Portia Gwanzura | |
---|---|
Birth name | Portia Gwanzura |
Born | Norton | 22 May 1967
Origin | Mhondoro, Zimbabwe |
Genres | Traditional music |
Instrument(s) | Mbira Drums |
Years active | 1992–present |
Labels | Hohodza |
Website | https://portiagwanzura.com |
Portia Gwanzura (b. 1967) is a Manchester based Zimbabwean singer and founder of music group Hohodza Band. [1] [2] She is known for being the first woman to form and lead a band in Zimbabwe when she established Hohodza Band which performed African dance, music and culture.
Portia Gwanzura was born in Norton, Zimbabwe. She grew up in Mhondoro village, [3] she moved to Harare when she was a teenager then relocated to the United Kingdom in 2002. In 1992, Portia formed Hohodza, the first female led band to be formed in Zimbabwe which was made up of school leavers at the time. She has recorded fifteen studio albums with the band. In 1995, Hohodza was voted as third best band in Zimbabwe by The Herald (Zimbabwe) readers across Zimbabwe. [4]
She has performed live on the BBC's Andy Kershaw Show, was interviewed for the Esther Rantzen show on Granada TV and performed for the Mayor of Wigans "Christmas Cheers " fund to raise money for the local community. [5] Up until 2006 Portia Gwanzura and her band recorded fifteen albums with the eleventh being launched in England by then Junior Minister and MP for Leigh Andy Burnham. In 2007, Portia Gwanzura chosen by the Wigan Borough Council as one of the ten most recognised people in the Borough for her contribution to the local community. In 2015, Portia was presented with Station Honor Award from ZimOnline Radio.
Mark Berry, better known as Bez, is an English percussionist, dancer, DJ and media personality. He is best known as a member of the rock bands Happy Mondays and Black Grape.
Catharine Letitia Hoey, Baroness Hoey, better known as Kate Hoey, is a Northern Irish politician and life peer who served as Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Home Affairs from 1998 to 1999 and Minister for Sport from 1999 to 2001. During the 1970s Hoey was involved in radical far-left groups but by the end of the decade became involved with the Labour Party. Hoey remained a member of the Labour Party for several decades while she was Member of Parliament (MP) for Vauxhall from 1989 to 2019, but resigned from the party in 2020.
Tsitsi Dangarembga is a Zimbabwean novelist, playwright and filmmaker. Her debut novel, Nervous Conditions (1988), which was the first to be published in English by a Black woman from Zimbabwe, was named by the BBC in 2018 as one of the top 100 books that have shaped the world. She has won other literary honours, including the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the PEN Pinter Prize. In 2020, her novel This Mournable Body was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. In 2022, Dangarembga was convicted in a Zimbabwe court of inciting public violence, by displaying, on a public road, a placard asking for reform.
Stella Chiweshe was a Zimbabwean musician. She was known internationally for her singing and playing of the mbira dzavadzimu, a traditional instrument of the Shona people of Zimbabwe. She was one of few female players, and learned to play from 1966 to 1969, when other women did not.
Cosmas Magaya was a Zimbabwean mbira musician.
Nehanda Charwe Nyakasikana also known as Mbuya Nehanda was a svikiro, or spirit medium of the Zezuru Shona people. She was a medium of Nehanda, a female Shona mhondoro. As one of the spiritual leaders of the Shona, she was one of the leaders of a revolt, the Chimurenga, against the British South Africa Company's colonisation of what is now Zimbabwe led by Cecil John Rhodes in 1889. She was a Hera of the HwataShava Mufakose Dynasty. She and her ally Sekuru Kaguvi were eventually captured and executed by the company on charges of murder. She has been commemorated by Zimbabweans by statues, songs, novels, and poems, and the names of streets and hospitals. The legacy of the medium continued to be linked to the theme of resistance, particularly the guerrilla war that began in 1972. Her name became of increasing importance to the nationalist movements in Zimbabwe.
