Day 3: Homa Bay and the Kochia Dancers Story
…Bay: The band in full dance: One of the dancers plays the Tung’, the Luo horn: Note how beautiful the long head-dress is. After the dancing, we completed an influences session with Winyo and Jesse on guitar: And that concluded the afternoon with the Kochia Dancers. The Singing Well Team 30 November 2011…
Day 2: Focus on the Nyatiti, Orutu and DRUMS! Story
…drumming, let’s introduce the Orutu. It’s a one string instrument, played with bow, with notes determined by finger pressure against the central stick, ‘fretting’ notes. Here’s what one looks like close up: Here’s the band playing with Jessie and Winyo on an influences song… https://youtu.be/kWbhAfwJkkw https://youtu.be/9Pd3IwODTlY https://youtu.be/KmJULbLUzME https://youtu.be/gPaBQwODTtU https://youtu.be/2ta51sAwNoc Nyatiti Group Featuring Oku…
Day 1: The music of the Luo – starting at Rang’ala Village Story
We are in Rang’ala with the chance to listen to Osumba Rateng and Ogoya Nengo… If you look at a map and think of Lake Victoria as a clock face, the village for today’s recording is at 1PM – it is the Rang’ala Village, home of the legendary Luo singer Ogoya Nengo. We’re about 90 minutes northeast of Kisumu, our ‘base’ for two days. We are here to record the Sega Sega Band (Benga Style) and the Do Do Band (Do Do), both Luo musical styles; the Luo a…
From Kisoro to Nairobi to Lake Victoria Story
…ontinue to tell the story of one young man carrying a generator on his head 800 metres, with 400 metres elevation. We will get T shirts made. Francis Playing Kid Golf: Francis is the music leader of most of Kisoro Batwa, knowing all the clans – he is pretty much has the final say in who sings what song. He is also the lead dancer of his group. We will never forget Francis playing what we called ‘kid golf.’ He was carrying his big spear doing his d…
Day 6: The Studio @ Traveller’s Rest Hotel, Kisoro Story
…): And you’ll remember our guitarist…….who was happy to be back performing with us! With his hand made guitar… And his growing fan base…. And that was that for our trip to Kisoro. We have lots of music, lots of video and lots more stories to tell. But we want to keep disciplined and report daily, so forgive us if we can’t give you everything at once. Over the coming weeks, these blogs will be filled with the music and videos and far more backgroun…
Samba Mapangala & Orchestra Virunga News
…of Samba’s new album Maisha Ni Matamu (Life Is Sweet) on Virunga Records. We first met Samba in Kenya, on a recording trip as part of The Singing Wells project. He sang as part of a ‘Welcome’ concert put together by our friends at Ketebul, along with Winyo and Ayub Ogada. We’ll bring more news on his new album as we have it, but until then you can view his tour dates on the Abubilla Music events calendar – just click here For a profile on Samba M…
Day 5 (much later): The Micyingo Group – guitar and bass! Story
…n. So, hats off to our wonderful guitarist and his fully home made guitar, with wire strings and frets. And a special thumbs up to the magic bass – a clay pot and a ‘beat boxer’ providing one of the coolest bass lines we’ve ever heard. Here they are in action… https://youtu.be/38uXVC1pEvQ https://youtu.be/-alDBT6_wJw https://youtu.be/5Zv_8A8LpRE We invited them back to perform an ‘Influences’ set with us tomorrow. Fantastic songs and a wonderful…
Day 5 (PM): The ‘Togetherness Group’ from Kanyabukunga Story
…They are led by Gadensia Kampire. The SWP crew poses next to the road sign with the empty field behind. Soon, however, the area was filled with lovely children, here to watch some wonderful dancing and singing. As we unload the vans, the ‘Togetherness’ group are waiting to greet us on the ‘stage’….. The performance is fantastic… here the group are singing ‘Waratsinze Sikota’ in praise of God, but lamenting that the Batwa people had lived in the fo…
Day 5: Recording the Mperwa Dancers Story
…ce and we did an ‘Influences’ sessions with her. Until the music is ready, with think this village is best described through pictures: We arrived, greeted by lots of men and boys going back and forth to market, including this chap (later we’ll write on a blog on all the things folks carried on their head and bikes). And there’s always the wonderful backdrop of the Virunga Mountains. And the inevitable narrow path leading up to the village…. And…
Day 4 (later): Recording for ‘Influences’ with the Birara Dancers Story
…cians into an alien environment. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. With the Birara Dancers over the three days we worked with them it worked very well. Here they are on the first night. One thing to remember, which will become clear on subsequent videos – every time you see them singing, there is a baby on their back. 90% of the Batwa women we met had a baby on their back. They would sing and dance through a song with the baby sleeping and…
Day 4: UOBDU and the Birara Dancers Story
…rd. And we rewarded with a great day of recording, starting in the morning with the Birara Dancers, led by the legendary Batwa artist, Francis Sembagare. We woke up early and were greeted with this wonderful view from the garden of the Traveller’s Rest Guesthouse: After breakfast our first stop was the office of the United Organisation for Batwa Development in Uganda (UOBDU), where we met Henry Neza, the Capacity Development Co-ordinator, and Alic…
Day 3: From Nairobi to Kigali to Kisoro Story
…r equipment (we really wanted to return with it all!). We then took Kenyan Airlines (new plane with movies!) to Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, population roughly a million. We were met by our drivers Arun and John and drove through heavy rains to the Rwanda-Uganda border crossing near Kisoro. After a rather lengthy crossing, we then drove on to our final desitination – the Traveller’s Rest in Kisoro. Five quick things: Rwanda: Beautiful country kn…
Day 1 & 2: Preparing to leave for Kisoro, Uganda Story
…ical Pelicases with Apple Laptops, Motu Mixer, Hard Drive Back ups and Headphone Amps. With these, we can record 1 large session with 6-8 inputs, or two separate sessions with smaller groups. SW3 and AM2: These are two Pelicases, with Canon 5D, 7D and 60D camera/lenses and 12 32GB flash cards, plus multiple lenses to video the tribal dances. A major lesson from the March Pilot and Lake Turkana Cultural Festival was that we had under-estimated the…
Kenya (Coast): Day 4 – the road back to Nairobi Story
…college for Graphics Designs and met a lot of musicians there and started with music production, music software, starting with Fruity Loops. I remember the first song I was produced was a song called Msewangu, which is slang for my ‘buddy.’ During the time I was in college, I had a friend who was in a band; she knew an Indian singer who had a project with a temple. She wanted to do a fusion between Indian and Kenyan music. A common friend brought…
Kenya (Coast): Day 3 – our final recording day Story
…felt very much in the middle of things. The corner of the ‘meeting place’, with the rich red earth gradually moving up the light blue walls By this time, we were using the back of the truck as the studio as often as we set up the tent. Folks are gathered around for the second group. Birds were pretty much everywhere….. Folks are intrigued with Pro Tools 9…. …and life went on as we recorded… Zigidigi Cultural Troupe The group is led by Matano Mwach…
Kenya (Coast): Day 2 continued…. Story
…zele style. Wonderful dancing, costumes and percussion… Katana bin Kalama, with beautiful costume of shells… The Group prepares for their performance… Sengenya The most energetic group by far, brought the house down, with wonderful dancing. Led by Munyaka Chimega, they danced in the style of Sengenya (which bears their name). Non-stop dancing, multiple songs and they didn’t want to stop (but we ran out of video!). Fantastic energetic dancers tha…