I am, I am, I am, I am coming Hello for another nice meeting with an international guest from far away. Today I am very proud and I have the big pleasure to welcome Miss Sue from Johannesburg. Just arrived yesterday from Josie. Fresh from Joburg. Yes. Yes. Thank you for having me. Very welcome to Austria. I'm sorry for the cold weather. Oh, my goodness. It feels like it's welcoming me intentionally. Yes, especially for you. Wow. Yeah. Thank you, I guess. Yes, especially for you. Wow. Yeah. Thank you, I guess. Thank you for having me. So I'm really very happy that finally... We've been planning this for months. We got the chance to bring you here. Yeah. I had this in mind since I met you first time and I heard you live on stage. 11 years ago. 11 years ago in Swaziland at the Push Fire Festival. I was performing there as guest soloist with a Mozambican band. And you performed with your band. And your band was the only chance for me to listen to any other group. We were the only ones you watched. Yes, of course. That makes it even more special. It was very, very special. And not only as I could capture some very nice photos of your performance, but I was so impressed about the quality and the power and the energy of you and your band and your presence on stage. It was incredible for me. So from this moment on I thought no this band has to come here or at least you as a soloist and now we make it. please, can you tell a little bit, introducing yourself? Who are you? Yes. What do you prefer? What is your life? I am Zu. I'm all the way from South Africa, Johannesburg. I'm a musician, an actress, a writer, an editor, a mentor. I've recently started mentoring teenagers, music and mental health. I'd like to think of myself as an activist, but I think it's a very heavy title to take on and put out there. But I'm very passionate. I have big, big feelings and I express them very loudly, both in talks and in music. I'm very passionate about us being mentally healthy and community. Humaning is a team sport and I like to be part of the team. That's very good, I think. Thank you. Yeah. That's very good. I had the chance to experience and feel your energy not only there in Swaziland but also one year later in Joburg. I had the big pleasure to perform with your band. Oh, the pleasure was ours. Yeah, you came in with the third brass piece of a very big band, because I'm a big band girl. And it was so humbling at that young age. I mean, 10 years ago, I was 20-something. And it was incredible to see myself realize big dreams. You know, dreams I thought were quite audacious of me to have. But you came in and affirmed me. You've always affirmed me. So that's really nice. And it's humbling for us to have kept this relationship alive for so long that's necessary absolutely and uh um if i'm uh really convinced about somebody especially artists yeah i keep the contact and yeah sometimes i'm telling people, I really like your work and one day in the future, I would like to invite you for a project, for some collaboration. And sometimes it takes very long. Sometimes it can happen immediately. But in our case, it took 10 years until we can continue. We were a slow cook. We were like a stew. But it's not important when it happens. Important is that it happens. All is as it should be. And now you came to be one of the guest solos of my project dedicated to Anton Bruckner, Vibes and Vibes. Yes. It's the volume two lineup. Dom Kuckner, Vibes and Wipes. Yes. It's the volume two lineup. We have some concerts now in Linz. Yes. On Saturday, the 16th of November. And next week in Paris. Paris. At the church Saint-Eustache. That is on 21 of November. Yes. And beside that, we will make some other performances and videos and photos and traveling. So these three weeks you will be here. Yes. We'll be very busy, I can tell you. And yeah, before I forget, I also want to thank the City of Linz for the very kind support to make it possible that we could finance the flight ticket with the support from the city of Linz and with the program Linz Import. This is a very big help and thank you for that. I would say that our audience can already get some better impression about your music. You brought some video stuff. Yes. And I would suggest let's listen to one of your solo thing that you are doing with the looper. Can you describe a little bit how that works? So years ago, a friend of mine had this TC Helicon in his house and I said, what's that? And he said, oh, it's just a little loop toy. And I said, let me play with it. And I did and he let me take it home. And I discovered that, you know, as a musician, when you work with bands, it's fun, but it's a lot of work because you have to manage all these personalities and people. And I found that with the voices in my head, I could put them out without needing a bass guitarist or a trombonist or whatever else. I could