fally ipupa performing at sawa sawa
Get insights on how to organise a great cultural festival from this interview with Marion van Dijck, director of Sarakasi Trust, creators and organisers of the Sawa Sawa Festival that took place in Kenya this past weekend (see images here) and brought the big time star, Fally Ipupa for the first time to Kenya. She takes some time to share her invaluable experience. This is a must read for Creative Entrepreneurs!
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Hi Marion, so you already know that i thought the festival was absolutely fantastic. Congratulations on it. So, to start off, how do you feel now that it’s over? Happy it is over and that all went well and tired and ready for lots of sleep… But still winding up with evaluations, reports, paying of artists and suppliers, etc.
And talking of feelings, could you give us a sense of how it feels as you await to pull of such a big event? Since this is the 5th time, we have the blue prints ready and they only needed to be tweaked a bit. Our team knows what is expected and has been working together real good. Of course there is happy anticipation, a bit of nervousness but with a basic feeling that all will be good because we know what it takes.
Is this completely organised by Sarakasi Staff or do you need to pull in additional hands to make this happen? Volunteers also? We usually work with a very small event team; this year it was Kui, Rahim, Anitah and me, each with very specific tasks. The two interns took care of the Dome workshops and the vending area at the venue. (The Dome refers to the Sarakasi owned property which includes a theatre/auditorium, dance studios, apartment and Sarakasi offices located in Ngara, an area adjacent to the Nairobi CBD) Farrah (of Samosa) was the extra hand who produced Mabinti and did the stage management. During the last week the rest of the Sarakasi team was pulled in and briefed on specific tasks during the festival days. We had one volunteer to assist back stage.
This year, the festival was held at the Carnivore Grounds. Why the change of venue? And what goes into selecting the right venue for such an event? Change of venue because this year we asked an entrance fee. This venue is fenced in, has an infrastructure (paying booths, parking, toilets, electricity, water, catering, etc) and is known for staging concerts. Because of the gate we also expected less audience, hence a smaller venue.
Something else that was also different this year from the previous editions is that there was no free show this time. Why the change? Main reason was crowd control: last year we had a crowd of 120,000 at Kasarani which is a huge risk and even a huger challenge!
Did the removal of the free concert impact on the audience numbers you had this year as opposed to the last? Yes, as planned. On top of that: because of the fee we automatically target and appeal to a different audience. This is a new audience which we will also have to be build up over the coming years.
Tell us more about audiences. Do you set targets for how many people you need to pull into the gate and how was the target compared to the actual audience numbers this year? Yes, we set targets of what we would want: a minimum and a maximum; the max being the capacity of the venue, the minimum being the breakeven point. We stayed within the limits on Sunday and were a bit under on Saturday, which we think was due to the UEFA Cup final.
Let’s talk about the line-up of artists. How is the selection of artists made and especially the main acts? How did Fally get chosen for this year? The main act was selected based on the theme, concept, target audience and numbers. In other words: who is currently hot, African and can pull in a diverse audience and women??
And now to the finances. What does it take to put on such a big festival? Was Sarakasi able to break even in regards to the monies put in compared to the monies raised? What do people need to know about financing such a huge cultural event? Apart from dedication, pulling off a good logistical and technical production of course needs a budget. The trick is to slash the right budget lines and to know where the bulk needs to go. Most money came from HIVOS and Sarakasi (core funding). Then we got almost all rates and prizes discounted, especially from the media. This way we were able to break even. You need to start early with such a big event and try to build long lasting partnerships with donors, sponsors and suppliers.
What were the challenges experienced during the festival that we as the audience probably did not know were happening? Any fires that needed to be put out behind the scenes? Hehehe, Fally decided to have a long shower, so he left the hotel one hour late. At the same time Daddy Owen’s performance was shorter than expected so we had to be creative: hence the dancers kept re-grouping and adding on and the Emcee came up with the dance competition digging money out of his own pocket!! But it all worked out perfectly and even better and more entertaining!
What’s your overall evaluation of this edition? It was a good production, the team worked well, the theme was addressed appropriately with a good evaluation of the workshops. The audience was happy and the reviews were all very positive. We hope that next time it will be even bigger and better!
And what can we expect for next year’s Sawa Sawa? I am already looking forward to it actually! The momentum of approaching sponsors is upon us now as we can ride on the success and the very positive media attention. Next year will be themed again and since it will be held in the months leading up to the next general elections we might take that up somehow. I liked the Mabinti project, so there might be something like that again (a project that brought together 7 young women musicians to do a set together. All of them, strong performers in their own right, worked alongside each other for the first time towards a shared performance that rocked!). Furthermore, the festival is also a platform for the Sarakasi projects, so these also will be incorporated again: Wapi, Amani Lazima, Talanta, Umoja.
Thank you so much Marion for sharing your super experience.
To stay plugged into what Sarakasi is up to, check their website, www.sarakasi.org and also stay plugged in here where we always cover what’s happening with our partner organizations.
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