Nhlanhla Mahlangu is a vocalist, composer, theatre-maker, dancer, educator, and creative collaborator at the Centre for the Less Good Idea.

‘Or Else the Machine Will Breathe’ sees the combining of footage and images taken while in hospital earlier this year after contracting COVID-19, with music composed during Season 2 of The Centre in 2017. ’Enyangeni’, was a central performance created, composed and choreographed by Mahlangu which went on to be performed in Amsterdam at the Holland Festival in 2019.

The music is performed by vocalists Xolisile Bongwana, Thabang Mkhwanazi, Simphiwe Bonongo, Sbusiso Shozi, Penwell Langa, Gregory K. Mabusela, Lulu Mlangeni, Teresa Phuti Mojela and Thandazile Sonia Radebe and comes out of workshops in which children’s games and playground rhymes were developed and build into more complex compositions.

A loose translation of the lyrics: “I am the shoe, I am the shoe, everybody steps on me, look now, now I am old, now I am worn out, I look like this, I look like this, I look like this…

Hey you! Mama Themba, who beats you up? Is it that man! Call him to come here! Oh no, I am scared! Take the horse! No I am scared! Oh the bones are going down, the bones are going up…”

Concept & Creation | Nhlanhla Mahlangu
Vocalists | Xolisile Bongwana, Thabang Mkhwanazi, Simphiwe Bonongo, Sbusiso Shozi, Penwell Langa, Gregory K. Mabusela, Lulu Mlangeni, Teresa Phuti Mojela and Thandazile Sonia Radebe
Video Editor | Noah Cohen
Curator of The Long Minute | Bronwyn Lace