Jimmy Dludlu on stage the Safaricom Jazz COncert
Last night saw Jimmy Dludlu bring down the house at the Safarciom Jazz Concert which was held at the Safaracicom Kasarani indoor arena.
Doors to the event opened at 6.30pm and the show was to begin at 7.30pm. Getting to Kasarani was a bit of a tiresome journey with traffic making me worry that I would get there an hour late. Fate seemed to be on my side as the show started at 8.00pm and I arrived just on time.
Safaricom had gone all out with the set-up. There was V.I.P seating in theatre style directly infront of the stage and the rest had seats around the arena. There were 2 screens on the side of the stage broadcasting the show which ensured you didn’t miss a thing. The stage itself had LED screens spread out and they would light up periodically to spell out words or images.
The MC for the evening was Kavutha Mwanzio – Asiyo and the Dj for the night was DJ D-Lite. Both were a great choice as they know how to work the crowd without making too much noise and do it with so little effort.
Swahili Jazz band were first on stage to curtain raise for jimmy Dludlu. I don’t know many Kenyan Jazz bands. I had heard the band play a few times before and I knew they wouldn’t disappoint . They played their set seamlessly while giving us the best if Swahili flavoured music. Their performance seemed to energize us while making us relax at the same time.
After a 15minute intermission, it was time for the man of the night; Jimmy Dludlu, to take to the stage. I didn’t know much about him. I had listened to a few of his songs in preparation of the concert and could only hope that he could replicate the awesomeness I was expecting to a live performance.
For a while as he was on stage, everyone was calm. It was a bit disturbing as his music demanded for people to be on their feet. It seemed like everyone was waiting for that one person to start off the dancing chain. And sure enough, someone did.
Jimmy Dludlu seemed to feed off the energy of the handful of people dancing and even came off stage. As he walked around the arena dancing and playing his guitar, the music just seemed ot get better and better.
Kavutha Mwanzia – Asiyo joining Jimmy Dludlu on stage was one of the best moments of the night. It was toppe doff by the fact that Aaron Rimbui and Jacob Asiyo also came on stage and had a mini-showdown. In true Kenyan fashion, a few people joined Jimmy and his band on stage to show him how Kenyans get-down.
The night was topped off by Jimmy DLudlu doing a rendition of the national anthem that had everyone on their feet mesmerized by the lighting of the the Kenyan flag on the LED screens. Jimmy might have wanted to end the night their but the crowd demanded more and he did one last track that seemed to calm everyone down form the energetic dancing they had done.
The only down sides to the event would be that the network was a bit slow and it made it hard to make noise and post image son social media form the event. But that gave us more time to dance so I’m not sure it was that bad. There were also a few instances where the sound was a bit off as jimmy Dludlu was on stage, but the technicians figured it out eventually and we enjoyed the performance.
The ight wrapped up with a DJ set from the amazing DJ D-Lite who had selected songs that were in tune with the mood set by Jimmy Dludlu’s performance.