Newport Live presents: Melanie Scholtz & Aaron Rimbui – Jazz From South Africa

Newport Live is brings to the Museum a live concert by South African jazz artists, Melanie Scholtz with Aaron Rimbui (Kenya), for a performance celebrating the 30th Anniversary of South African Independence and the April 1994 elections that brought Nelson Mandela to power.

This concert showcases a sublime performance featuring South African vocalist and composer Melanie Scholtz and Nairobi-born pianist Aaron Rimbui, honoring the memory of the legendary vocalist, songwriter, and social activist known around the world as “Mama Africa,” Miriam Makeba. A Cape Town native, Melanie Scholtz has been a major artist on the South African scene since the early 2000s, releasing five acclaimed albums, working with jazz legend and Miriam Makeba’s one-time husband Hugh Masekela, and touring the world with Wynton Marsalis and the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra in 2019. Her 2013 collaboration with the iconic poet and anti-apartheid activist James Mathews, Freedom’s Child, featured SFJAZZ Resident Artistic Director Soweto Kinch.

Harun Kimathi Rimbui (born 15 October 1979) known professionally as Aaron Rimbui is a Kenyan pianist, keyboardist, bandleader and producer who also goes by the nickname Krucial. He is regarded as one of East Africa’s finest pianists and has served as head the Tusker Project Fame band.

Tickets are $35, cash bar.

About Newport Live

Celebrating diverse music traditions through vibrant performances.
Newport Live was previously known as Common Fence Music, originally established by Ed Nary in 1993 to make folk music accessible in Portsmouth, RI. Decades later, our concert series has evolved to providing diverse music across Newport County, continuing to attract audiences from all over New England to performances featuring GRAMMY award-winning songwriters and musicians, and other highly acclaimed music artists from across the globe.