By Marshall Bwanya
HARARE – When ZimDanceHall maestro Winky D, announced his upcoming “Tete-a-tete” concert at Alex Sports Club, Harare, he didn’t just set a date.
The Gaffa as Winky D is affectionately known by his legions of fans set the stage for a cultural moment teeming with mystery, symbolism, and expectation.
This isn’t just another ordinary gig.
It’s billed as a “person-to-person conversation,” and if history is anything to go by, the Big Man is about to turn a football draw into an economic, political, and cultural derby, a stage show into a struggle session, and a night of music into a moment of reckoning.
For weeks, the suspense has simmered.
With no poster details, tracklist hints and official comments of what Tete-a-tete gig offers.
Just a Fabrizio Romano-style “Here we go” and the air-tight secrecy that has kept fans, critics, and entertainment analysts buzzing.
The concert title itself, Tete-a-tete is a French term for “head-to-head” isn’t just a linguistic flex.
It’s a loaded metaphor, delving into the semantics of artistry that define Winky D’s persona.
For some, it signals intimacy, a chance for Winky D to speak heart-to-heart with his fans about their shared hardships.
For others, it’s a veiled challenge to a political system that has tried, time and again, to mute and silence his voice.
The football semantics no doubt seal the intrigue.
In his draw on August 26, Winky D teased supporting acts as though he were pairing teams for a Champions League clash.
Artists that have dominated the local scene such as Nisha T, Bling 4, Saintfloew, Bazooker, Killer T, and Chillmaster will feature in the much anticipated concert.
This is no accident.
Football, like politics, thrives on rivalries, strategy, and the possibility of last-minute upsets.
Winky however, is positioning his concert as a contest, not between artists, but between silence and speech, between despair and defiance.
Yet, beneath the spectacle lies the shadow of last year’s snub.
Last December Gateway Streams barred him from staging “Jabhuna” at the Harare International Conference Centre (HICC), fans felt the weight of censorship.
Jabhuna wasn’t just a venue.
It was sacred turf, the kind of place Highlanders FC call Soweto End and Dynamos FC claim as Vietnam Stand.
A shrine where Winky’s crossover shows became collective rituals, defiantly confronting the socio-economic injustices endured by the masses.
To be denied that platform was not merely a coincidental inconvenience it was a political statement to silence the Gaffa.
Winky D, by moving to Alex Sports Club, and declaring it the “new Jabhuna,” Winky D reclaims ground and redefines what it means to own your narrative, voice and art.
This explains why fans, music analysts and critics’ expectations stretch far beyond music.
They aren’t merely buying tickets to dance, it’s more of a road to Damascus moment, where they anticipate a messianic voice of truth and transformation.
They’re showing up for honesty, for solidarity, for an unfiltered exchange with an artist who has never shied from naming corruption, poverty, and the betrayals of power.
When Winky D sings about injustice, he isn’t entertaining, he’s testifying.
Ironically in the past when police shut down his shows, or state media starved him of airplay, it only deepens the bond between him and his base.
The secrecy around Tete-a-tete only adds fuel.
Will he unveil new music, will there be a surprise collaboration and will he dare to stage symbolic theatrics that double as political commentary?
No one knows, but everyone is speculating with anticipation.
But that’s Winky D’s point, mystery isn’t a gimmick, it’s part of the promise.
It molds the audience to arrive open, expectant, and ready to engage in the unexpected.
What fans crave most is not pyrotechnics or guest stars.
It’s a moment of truth.
A reminder that their struggles induced by economic collapse, political suffocation, social fractures, are not lived alone.
They want affirmation that art still has the power to bear witness, and that their favourite socially conscious artist has the courage to say what others cannot.
So, come August 30, 2025 the Alex Sports Club won’t just be a concert venue.
It will be a confessional, a battlefield, and a new Jabhuna rolled into one.
Winky D has promised a Tete-a-tete.
The question is, will it be an intimate embrace, a direct confrontation, or both?
Either way, the Gaffa knows his audience isn’t coming for escapism.
They’re coming for truth, cloaked in riddim.
That truth, if delivered as expected or anticipated, might just echo louder than the basslines.
