Tag Archives: Cape Town International Jazz Festival

Cape Town International Jazz Festival positions Cape Town as Jazz Capital of Africa!

January 29, 2014

At the media launch yesterday of the 15th Cape Town International Jazz Festival at the Cape Town International Convention Centre Mayor Patricia de Lille said that the goal of Cape Town is to become the Events Capital of Africa, and with it the Capital of Jazz in Africa, attracting 37000 Festival goers. An exciting line-up of international and local jazz artists was announced at the launch.

The launch was addressed by a number of speakers. Billy Domingo, the Chief Operating Officer of espAfrika, the events company organising the Jazz Festival, was a witty MC for the event. Rashid Lombard organises the musical side of things, and announced that since ticket sales opened last month, all two-day passes have been sold,. There are about 500 day tickets available for each of the two days. The event is a team effort, within their company (of mainly ladies he joked) and also with the City of Cape Town. They want to create a legacy through the event, which includes a training and development programme which has already seen six students study at the Berklee College of Music in Boston in the USA. Job creation is another goal. Lombard proudly shared their Social Media statistics, having more than 14000 Twitter followers, close to 9000 Likes on Facebook, and 140000 YouTube views.

Lombard also presented the eagerly awaited line up for the Cape Town International Jazz Festival, which includes top international jazz artists Level 42, Shakatak, Eryka Badu (but not mentioned in the media release), and Abdullah Ibrahim and Ekaya. Other international artists are Andreya Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 9 January

January 9, 2014

Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

* ‘Cape Town’s most stylish hotels’ feature in the Telegraph Travel article, which focuses on more than just the Mother City’s hotels. Given Cape Town’s status of World Design Capital 2014, Woodstock, Bree Street, and Long Street are recommended for arts, sculptures, jewellery, and crafts. Hemelhuijs and The Pot Luck Club are recommended restaurants. The Mount Nelson, One&Only Cape Town, Cape View, The Clarendon, and Ellerman House are recommended as accommodation establishments.

* Six of Africa’s twelve top music festivals are hosted in South Africa, and include Oppikoppi (in Limpopo province, the largest local music festival); Up the Creek (in Swellendam); Cape Town International Jazz Festival; Splashy Fen (at Underberg); AfrikaBurn (in North Cape province); and Rocking the Daisies (in Darling).

* National soccer team Bafana Bafana arrived in Cape Townlast weekend, in preparation for the African Nations Championship, which kicks off at Cape Town Stadium on Saturday.

* James Romanow, writing in the New Mexico Leader Post, says that drinking a House of Mandela wine is a fitting tribute to the late Nelson Mandela.

* A manual of information published by (£30 million a year budget) Visit Britain, which was targeted at accommodation establishments and tourism players in the UK to guide them in dealing with tourists from around the world, has been criticised for ‘racial stereotyping‘! For example, the manual describes: Continue reading →

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 28/29 November

November 29, 2013

Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

* The 15th Cape Town International Jazz Festival will be held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre on 28 and 29 March. The top artists performing in the past fifteen years can be expected on the stage next year. Last year 60000 jazz lovers attended the jazz performances. Early bird specials are available for the first 1000 tickets booked at Computicket.

Rashid Lombard, CEO of espAfrika, organisers of the Jazz Festival, said: ‘Fifteen years ago, we couldn’t have imagined that the festival would have such a massive impact. It’s got its own beat now – and we just love the fact that we are able to keep giving people what they want and to promote jazz and jazz related as a music genre in this country’. (received via media release from networx public relations)

* Taipei has been announced as World Design Capital 2016, it was announced today by Cape Town Design NPC, the company managing World Design Capital 2014 for Cape Town. (received via newsletter)

* Ellerman House has opened a Wine Gallery, to the irritation of Neil Pendock, whose petite (2 x 4 m space, and 6 bottles only per month) Wine Continue reading →

Will City of Cape Town Tourism Directorate forensic investigation affect Cape Town Tourism, World Design Capital 2014, and Marketing of Cape Town?

November 4, 2013

A week ago we picked up an article in the Cape Argus that intimated tender irregularities in the City of Cape Town’s Tourism, Events and Marketing Directorate, headed up by Executive Director Anton Groenewald, reporting to Grant Pascoe, Mayoral Committee member for Tourism, Events, and Marketing. Now action appears to have been taken, with a follow up report about a forensic investigation and the removal of laptops used by staff in the Directorate, including Councillor Pascoe’s computer!

The original article was difficult to follow, and we have re-read it, to summarise the report as follows: A three year multi-million Rand contract for branding for Cape Town (no logo has been created for brand Cape Town by Groenewald’s Directorate yet, as far as we know, and certainly has not been revealed for comment to date) was at risk of being cancelled, just as it was to be awarded. The proposed cancellation was denied by the City of Cape Town, even though the Cape Argus has documentation confirming the proposed cancellation. The branding was to be used at events, the City of Cape Town’s Finance department spokesperson Priya Reddy said. She also denied that cancelling the tender would be contrary to the host city agreement for the Chan soccer tournament in January, which includes a R6 million marketing commitment. The cancellation of the tender would be contrary to the City of Cape Town’s supply chain management policy.