Day 3: Homa Bay and the Kochia Dancers Story
…nder the bar and the dancers ready to do their stuff… The Kochia Dancers Today is all about dances, so our videos will be much better than still photographs. Let us introduce you to the dancers; here in full glory are the Kochia Dancers who dance in the Ramogi style of dance (ref: for a great article on the Ramogi dance of the Luo, by Helen Odwar, click here): https://youtu.be/_qVuMFLJ9-M https://youtu.be/pwVlHnpw8Io https://youtu.be/B_M_OFRzDoU h…
Day 2: Focus on the Nyatiti, Orutu and DRUMS! Story
…re based in Kisumu, at the Nyanza Club, deep into Luo-land tribal music. Today we are focusing on some of the best Nyatiti and Oruti players around. And we discovered the Keith Moon of Luo drumming. Woke up at the Nyanza Club, outside Kisumu, on the shores of Lake Victoria. This is the view of Lake Victoria we face in the morning before we set out to the next village, Saiya: As we will do six times on this trip, we pass the equator. We can’t help…
Day 1: The music of the Luo – starting at Rang’ala Village Story
…ook 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 are Kenya’s third largest tribe, making up about 13% of the population. The Sega Sega Ban…
From Kisoro to Nairobi to Lake Victoria Story
…in mist. Power and Locusts and Rain: In Kisoro, we had a power cuts every day. The last day for about 18 hours. In general this is okay as we have a generator for recording. We also had an attack of locusts, however, which occupied our rooms like an invading force. All of us woke up in pitch dark to a massive racket in our rooms. As we fumbled to light our candles, we found ours nets covered in locusts – 100’s. They look bigger and meaner in cand…
Day 6: The Studio @ Traveller’s Rest Hotel, Kisoro Story
…inyo. Here, they put down their track. Not at all phased by the use of headphones and mics, they take everything in there stride, performing a number of takes as the song develops. We start by giving them a simple click to follow the beat but quickly realised that their tempos are far more subtle than this. Francis comes back to set the rhythm with their natural clapping and it suddenly all came together again. Once we have the female vocals recor…
Day 5 (much later): The Micyingo Group – guitar and bass! Story
DAY 5 continued: Sunburned, exhausted, and ready to call it a day. Just in time to be shocked by the world’s best bassist.. We opened the ‘Hotel Studio’ for the Kisoro Hill Community who started with wonderful dance and song. But then, they switched gears and set up a smaller group of ‘bass’ and guitar and absolutely blew us away… They started as wonderful large group moving through a set of songs, including ‘Imparake Yagahinga’, the National Par…
Day 5 (PM): The ‘Togetherness Group’ from Kanyabukunga Story
DAY 5 continued: A wonderful afternoon – lots of children, sunshine and a very important empty field.Our time on the hill was followed with an afternoon in an empty field. It was a delightfully empty field. The purpose of the field is as a UN evacuation and refugee centre if there are troubles in Rwanda or the Congo. The fact that it has no tents, has no refugees, is a wonderful thing and we felt it was a great location to record Kanyabukunga Twi…
Day 5: Recording the Mperwa Dancers Story
…5: Welcome to the most beautiful setting for a music recording session. Today we visit the Mperwa Community. The second day of recording – beautiful sunshine in morning and there’s a patten emerging. Morning sunshine, afternoon rain, then the power goes out. Then the locusts attack. But let’s focus on the morning. This morning we recorded the Mperwa Dancers – the lead singer had a beautiful voice and we did an ‘Influences’ sessions with her. Unti…
Day 4 (later): Recording for ‘Influences’ with the Birara Dancers Story
…el, just outside the bar. We were able to record there over the next three days, rain or shine, night or day. Which was good, because it rained a lot. https://youtu.be/c1XBVlNQL6E We continued to use this ‘hotel studio’ to record our ‘Influences’ sessions. A word on what we mean. We have multiple goals at Singing Wells. The first is to preserve the vast musical heritage of East Africa, capturing the diversity of music and dance throughout the regi…
Day 4: UOBDU and the Birara Dancers Story
DAY 4: After 3 days of travel (at least for those of us leaving from London), we were ready to record. 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 Dev…
Day 3: From Nairobi to Kigali to Kisoro Story
DAY 3: Today, we travelled from Nairobi to Kigali to Kisoro, arriving at the Traveller’s Rest Hotel by late eveningWe set off early so we could settle all custom issues with our 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 cr…
Day 1 & 2: Preparing to leave for Kisoro, Uganda Story
…of the Singing Wells Project and met the Ketebul team in the studios for a day . Day 1: 11.11.19, Flight to Nairobi: Jimmy and Andy, Founder and Sound Engineer of Abubilla Music respectively, set out to Nairobi on Saturday for Nairobi. All good with flights, visas, bags and customs and we were greated by Tabu Osusa. Checked into Fairview, had the obligatory fries in a chip basket and crashed. Day 2: 11.11.20 Day in Ketebul Studio: Jimmy and Andy m…
Kenya (Coast): Day 4 – the road back to Nairobi Story
…t as well to me. I brought a demo CD and he listened to it . This was a Friday and on Monday I went to Ketebul and was hired. Told Tabu that I didn’t have experience but wanted to be a pro studio engineer. He agreed and I joined as apprentice in 2005 and I was 23. The cultural side started in 2007. We started the spot light on Kenya music and other initiatives with Ketebul Productions, the Ministry of Culture and Alliance Francaise. We picked arti…
Kenya (Coast): Day 3 – our final recording day Story
Second day in Diani. Early morning trip to Vuga Kwale County, in a densely covered village, of deep red earth, light blue buildings and wonderful village life. Recorded our final two groups and packed up equipment for the long trip home. The village We recorded at the village’s central meeting place. Throughout recording, clothes were being washed, iron and hung to dry, meetings were being held, grain sifted, chickens chased about… We felt very m…
Kathy’s reflections on her Singing Wells experience News
…worried. Everyone was extremely welcoming and I could tell from the first day they were a professional group, had a common mission and were all dedicated. I enjoyed getting to know everyone and to hear what their views were on the music we were going to record. It certainly felt like an adventure and I was excited to get going. The next day we set off and travelled up to Kitale, Northwest of Nairobi, in the Rift Valley. From the itinerary it look…
Kenya (Coast): Day 2 continued…. Story
…We’ve already reported on our morning… this blog covers our afternoon with our 5th and 6th groups… in an extraordinary setting on a river bank….