Rodriguez to perform in Usher Hall in Edinburgh on November 25th
The Sugarman receives recognition in the west four decades after his music was originally discovered
Sixto Diaz Rodriguez will perform at Edinburgh’s Usher Hall on Sunday 25 November following sell-out shows in London. The music of the 70-year-old Detroit singer has only recently come to light in the western world, despite achieving a cult status in South Africa over the anti-Apartheid era, a fame that Rodriguez himself was for decades completely unaware of.
Malik Bendjelloul's documentary Searching For Sugar Man, which was released this summer to critical acclaim, details the extraordinary hunt for the legend by two fans of the musician. Feared dead, the two South African fans embarked on a journey which revealed the extraordinary: that far from committing suicide as had been suspected, Rodriguez was alive and well and living in obscurity.
The folk musician had originally been discovered in 1970s Detroit by producers Dennis Coffey and Mike Theodore, who were certain that the LP they produced with him, Cold Fact, would secure his reputation as one of the greatest living artists. The record bombed however, and it is only now in 2012 that the soulful Sugar Man is finally being given his dues, four decades on.