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Released
2013 · FILM

Ndiphilela Ukucula: I Live to Sing

Runtime
81 min
DocumentaryMusic

Synopsis

Two decades after Mandela's election, opera students struggle to fulfill the promises of a new South Africa. Some of the world's brightest new opera stars are emerging from the black townships of South Africa. When the University of Cape Town's once all white opera school opened its doors to black students after apartheid, a wave of remarkable talent came in. Recent graduates are singing at The Met and La Scala. This documentary musical follows three students from their home townships to Cape Town where they perform at the country's premier opera house, to New York where they sing at the prestigious Glimmerglass Festival. Along the way they confront everything from tuberculosis and racial politics to their parents' fears that music is not a suitable career.

Credits

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How many hands made this film

The scale of the collaboration

Principal cast & crew: 5

These are the principals we have on file — the full crew ran to the hundreds. Every film this size was made by far more hands than any credits list ever names.

Why a floor?

This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.

Craft leads on file

Edited by Alex LowtherShot by Rich White

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