OUTDOOR CINEMA: Soul Power

Saturday, July 29, 20:00, entrance: donation

I.c.m. Filmhuis Cavia and Outdoor Cinema

Kinshasa, Zaïre, summer 1974. During three unequalled nights, several African-American artists, James Brown, Bill Withers, the Crusaders and more, played for an ecstatic Congolese crowd of 80.000. They shared the stage with their African counterparts; with Miriam Makeba, Manu Dibango and OK Jazz, performing side by side with the Americans. This was Zaïre ’74; the first large music festival in Africa, to coincide with the famous Rumble in the Jungle, held also in Kinshasa, where Muhammad Ali faced George Foreman for the heavyweight title.

The film Soul Power is footage of this unrivalled event unreleased until 2008. We will see jam-sessions in the chartered Air Zaïre 747, Muhammad Ali musing over some Black Power philosophy, Manu Dibango using his soprano saxophone as a snake charmer on the streets of Kinshasa, and finally the Godfather of Soul himself, James Brown, in a purple suit studded with diamonds, bellowing out I’m Black and I’m Proud into the tropical heat of the Congolese night…

Before the film we will host our own Rumble at the Ruimte: two DJs play back to back with a referee in the middle, armed with a cross fader…

So soul brothers and sisters, you better get up, get on up and stay on the scene (like a …) !!!!