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“When you speak about Miriam Makeba in the nation, it’s akin to referring about a royal figure,” explains the choreographer. Known as the Empress of African Song, Makeba additionally associated in New York with renowned musicians like prominent artists. Beginning as a young person sent to work to provide for her relatives in the city, she later served as an envoy for Ghana, then the country’s representative to the UN. An outspoken campaigner against segregation, she was the wife to a Black Panther. This rich life and legacy inspire Seutin’s new production, Mimi’s Shebeen, scheduled for its British debut.

The Blend of Movement, Sound, and Narration

The show combines movement, live music, and spoken word in a theatrical piece that isn’t a simple biography but utilizes her past, especially her story of exile: after moving to the city in the year, Makeba was barred from South Africa for 30 years due to her anti-apartheid stance. Later, she was banned from the US after wedding activist Stokely Carmichael. The show resembles a ceremonial tribute, a deconstructed funeral – part eulogy, part celebration, some challenge – with the fabulous vocalist the performer leading bringing Makeba’s songs to vibrant life.

Power and poise … Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the country, a shebeen is an under-the-radar venue for locally made drinks and animated discussions, usually presided over by a host. Makeba’s mother Christina was a proprietress who was detained for producing drinks without permission when Miriam was 18 days old. Unable to pay the penalty, Christina went to prison for six months, taking her baby with her, which is how Miriam’s eventful life started – just one of the things Seutin discovered when studying her story. “Numerous tales!” exclaims Seutin, when they met in the city after a performance. Her father is Belgian and she mainly grew up there before relocating to study and work in the United Kingdom, where she established her dance group the ensemble. Her South African mother would sing her music, such as the tunes, when Seutin was a youngster, and move along in the home.

Melodies of liberation … the artist sings at Wembley Stadium in the year.

A ten years back, her parent had cancer and was in medical care in London. “I paused my career for a quarter to take care of her and she was always requesting the singer. It delighted her when we were performing as one,” she remembers. “There was ample time to pass at the hospital so I started researching.” As well as learning of her victorious homecoming to South Africa in 1990, after the freedom of the leader (whom she had encountered when he was a legal professional in the era), Seutin discovered that she had been a breast cancer survivor in her youth, that her child the girl passed away in labor in 1985, and that because of her banishment she hadn’t been able to attend her own mother’s funeral. “Observing individuals and you look at their success and you overlook that they are facing challenges like everyone,” says the choreographer.

Creation and Themes

All these thoughts went into the making of the show (first staged in Brussels in the year). Thankfully, Seutin’s mother’s treatment was successful, but the idea for the piece was to celebrate “loss, existence, and grief”. Within that, she highlights threads of her life story like flashbacks, and nods more generally to the theme of uprooting and loss nowadays. Although it’s not explicit in the show, Seutin had in mind a second protagonist, a modern-day Miriam who is a migrant. “Together, we assemble as these other selves of personas connected to Miriam Makeba to greet this young migrant.”

Rhythms of exile … performers in Mimi’s Shebeen.

In the show, rather than being inebriated by the shebeen’s home-brew, the multi-talented dancers appear possessed by rhythm, in synthesis with the players on the platform. Seutin’s choreography includes various forms of movement she has absorbed over the time, including from African nations, plus the global performers’ own vocabularies, including urban dances like the form.

A celebration of resilience … the creator.

She was taken aback to find that some of the younger, non-South Africans in the group didn’t already know about the singer. (Makeba passed away in the year after having a heart attack on the platform in Italy.) Why should younger generations learn about Mama Africa? “I think she would motivate the youth to advocate what they are, expressing honesty,” remarks Seutin. “But she did it very elegantly. She’d say something meaningful and then sing a lovely melody.” Seutin aimed to take the same approach in this production. “Audiences observe dancing and hear melodies, an aspect of enjoyment, but mixed with strong messages and instances that resonate. That’s what I respect about her. Since if you are shouting too much, people won’t listen. They retreat. Yet she achieved it in a manner that you would accept it, and hear it, but still be blessed by her talent.”

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