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“Discussing about Miriam Makeba in South Africa, it’s akin to referring about a royal figure,” explains Alesandra Seutin. Called the Empress of African Song, the iconic artist additionally associated in Greenwich Village with renowned musicians like Miles Davis and Duke Ellington. Starting as a teenager dispatched to labor to support her family in Johannesburg, she later became a diplomat for Ghana, then Guinea’s representative to the UN. An outspoken anti-apartheid activist, she was the wife to a activist. This remarkable life and legacy inspire Seutin’s new production, Mimi’s Shebeen, scheduled for its UK premiere.

The Blend of Dance, Music, and Spoken Word

Mimi’s Shebeen merges movement, live music, and spoken word in a theatrical piece that is not a simple biography but draws on her past, especially her story of exile: after relocating to the city in the year, she was barred from her homeland for 30 years due to her opposition to segregation. Later, she was excluded from the US after wedding Black Panther activist Stokely Carmichael. The show resembles a ritual of remembrance, a reimagined memorial – some praise, some festivity, some challenge – with a fabulous vocalist the performer leading bringing her music to vibrant life.

Power and poise … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In South Africa, a shebeen is an unofficial venue for home-brewed liquor and lively conversation, usually presided over by a shebeen queen. Makeba’s mother Christina was a shebeen queen who was detained for producing drinks without permission when Miriam was 18 days old. Unable to pay the penalty, Christina was incarcerated for half a year, taking her infant with her, which is how her eventful life began – just one of the details Seutin learned when studying Makeba’s life. “So many stories!” says Seutin, when they met in Brussels after a show. Seutin’s parent is Belgian and she was raised there before relocating to learn and labor in the UK, where she founded her dance group Vocab Dance. Her South African mother would perform Makeba’s songs, such as the tunes, when she was a child, and move along in the living room.

Melodies of liberation … Miriam Makeba performs at Wembley Stadium in the year.

A decade ago, her parent had the illness and was in hospital in London. “I stopped working for three months to take care of her and she was constantly asking for Miriam Makeba. She was so happy when we were singing together,” Seutin remembers. “There was ample time to kill at the hospital so I started researching.” In addition to learning of Makeba’s triumphant return to South Africa in the year, after the freedom of Nelson Mandela (whom she had encountered when he was a legal professional in the era), she found that Makeba had been a breast cancer survivor in her teens, that her child the girl passed away in labor in 1985, and that due to her banishment she hadn’t been able to be present at her parent’s memorial. “Observing individuals and you focus on their success and you forget that they are facing challenges like anyone else,” says Seutin.

Creation and Themes

All these thoughts contributed to the making of the show (first staged in the city in the year). Thankfully, Seutin’s mother’s treatment was effective, but the concept for the piece was to celebrate “death, life and mourning”. Within that, Seutin pulls out elements of Makeba’s biography like memories, and nods more generally to the theme of uprooting and loss nowadays. While it’s not explicit in the performance, she had in mind a second protagonist, a contemporary version who is a traveler. “And we gather as these alter egos of characters connected to Miriam Makeba to greet this newcomer.”

Melodies of banishment … musicians in the show.

In the performance, rather than being intoxicated by the shebeen’s local drink, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in synthesis with the players on stage. Seutin’s choreography includes multiple styles of movement she has absorbed over the time, including from African nations, plus the international cast’ personal styles, including street styles like krump.

Honoring strength … Alesandra Seutin.

She was taken aback to find that some of the newer, international in the cast were unaware about the artist. (Makeba passed away in the year after having a heart attack on the platform in the country.) Why should younger generations learn about the legend? “In my view she would inspire young people to stand for what they believe in, speaking the truth,” says the choreographer. “However she accomplished this very gracefully. She expressed something poignant and then sing a lovely melody.” Seutin wanted to adopt the similar method in this production. “We see dancing and hear melodies, an element of entertainment, but intertwined with strong messages and instances that resonate. This is what I admire about Miriam. Because if you are being overly loud, people won’t listen. They back away. But she achieved it in a manner that you would accept it, and understand it, but still be blessed by her ability.”

• Mimi’s Shebeen is showing in London, 22-24 October