Amy Elizabeth Macdonald is a Scottish singer-songwriter. In 2007, she released her debut studio album, This Is the Life, which produced the singles "Mr. Rock & Roll" and "This Is the Life"; the latter charting at number one in six countries, while reaching the top 10 in another 11 countries. The album reached number one in four European countries – the United Kingdom, Denmark, the Netherlands and Switzerland – and sold three million copies worldwide. Moderate success in the American music market followed in 2008.
Eimear Mary Rose Quinn is an Irish singer and composer. She is best known for winning the Eurovision Song Contest 1996 with the song "The Voice". Since then she has toured and performed extensively internationally and has released four albums of her work, the most recent being Ériu, recorded with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra and released in 2020.
Anas Sarwar is a Scottish Labour and Co-operative politician who has served as Leader of the Scottish Labour Party since 2021. He has been a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Glasgow region since 2016, having been Member of Parliament (MP) for Glasgow Central from 2010 to 2015.
Dame Vera Margaret Lynn was an English singer and entertainer whose musical recordings and performances were very popular during World War II. She is honorifically known as the "Forces' Sweetheart", having given outdoor concerts for the troops in Egypt, India and Burma during the war as part of the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA). The songs most associated with her include "We'll Meet Again", "(There'll Be Bluebirds Over) The White Cliffs of Dover", "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square" and "There'll Always Be an England".
Laura White is a Grammy–nominated English singer-songwriter from Atherton in the Metropolitan Borough of Wigan, Greater Manchester. White is known for being a contestant on the fifth series of The X Factor in 2008. As part of The X Factor Finalists group, she reached number one in the United Kingdom, Scotland and Ireland with "Hero" in November 2008, eventually becoming the fastest–selling single of 2008 in the UK.
Lisa Eva Nandy is a British Labour Party politician serving as Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport since 2024. She has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for Wigan since 2010. Nandy previously served as Shadow Foreign Secretary, Shadow Levelling Up Secretary, Shadow Energy Secretary and Shadow International Development Minister.
Lilian Rachel Greenwood is a British Labour Party politician who has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Nottingham South since 2010, and the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Future of Roads since July 2024.
Yvonne Helen Fovargue is a British Labour Party politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Makerfield from 2010 to 2024.
Portia Woodman-Wickliffe is a New Zealand rugby union player. She plays fifteen-a-side and seven-a-side rugby union, and was a member of the New Zealand women's national rugby sevens team and New Zealand women's national rugby union team. Woodman was a member of the New Zealand Women's Sevens team that won a silver medal at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro and gold medals at the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo and at the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. She retired from international sevens rugby after the Paris Olympics.
Margaret Ferrier is a Scottish politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Rutherglen and Hamilton West from 2015 to 2017, and again from 2019 to 2023. She was first elected to the House of Commons at the 2015 general election as the Scottish National Party (SNP) candidate for the constituency. She lost her seat to Ged Killen of the Labour Party at the 2017 general election but regained it at the 2019 election.
Rachael Thomas is a Canadian politician who was elected to represent the riding of Lethbridge in the House of Commons of Canada in the 2015 federal election. A member of the Conservative Party, she was reelected in the 2019 and 2021 federal elections, and has been the Shadow Minister for Canadian Heritage since October 2022. Previously, Thomas has also served as the Official Opposition critic for Youth and Persons with Disabilities, the Status of Women, and Digital Government.
Joanne Marie Platt is a British Labour and Co-operative politician who has served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Leigh and Atherton since 2024. She was previously MP for Leigh from 2017 to 2019.
The 2021 Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council election took place on 6 May 2021 to elect members of Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council in England. This election was held on the same day as other local elections. The election was originally due to take place on 7 May 2020, but was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. A by-election was held on the same day in Orrell ward to fill the seat left vacant by the death of Conservative councillor Richard Clayton.
Vangelis Peter Haritatos is a Zimbabwean businessman and politician who has served as Deputy Minister for Lands, Agriculture, Water, Climate and Rural Resettlement and a Member of the National Assembly of Zimbabwe for Muzvezve since 2018. Haritatos is a member of the ruling ZANU–PF and his father, Peter Haritatos, was previously an MP for the same party.