Grahamstown outfit, African Musical Instruments (AMI) won the Small Business category in last night's BASA (Business Arts South Africa) Awards for its support of another local initiative, Access Music Project (AMP!).
Grahamstown outfit, African Musical Instruments (AMI) won the Small Business category in last night's BASA (Business Arts South Africa) Awards for its support of another local initiative, Access Music Project (AMP!).
The ceremony took place in Johannesburg and AMP! director Gareth Walwyn and administrator, Matthieu Maralack were there to received the trophy from Arts Minister, Nathi Mthethwa.
AMI has been making traditional African instruments – including kalimbas and marimbas – in Grahamstown for over 50 years and was started by renowned ethnomusicologist Hugh Tracy.
It has become one of the very few manufacturers of African instruments worldwide using traditional materials and techniques.
The current director is Christian Carver and, as it says on their website, AMI is "committed to the ideals that inspired Hugh Tracey – to make music (especially African Music) happen".
This led to an obvious partnership with AMP!, a project which provides music teaching for underprivileged schools that have no music departments of their own.
Walwyn explains, "When Access Music Project (AMP!) began in 2011, the College of the Transfiguration donated to us their old set of instruments, which needed serious repairs to become usable.
AMI came forward very generously in providing the professional expertise, tools, machinery and material to make them usable.
From that beginning, AMI's involvement with AMP! has grown considerably – we have a large number of instruments which were donated in an unusable state and which have been made great again, we play exclusively AMI instruments with custom modifications".
He says that AMI's director, Christian Carver and manager, Patrick Marthinus have provided AMP! with a great deal of additional support in the form of mentorship and skills training.
"AMP! simply would not have been able to begin without AMI's generosity and guidance" says Walwyn.
"Added to this, through several interactions each year, AMI continues to support us in so many ways that we feel they are a part of our ongoing growth.
In turn, we are delighted to have brought in some sizeable orders with our NLC (National Lotteries Council) funding.
This is specifically the sort of partnership that BASA encourages – a small arts organisation is able to feed back to a local industry in a variety of ways, be they positive exposure, corporate development or business itself".
