Over five decades, the mbira queen Stella Chiweshe has shared her love of this spiritual music with audiences around the world. Now 74 and based in Berlin since the early 1980s, she is realising her ultimate dream: creating a centre for the mbira in her home country of Zimbabwe and giving back to her people.
The project aims to preserve, deepen and promote traditional mbira culture, passing it on to the next generation through the practice and teaching of music as well as related dance, singing and craft. Chivanhu means ‘humanity' in the Shona language and the Chivanhu Centre will be a public facility: a space of learning, expression and encounter between children, young people, elders and musicians. At the heart of this project is also very much the empowerment of the local community by providing an infrastructure of water, power, buildings and work for the local people.
Here is a short clip giving some impressions about the space and her vision: www.vimeo.com/480902633
The place for the centre has been chosen and first work on the village has already been done, but an ambitious project like this requires some additional funding and the support of people spreading the news about it. Stella needs to raise 24.000 EUR to build Chivanhu's infrastructure and for this process, she would like to ask for your help. The crowdfunding campaign to finance the infrastructure for the centre was launched recently https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-chivanhu-project#/
The campaign runs until the 22 December 2020
"It is my dream to give something back to my home country by building a place to preserve traditional music and Shona culture"
Stella Chiweshe
Like us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/thechivanhuproject
Crowdfunding Campaign: www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-chivanhu-project
Visit Stella's website: www.stellachiweshe.com