Mango Groove 30th Anniversary Concert: March 2019

30 Years of Special Star coming to Teatro!

Mango Groove and Real Concerts announce their awesome news, that Mango Groove will be performing a spectacular 30th Anniversary Concert, at Montecasino’s Teatro Theatre, on Friday, 8 March 2019. Hot 91.9FM’s Jeremy Mansfield then announced that due to an overwhelming response to the Mango Groove 30th Anniversary Concert on Friday March 8, which has sold out, a new date has been added! The second concert date is Saturday, 9 March 2019.

Mango Groove’s lead vocalist, Claire Johnston, says that 2019 is a big year for them, as they will be celebrating the 30th anniversary of the release of their debut album, Mango Groove. With this in mind, Johnston mentions it seemed right to them that they put on a high production concert that showcases the highlights, memories and moments of that album, as well as performing all the other Mango songs that people have come to know and love through years.

The Mango Groove album in fact, went on to become one of SA’s biggest-selling albums of all time, having gone well over 25-times Platinum, producing a string of hits, that to this day remain part of the soundtrack of South Africa’s journey over the last three decades, including Special Star, Dance Some More, Hellfire, Move Up, and many more.

That first album release created the platform for what was to become a meteoric rise to fame for the band, as it paved the way for a host of achievements that set new precedents and records, which still stand today:

The successive releases of several more albums and hit singles, including Hometalk, Moments Away, Another Country, Nice to See You, Bang the Drum and their latest album release, Faces to the Sun;

Setting new live performance benchmarks for all SA artists, being the only SA group ever to sell out the Sun City Superbowl and the Standard Bank Arena, six times each;

The band was the first to redefine live staging and production standards for SA acts; the first to command a million Rand sponsorship deal, and were the first and only group to remain at the top of the SA national sales charts for over a year;

Internationally, Mango Groove’s unique and magical blend of South African marabi, kwela and pop influences, together with the voice and presence of Claire Johnston, went on to captivate audiences around the world –

Highlights of their career include the direct satellite link-up to the Freddie Mercury tribute in London, to an estimated audience of a billion people; their performance in front of 200 000 people at the Paris SOS Racism concert and their performance at the renowned Montreux Jazz festival, where the band received 3 encores. From London to Hong Kong, from Toronto to Sydney, the band has played to sell-out crowds around the world.

Mango Groove was given the honour of being the only South African – and indeed African act, to be invited to perform at the Celebrate Hong Kong 97’ Reunification Concert. This historic event, part of the official celebrations commemorating the hand-over of Hong Kong to China, was televised world-wide and immortalised on a commemorative CD. It was followed up, in fact, by Mango Groove being the only SA act to perform at the globally-televised concert, commemorating the handover of Macau to China.

Mango Groove was also especially proud to have been associated with the ABC world- wide broadcast of Nelson Mandela’s release, where their music was used as the main theme. A few years later, they headlined at his inauguration.

Mango Groove has long been aware of music’s unique power to change people’s hearts and minds, and through the years the band has raised hundreds of thousands of Rands for issues such as literacy, terminally ill children and conservation.

Founder member John Leyden’s describes it in terms of finding the ideal partner, for what is truly a very special event for them and working with Real Concerts again made perfect sense – serendipity at its best. Leyden mentions further that it was this very partnership that properly launched Mango Groove on a grand scale to SA markets in 1989, and it was a partnership that then powered its way through the host of precedent-setting achievements in the years that followed.

What can the audience expect from the show itself, then? Leyden continues, affirming the show will be a veritable memory-fest, and truly a joyful celebration of all the Mango songs that have come to be loved through the years: All of this backed up, of course, with the best possible live production, dancing and performance standards. As importantly, though, it will be a celebration of South African-ness in all its glorious diversity – who they were, their transition, the great ongoing South African journey, who they are today, and what is still so possible for us as a country. Roddy Quin of Real Concerts comments the show will really move the audience in so many different ways…

 

Mango Groove’s 30th Anniversary Concert:

The Teatro Theatre, Montecasino

Friday, 8 March 2019 and Saturday 9 March 2019

Tickets from R300 now available from Computicket.