Rakgadi of the rhythm: Mantwa Chinoamadi and the soul of jazz

Mail & Guardian

15-05-2025

Out of the blue: Producer of the annual Standard Bank Joy of Jazz festival Mantwa Chinoamadi advises young women who aspire to succeed in the music industry to listen, learn and always be a student.
'Some call me 'Hahani', or even 'Dabawo', but I am mostly known as 'Rakgadi,'' says Mantwa Chinoamadi, producer of the renowned Standard Bank Joy of Jazz festival.
She says it not with pomp, not even with power, but with an ease — like it's not a title she carries but rather a truth that carries her.
In our communities, titles are more than mere names — they are positions, placements, deeply woven into the fabric of black identity.
Rakgadi is not just the aunt who brings sweets at family gatherings or calls to check in during exams. Rakgadi is the firm hand at a funeral, the voice that steadies a family during lobola negotiations, the woman who speaks with her eyes when elders are too weary to explain. To be called Rakgadi is not just to be known — it is to be trusted.
When I first met Chinoamadi, it wasn't her CV or her reputation that walked into the room. It was her presence. Her words — 'Have you eaten?' 'Did you get a drink?' 'Do you know where you're going?' — floated through the air like a melody, warm and anchoring.
There was music in her care, rhythm in her hospitality. She moved with the kind of energy that doesn't need to be announced. It wraps around you, grounding you. That's what makes her powerful. That's what makes her Rakgadi.
In many spaces, softness is seen as weakness. But in Chinoamadi's hands, it is strength, braided with intention, stitched into leadership. She commands not with ego but with empathy.
In a male-dominated industry, where elbows are sharpened for boardroom battles, Chinoamadi walks in, not as 'the woman among men' but as the producer. The executive. The decision-maker. Titles she wears lightly, but roles she fulfils with precision and a maternal command.
Chiawelo, Soweto. That's where the seeds were sown. The streets, filled with jazz on Sundays after church, gave her an early, unshakable rhythm. The township soundtrack was her first syllabus.
'My father loved music,' she says. 'He played jazz all the time — songs from Brook Benton and Ella Fitzgerald to name a few.'
The music didn't just play — it lived. It spilled from windows, danced along pavements, curled under doors. Back then, Chinoamadi didn't know that music would become her path — she just knew it was there, part of her, like her surname or her skin.
The funny thing is, she wanted to be a doctor. A science and maths whiz. And that's the beauty of it. We are never one thing. We are branches reaching in different directions, finding light in unexpected places.
It was during a gap year that destiny knocked, softly at first. Computers had just become a thing and Chinoamadi signed up for computer science. But life or perhaps her ancestors had other plans.
While waiting for her brother-in-law Peter Tladi in Auckland Park, she was asked to help around his company, T-Musicman. Simple tasks: filing, typing. But for her, no task is ever just that. She learned not by watching from afar but by rolling up her sleeves.
'I would sit and do enquiry forms for musicians such as Hugh Masekela, Tsepo Tsola and Jonas Gwangwa who were artists managed by the record label, and so I worked my way up from that moment on.'
She says an industry like this can be intimidating but she chose not to operate on fear.
'I was scared,' she admits. 'I was scared of something I did not know.' But she looked across the room full of men and told herself, 'There is nothing to fear.'
'I let go of the thought of saying I am in a boardroom full of 23 men as a woman, instead, I walk into the room as a producer or executive and get rid of the title of female producer or female executive.'
That quiet courage, that gentle assertion is the heartbeat of Rakgadi. The kind of power that doesn't roar, but makes the ground tremble all the same.
Today, when young black girls ask how to thrive in the music industry, she says: 'Listen. Learn. Always be a student.'
That humility isn't a performance — it's how she's built everything.
'When I was young, I used to do internships at festivals. I did New Orleans, I did one at the London Jazz Festival, just to be in the middle of the preparations to see how things work.
'I still go to festivals and you will never see me with the audience, I still go behind the scenes because I want to learn and see how I can make the work I do different back home.'
That sense of eternal learning, of never being too grand to be a student, is what makes Chinoamadi rare. Her journey reminds us that leadership is not about hierarchy — it's about service. She doesn't mentor with authority; she mentors with presence. She doesn't lead with a loud voice; she leads with a full heart.
At Joy of Jazz, her imprint is everywhere. Not just in the artist line-ups or production details, but in how people feel. Joy of Jazz isn't just a music festival. It's a gathering. A homecoming. And every home needs a Rakgadi — someone who makes sure you're fed, who shows you where to go, who welcomes you like she's known you forever.
That's Chinoamadi. That's her gift. She takes care of the music and the people.
What she's building is about legacy as much as jazz. She dreams of a world where young black girls from Soweto never doubt their brilliance. Where they don't shrink themselves in rooms filled with titles and tension. Where they see themselves — fully, fiercely, freely.
And when that happens — when the next generation of Rakgadis rises — we will look back at Mantwa Chinoamadi and know: she was the bridge. She was the one who said, 'Come, sit here,' when others said, 'You don't belong.' She was the one who lifted, who built, who mothered dreams into motion.
'I wish to leave a legacy where a young black girl from Soweto doesn't think less of herself or sell herself short.'