Thousands of music lovers packed Huddle Park in Johannesburg on Saturday, August 1, 2026, for the inaugural Scatterlings Music Festival, as its curators brought South Africa’s diverse South African music scene together for a day rooted in Johnny Clegg’s legacy.
Fans spilled across the open fields for a festival that moved between maskandi, Afro-house, pop and electronic music, creating a broad celebration of South African sound.
The festival arrived a day after the release of Scatterlings: Johnny Clegg Reimagined, a collaborative tribute album curated by Jesse Clegg and Msaki.
Rather than simply replaying Johnny Clegg’s catalogue, the project reworks it, giving songs such as “Third World Child” and “The Crossing (Osiyeza)” to a new generation of artists to reinterpret in their own voices.
A festival built on Johnny Clegg’s legacy and South African diversity
That reinterpretation carried straight onto the Huddle Park stage. Zakes Bantwini, Sjava, Sun-El Musician, Tresor, Simmy, Muzi, J’Something, Zolani Mahola and the Johnny Clegg Band shared the bill, bringing artists from very different corners of the music scene together.
Msaki, who co-curated the event, said the day showed that South African audiences resist being boxed into one genre.
“A day like this proves that South Africans are so versatile,” she said.
She pointed to an audience willing to move from a dance set to an intimate guitar performance within the same day.
Jesse Clegg framed the festival’s purpose simply: it is “about bringing South Africans together again through music that has always connected us.”
Muzi, fresh off his set, called performing at Scatterlings “a dream come true.”
The Johnny Clegg song that started it
J’Something’s reinterpretation of “Asimbonanga” helped set the tone for the wider project months before the festival.
“His music shaped how so many of us understood our identity and our history,” he said of Johnny Clegg, describing the reinterpretation as “an honour beyond words.”
Stream / listen to “Asimbonanga”.
Organisers confirmed Scatterlings Music Festival will return next year, following an earlier London edition.
The plans position the festival as an annual event that keeps Johnny Clegg’s music and legacy alive rather than leaving them confined to the archives.
