New display in our Hamburg shop!

Cebo Mvubu and Sino Makhubalo doing final touch ups on our Christmas display in Hamburg.

Celebrating Bell

Keiskamma Music Academy has expanded music teaching to another village. 

Tuwa Primary School is located in the village of Bell, just before highway R72, 14 km from Hamburg, where we have been teaching for 7 years now.  There, Keiskamma Music Academy volunteers and staff have begun a new teaching initiative for the benefit of Tuwa Primary School students.  

This new teaching initiative, and the expansion of Keiskamma Music Academy’s youth development efforts began when Mr. Mali, the former head teacher of Tuwa Primary together with the parent body, reached out, requesting musical education for its learners.  

Keiskamma Music Academy volunteers Martin Kratzing and Val Arnold joined Music Programme Manager Anthony Drake to give weekly music lessons.  Instruction in recorder and basic musicianship began in September 2013.  The music team began by teaching all eighteen primary school students as a group.  
Since the end of October, lesson are now taught in smaller groups.  

The youngest students so far are in Grade 4; the oldest are in Grade 6.  In little time, students at Tuwa Primary School have already developed a good understanding of rhythm and some basic musical repertoire.

The Last Supper Table

The idea of this Table is make a table of remembrance for the trees and forest of the Eastern Cape of South Africa. It is a prayer for restoration and healing of our forests.This table was made by Garvey McConnell, a resident cabinet maker and barista of Hamburg, and the bowls were turned by wood artist Derek Wentworth, also a Hamburg resident. The wood used was largely found pieces, or wood from pruning local trees. The middle piece of the table is Petrocarpus soyauxii, African Padauk, a Central African forest tree. The piece was found on Hamburg beach. The embroideries on the table runners were designed by Cebo Mvubu and Nokuphiwa Gedze and embroidered by Nozibele Nxadi, Nokuphiwa Gedze, Lumka Macingwana and Cebo Mvubu.