just have this loop station and express all my different voices with the filters. And it's really fun. And then during COVID, I started something called Music Monday, which is basically me pouring into the music and healing myself, you know, mentally and emotionally. And yeah, I just started making different songs and ideas and playing around with melodies. And yeah, the first one is called Super. I woke up one day and I had the word super in my mind. I thought I'm feeling super. I'm coming into super power and super excellence and super peace. It's just literally that. It's my free space when I'm at home feeling whatever I'm feeling, good or bad, and I just switch the gadget on and pour my emotions into it. Okay, please, let's listen and please open your all of your ears you have for this beautiful music. Super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super, super. Super power. Super peace. Super wealth. Super loving. Super, super, super, super. Super, super, super, super. Super power. Super peace. Super wealth. Super loving. Super, super, super, super. Super peace. Super wealth. Super loving. Super, super, super, super. Super, super, super, super. Already finished? Very short. I keep teasing. Yeah, I'm a teaser. People must come to the show. So this kind is more or less improvised? Or you have some conception? I wake up and I come up with the melody that comes to my mind and I just put it out there. And so this is my improv space. Yes, it's fun to work with the band. Yes, it's fun to go into studio and have structured work. But this is like, I mean, you can see I'm in my gown. I'm literally just home having, you know, a moment with myself, allowing myself to express through the music. So there's no plans, nothing written beforehand. That's why they're so short. I'm teasing myself as well, you know, and I think sometimes I'll go back and take that idea and build a beautiful big song out of it. For example, my most recent project, The Aha Moment, well, Tones of Epiphany, the song The Aha, started much like Super. It was just a snippet, and I had something to say in the moment, and then two years later, I went back to the idea, and I wrote a full song. So for now, the clips are little teasers, but who knows? In the future, it might be a big song. I like this way you're working. It's similar with me a little bit, but as a trombone player and instrumentalist, we work different. But I'm also trying to work more and more solo, especially when I'm also recording and editing after that. It gives a lot of other possibilities than playing live or with a band or arranging. But it's always very exciting and thrilling. Yes. And it's a real challenge. And you have to make all the decisions. Yes. Yes. I think that's the job of artists. and you have to make all the decisions. Yes, yes. I think that's the job of artists. You have so many things in your head and so many ideas, and then you have to select, and the selection is one of the most important things in art, I think. But it's also easy to get caught up in trying to make it perfect, and I think this project, Music Monday, helped me relax a bit, helped me not be such a perfectionist. And, yeah, I think that's what I'm excited about with this project that we're working on as well is that there isn't really space to be a perfectionist, right, in the execution. But because we are perfectionists as seasoned artists that we bring our our individual experience to to the space and and i'm really looking forward to that yeah i think um i'm already also very curious i mean making projects like this is always kind of risky too. But my experience is I'm very, very careful with choosing the artists who are best for the certain projects. And for me, it's not depending if an artist is living next door to me or in the same town or in the same country i just want the right artist and if the right artist is living in japan or in south africa or on the moon i'm trying to bring it here i love that so um and and uh with the pipes and wivesives project, I'm really looking very forward to bring you together with some others of my favorite artists. And I'm sure it will be a very nice experience. Oh, I have goosebumps. So people, use the chance. Don't miss our shows. Come to Linz on Saturday, November 16. We start at 7 at the church St. Severin. And also a big thank you to the people of the church that we can use this incredible space. It's a very nice, modern architecture church with a very very interesting acoustic and because our soloists they perform acoustically. No, they don't have microphones, there is no sound thing and I'm just adding some videos prepared before and the videos have a soundtrack that I produced in the studio and I performed with quotating little parts of Bruckner compositions in an abstract form and but performed only on trombone and conch shell. So there is no