City counts down to World Design Capital Cape Town 2014 with spectacular New Year’s Eve celebration. Roll on WDC 2014!
The City’s New Year’s Eve party promises to be a visual extravaganza, using creative design elements in the form of 3D mapping and laser lighting.
Cape Town will ring in 2014 with its first ever New Year’s Eve celebrations on Tuesday 31 December 2013, from 18:00 to 00:30 on the Grand Parade, amid a visual extravaganza of lights, top DJs and performers, dancers and a fireworks display.
Come and enjoy an exciting line-up of non-stop entertainment, complete with pulsating lights, laser and stage effects, award-winning electro-pop singer, Toya Delazy and DJs Ready D, Fresh, ClassyMenace, Dr Jules and Mixi playing on top of massive cubes.
A unique feature for the night will be a triangular stage, designed to amplify an electro-dance party environment along with the line-up of South Africa’s top DJs and dance artists.
The City Hall will be lit up in magnificent colours, celebrating its archetypal design, with Table Mountain presenting a glowing backdrop. This is consistent with other top international cities such as New York, Paris and London, that showcase their iconic locations.
‘The City of Cape Town has pulled out the stops this festive season to present the very best of the city’s unique and diverse cultures. It is inclusive events like this that unite our communities, and afford us the opportunity to welcome our numerous visitors in a vibrant spirit. This event is part of this administration’s efforts to make Cape Town the events capital of Africa,’ said the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Tourism, Events and Marketing, Councillor Grant Pascoe.
An elaborate 3D video-mapping display will transform the City Hall’s façade into a nostalgic visual tribute to the late Tata Madiba. Local lighting design specialists and Cape Town Design NPC (the agency created by the City to implement and manage the World Design Capital 2014) will combine technology, light and design, to project iconic imagery from Madiba’s life onto the City Hall.
This dazzling show will be one of the many exciting elements of a five-minute lighting spectacular in which the City of Cape Town will ascend to its position as World Design Capital 2014 – the countdown to which will begin with lights, music, dance and fireworks.
Trenton and Free Radical will take to the stage to get the crowd into the groove with the official ‘Madiba Jive’.
‘Not only is this our inaugural New Year’s Eve Party, but it also formally places an international focus on the city as it launches Cape Town as World Design Capital 2014, beginning a year-long focus on design with the aim to develop our people and turn our workspaces, homes, businesses and city into better places,’ said Councillor Pascoe.
The title of World Design Capital 2014 was bestowed on Cape Town by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ICSID), which awards this status biennially to cities that demonstrate the value of design as a tool for social, cultural and economic development.
The New Year’s Eve celebrations will be followed by the Nagtroepe Malay choirs parade, past City Hall from Keizersgracht, towards the Bo-Kaap Museum.
Along with an innovative stage, event facilities will also include big screens, as well as music delay towers to ensure revellers do not miss a thing in what will be Cape Town’s most exciting New Year’s Eve event yet.
About the New Year’s Eve Artists
• DJ Fresh: Botswana-born DJ Fresh is one of South Africa’s most-sought after mix masters and is credited with pioneering the house music sound which has engulfed Southern Africa since the early 2000s. One of South Africa’s most recognisable voices (and laughs), DJ Fresh hosts the popular Fresh Drive on 5fm weekdays.
• DJ Ready D: With his prolific urban style, Cape Town’s hip hop DJ and ‘turntablist’ Ready D – also known as the DJ for breakthrough hip hop group Prophets of the City in the 1990s – has been rated one of the top 30 hip hop DJs in the world. Now with his own radio spot – The Ready D Show on GHFM, Monday to Thursday – Ready D is also one the country’s most exciting DJ in terms of live performance.
• Toya Delazy: Toya Delazy rose to fame in 2011 with the release of her debut single ‘Pump it on’ and her album ‘Due Drop’ in 2012. Since then her edgy mix of rap, jazz, pop and funk has kept her on top of the charts. South African fans cannot get enough of the nerd glasses, bright colours and mohawk. The award-winning electro-pop singer, who has a current hit ‘Love Is In The Air’ out right now, was also nominated for Best International Artist (Africa) at the 2013 BET Awards in the USA earlier this year.
• DJ ClassyMenace: One of SA’s top DJs, Cape Town-based DJ ClassyMenace is fast making his mark as one this country’s edgiest and addictive producers of club-thumping tunes, one of which, ‘Humbug’, went on to clinch the Number Five spot on 5FM’s chart a few weeks after its release. Having been ushered into the electro-dance fold last year, ClassyMenace’s scale is building bigger and broader with each song he releases, including the turning of Toya Delazy’s monster hit ‘Love Is In The Air’ into an even bigger club anthem.
• DJ Dr Jules: One of Cape town’s most enduring and popular club DJs, Dr Jules – who has also had stints on GHFM – blends hip hop and house into a sound unique to the good Doctor himself who revels in live performance.
• DJ Mixi: Having been on radio since high school at MFM in Stellenbosch, Mixi hosts the popular dance show Night Funk every Friday night as well as Sunday mornings on Good Hope FM while also working the decks as a club DJ, playing a host of various sounds from radio hits to commercial dance, funky/tech house and more.
• Trenton & Free Radical: With songs that have the rhythmic energy and lyrical impact of anthems, the group delivers a unique fusion of diverse influences, including hip hop and electro, ska and Afro. Theirs is a contemporary African sound with universal appeal.
