Kenya (Coast): Day 2 – recording in the village of Kibarani Story
This is our second day of recording and a full one. In this blog we report on the morning. We’ll give you a sense of the village, the groups, the kids and the ‘setup’… The Village This village was called Kibarani. We set up behind on larged thatched hut in an open field, filmed with cows (lots of mooing ended up on record), cow poo (lots of misteps), children, beautiful trees, chickens… but far off the main road, wonderful quiet and cool. This i…
Day 1: The very first field recording day for Singing Wells Story
…tching. At close of day we were invited to some coconuts to celebrate the music Winyo with Coconuts Maddo, Chairman of Ketebul during our coconut break That’s it for now. This is only Day 1 of recording… we look forward to the next two days, 6 more groups, 3 more villages and of course 600 kilometres back to Nairobi. Jimmy …
Nick Abonyo (the ‘clapper-man’) News
…yond borders’ to discover real music.” Nick’s favourite Singing Wells moment was the welcome we received at the home of Ogoyo Nengo in Rang’ala, Nyanza province. “She is a great artist and for her to welcome us to her home was a great honour. I felt so proud.” His worst moment was during the first day of recording on this trip to record the Kalenjin……when the rains came. In his typical wordy style Nick reported, ‘I was wet.’ When asked who from th…
Sad News from Kenya News
…rack with the Singing Wells project. Some sad news. Okumu K’Orengo, one of the musicians we recorded in Kenya as part of the Singing Wells trip, had passed away. He was a master of the Nyatiti and performed for us in the village of Aluny, his final track on the day being a funeral dirge. We send our sympathies and condolences to his family and friends at this sad time. Here is an audio excerpt and video from his performance in Aluny. The news of h…
May 2011 – Jimmy reports back on the pilot phase News
…s base their work on more acoustic instruments while taking advantage of today’s modern recording equipment rather than being totally reliant on it to produce “robotic” stuff. There shall exist modern, contemporary music and traditional music. The latter is sometimes viewed as “backward” and is not at the frontline of entertainment in a country such as ours – in fact one must go to great lengths to access it. It’s available on national days in sta…
Lake Turkana Cultural Festival 2011 News
…o allow them to undertake the trip to this remote area of North West Kenya, 800 km from Nairobi and home to the Turkana and Samburu tribes and the original ‘singing wells’. When Steve Kivutia (Ketebul Music) presented the idea of recording music at the Festival to the AMF, it seemed a perfect fit with the objectives of the Singing Wells project and the trustees were happy to approve a grant to cover the costs of travelling to the Festival with the…
Reflections on the pilot phase by Pato News
…really creepy. We did however enjoy their performance. This being the last day of the tour we planned to finish earlier than the previous days so as to have some little time to relax. On our way back to the hotel we made a stop at the African Pot restaurant, Jimmy was so happy at this because on previous days we never had lunch breaks, and he even let me spend time with my new love [CANON 5D CAMERA]. I cant wait for her to be mine… DAY 6: Drive ba…
Reflections on the pilot phase by Willie Bembe News
…ery tired so we let the big boys have their meeting at the Fairview Hotel. DAY 6 It’s our guest’s last day and we enjoy having last recording sessions with them at the studio. The “seventeen hour” song is very catchy and Jimmy is dancing all over the place as an African touch is added by Makadem, Winyo and Ayub Ogada. Andy is at the control desk being a magician after tearing down our studio so we can use the new equipment. Jimmy is an amazing son…
Discovering music roots with SWP News
…recover from the shock of encountering a moon directly overhead. The next day, Sunday, they were busy at our studios before we ushered them to Sippers Restaurant where we’d lined up a team of brilliant music performers to welcome them and also accord them the opportunity to check if their hi-tech equipment would work well south of the Equator. Blow by blow accounts of the field recordings starting Tuesday March 29 to Thursday March 31 are availab…
More Ketebul voices…Steve reports from the field News
…meeting with one of our prospective donors, so we soon all retired for the day. Day 6: Diani to Nairobi The following morning we checked out of the hotel and loaded up the equipment and luggage into the cars. This time around I joined Tabu, Jimmy and Andy in car number 01 to talk shop on the drive back to Nairobi. Deche rode with us to Mombasa where we dropped him off. The drive to Voi served as a chance for us to reflect on the project and pin po…
What we learned from the pilot phase News
…ng truly amazing by combining the best of old and new. The Magic Moment on Day 1 when it all seemed worth it. We took a simple (very American sounding song) from Bado and blended it with his Dad’s styles to make something really special 3. And Lessons? What Need to Improve? We were glad we did the pilot because we did learn a lot. Here are the main lessons: Far more time on Visuals: We had under-estimated how beautiful the locations would be a…
Meet the team from Ketebul Music News
… Our ‘Throat to Choke’ on the project – Steve is responsible for day to day management. Jessie Bukindu: Senior Sound Engineer at Ketebul, Jessie will lead the studio work on Singing Wells, including the ‘Fusion’ projects: The ‘Sound of Ketebul,’ Jessie will lead many of the key ‘Fusion’ projects coming from Singing Wells Patrick Ondiek: Pato will lead the video/photography aspects of Singing Wells, including field cap…
SWP Launch Day News
Today is launch day – the day we go live with the brand new Singing Wells website. And it’s a very exciting prospect, as the project starts in earnest from here. It’s particularly appropriate that we should launch today, as this week Kenya celebrates the 47th anniversary of independence, which was granted on 12th December 1963. And yesterday, I was very honoured to be a guest at a reception for Kenya National Day hosted by the High Commissioner i…