other sound, only trombone and conch shell and these are the bridges between the live improvisations and in different constellations of few soloists. So each soloist will perform solo but there are also three duos and the big finale will be all together. Also with the video. So please, this is a global musical crossover multimedia concert performance. Something no one should miss. Don't miss it. If you can come, come you do not want to miss this and don't be afraid that it's too expensive, you choose by yourself how much you want to pay, how much you can pay it's free donation and if you don't have a chance to join us in Linz, just come to Paris next week 21 of November it's during the week on Thursday, so it's also easier to travel and get your flight ticket. We start there at 7.30 and the special thing there, because that is also in collaboration with the Austrian Cultural Forum in Paris and with the Anton Bruckner Expo from up Austria also thanks to this both organizations we are very happy that we are invited to present this projects also there but the special thing is before we do the show, Norbert Travöger, the director of the Anton Bruckner Expo and also artistic director of the Bruckner Orchestra in Linz, he will do an introduction about Anton Bruckner and leading to our performance. So this will be also a very special moment and if you can make it, come to both. It will be very different, I guess. And Saint Eustache is a very, very nice renaissance gothic style church, quite huge, like Notre Dame, and I think that will be also a very special experience there. Coming back to your history, and enough for now for the promotion, and enough for now for the promotion. Tell me something about your work with your band, Zuko Collective. So Zuko Collective was born in 2013. I had just left a band I was working with and it was a very bad breakup. And I was very sad and very emotional. And I remember I had made a call to apply for something. And I completely forgot in the moment when we were breaking up that I'd had this call. So the call comes in and they say, hey, we want to see you and your band. I said, there's no more band. And he said, no, you have to make a plan. And I think he meant get back together. But I don't go back. Once I'm gone, I'm gone. So I started a brand new band. And I remember that phone call came in on a Tuesday. By Wednesday, I had five people on board. By Friday, I had a 13-piece band. And by Saturday, we were performing. So one thing about me, I think, is I'm resilient and audacious and stubborn. So I started Zuko Collective in 2013. And that's the year we met in Bushfire. I was breaking down. I was kicking down doors, know uh literally we performed at 2 a.m the night you saw us we performed at 2 a.m after a duo called black motion and they were like up here a beat a beat and we opened with like a choral warm so so so and you know the room just came all the way down and i think that's what I've been doing with Zuko Collective ever since we founded the band I've been breaking my norm you know I don't I don't like to compare myself to other people I have a very unique voice and a very unique approach so I break my boundaries I break my barriers I. I change my formula, you know, as opposed to competing with anyone. So in 2016, I mean, I have highlights. The night we met, big highlight for me. Bushfire was a huge highlight. Being put on that spot in that slot was huge. The audience got to experience such a shift in energies. was huge. The audience got to experience such a shift in energies. That same year, we opened for Most Def in the first digital festival of the world. In the next year, 2014, you came and we played at Drill Hall. We had a lot of gigs, recorded our debut album. 2015, we released it. It's an album called Relation Trips by Zuko Collective. And in 2016, something magnificent happened. We got invited to a show called Bantu Awa. And the late legendary Brahiu Masikela, as we're soundchecking, looks at us and he picks up his trumpet and he says, I'm going to play with you guys. I could have melted into the floor. I was starstruck, you know, and there's a there's a picture where I look like such a little child because I was so moved by him being moved, you know, because a lot of the people in the crew were saying, he doesn't do this all the time. You know, he doesn't play with every band. So for me, that was such an affirming, validating moment when Brahu got on stage and decided to join my band. You know, my little collective. And we played a song called Mule, which was written for me by one of my bandmates for my birthday as a birthday gift. It's called Buhle, which means beautiful in Guni. And she was basically expressing how much she loves everything about me. She loves my smile, how I walk, how I talk, how I sing. And when Brahu got on stage and played with us I could have cried