Singing Wells – Origins News
…Osusa, one of Kenya’s most successful record producers end up in a remote Kenyan village, teamed with me, an American businessman, and a sound engineer from Gateshead? The Singing Wells project is a result of a chance meeting between two music labels on two separate continents. Tabu Osusa founded Ketebul Music in 2007 with a goal to record and promote traditional East African music. Tabu laments the fact that the music heritage of the region is b…
Day 2: Nairobi to Kitale & an interview with Pato Story
…ho works with Content House in Kitale and is producing a TV documentary on Kenyan Olympic athletes. (Pictured in the photo with Willie and Eddie). Interview with Patrick ‘Pato’ Ondiek We used the car ride to interview Pato about his background and his work with Ketebul Music. Pato is from the Luo tribe, from the village of Bondo (450 Km from Nairobi) , although he and his father were both born and raised in Nairobi. He is one of 6 children – he ha…
Bill Odidi reporting on Singing Wells from London News
…don in August as part of Ketebul Music’s ‘Kenya @ 50’ music documentary. He teamed up with Andy Patterson while he was here and together they conducted a number of interviews with Kenyan musicians who are now based in the UK. They also had the chance to visit Kenya House in Stratford as a guest of our friends at the Kenya Tourist Board. Here’s Bill’s article published in Business Daily Africa: http://www.businessdailyafrica.com/Where+the+world+got…
Day 1: In Nairobi, packing and talking to Tabu Story
…ibal music. The Rift Valley is known for its marathon runners. Most of the Kenyan stars have come from this area of Kenya. On this trip we willl visit villages where the Olympic medal winners in Beijing are from and record their music. Ketebul is part of the Go Down Art Centre in Nairobi. This centre is funded by NGO’s and in particular the Ford Foundation. It hosts various artists including painters, sculptors, musicians and a film and TV product…
Song Translations: Music of the Kalenjin Story
…ng translations: view PDF Chebonet group Date of recording: 5th March, 2012 Recorded on location in: Kapsokwony, Kenya Song translations: view PDF Lomut Traditional Dancers Date of recording: 6th March, 2012 Recorded on location in: Kapenguria, Kenya Song translations: view PDF Lomuke Group of recording: 6th March, 2012 Recorded on location in: Kapenguria, Kenya Song translations: view PDF Kalomoywa Date of recording: 6th March, 2012 Recor…
Victoria’s reflections on the music of the Batwa Story
…r in the day Henry highlights many of the problems facing the Batwa people today and I realize that wearing dirty clothes is the least of their problems. Despite that, I speak to my daughter Nicola later in the evening and tell her about what I’ve seen and we talk about what we should do with our unwanted clothes from now on. The Birara perform seven songs for us and the dancing becomes infectious. By the end we are all dancing. The children have…
Return of the Batwa @ Ketebul Music Studios Story
While in Western Kenya, we made a decision to bring some of the Batwa singers back from Kisoro to Uganda. We spent Saturday and Sunday recording them and the results are fantastic. The whole way back from Kisoro to Kisumu we talked about the Batwa and how much we loved the singers. We thought about bringing them to Nairobi sometime in the future. We then decided the future is now and called Henry Neza to see if he would be willing to travel with…
Music of the Kalenjin: video playlist News
…eople. The people from this highland ethnic group – the Nilotic – include eight culturally and linguistically related sub tribes – Kipsigis, Nandi, Tugen, Marakwet, Keiyo, Sabaot and Terik. They are perhaps most widely known as world class athletes as many of the legendary Kenyan long distance runners are Kalenjins, including Kipchoge Keino, chairman of the Kenyan Olympic Committee and the first African to win an Olympic gold medal (Mexico City 19…
Day 3: Homa Bay and the Kochia Dancers Story
…under 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…
Day 2: Focus on the Nyatiti, Orutu and DRUMS! Story
…are 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 hel…
Day 1: The music of the Luo – starting at Rang’ala Village Story
…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 are Kenya’s third largest tribe, making up about 13% of the population. The Sega Sega B…
From Kisoro to Nairobi to Lake Victoria Story
…ng our recording of the Batwa in Kisoro, Uganda the team travelled back to Kenya to embark on the second phase of the trip. We are recording the music of the Luo in the Nyanza province in the west of the country near Lake Victoria. We want the focus of these blogs to be about the music. So we’ll keep travel updates to the minimum. In this blog we combine all the fun of travelling from Kisoro back to Nairobi and from Nairobi to Kisumu. Kisoro to Na…
Samba Mapangala & Orchestra Virunga News
…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 Mapangala click here …
Day 6: The Studio @ Traveller’s Rest Hotel, Kisoro Story
…filled with the music and videos and far more background on the project and the Batwa. For now leave for Nairobi again and then, on Sunday, travel to Western Kenya for the next series of villages and more music. All the best The Singing Wells Team…
Day 5 (much later): The Micyingo Group – guitar and bass! Story
…ntre stage. For us, he symbolised the essence of how life is for the Batwa today – a very hard life, but a life full of spirited song and dance… and this lady is their wonderful lead vocalist… https://youtu.be/pZzgr2PXZ3s https://youtu.be/gt4_CaZNN2c Then the guitar and bass took to the stage….if you are wondering where the bass is, the plastic bag turn out to be significant. We were bemused by this magic plastic bag, but it turns out it was cov…
Gary Barlow, Ayub Ogada & the Diamond Jubilee song News
…on the Radio 2 Breakfast Show (22nd March). Click here to listen: Gary Barlow speaking from Kenya on Radio 2 Kothbiro If you’ve never heard the song Kothbiro here it is – we think you’ll love it as we’re sure Gary Barlow does. Magical Kenya If you’re going to Kenya on holiday we recommend you visit the Magical Kenya website first – it’s a fantastic source of information about Kenya and has everything you need to know about planning a great trip….