They just waited at the edge of the stage for the signal. It’s Kokonelle’s last song on this “Sound of Munich Now” evening, a party song, “Move”, because the beats make you want to dance. And now everyone should jump and dance together when Kharis Ikoko, as the musician is called, sings “Jump”. “Are you ready, Sound of Munich?” the rapper asks one last time – and Gündalein and ESC Rilla, also musicians at the festival, storm the stage. They jump into the air, their arms rise and fall in rhythm, on stage, in the audience. So beautiful.
Kokonelle grew up in the Congo and was musically influenced by Congolese, church music and gospel music. Today she mixes hip-hop, Afropop and soul in her songs. It is important to her to mix her songwriting with musical activism. The death of the African American George Floyd prompted her to write her first text in 2020. Her decision back then: “I want to be an activist, I want to do something, I want to change something and not just make it my own,” she told the SZ last year. And since then she has repeatedly brought songs about black perspectives, political and socially critical topics to the stage – including at the “Sound of Munich Now” festival.
Because of the corona pandemic, “Sound of Munich Now” took a break and transformed into a successful digital festival. In autumn 2023, the live festival was revived – more precisely, the two types of festival were combined because the organizers no longer wanted to do without videos. Thanks to the support of the Cultural Department of the City of Munich and the Jugendkulturwerk, the Ideal Entertainment video crew will once again be in action at the show in November; the performances of the 20 bands will be filmed with six cameras. One song is selected, edited and mastered – from then on a video is played every two or three weeks.
Of course, a video can only give you an idea of what the mood really was in the hall. “Everybody move,” sings Kokonelle. You can see the drops of sweat on her forehead. “Jump, jump,” she shouts into the crowd. The rapper ESC Rilla next to her pulls his left arm up, her rap colleague Gündalein turns, and the people in the audience jump. Dance. And clap when Kokonelle bows after this song.