In Motion

Vuma Levin – Guitar
Théo Duboule – Guitar
Various guests

In an age of unprecedented mobility, young black South Africans find themselves in a curious dual position. On the one hand they are tied to the South African democratic national project and its related histories, power dynamics, and identities. On the other, the world is becoming increasingly transnational in character, broadening cultural debates around national belonging, history, power, and identity. Through his new project, In Motion, a collaborative guitar duo with Swiss virtuoso Theo Duboule, Vuma Levin aims to explore the contradictions that emerge out of the tensions between the national and the global in a technologically driven world.

Aesthetically, they will draw from historically significant, traditional, and urban syncretic South African forms including Nguni-Sotho choral and gourd bow song, Marabi and Ghoema, exploring the possibility of fusing these forms with jazz, pop, and other improvised music. Further, they will explore sound design by making use of prepared instruments, loops, effects and samples, all towards extending the sonic possibilities of the guitar duo format.