I mean of course I couldn't because professional but it was quite a huge moment for me and yeah Zuko Collective is still alive even though in 2016 I decided to go solo not to leave the band but to express myself without validating other people's feelings you You know, when you're in a collective of people, you want to consider other people, you want to consider the band's feelings, their artistic input. And so I decided in 2016 that I would record, you know, a whole bunch of things. I think I had like 25 songs, which then birthed the trilogy Ndim. I have a trilogy called Ndim. Part one is Ndim Ngawe, which is love songs. Part two is Ndim Nani, which is a little more political. And part three is Ndim Nom Tulo, which is very personal. It means music and I. And that's where like I explored all my, you know, those ideas you don't necessarily put forward to the label or whatever, but all the personal selfish ideas I had, I put out. And yeah, it's been an incredible journey from then to now. I mean, next year marks 20 years of me singing, you know, feel a little old, but more like wine than something aging. So yeah, next year is 20 years of my music career. And it's been an enthralling, exciting journey. I mean, I have highlights like this to put on my resume now as well, which is, ah, I can't even put into words. I get goosebumps when I think about my journey, right? And the fact that I'm doing all of this as an independent artist is really exciting for me. And I think it speaks to, as an artist, you don't have to sign to a label, you know, especially, you know, I tried to sign, a big label signed me a few years ago and they said, you're too avant-garde. You sound so old, you know, and I thought, yeah, I have an old soul and I'm OK with sounding avant-garde. It's OK. You know, so I think, yeah, the lesson of my 19, almost 20 years of music is to focus on your why, to audacious to just do it because i think a lot of the times we get stuck in our head trying to make it perfect trying to time it perfectly you know trying to do it right and there is no right in art there's just you expressing yourself so it's been a very exciting journey and i look forward to 20 40 40, 60 more years of expressing myself. Yeah, it's been so fun. I like to hear this because this is just my impression also about you and your work and your collaborations is so individual but that is the sense of art. It makes no sense to just copy a style and try to make it in the same way. This is not art. Art is to trust yourself, to take all the risk, to express yourself and find your own style. And in your case, it's also nice that you do your style in different things, with the band, with other collaborations, especially with the solo. So to all organizers of venues and festivals, not only in Austria, all over Europe and this planet. Please, this lady, 20 years of her career will happen next year, so it's the very very best chance for you to invite her solo or with her band Sukkot Kollektiv or any other thing just invite her and present her at your festival at your venues you will not regret it you will not be disappointed thank you, that's the one just take the chance. And I mean, a talent which already produces herself and her music for 20 years. And Hugh Masekela was joining her on stage. Trust this man. Hugh Masekela. You know what I'm talking about. You know what I'm talking about. So, you will have, you'll find all information about her. Can you tell your website? So, I have a website. zoomakesmusic.co.za That's Z-U-M-A-K-E-S-M-U-S-I-C dot C-O dot Z-A my handle on all social media platforms is zoom makes music for bookings if you can't reach me there info at roundsquaremanagement.africa I'm very accessible I personally manage all of my social media just so I stay in touch so reach out I'm ready to talk. And if you are still not convinced what she's talking and telling about, let's take a look to this very magic moment when Hugh Masekela was performing with her band Sukkot Kollektiv at SABC in Johannesburg. Oh, I'm gonna die on Sunday Oh, I'm gonna die on Sunday I'm gonna die on Sunday I'm gonna die on Sunday Thank you. I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer I'm a womanizer No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Thank you. Oh Thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know a place I know a place I know a place I know a place I know a place Oh, I'll play Thank you. So, you can take your phone and write your emails to Sue. She's ready to get invited and just join her and I just recognized I'm looking in the wrong camera. Now it's the right camera. Okay this is improvisation two. Yeah for me it's it was very nice to listen to Hugh Masekela again. I saw him several times and met him personally in South Africa, in Mozambique, in Austria. He was just such a fantastic person and a great musician. Unfortunately, he