Stellenzight Music Project

The Stellenzicht Music Project is a youth development organisation which was established in 1995 by educators at Stellenzicht Secondary School in Jamestown, Stellenbosch. We serve a large farming community and our children come from about 70 different farms in the area in and around Stellenbosch. The goals of the Project were simply to give alternatives to the many challenges which faced the youth at the time, and which still confront them today. Music was chosen as the vehicle through which we were to work to address our goals. The Project has since achieved many highlights and has performed all over the country for Government ministers and once even at a national event in Pretoria for members of the cabinet.

The Groove Project had the priviledge to record two EPs for the Stellenzight Music Project. We are happy to see that some of the young people who performed on the first recording are now part of a commercial music project and performs regularly.

Khulani Kids

Khulani Kids is a after-school program based in Kayamandi. Not only does the program offer tutors to help with homework and school projects, but kids are also offered the opportunity to get instruction in drama and music. The Groove Project had the priviledge to record the first album of the Khulani Kids Choir.

A recorder ensemble was also founded in 2008, and is still going strong. We do apologize to the neighbours.

Masizakhele Group

The Masizakhele Group is a after-school program that teaches singing and dancing and performs at a regular interval at popular tourist spots in and around Cape Town.

Ari Joshua Zucker, a jazz musician from the U.S.A. saw this group perform in Cape Town and wanted to attempt a collaboration with the group. A few UCT Jazz students helped to complete the band and the choir performed some of their own songs in our studios while the Jazz musicians improvised along. We also recorded an album just of their vocal works.

Audio Engineering Workshops

The Groove Project's first Audio Engineering workshop was presented by Gerhard Roux at the NewMusicSA Unyazi 2008: Festival Of Extreme Listening. The free workshop gave a concise overview of a commercial recording project by comparing microphone types, placement tecniques as well as an introduction to mixing.

We plan to present free workshops on a regular basis in the future.

Kuyasa

Kuyasa is a performance arts group from Kayamandi, that consists mostly of AIDS orphans. The band Switchfoot recorded Kuyasa's first album in a community hall in Kayamandi with gear we provided. The second album and DVD was recorded in our studios in 2007 and their third will be recorded in March. See them in action in our studios here.

Madosini

Hailed as the 'Queen of Xhosa Music', Madosini Latozi Mpahleni was born amongst the Pondo, in the district Dlomo of the village of Mpheko near Umtata in the Eastern Cape . She learned to play uhadi at the age of 13, 'and since then I never stopped!' As a singer, composer, storyteller, and master player of three traditional musical instruments: uhadi (bow), umrhubhe (mouth bow), and isitolotolo (jaw harp), she performs frequently around the country.

The Groove project had the privilege to record Madosini performing some traditional works, as well as her own compositions. We plan to record a colaboration between her and other artists later this year.

Uthingo

Uthingo is a Zulu word which comes from Uthingo lwe Nkosazana; meaning the Rainbow. The group is made out of mostly graduates from the UCT School of Music, specialising in different genres of music mainly; Jazz, African music and Opera. All the members are talented and professional musicians and dancers in their own right, including a poet, and they have performed with different groups and artists, locally and internationally. The members come from different cultural backgrounds and each member adds their specific spice, from their background to this one melting pot of African music and dance performed by the ensemble.