Artists and Their Names

If there is something that never ceases to thrill me is the carefully chosen stage names that performance artists use. Every time before I can buy a ticket to a music or poetry show, I scan through the list of performers first. I look for those catchy, vibrant, snappy, enticing, sweet, rough, daring, unique, flamboyant, crazy names. They always amuse me. 

Back in 2003, I was a bassist in a backup band called Ambassadors in Johannesburg, South Africa. On this particular night, we were invited to perform in Melrose Arch, Rosebank, Johannesburg as back up band for a South African poet called Zwesh Fi Kush. The MC for the session was this very popular South African comedian called Ashifa Shabba. Every time he introduced a performer, he would marvel at the name. ‘Eish, artists and their names!’ he would say it so comically that the entire audience had no choice but to crackle in laughter. Shabba was certainly amused by the names of the performers. I wonder what he thought about his own!

Now, as we invited poets to the Unfolding the Scrolls: Chronicles of the Poets – Part 1 poetry show at the end of July, I was, again, thrilled by the names alone, before even seeing the artists perform. The first one was called Slash the Don, a heavyweight spoken word artist from Kanye . He has several other names, which I don’t remember right now. Then there were Quin B, Iddlehandz and Tongues. I haven’t met these artists yet but just from the names, I can tell a lot. 

A name really speaks volumes for an artist. There is always a story behind a performer’s name. And the story is always interesting, one way or another. When I meet these performers at the end of the month at Riley’s Hotel, I am going to find out the stories behind their names and I will share that with you. I will also dig into the names of our local poets. They do have interesting names; King Philosopher, Prophet Caribbean Weed, Mista Poke, T-Noise, Vygoras, etc.

Keep checking the space on the updates.