Soup, songs and solace were the blend at Café Blanca on Tuesday. The Singing for Soup event held its seventh evening of live music and fresh-out-the-pot soup to raise funds for the Masincedane Soup kitchen in Xolani, Grahamstown.
Soup, songs and solace were the blend at Café Blanca on Tuesday. The Singing for Soup event held its seventh evening of live music and fresh-out-the-pot soup to raise funds for the Masincedane Soup kitchen in Xolani, Grahamstown.
The organisation provides afternoon meals for schoolchildren in the Xolani township area. The line-up of current and past Rhodes students, including performances by Seneliso Dladla, Lizzie Gainsford, Keegan Watkins, James Spear, Lucy Kruger, The Footnotes and Danielle Bowler, attracted a full house.
The Rhodes University society had not anticipated such a turnout of people. “I always had my doubts” said Jocelyn Coldrey, Masincedane chairperson, amazed at the excellent turnout.
She said it had been one of the best Singing for Soup evenings the organisation had hosted. The initiative began in 2009 and this is the first Singing for Soup event to be held during the National Arts Festival.
It was the third time performer Keegan Watkins had taken part and he said the evening was cool – in every sense. The evening air may have been cold, but the moods were lively as aromas of soup and burning wood warmed the outdoor space and the music satisfied the ear.
But the music was not the only crowd-pleaser – the soup was “absolutely divine” according to Bowler. “The music and soup went well with the amazing home-made bread,” she said.
With an assortment of soups available, all 250 cups were sold. While the evening’s profits had not yet been tallied, Coldrey estimated that it had raised around R6 000 for Masincedane and Cynthia Belwana’s soup kitchen.
