Day 1: Saturday, 2017 February 18th Story
…reating a specific post for him, so he could continue drumming for all visitors to the government. Because he was blind, he was invited to perform with specific women groups, of songs for women by women, of songs that no males could see. Every day we will tell more about Mzee Morris and his music (see picture below). We will also talk about his legacy and the attempts of his family and fans to keep his name and his music alive. Like all Singing We…
Our journey to the Royal Drums: in the words of James Isabirye Story
…e, things evolved more organically. You’ll remember in 2013, Singing Wells came to Uganda and we started to discuss the issue of the royal instruments. At the Kampala Museum, Singing Wells, Albert Ssempeke and I talked and all concluded: we really have to focus on the Entenga, the Royal Drums of the Buganda Kingdom. If we lose these, we’ve lost something truly unique. Singing Wells then agreed to kick-start a project based on what we had done toge…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 3, Part 2 – Interviews with Musicians of Uganda’s Royal Palaces Story
…e proven wrong. Musisi is looking for more drummers and the ones we talked to today are desperate to find others that played with them. Richard Ssewannyana We first travelled about an hour from Mukono to the village of Bamusuta B Kizimula to meet with Richard Ssewannyana. As we believe Musisi is the ‘last surviving’ royal drummer, we believe Richard is the last surviving royal flutist. Please, let’s be wrong here. We first interviewed Richard: “I…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Days 5-11:An Interview with Gregg Story
…but fading fast, and we are two teams in two cars chasing after it, trying to capture as much as we can. But as a Kenyan I am frightened that we are devoting so little to this. Where is the supply of talent to help us go further and deeper? Where are the funds? And where is the demand? This is not as easily digestible – there are not a lot of people ready to consume it. You have to care, you have to want to know the music. SW: Why isn’t there more…
The History Of Benga Music: A Report by Ketebul Music Story
…g’ Kabaselleh, a Luo pop artist who occasionally teamed up with Laban Juma Toto, formerly of the Hodi Boys band, to produce some of the best rumba melodies sang in the Luo language. Kabaselleh’s love for rumba saw him adopt the name of Congo’s celebrated pioneer musician, Joseph Kabaselleh ‘Le Grand Kalle.’ Some of Ochieng’s sons like Babu Kabaselleh and Reggie Kabaselleh are now well-known musicians in their own right, same to his siblings who ma…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Day 4 – Nkubu to Mukuuni to Nairobi Story
…nd Gitar Thura. Mware is about an uneducated woman who wants to be married to an educated man. This song challenges the woman to get an education in order to be at par with the prospective spouse. We then wrapped up and took lots of final pictures, including of three children, practically our only children from the trip! We packed for a final time and departed for Nairobi. We made pretty good time to Ketebul music, where we unloaded our gear. Then…
Interview: fusion band Ndoto Afrika News
…logy that they no longer are willing to sit by the evening fire and listen to stories. So we will have to transmit these stories to their iPhones and iPads in the form of music, the universal language. Where are you from? From Kenya, in the East of Africa. To be more specific, we hail from a small village in Siaya County where most of the renowned Luo musicians come from. Ever heard of Otieno Aloka (the famous Ohangla artist)? He is our next door…
Central Uganda: Day 5 – Jinja to Kampala Story
…n’t even have a bicycle not have houses. We are showing you can have a musical career. We are growing our knowledge and getting better at representing the culture. Now we have city in Sweden that is starting to partner with us to advance cultural exchanges.” Tabu asked James, “Why did you want to do traditional music?” James answered, “We love traditional music of any ethnicity I understand it now in the context. We started with our music from our…
Central Uganda: Day 4 – Jinja Story
…s also trying to start a gourd revolution so people start using them again to store liquids and stop using plastic) The coordinator and lead female vocalist in the group is Irene Nabirye. The group is made up of 6-7 Bigwala players and drummers, plus dancers and singers. They performed four songs and then we did a magic moment with their instruments; these were: Muwe Bwobona Asaba: When someone asks you kindly assist them Mperekera Omwana Womuremb…
Central Uganda: Day 2 – Kampala to Budaka Story
…loss as the female singers performed. Animals were sacrificed during the story to bring hope and health to the village (very brutal throat slitting of a fairly battered foam cow, lamb and chicken). Bamiisi Muwulire: This was a song to rally people to listen to the stories of the band. Daudi: This was really a dance, a performance play, with many actors. The story was about a village boy that had gone astray – lots of partying, lots of late nights…
Singing Wells in Numbers…. News
…Andy did a litte homework for this one: Number of recordings of groups: 374 (this does not include other recordings like Magic Moments, Influences, etc…) Number of groups recorded: 83 Number of hours of music: 27 hours and 30 minutes. …
Report from Womex 2013 News
…ampler to enjoy in the car journey home again. We then crossed to the tent to catch Scottish band Lau, who gave a stirring performance despite the poor sound in the tent arena. Films I visited the film screening room to see two of the films being shown – Encounter at the Cello Bienalle – by Myles O’Reilly – featuring the music of Dutch cellist Ernest Reijseger. Myles has a great eye and manages to tell a story well with little narration required –…
A recording studio which fits into the back of an SUV Story
…st Hotel in Kisoro, Uganda!) We can also combine the two recording units into one to increase the number of inputs, while still working off battery power. The laptops use Avid ProTools recording software – an industry standard for recording and music production. The microphones we have chosen are industry standard models used in studios the world over but, most likely, not seen in the villages of East Africa. The equipment has been carefully selec…
73,603 views on YouTube News
…g what we are all about – bringing the more traditional sounds of East Africa to an enthusiastic audience. Thanks for watching! Our top 3 video hits In third place, this is the Nyerere Wa Konde Music Club from Sita Village, Gede in Kenya’s Malindi District. It was the very first video we uploaded to YouTube following our field visit to the Coast Region to record the music of the Mijikenda tribes. Is second place is a video from our field vis…
A new type of city Story
…n the distance. Despite this unconventional type of city,I loved it. There was certainly a lot going on and during the week Akello told us many stories of the vibrant buzz in Kampala. Every night there’s music to listen to somewhere in the packed hub of 180,000 people . The image above of the tin houses and the Uganda House of Commons in the background was one of the first pictures I took on the trip….
The Boy with the Headphones Story
…oys who were intrigued with all our recording equipment. Andy invited them to listen to a playback of one of the songs through his headphones and this particular boy overcame his shyness to have give it a try. We could see how hard life is for the Batwa, living on small pieces of borrowed land on the fringes of society but the performance of the Mperwa Dancers did not portray this – it was full of pride and happiness. Once again, we witnessed ho…