How Bacardi House Party Sessions came into being

The Birth of a global property that travelled 5 countries and became a platform for music talent discovery.

Manthan Gada | 23rd Jul, 2020

Entertainment | Music

With the aim to champion and celebrate the local music talent in South Africa, Bacardi House Party Sessions chose 4 A listers to represent the platform – Frank Casino, DJ Speedsta, DJ Shimza and Nadia Nakai. All these artists headlined their own Bacardi House Parties through October 17 – March 2018 opening the arena for upcoming artists to open for them and make the audiences move to their music.

We kick started the fireworks with a Halloween Party where all four artists performed back to back to close the show with a barrage of high energy opening artists to build the energy for the night. This party was then followed by a series of parties each of the artists headlined creating a lot more opportunities for upcoming artists to perform for a live audience alongside established names.

The Grave Yard Shift Halloween party, at the Neighbourgoods Market in Braam Johannesburg witnessd Bacardi host the first of the Bacardi House Party Sessions. Sharing the spotlight were up-and-coming artists PHFat, DJ Da Lootz, DJ Venom, PatricKxxLee and Chuck Tailored. A few weeks later on 18th November, Bacardi turned the Alexander Theatre in Braamfontein into the ultimate throw down where Johannesburg’s coolest crew got to witness South Africa’s rising stars, Dala Fam and Flex Von Doom, share a stage with top cats Frank Casino and DJ Speedsta. The guests sipped on signature Bacardi cocktails, while getting down to local music and rhymes through the night.

Popular South African DJ, Shimza, hosted the third Bacardi House Party Session. He had the party animals grooving to the hottest house tracks and kept them singing along.

Upcoming stars Moonchild Sanelly, Earful Soul, and Soul Healer held the crowd up before the man of the night took the party to another level. The entire venue glowed red illuminating the bat themed decor scattered throughout the venue while multi-coloured lights strobed from the stage adding to the ultimate house party experience.

On Friday, January 19, a giant lollypop and candy floss sticks were scattered around the garden, bright neon lights lit up polka dot and candy covered walls. South Africa’s top female artists, Nadia Nakai aka BRAGGA hosted the final Bacardi House Party Sessions. Held at Off Boyz residence in Sandton, it was the ultimate closing house party for the year.

On the evening Nadia premiered her brand new music video Naaa Mean featuring Casper Nyovest on the big screen, before performing a string of her hit songs including Money Back and Savage . Nadia also joined the crowd to get down to performances by rising artists DJ Banques, Angie Santana, BlakSuga and Rowlene. Here’s the music video for Naaa Meaan!

This marked the last Bacardi House Party Sessions but left fans looking forward to the first ever Bacardi Holiday Club on the first weekend of February 2018 where all 4 Bacardi House Party Sessions headliners DJ Speedsta, Frank Casino, DJ Shimza and Nadia Nakai came together to perform alongside American Hip Hop artist Swizz Beatz. This marked the end of the first year of Bacardi House Party Sessions and Bacardi Holiday Club but got etched as the beginning of a music discovery journey that traveled 5 countries in the coming years and explored a whole lot of musical prodigies on the way! Check out the after movie of the first edition of Bacardi Holiday Club below!