Thesis (PhD (Music))  – Stellenbosch University, 2010.

ENGLISH ABSTRACT: During the past few decades fascinating opera productions have been staged by South African opera companies, using strong local casts and strikingly indigenous interpretations of standard works from the canon. It appears that opera in South Africa has survived the tumultuous recent history of this country and is invigorated by the creative possibilities unleashed by its contexts. This dissertation explores whether and how opera production in the Western Cape has reacted to societal influences specific to South Africa. It launches an exploration of if and how the genre has ‘indigenized’ to become what it is today. The following themes present themselves during the course of this dissertation: the process through which opera has rooted itself in the country historically, the forms in and through which opera manifested itself in the Western Cape, how the art form has developed, to what extent local culture has influenced the art form and if, how and why opera production in the Western Cape has diverged from original Western operatic ideals. This dissertation is comprised of two sections representing, broadly, the past and the present. Chapters 1 and 2 are historical studies, whilst Chapters 3 and 4 discuss contemporary perspectives. Chapter 1 is an attempt to construct a history of opera in South Africa and serves as a background or frame for the ensuing chapters. This chapter will show that indigenization in its most subtle form can be traced in local opera productions long before the issue of the reflection of indigenous cultures in opera became relevant. Chapter 2 is a first attempt to account for the history of the Eoan Group, a so-called Coloured opera company who performed during South Africa’s Apartheid years. It investigates the far-reaching implications of the drive to ‘Europeanize’ indigenous culture, as exemplified in the opera productions of this group. Chapter 3 discusses a new opera composition, Hans Huyssen’s Masque (composed in 2005), focusing on the use of voice as it engages with the indigenization of the aesthetic model of voice production. Chapter 4 is an investigation into the functioning of Cape Town Opera. It investigates how a local opera company – an institution promoting opera as a Western form of art – negotiates its way through the tumultuous changes of post-Apartheid South Africa.

AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Operageselskappe in Suid-Afrika het gedurende die afgelope dekades verskeie fassinerende produksies op die planke gebring, produksies wat aansienlik deur inheemse interpretasies beïnvloed is en dikwels van inheemse sangers gebruik maak. Dit wil voorkom of opera in Suid-Afrika nie slegs die politieke omwentelinge van die onlangse verlede te bowe gekom het nie, maar ook produktief put uit impulse wat uit plaaslike omstandighede voortvloei. Die gedagte wat in hierdie proefskrif ondersoek word, is of en hoe opera produksie in die Weskaap op spesifiek Suid-Afrikaanse omstandighede …

Advisors/Committee Members: Muller, Stephanus, Huigen, Siegfried, University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of Music..

Racial segregation was a long-standing practice in South Africa, but until the NationalGovernment formalized it under apartheid in 1948, social groups formed based onfamilial bonds, common education and economic status. Consequently, within certainculturally diverse communities, South Africans of various ethnicities interacted withminimal regard for the barriers imposed by state mandated separatism. South Africancommunities such as Cape Town’s District Six were one such microcosm, where multiethnicperformance groups such as the Peninsula Dramatic Society (PDS) and the Trafalgar Players (TP) were born. This historiography explores the relationship betweenthe apartheid these groups. Through oral histories collected from surviving members ofthe troupes, this study illustrates the impact of social constructs such as race and casteon theatre communities in South Africa. It extends scholarly knowledge regarding theepidemiology and social impact of apartheid and highlights Resistance Theatre as culturalphenomena, a declaration of identity and vehicle for equality and social justice. Mostimportant, it brings into focus, some of the individuals who, through their stagecraft,gave shape, form and voice to coloured resistance theatre. Advisors/Committee Members: Ferris, Lesley (Advisor).