As the MTN Bushfire Festival once again returns to a physical edition, taking place from 27-29 May 2022, the festival is once again proud to host the annual Arts Round Table that aims to increase knowledge and skills within the Eswatini artistic community.
For the 2022 edition, MTN Bushfire is excited to announce a partnership with the Africa Rising Music Conference (ARMC),  a new, female led, executive-focused music industry conference that promises to be a game-changer for African music and its connection to the European market. ARMC will form an integral part of the Arts Round Table for this year’s festival, kindly supported by First National Bank.
This partnership between ARMC and MTN’s Bushfire Festival will create a synergy that aims to lay the foundation for an annual opportunity to meet, engage, showcase and activate a dynamic range of topics and outputs. This ground-breaking three-year partnership seeks to showcase emerging local talent and provide a platform for stakeholders from different arts disciplines to interact with top industry professionals and ultimately contribute to the development of the arts industry in Eswatini. By connecting the African and European music markets at multiple touchpoints, there will be a range of new opportunities specifically for the local Eswatini creative industries as well as more broadly for the region.
This year’s edition of ARMC will be held in Johannesburg at the Hallmark House Hotel on the 24th and 25th of May 2022. This unique conference will feature a mix of local and international delegates, centering around the urban and electronic music industries and the Afro-Euro connection both of these chart-topping genres provide.
In collaboration with ARMC, MTN Bushfire’s Arts Round Table 2022 will host speakers from the region and from around the world, all with expertise across various pillars of the music business ecosystem. Speakers from the Southern African region, The Netherlands, Germany, Rwanda & Americas form part of this year’s Arts Round Table. The themes will centre around; Women’s Voices: Amplifying them in the music business; Building Bridges: exchange between Africa & the world; and Independent Africa: developing, understanding and creating new opportunities.
Every year The Arts Round Table, a series of conversations and workshops that takes place on the Friday of the MTN Bushfire Festival weekend, connects aspiring multi-disciplined artists with a selected number of seasoned festival performers. These thematically driven conversations enable individuals and organizations to succeed as professionals in the entertainment industry. To date, over 800 artists have benefited from these workshops.
Aspiring participants from Eswatini should look out for the application call-out on MTN Bushfire social media or attend one of the upcoming MTN Bushfire Roadshows to apply to participate in the 2022 Arts Round Table.
