers team achieved a number of international successes. Among others, in December 2013 the band performed at the Cape Town stadium during Nelson Mandela's funeral. In the same year, in addition to his musical success, Loyiso Bala was appointed UN Goodwill Ambassador to Fight AIDS. In 2015 their new album reached the top ten Billboard's World Music Charts in the USA.
At the meeting at the ambassador's residence, Loyiso was accompanied by his wife, Jennifer Odjidja. Jennifer's mother was Pole, from Łódź, and her father was a Ghanaian.
