The repatriation of Kenya’s music heritage News
…which these songs were made in the 1950s by English ethnomusicologist, Hugh Tracey. The repatriation of these recordings began in August, during a two-week pilot project in Kenya’s Rift Valley led by Prof Diane Thram, Director of the International Library of African Music (ILAM) in South Africa and the team from Ketebul Music, supported and funded by The Abubilla Music Foundation as part of the Singing Wells project. Read Bill Odidi’s article abo…
Music Depositories and Archives around the World News
…as offices in 6 countries around the world, with the expansion of Putumayo International into South America, Asia, Africa and Oceania Putumayo World Music Hour, the first commercially syndicated world music show now heard internationally on 170 commercial and non-commercial stations. It is fantastic to see a World Music Label with such far reaching success, not only proving that traditional music in Africa, and around the world, can be commerciall…
Archiving Guidelines News
…orage of both digital and physical sound files. Online Sound Archiving The International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives (IASA) released the second edition of an online publication – Guildines on the Production and Preservation of Digital Audio Objects (IASA-TC 04) – in 2009, which is described as ‘an accepted authority on digital audio preservation in the sound archiving field.’ It is informed by their other publication, ‘The Safegu…
A History of Recording East African Music News
…ng from various projects, after a lecturing tour in the UK, and set up The International Library of African music in 1954, where his 20000 recordings are today stored. The ILAM will be explored further in a later blog of this series. There are a few of Hugh Tracey’s recordings available online on the British Library Sound Archive, under the David Rycroft South African Collection. However, to play these you need to be studying further or higher edu…
Tracey Instrument Collection News
…da, as it is demanded so much for drums, lyres and fiddles. Endara log xylophone The xylophone is 263.5cm long, made up of 16 roughly cut keys and tuned to a pentatonic scale. It is played using one beater, which is attached to the xylophone by string and can be played by up to five people at one time. This frame was actually made by Hugh Tracey, after he collected it in 1950, though the original frame was made of two banana stalks with loose keys…
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. …
ILAM, Repatriation and Jimmie Rodgers/Chemirocha News
…we had our latest in a series of conversations with the Director of ILAM (International Library of African Music), Diane Thram. ILAM was founded in 1954 by the late Hugh Tracey, the legendary ethno-musicologist, who conducted ground breaking village recordings from the 1920’s to 1950’s. We are working with ILAM to begin to repatriate these recordings back to the villages from which they were taken. We hope to start with two pilot villages in July…
Report from Womex 2013 News
…onsuming music. In Africa – 60% have electricity whereas 86% have a mobile phone. This is again another area in which the Singing Wells project may be interested in the future – mobile phones and ring back tones as a method of delivery for music. Mike and I also attended the African music networking session which became the launch for a new initiative by the Cape Verde government. It has been calculated that music is their biggest export and so ha…
A recording studio which fits into the back of an SUV Story
…ing with us: 2 Apple MacBook Pro 2 MOTU Traveler MK3 Audio Interface 4 Headphone amps 8 Sony MDR-V600 headphones 2 Shure mics & stands 2 Rode Lavalier omni-directional mics 2 Rode NTG-1 condenser Shotgun mics 1 Matched Pair of AKG C414 XL Microphones 1 Matched Pair of Rode NT5 Microphones 2 Rode professional boom pole 1 K&M telescopic mic stand/boom 1 Canon EOS 7D 1 Canon EOS 60D 1 Canon EOS 5D 1 LED video camera lights 1 Flip HD video camera Thin…
73,603 views on YouTube News
…ls YouTube channel……73,603 views and still counting! It’s not a meaningful number in itself (like a nice round 100,000 – our next target) but it does mean more and more people are finding us and enjoying 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…
A new type of city Story
…hat the capital would be like; this image speaks a lot about the city. The number of ‘proper’ buildings were few and in only the small centre. It was hilly and most of the roads were not built for vehicles. The shops were small shacks mostly and at night stayed open, lit by candle light. There were animals everywhere and make-shift houses, which starkly contrasted to the taller office buildings you could see in the distance. Despite this unconvent…
The Boy with the Headphones Story
…hen we travelled to the Mperwa Batwa community. Consisting of just a small number of families, the Mperwa have settled on a small area of borrowed land just a few kilometres from the town. At first glance the setting appeared to be spectacular, with the lush valley and terraced hills of local farms as a backdrop and the magnificent Virunga volcanos in the distance. But we were quickly struck by the impoverishment of this small community. As we a…
Music of the Batwa: video playlist News
…ated by the generous support of donors to our charity the Abubilla Music Foundation, including a grant from the Institute of International Education….
The origins of Singing Wells Story
…s for the whole group to perform, singing and dancing in front of ten microphones and three digital cameras.’ Video engineer, Patrick Ondiek, adds, ‘I love producing the final videos and getting phone calls from my friends asking me ‘how did you find these musicians?’ I feel like I’m on the cutting edge of music, bringing these talented musicians to my Nairobi friends.’ In addition to our field visits, we have developed an online Music Map of East…
Day 8: Entebbe to Nairobi and Ketebul Studios Story
…anted to make sure we recorded their shakers, the Kayamba (hand shaken idiophones with dried seeds inside), the Lungo (broken glass moved in a big bowl) and Ndema (2 brass rings played in ringing and muted tones). In the Rift Valley, where the people are more pastoral, we really focused on their voices and I wanted some one to play the burkandit (a handmade guitar). In Nyanza, we focused on the Orutu, the Nyatiti and the Ohangla (drums). In Kisoro…
Day 7 (pm): Recording at the Airport Guesthouse, Entebbe Story
…ocal stores on big speakers). We listened to a few different tracks on his phone, and I narrowed my favourite Ugandan pop tracks down to ‘Apple’ by Bigtym and ‘Guns & Bomb’ by Bebecool.. Odika Constantine, son of Watmon, is in his 30s. He was abducted by the LRA from his home in Kitgum District when he was just 17. He was held as a soldier in the bush for 6 months until he managed to escape. He described the day it happened: the rebels arrived to…