Bain’s Whisky launched a brilliant new TV advertisement that brings the iconic South African musician, Miriam Makeba back to life on screen.
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Not only does the late South African legendary singer, Miriam Makeba feature in it, but it features the musical talents of Msaki and Sun-EL Musician, paying tribute to the enormous influence that Miriam Makeba had, and continues to have, on South African music.
It features a song called ‘Pata Pata – Saguquka’ that is inspired by Makeba’s 1967 hit song ‘Pata Pata’.
According to Music Africa, the remastered track will be available for download and streaming on all major digital platforms with all proceeds to be donated to the Miriam Makeba Foundation.
As part of a new WhiskyRemastered campaign courtesy of Bain’s Whisky, it draws a parallel between iconic South African music, and whisky making, demonstrating that the greatest honour you can pay the icons of the past is to build on their legacy, pushing your craft to the next level by making it your own.
It was inspired by Bain’s Founder Distiller, Andy Watts, who mastered traditional whisky making in Europe before realising that he needed to embrace his curiosity and reimagine time-honoured techniques to create something entirely new – Bain’s Whisky, reports Moziak Africa.
According to Marketing Manager: Whisky & White Spirits, Lynsay Simpson, the campaign aims to celebrate and acknowledge South African creatives, past and present, who never settle for perfection but continue to innovate and advance their craft, inspiring future artists for generations to come.
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“This is the essence of #WhiskyRemastered,” said Simpson. The beloved Miriam Makeba was a woman of great substance, with Simpson commenting : “We worked closely with the Miriam Makeba Foundation to ensure we honoured her legacy in a way that captured her charisma, her unbounded talent, and her love for her craft. We’re honoured for her to be a part of our story.”
With the TV advert six months in the making, they overcame some impressive creative challenges. Bringing Makeba back to the silver screen was challenging, as a VFX team was assigned the task of mapping her face onto a body double and then “remastering” it into the new artist’s face.
Speaking about this revolutionary technique, Director Zwelethu Radebe from Egg Films noted: “To get the legend of Miriam Makeba to perform once more, we analysed a wide selection of archival footage. Once we narrowed down the selects, we filmed a body double performing the song, matching the angles, and lighting of the stock footage. We then replaced our double’s head with the archival footage of Miriam, matching the look and feel of the old footage to create an authentic remastering of the classic song.”
Simpson expressed how daunting it was creating the music for the campaign but yet an exciting task, saying, “We were thrilled to collaborate with Msaki and Sun-EL Musician for the credibility and authenticity they brought to remastering “Pata Pata.”
The impressive advert started airing on DSTV, SABC and e.tv from Monday, 15 August 2022 as part of the whisky brand’s WhiskyRemastered campaign.
Have a look at the creatively brilliant advert launched in Women’s Month to commemorate one of the most treasured voices in South African music.
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Picture: Homage to Miriam Makeba group/ Facebook