Ntomb'Yelanga Thobekile Mbanda is a dedicated indigenous instrument maker, educator, and cultural preservationist committed to the revival, promotion, and development of African musical heritage.
Through her company, Mmaletstatsi Productions, she specializes in crafting traditional instruments such as Umakhweyana, Ughubu, Ingungu, Isigubhu, Lesiba, and Segankure, while also offering dynamic workshops that share ancestral knowledge and empower communities with heritage-based, self-sustaining skills.
She is a globally celebrated educator and performer, with her work extending into community development through initiatives like Zakhe Juluka, a project devoted to the preservation, promotion, and development of indigenous African instruments and knowledge systems.
As a teacher, Ntomb’Yelanga brings indigenous knowledge systems into both formal and informal education spaces. At schools such as Reddam House Ballito and Village Kidz, she teaches indigenous instruments, enabling learners to experience music as a living archive of identity, storytelling, and community values. At the university level, she lectures third-year students on the history, performance techniques, and ethnomusicological significance of instruments like the Umakhweyana, combining academic research with lived practice.
Her mission has taken her across the globe—to Russia, the United States, and the Caribbean—where she has shared indigenous instruments and African knowledge systems with diverse audiences. Her performances, both locally and internationally, celebrate the richness and depth of African sound traditions. In addition, Ntomb’Yelanga engages in healing practices rooted in ancestral wisdom and guided by spiritual intuition, using indigenous instruments as tools for restoration and connection.
A central part of her work involves reconnecting communities—especially youth—with their cultural roots through music, storytelling, and hands-on creativity. She also trains educators in under-resourced schools, often in partnership with organizations like ASSITEJ, helping teachers integrate indigenous instruments into classrooms as tools for both cultural expression and education.
Through Mmaletstatsi Productions and initiatives like Abancane Art Academy, she creates isiZulu children’s books, learning charts, and storytelling programs that preserve indigenous language and music. Her work is grounded in decolonial frameworks that center African identity, intergenerational knowledge, and the right of communities to define and express their own cultural narratives.
With every instrument she crafts and every student she mentors, Ntomb’Yelanga Thobekile Mbanda continues to light the path for a new generation—reconnecting them with their heritage and empowering them to carry forward the rhythm of their roots.
