Ofentse continues riding the crest of a wave

Moments before an orchestra performs, when silence falls over the audience and the baton is raised, the conductor expects every fibre of each musician to be channelled towards playing their instrument as impeccably as possible. 

During the performance, the conductor is a channel, drawing out the best from the musicians, funnelling their collective effort into presenting a unified sound to the audience.

Ofentse Pitse — the first black female conductor to own an orchestra — has a complex task. She frequently conducts Western classical instrument players performing contemporary South African musical repertoires, but has other plans. 

"I want to be a conductor rooted in Africa that highlights African orchestrations and music," Pitse says between rehearsals for her latest orchestral project.

On stage, Pitse uses a combination of conventional conducting techniques which she's learnt from various mentors, including Dutch conductor Gerben Grooten. The signs and gestures she uses are part of a tradition, a language.

 Conductors set the tempo, anticipate key moments, listen to and shape the sound of the orchestra.

In her conducting she becomes part of the music, piercing the air with her baton, leaning in and using facial expressions to show the musicians what she feels, dancing on occasion, while her baton keeps unfaltering time.

Pitse was born in 1992 in Mabopane township, northeast of Pretoria, two years after the passing of her jazz musician and conductor grandfather, Otto Pitse. Otto had been a founding member of the Jazz Maniacs, a prominent Sophiatown jazz band in the 1940s. 

"He conducted using bark from a tree, not a conventional baton," Pitse says about her grandfather.
"If you believe that gifts can be passed on, I think his gift was passed down to me, spiritually and sonically."

Growing up, Pitse's musical influences were rich and varied. As a child, kitchen parties were an important pillar of her community's structure and a place for black women to socialise and support each other. 

At these gatherings with her mother, Pitse would be exposed to soul music by American acts. "That sound filled my formative years," Pitse says.

She developed her jazz sensibility with her uncles' help. Five of her mother's brothers were music enthusiasts in their own right and exerted on her what she calls a "grootman" influence.

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