Ballantine’s Scotch Whisky Presents ‘Black Coffee’s Human Orchestra’: the Latest Instalment in the Global ‘Stay True Stories’ Campaign

Electronic music and vocal techniques collide in ‘Black Coffee’s Human Orchestra’, a unique film which sees inspiring South African DJ and Producer Black Coffee lead a 40-strong group of African vocalists to create a stunning voice-only recreation of his most famous electronic track, ‘Rock My World’.

Africa’s leading DJ, Black Coffee, features in the film which is being premiered globally with Hypebeast.com. The film will also appear in a major South African mixed media advertising campaign, implemented to communicate Ballantine’s global brand mantra, ‘Stay True, Leave An Impression’

Also launching today is StayTrueStories.com – a digital home for inspirational content produced by Ballantine’s around the globe, as well as from the wider web

OCTOBER 2014: Ballantine’s, the world’s No 2 Scotch whisky, today launches an inspiring short film ‘Black Coffee’s Human Orchestra’ and supporting marketing campaign, created in collaboration with world-renowned African DJ and Producer, Black Coffee. The film is the latest of a series presented by Ballantine’s, each of which has been shot around the world and features unique individuals who represent Ballantine’s global mantra, ‘Stay True, Leave an Impression’. Each film in the series, which can be seen at www.StayTrueStories.com, captures these individuals as they bring their own story to life, performing innovative, creative and artistic experiments centred around their passions, philosophies and talent.

About Stay True Stories
The ‘Stay True Stories’ campaign, produced by M&C Saatchi Sport & Entertainment London and M&C Saatchi London, is intended to drive deep and targeted consumer engagement around the world. Ballantine’s global and local social media channels, in addition to Black Coffee’s (which have nearly 1.5m cumulative followers), will be utilised to drive views and engagement with the film, with a substantial online media campaign managed by Vizeum. In addition, Black Coffee will participate in a series of media interviews to support the campaign, including with the campaign’s media partner Hypebeast.com, the world’s leading cultural trends site. Future campaigns are in production across three continents and will appear between now and June 2015.

About ‘Black Coffee’s Human Orchestra’
The film, directed by Novemba (Cap Gun Collective) and shot in and around Johannesburg (Soweto and Maboneng), illustrates Back Coffee’s passion, creativity and ‘Stay True’ spirit of continuous experimentation with music. The film opens with Black Coffee’s own back-story and beliefs around life, music and creation, before we see him assemble a group of individual and talented vocalists from across Africa. The climax of the film is an experiment which defines Black Coffee’s ambition as an artist; an impressive feat to deconstruct one of his most famous electronic music productions, ‘Rock My World’, recreating it using only the vocal abilities of his 40-strong group, put together especially for the film.

This film, along with others in the series, can be found at StayTrueStories.com, an online hub which also launches today, collating the richest and most captivating stories from across the web, chosen as a result of their ability to inspire us to Stay True to our own courage and conviction.

Previous film content includes ‘Kilian Martin’s Carmen’, featuring world leading freestyle skateboarder Kilian Martin and his unique take on Bizet’s Spanish set opera Carmen, ‘Ben Mead’s Art of Drumming’, which shows the London-based star of Ballantine’s global ‘Stay True’ TV campaign performing a unique experiment to visualise sound, and ‘The Whale Song’, featuring Chilean bassist, Juan Manuel Aguirre, as he takes to the sea in a unique experiment to capture the union of music and nature.

South African Advertising Campaign
In South Africa where Black Coffee is a household name, he will feature in a nine month advertising campaign across posters, billboards and in print, as well as below-the-line in on-trade venues which utilise his inspirational reputation to communicate ‘Stay True, Leave an Impression’. South Africa is a high-growth market for the brand, and this campaign is intended to drive awareness and affinity for the brand locally.

Peter Moore, Global Brand Director for Ballantine’s, commented: “The Stay True Stories series is proving to be a multi layered and effective way of communicating what Ballantine’s stands for globally, in a way that is both entertaining and unique. Through extensive collaboration with the protagonists of the films, we have ensured that they are rooted in our global brand positioning of ‘Stay True, Leave An Impression’, inspiring consumers to do just that.

Whilst the campaign is, from a global perspective, mostly digitally focussed, extending our association with Black Coffee into advertising in South Africa will serve to make even more impact in such a key market for us going forwards.”

Black Coffee commented: “Musical experimentation and its power to bring people together is why I do what I do. When Ballantine’s asked me what my dream experiment would be, I wanted to set us the challenge to do something unique. To see the group of vocalists we put together from throughout Africa with each playing their own part, producing the final recreation of ‘Rock My World’ was an amazingly satisfying moment.”

Notes

About Ballantine’s

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