It's the Sankofa International Music and Arts Festival
“Sankofa, a word from the Akan tribe of Ghana in West Africa, means ‘go back to your roots’ or ‘go and retrieve from your past’,” said percussionist and dancer Kofi Mawuko. “I grew up with this symbol.”
The symbol for sankofa is rich with meaning; it’s a bird that has its head turned backwards—looking at the past—while it holds in its beak an egg, representing something to be treasured that can foster progress, growth and life.
In a broader sense, sankofa can be interpreted as not leaving anything behind and promoting openness, and it’s a word that Mawuko has appropriately adopted for the Sankofa International Music and Arts Festival (SIMAFEST), a free event that will take place at Miller Plaza this Saturday starting at 1:30 p.m.
“I grew up in a multi-culture community in Accra, Ghana,” said Mawuko. “Although we are all Ghanaians, we are from different tribes of language, food, clothing, music and dance.”
“This has opened me up to be an open-minded person, to accept diversity as an important way of learning and appreciating others as human as I am,” said Mawuko, who explained that this multi-cultural upbringing was a way of life.
As a child in Ghana, Mawuko learned traditional African drumming and dance, and before he was even a teenager, he was a master drummer for an international touring company.
After moving to the U.S.A. in 1989, Mawuko settled in Chattanooga nine years later and began to work at the Creative Discovery Museum and teach drumming within the school system and elsewhere.SIMAFEST grew out of an idea Mawuko originally had to celebrate the release of the new CD from his band Ogya, but he realized that it could be a much bigger event.
“I had a second thought to open it to an International Festival,” said Mawuko. “Chattanooga and its surrounding areas have beautiful, diverse cultures from around the world.”
International sounds and local flavors are both represented at SIMAFEST with 13 different acts plus an open drum circle which begins the all-day event.
Acts include Esmond, playing Trinidad steel pan (a/k/a. steel drum) music, the duo Crazy Flute which performs material based on traditional Native American songs, The Divine Poetess (Denise Adeniyi) and the Frequency, and the roots-rock/worldbeat outfit Lumbar 5.
The quartet Sistren features a trio of women who harmonize on vocals, and jazz pianist Robert Crabtree will perform with his trio; the Ringgold outfit R.A. and the Flames concentrates on blues and funk.
Mawuko has been a dancer his whole life, having formerly been a lead dancer for the West Africa-based international touring company Kyirem Cultural Troupe and a dance instructor in London.
And with that in mind, he has programmed SIMAFEST with ample dance showcases, including Emerald Hips Bellydance, Mexican dancer Fernando Guadarrama, and Mawre & Co., an African dance group founded by Mawuko with his wife Rebekah.
SIMAFEST also has a focus on education, with performances from the East Lake Expression Engine and dance students from the Center for Creative Arts.
Mawuko’s group Ogya (pronounced “oh jah”) takes its name from the word for “fire” in the Ewe language spoken in Ghana, and it closes out SIMAFEST with a 10:30 p.m. performance.
The dance-inducing band Ogya is no newcomer to festivals, having played Bonnaroo several times along with a number of other festivals, and it features an assortment of genres, from Afrobeat rhythms to a reggae swagger to funk or even hints of jazz; its dominant theme of togetherness, a natural match with their diverse amalgam of musical styles, is a simple, yet effective one.
Mawuko formed Ogya after seeing an opportunity to fill a void and expose people to different cultures and learning experiences, and SIMAFEST can be seen an extension of that devotion.
“What I want people to get out of the Sankofa International Music and Arts Festival is that diversity with an open mind can bring us all together for peace in our communities and around the world,” said Mawuko.
For curious and open-minded listeners, SIMAFEST is an opportunity to absorb the sometimes overlooked cultural variety that the region has to offer in music and dance; it’s about facing the future, understanding the past and accepting the treasures that one is offered.