Kochia Traditional Dancers Group
…ses (the ostrich, a symbol of beauty and courage, represents the courage they will need to entertain) and monkey fur. They are accompanied by drumming, and the Tung’, the Luo horn. You can contact the Kagan Kochia group for bookings on +254 700 600881 Sources: www.hivisasa.com www.allafrica.com Homa Bay, Kenya Leader: William Odero Ondiek…
The Kalenjin of Kenya Album
…rs and the Kewamoi Women Dancers both featured. The latter – a nice addition to the lineup, as the field day coincided with World Women’s Day. Eddie Grey was part of the team for the recordings, and he joined a number of groups to join them for Influences recordings. Two of these have been included on the album – his guitar playing accompanying The Elimu Cultural Promoters and the Kewamoi Women Dancers….
Tarajazz Group
…h from Zanzibar) with Singeli (a new tribal rhythm). Taarab came from early 1800’s as Egyptian music. In Zanzibar the Mother of Taarab, Siti Binti Saad, made Taarab more popular in the 1920’s to 1950’s. We spoke to Hassan Mahenge, the assistant director of this band. He is a teacher at the DCMA. He teaches the Oud and plays the saxophone. All the students at the DCMA study traditional music such as Taarab as well as Western music. Members of the g…
Day Three: 9 March 2022 (Kisumu) Story
…ngs with Dada Njoo being his biggest hit. After retiring from the Teachers Service Commission, Akwabi joined Kenyatta University’s Performing and Creative Arts Centre where he directed music activities for another 12 years before finally retiring to his village in Ebuhongo were he currently resides. During this recording he was accompanied by his younger brother Silvanus Anyangu (vocals), Ben Mukabwa (bass) and Fiston Lusambo (guitar). They were a…
Ekhunjwe Musical Group Group
…A folk group. Led by Stephen Bwire, a local music scholar who acted as our contact person and by the group’s secretary Wilhemina Oduor, this is a very organized group of twenty eight (28) members coming from the different administrative areas of Samia district. Ekhunjwe ya Abasamiawas formed in April 2008 with common focus on using music as a tool for community development. The group promotes traditional African values and acts in both education a…
Support Singing Wells Page
…We are always keen to hear from people who are happy to offer their time to help the project and from companies which may be able to support us with products or services free of charge. If you can help out in this respect please contact: info@singingwells.org…
Contact Page
…sponsorship, fundraising, publicity, volunteering or anything else, please contact Victoria Denison Email Victoria: victoria@abubillamusic.com Our business addresses Abubilla Music Wey Court West Union Road, Farnham, Surrey GU9 7PT (A Limited Liability Partnership. Registered no: OC354221) www.abubillamusic.com Abubilla Music Foundation Valiant House 12, Knoll Rise Orpington, Kent BR6 0PG (Registered charity no:1142173) www.abubillamusicfoundation…
Day Zero: 6 March 2022 – Travel To Stream Story
…t admit ticket holders into the virtual performance. The result was that a number of live streaming studios where performers book sessions to perform and stream their concerts sprung up in Nairobi. Some venues also adapted to hosting online performances, directly streaming shows to mobile devices and computers of audiences wherever they may be. With the prevailing situation, it is becoming increasingly apparent that the ability of performers to ea…
Elgon Ngoma Troupe Group
…rve the traditions of Eastern Uganda to the rest of the world. ——– You can contact Julius at juliuswolimbwa@gmail.com or PO Box 2254 Mbale, Uganda You can find the Troupe on Facebook here. You can watch a video about the group here. Some of the musicians we recorded were: Bikumbi Yusuf (solo Adungu), Wamumdu Albashir (bass Adungu), Kyasowbayo Joseph (xylophone) and Dkining David (tube fiddle). The songs played were: “Isongja”: a pre-circumcision s…
Day 9 – Sunday 9th July 2017 Story
…ypes of wood); body parts (any specific additional parts and why); strings number; playing techniques (position of instrument; hands positioning and fingers involved in playing; plucking techniques); tuning and sound (central string, sound spectrum, twin strings, accompanying instruments in both traditional context and modern instrumental ensemble, technical innovations and developments); transmission methods; community occasions played in; taboos…
Kiplagat Edwin Kwambai aka Fifty Cows Staff Profile
…r the Singing Wells project at the time. Fifty Cows went on to be the main contact person and “fixer” for the project. In 2014, the Singing Wells again called on Fifty Cows for the first Repatriation Project by the International Library of African Music, which was supported by the Singing Wells. This repatriation project involved retracing and locating surviving musicians who had been recorded and their music archived by ethnomusicologist Hugh Tra…
What We Do Page
…post produced to provide an archive of audio tracks and videos. We are in contact with The British Library about adding the Singing Wells collection to their archive of World and Traditional Music but we also endeavour to make our recordings accessible to the widest possible audience of musicians, music lovers and ethnomusicologists. You can find all our recordings on Soundcloud and YouTube or discover music groups by location or genre via our di…
Conclusion: Challenges and Recomendations Story
…ecording mission is quite satisfactory. Considering the limited time and a number of challenges encountered, I believe we managed to accomplish most of the set objectives and bring back an extensive amount of data and video/sound materials of very good quality. However, there is space for improvement. I think that team work was successful, although division of roles, more particularly on the data collection part on the project, was initially blear…
Albums Introduction Page
…h the music of the area we were recording in. Each album also contains a number of extra tracks that weren’t strictly part of the archiving recordings we were making. These recordings are of ‘Influences’ sessions – where a popular musical artist has joined us on our trip to collaborate with the groups we record. In the event that we have invited one of the musicians back to the Ketebul Studios in Nairobi to record, we will also include these rec…
The Singing Wells podcast #3 Podcast
…Here is podcast number 3. In this podcast, we look at the development of Abubilla Music – one of the partners in The Singing Wells project – from initial idea, to music label. There are interviews with members of the SMCC, and music from the SMCC, Louise Calf, Gus Warriner, Tati Kalveks, Chris Kozlowski and Ketebul artist Winyo. Click here to download the podcast….
Day 1 – Saturday 1st July 2017 Story
…yatiti’s shape (resembles the traditional Luo hut shape), symbolism of the number (8) of strings of the nyatiti, his tuning techniques and order of string tuning, together with the story of his personal attachment to his instruments collection (owns 14 nyatitis). Upon our arrival to Kisumu City, we had another semi‐formal interview that would birth ideas for other hypothesis and arguments to follow up on. We met Meshack Okoth Okumu, who was to be…