Day 7: Friday, February 24th, 2017 Story
…e This is our last day and we saved it for Henry Mkanyia. Because he is so central to the history of Tanzanian music, we asked Henry to assemble members of his original group DDC Mlimani Park Orchestra. We assembled at Nafasi Art Space, which is very similar to the Go Down Art Center in Nairobi, hosting artists of all kinds from musicians to painters to dancers. Henry brought two members: Hasaan Rehani Bichuka, his lead vocalist and Juma Ubao (aka…
Day 3: Monday, 2017 February 20th Story
…pebbles. Fire tuning is common across all of East Africa. Many traditional African drums are ‘untunable’, so you control tone through heat. You use moisture to loosen an over-tight drum or heat to evaporate moisture on a too-loose drum. Our sessions are typically filled with lots of smoke and video of drummers running back and forth in/out of camera range tuning their drums as they play. See example: Here’s the Group: The group played 6 songs: Ndi…
Day 1: Saturday, 2017 February 18th Story
…and we’ve not seen it in Kenya or Uganda. In fact, ‘clown’ acts are quite central to Tanzanian dance as are acrobatic acts. We spoke to Leo about this. “Yes, we love to bring comedy to our music. If you look at most circus troupes that are touring in the world today, a huge number of the acrobats and clowns are Tanzanian.” https://youtu.be/C-4PdHne3Jc We’ll leave you here. We checked in to our hotel, the Mediterraneo Hotel, Dar es Salaam. Tomorro…
A Report by Professor James Isabirye – Indigenous music learning in contemporary contexts: Nurturing learner identity, agency, and passion News
…ed with such a visionary for the future, and protector of traditional East african music and instruments. We know that generations to come will be grateful for the work he has put in to continue these traditions. He has also written a report analysing how indigenous learning can inform modern schooling, in which Singing Well’s gets a featured mention as collaborators within his project. You can read more about that here: https://journals.sagepub.c…
Our journey to the Royal Drums: in the words of James Isabirye Story
…in James’ own words. I use the term roughly for two reasons: 1) These are African roads and James was highly distracted by his own driving during our interview, dodging vans, cows and potholes. 2) I was trying to take notes in a car that seemed to be driving as fast and far left to right on the road as forward. Between interviewee fighting to keep us alive, and interviewer fighting to stay in the car, we’re lucky we have anything at all… Centre:…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 4, Part 2 – Flutes Story
…13 visit to Uganda and have invited them back to do studio recordings. But today, we focused on two things: 1) Discussing in detail some of our observations from our time exploring the royal instruments of the Kingdoms of Uganda. 2) Recording again Albert Ssempeke’s Buganda Music Ensemble. Given that we first decided to rediscover the Royal Drums after recording Albert’s group in 2013, we wanted to end this field visit with his recordings. Part tw…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 4, Part 1 – Reflections Story
…13 visit to Uganda and have invited them back to do studio recordings. But today, we focused on two things: 1) Discussing in detail some of our observations from our time exploring the royal instruments of the kingdoms of Uganda 2) Recording again Albert Ssempeke’s Buganda Music Ensemble. Given that we first decided to rediscover the Royal Drums after recording Albert’s group in 2013, we wanted to end this field visit with his recordings Part one:…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 3, Part 2 – Interviews with Musicians of Uganda’s Royal Palaces Story
…roven 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 am…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 3, Part 1- Drum Making and Palace Players Story
…Part One: Drum Making The Singing Wells team was joined by James Isabirye today as we travelled to Mukono, to visit Ssebengwa Drum Makers (P.O. Box Mukono near Colline Hotel, Jinja Highway, opposite the Pork Joint). The shop is run by Abass Mirimu, a gentleman from the famous village of Mpambire which is known for its drum makers. Abass was the maker of some of the Entenga drums (the royal drums of the Buganda King). Above: Abass Mirimu To be spe…
Central and Eastern Uganda: Day 2 – Kampala to Jinja Story
December 1, 2015: Checking the progress of the Bigwala trumpets Today, we travelled 3 hours from Kampala to Jinja, to the village of Bukakaire, to listen to the Bukakaire Bigwala Players, led by the last surviving trumpeter from the Busoga Kingdom, James Lugolole. A woman playing the Bigwala First, why are we here? Well, there’s the obvious: at Singing Wells, we record and share the great music of East African villages. But, there’s another, equa…
Musisi’s Story, Part 1: The Fall of the Buganda Kingdom Story
…d and rose to brush my teeth as I always do. But the guns got louder – the Central Government was attacking the Buganda Kingdom and had attacked the Parliament first, which was about a kilometer away from the palace. I realized it was very real when bullets started hitting the palace and the hut where we kept our drums caught fire. People started running around all over and I was getting scared, but I still carried my toothbrush. I was only 15 or…
Rediscovering the lost Royal Drums of the Buganda Kingdom: Day 1, Uganda Story
…time at the palace. In terms of the music, we recorded the following songs today: Ganga Alula Omusango gw’abalere Mubandusa Ekyuuma kya Bboola Veneneka Olugambo olubuulire Sekanyolya The Drummers In terms of the moment, let’s stress a few things: These drums are magnificent. They are actually 15 drums, 12 of which are tuned to the notes of a xylophone and thus we are hearing a full song – percussion, bass, rhythms and melodies across the six playe…
The Entenga Drums: Part 1 Story
…orded the Entenga in the 1950s, and thanks to the International Library of African Music we brought his recordings with us and have repatriated the music back to Uganda. In addition, Lois Anderson recorded some performances of surviving musicians, wrote about the tradition and published transcriptions of about 26 tunes. His articles, ‘The Entenga tuned-drum ensemble’ (1968) and ‘Essays for a humanist: an offering to Klaus Wachsmann’ (New York, 197…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Days 5-11:An Interview with Gregg Story
…nal to be a development expert, was also a keen expert on the music of the Central and Eastern region of Kenya. He was in charge of interviews on the trip and did a fantastic job. We had the opportunity to interview him during our days recording in Nairobi. SW: What was the most surprising thing about the trip? GT: To know that this tribal music is available out in the villages. There were people singing and dancing to preserve the music – this is…
The History Of Benga Music: A Report by Ketebul Music Story
…as West Africa and as Mangwana once confessed, it was this sound and West African highlife that the people loved. The African All Stars added elements of this energetic rhythm to the existing Congolese rumba. In the 1980s some members of the African All Stars moved to Paris and formed the Four Stars (Les Quatre Etoiles) and became the base for the fast-paced Congolese music production spiced with additional Caribbean influences like zouk. This mu…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Days 5-11: Ketebul Studios, Nairobi Story
…o Obuyanzi Kali Munda Olubo Mary Queen John Nzanze One of the founders of “African Twist”, John enjoyed a major hit with ‘Angelique Twist’ in 1961. Born in 1940, he started playing his father’s guitar at 12. His band, Air Fiesta Matata, achieved fame, having come in third in the 1968 All African Music Festival in Algeria, and this led to introductions to Miles Davis and a tour of the USA. Angelique Twist Twist ni Nzuri Tama Amina Makashi ya Mrembo…