By the time the last question was asked last Saturday afternoon, you could feel it: nobody wanted to leave. In a city where meaningful conversations about music often happen in snatched greenroom chats or late-night WhatsApp groups, VERVE’s latest workshop at Obz Books gave Cape Town’s creative community a rare chance to sit down together — artists, managers, journalists, and curious fans alike — and be heard.
Held under the banner The Artist, The Art and The Culture, the panel — featuring LUUKHANYO, Kila G, and Mars Baby, and deftly guided by VERVE’s co-founder Jeriah Fredericks — set out to ask what it really means to survive, and thrive, as an independent in South Africa’s music ecosystem. What unfolded was less a Q&A and more a town hall for the scene.
A Hungry Community
The sheer energy in the room confirmed just how needed this was. Attendance was strong, but more than that, engagement was palpable. The audience was as varied as the city’s creative landscape itself: musicians, aspiring managers, writers, students, and scene veterans. Everyone came ready to participate, not just passively observe.
What emerged was a striking sense of alignment. Cape Town’s music community often feels fragmented, scattered across genres, cliques, and subcultures. Yet the challenges raised — lack of infrastructure, limited access to resources, the delicate balance between authenticity and audience demands — resonated across the spectrum. For once, these conversations weren’t siloed; they were collective.
Hard Truths, Shared Realities
The panelists spoke to the full spectrum of an independent career: from the discipline of honing craft and the importance of community support, to the financial realities of building a career without institutional backing. There was frank recognition of the emotional weight of independence, with mental health and sustainability positioned not as side concerns but as central to longevity.
Rather than glossing over the struggle, the discussion revealed how resilience and resourcefulness are the defining traits of Cape Town’s independent scene. The exchange of stories and strategies between stage and audience blurred the line between teacher and student — everyone present became part of the knowledge-building process.
A Platform That Matters
This workshop underscored something crucial: professionalism in Cape Town’s music world begins with community care. By gathering different corners of the scene in one room, VERVE demonstrated the power of creating intentional, safe spaces where honesty and collaboration can flourish.
If the city’s creative future depends on more than raw talent, then Saturday offered a glimpse of what that future could look like. These workshops are not auxiliary to the culture — they are its backbone. And fittingly, it all ended with an invitation to carry the spirit forward: everyone was urged to grab someone’s number, stay in touch, and keep building. Because in the end, the real work of the culture happens not just on stage, but in the connections we choose to sustain.