passed away, I guess it's already three years ago. But we can be happy that we could meet him in person. And his music is still there, online, on CDs, on long play records. So, yeah, what is also a good chance to extend your trip to Paris. Just two days later, you can follow her to London. She's doing some extra concerts, performance. It's a special guest there at the London Jazz Festival, I guess. Yes, yes. So when will it happen and with whom are you performing? So I forget the venue that I'm at on the 23rd uh but i will be in london after our paris uh trip with the brother moves on which is a south african band uh very very dear friends of mine um and they have been kind enough to invite me to feature with them. So we're performing on the 23rd and then on the 24th as part of the last night of the London Jazz Festival at the Barbican Centre, which is so exciting for me. Yeah, follow me on Instagram or whatever social media platform. I have been posting my gig guide and keeping people updated about where I'll be. And when I'm done in London, then I'm back in Austria for the last leg of our collaboration. That sounds good. Yeah, very exciting. Just to give you some idea what will happen after There will be another project of mine with just three musicians, Sue and our Taiwanese air-hoop player from Pipes and Wipes and me. And it will be a very different thing. It's called Surrounding Triangle. It's a concert performance with very special staging because the audience will be in the middle and we three will build an imaginary triangle and the sound will come from three sides. So it's three-dimensional music, special experience and in Linz it will happen on 26th of November in a very very special place which is already very famous here the post city and in the post city inside it will be in the bunker very deep underground with also very special acoustics there and the next day on 27 of November we will visit my hometown in Styria, South East Styria Bad Radkarsburg and there we will play also in special thing so a lot of traveling ideas for you to follow and I think if I remember right you will do a short solo performance now here and by using some of a special dialect or slang, I don't know how to call it, but with very special African language. So I am an Isi Xhosa speaker. My native language is Isi Xhosa speaker. My native language is Isi Xhosa, originating from the Eastern Cape. The language of the great mum Miriam Makeba. And so the click song was sung in Isi Xhosa. Those clicks come from the Nguni language, particularly in Isi Xhosa. clicks come from the Nguni language, particularly in Isiwakasa. So yeah, I'm going to sing you a nursery rhyme from when we were kids. It's a cute little thing that's also the hidden track of my band's album, Zuko Collective Relation Trips. So, I mean, it's hidden, but no longer a secret. It's on the end of a song called Umtandazo, so there's a bit of silence. Because I'm old school like that. I like those little quirks and things. There's a bit of silence after Umtandazo, and then the song starts. Basically, you know nursery rhymes don't always make like sense, like adult sense, but it speaks about having a pimple on your back and running from the dustbin and, you know, all those silly children things. But it sounded so nice when I wanted to create a song, you know, with my band and I got everyone in the booth singing. And I still, I have this vision. And I think now that I'm putting it out there, it'll come to fruition. I have this vision of the music video being the band in like a mental asylum, because it's just like a really weird song to sing. Anyway, it goes a little something like this. Sorry. We make it also a hidden track for this broadcast. So let me say goodbye to our people. And then we make a little silence and the hidden track will come so thank you a lot for watching and listening and especially giving your how to say give you attention and appreciation to our guest Sue from Josie from Joe Burke from Johannesburg in South Africa thank you to have TV for having us as guests and thanks to everybody who is supporting our work who is accepting artists individuality and respecting what we bring on stage and what we are recording, what we are producing, is very important to trust that we are doing original work, that we are creating original compositions, original improvisations, that we are trying not to copy anything. We're trying to be original. And that is the most important thing in art, I think. So thank you again, Sue. SUE SCHMIDT- Danke. It's very similar, like Afrikaans. SUE SCHMIDT- Yes, danke. Danke. So bye bye, and see you in Linz, in Paris, in Bad Radkersburg, in London, everywhere where you can find Sue performing. And please, we start with a short silence. Thank you. Chanting. Thank you. Kolemko, kolemko kolem, kolem, kolem. Sumixmusic.co.za Thank you.