Music: Hugh Masekela

One of the highlights of Love Supreme

Born and raised in apartheid-era South Africa, he learned trumpet from an early age and wound up in the orchestra of the musical King Kong, the country’s first blockbuster theatrical success, which ended up in London’s West End. Since then his CV has, in short, left him a musician and artist who continues to care deeply, as well as celebrating the human spirit.

Where are you based these days?
Hotels, airports… I live in LA and Johannesburg. I am here in London doing a fundraiser, for a South African education fund, which has for the last five years educated a whole lot of kids from the eastern cape in South Africa, many of them orphans from HIV parents, very very poor kids.
 
What will the set up be at Love Supreme?
That will be with the regular band I play with; piano, bass, percussion, drums, guitar, and myself.
 
You’re still touring and travelling the world. I’m guessing you enjoy it?
What else would I do? I’ve been doing this since I was a child. Most artists do this until they die.

Do you think artists and musicians still have a positive place in the world?
As an artist I’ve just wanted to be good at my skill, improving it all the time. I travel everywhere, I play to sold out houses but it doesn’t improve the world. I don’t know if it helps. Business and governments are paranoid about the arts. Support has been cut down all over the world and expenditure for destruction has been quadrupled.
 
Tell me about the help you received when you were a child.
Trevor Huddlestone got me my first trumpet. He was the chaplain of my school. He helped loads of people. He helped me to leave South Africa to come to England to study music, and Miriam (Makeba, who he grew up with and eventually married) and Harry Belafonte brought me to the States and I was able to study there. Even as a child I was always restless. You know the big speaker funnel on the gramophone? That gave me the idea that people were living in there! It is a wonderful world to be in, your mind is devoid of borders…
 
What’s the plan?
I’m very happy with what I am doing. I am more interested in heritage, heritage restoration and eduction. I’m very keen for Africans to know their history and to have pride in their heritage.
Love Supreme, Glynde Place,
4-6 July. www.lovesupremefestival.com