Bill Odidi reporting on Singing Wells from London News
…ic 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+real+flavour+of+Kenya+in+London/-/1248928/1480860/-/djb5…
Day 1: In Nairobi, packing and talking to Tabu Story
…ay to go to L Baringo to record the Tugen. Tabu is not sure what to expect of the tribal music in the villages we are visiting but he is always surprised by the quality of music we discover with Singing Wells. “I didn’t really know what to expect of the Batwa of Uganda, and was blown away by the musicianship. I expect to be surprised again!” The last time he was there was about 20 years ago. He thinks the music will be similar to music he has hear…
Song Translations: Music of the Kalenjin Story
…the Singing Wells project we are documenting the meaning behind the songs of the artists we record. Here are translations of the songs of the Kalenjin tribes. Ben Kisinja Date of recording: 5th March, 2012 Recorded on location in: Kapsokwony, Kenya Song 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…
How to Map 3: Prepare Your Data News
…cMap to display information on the map so you have a visual representation of your data. First of all, a recap of what we’re going to do: Prepare our data: ArcMap can be tricksy if your data isn’t properly organised and formatted so it’s worth sorting that out first. Import the data into ArcMap. Join the data to the country outline shapefile. Export the joined data and shapefile as a new shapefile. Display the data. Prepare the data To demonstrate…
How to Map 2: The Map Outline News
The first thing you’ll need is the outline of the area you will be mapping. Usually this will be the outline of a country with its administrative areas. This is known as spatial data. Downloading the outline There is a free online source for spatial data at http://www.diva-gis.org/. To get your spatial data you click on Free Spatial Data in the top-right corner. On the Free Spatial Data page click on country level data. On the Download Data by Co…
Victoria’s reflections on the music of the Batwa Story
…one. Kathy, one of our Abubilla Music Foundation trustees, had to pull out of the trip quite suddenly which left a gap in the team’s resources. Kathy was due to be videographer on ‘Roving Camera 2’ and also document the names and meanings of songs we would be recording. On Tuesday Jimmy asked if I could make any part of the trip to take on that role; on Wednesday we changed the flights into my name and on Sunday I found myself on a plane to Nairob…
Return of the Batwa @ Ketebul Music Studios Story
…and he arranged all travel papers by the 30th. They then left the morning of the 30th and travelled by private van from Kisoro to Kampala, arriving in Kampala the same evening. They spent the night in Kampala and left the morning of the 1st of December and arrived in Nairobi in the afternoon of the second. ‘They’ were five ladies and five babies and three men, plus Henry. 14 people drove for roughly 48 hours to sing. Second, let’s introduce the t…
Day 4: Discovery of the Young Stars… Story
…ith his left hand he hits either ring (with different sounds), or the side of the box or the top of the box (with different sounds). He also has the option, and this is where it begins to sound more like a bass, to slide the rings along the top as he plays to elogate the note and change its pitch. Please now listen to him in action – it is extraordinary and yes, this is one guy, one instrument: https://youtu.be/yP3s7QyT750 https://youtu.be/34kILyM…
Day 3: Homa Bay and the Kochia Dancers Story
…a dial) but a little more south and a little more west, on the south shore of the Winam Gulf. After a long drive, we set up at the hotel in a beautiful field against the lake – we’re surrounded by camels and pelicans, which is frankly a bit off putting. The pelicans are big enough to fly us away, but luckily we don’t smell like fish. We smell like a lot of other things by this time – there aren’t a lot of opportunities to wash and you’ll notice a…
Day 2: Focus on the Nyatiti, Orutu and DRUMS! Story
…yanza 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 ourselves: Left to Right: St…
Day 1: The music of the Luo – starting at Rang’ala Village Story
…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 Band Led by Osumba Rateng. This is Benga style, originating from…
From Kisoro to Nairobi to Lake Victoria Story
…oro, 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 Nairobi: Passport Control, Genocide Me…
The Batwa Trail News
…ely email this week from Ivy Beccu from Belgium. I’m glad to see that news of the Singing Wells project is spreading far and wide! Ivy has made a great video about the Batwa Trail in Kisoro, Uganda. When the Singing Wells team visited Kisoro last year to record the music of the Batwa (click here to go to our field reports), we didn’t have enough time to do the Batwa Trail but we heard about how it is helping the Batwa people tell the story of thei…
Day 6: The Studio @ Traveller’s Rest Hotel, Kisoro Story
…yo accompanying the ladies to sing Imparake Yagahinga – the song in praise of the National Park. The Music Groups Francis Sembargare We did a number of ‘Influences’ sessions with Francis, but we love this one, with Jessie and Francis singing together in the gardens of the Traveller’s Rest hotel in Kisoro. Please listen before reading the blog: https://youtu.be/c1XBVlNQL6E We also recorded a beautiful version of Amahoro with Jessie, Francis and t…
Day 5 (much later): The Micyingo Group – guitar and bass! Story
…including ‘Imparake Yagahinga’, the National Park song, which is a staple of the Batwa singing groups… This man was a wonderful dancer and he took centre 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 y…
Day 5 (PM): The ‘Togetherness Group’ from Kanyabukunga Story
…fternoon 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 Twifatanye (‘Togetherness Group”) from the village of Kanyabukunga. They are led by Gadensia Kampire. The SWP crew poses next to the road sign with…