2. Naizungwe Drums – progress report 1 Story
…enough drums for training a new generation of players. However, the basic number includes: 1 large Uganda drum (played with short heavy beaters) 3 smaller drums (played with long curved sticks) 1 medium drum (played with sticks) 1 long drum (ngalabi – hand-beaten) All together, 6 drums. Therefore, we are making four sets of naizungwe drums mainly to facilitate learning.” Below is a video documenting the progress of the drums thus far. https://you…
1. Introducing the Naizungwe drums Story
…velopment, which has been under way for a month now. James gives some background about his inspiration for starting this project: “I led the revival of entenga royal drum music of Buganda kingdom. At the time of doing this, I received an audio recording from Peter Cooke, telling me of his recording on his first field trip in Uganda in 1967. The multi-rhythmic texture of the drumming, Basoga traditional yodeling and humming plus the poetic recitati…
Day 3: Monday, 2017 February 20th Story
…he latter is an East Africa classic that most people know. Throughout this trip, we will spent a lot of time with Henry, starting with this first night of live recording at the Bagamoyo Country Club. Leo: Leo is Henry’s son and has been our Influences Artist for this trip. He was raised in a musical household, but Henry did not want Leo to become a musician. In fact, it was Leo’s cousin Isaac Vledi, who first tried to teach an 8 year old Leo some…
Day 2: Sunday, 2017 February 19th Story
…laughing. We learned about the Bi Kidude and Unyago style. Throughout this trip we will encounter multiple stories about ‘women for women’ songs. In this case, the women in the village have a special dance that is performed by women only for women. It is all about teaching young girls to prepare for womanhood, be it how to behave in the village, how to behave as a wife, and how to be a mother. The women invited Sophie into one of the huts to watch…
Day 1: Saturday, 2017 February 18th Story
…ormances as they have been traditionally performed. This includes the background noises of ‘chicken and children.’ Generally we become surrounded by village children by the end of each field session and we celebrate that their voices create a lovely background in our recordings. We are also here to try to bring this music to new artists and audiences, to show how it can inspire and inform more contemporary artists. This is why we always bring ‘Inf…
Our journey to the Royal Drums: in the words of James Isabirye Story
…he lives in Kiboga which was about three hours away. She gave me his son’s number and Musisi’s and we called. I talked to him! My only thought at the time was: GET MUSISI TO KAMPALA. I could not lose another teacher. So I agreed I would send money for Musisi to meet with me. I gave him a job to teach students how to play the drums. I was so relieved to have found a drummer. He arrived in Kampala and we set out to teach. But very quickly it was cle…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 4, Part 1 – Reflections Story
…steners that want to take elements of the music forward. With this as background, this is what we discussed on the grounds of the Kampala Museum. I will paraphrase a half a dozen voices and many long and winding conversations: What is it we’re reviving: palace life or music? We can be emphatic here. We are here for the music and are neither romanticising nor trying to revive palace life. We have allowed the former palace musicians to give their re…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 3, Part 1- Drum Making and Palace Players Story
…d thin. But he does this by rolling about a foot of string against his leg round and round until the entire length is tightly twisted. 8. The second stage of stringing the drum “Now, I have to restring the drum, replacing the nylon strings with animal skin strings. As I do this I cut away the holes from the old strings. As you can see the drum skins stick on the wooden drum. The first stage of stringing is called ‘Amabago.’ The second stage is cal…
Singing Wells Approaches 5 Million Views News
…s and stories to the world. Keep an eye out on the Singing Wells Youtube channel for the footage and recordings from our field trip to Zanzibar and Pemba….
Support for the Elgon Ngoma Troupe News
…m of income for the project, which houses children from disadvantaged backgrounds through performance of traditional music, through breeding and meat production. Donate to Elgon Ngoma’s gofundme page here! And you can watch one of their brilliant performances, recorded on our 2014 field trip, here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkyDtBXfunI Watch Julius, the leader of the group, explain who the Elgon Ngoma troupe is, and their mission: https://ww…
Singing Wells Youtube Channel hits 2.5Million views News
…was filmed back in 2011, on the very first day of the Singing Wells pilot trip to Kenya. Seeing the generations of Nyerere’s family performing together was a special moment (his son Mr Bado is also a musician). We captured a great fusion of old and new https://youtu.be/-MU13FLg_io You also need to check out the Elgon Ngoma Troupe, performing a traditional circumcision ritual dance. Please keep following our channel – with new videos going up the…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Days 5-11:An Interview with Gregg Story
…ng badly? GT: You are doing a lot right. First, this is one of the best partnerships I’ve seen. The AMF is an implementation partner and has none of the ‘funder’ hang-ups I see elsewhere. Everyone digs in to get the job done. Second, you get it – it is about stories and I greatly respect the amount of time you invest The second thing is stories. You guys look out for real stories and try to tell the stories. This is really important. I think devel…
The History Of Benga Music: A Report by Ketebul Music Story
…s home to the fishing community of Luo-speaking people, many of whom live around Lake Victoria—known locally as Nyanza. Lake Victoria straddles the three East African countries—Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania—covering an area of over 68,000 square kilometers. The Luo who live around its shores in Kenya speak a western Nilotic tongue distinctly different from their Bantu neighbours to the north and south, and their Kalenjin distant cousins to the east….
Central and Eastern Kenya: Days 5-11: Ketebul Studios, Nairobi Story
…ocine Kerokp Muumboro Osumba Rateng We first worked with Osumba during our trip to Nyanza in 2011; he is the founder of the Sega Sega band and ‘Flora’ remains a Singing Wells favourite. He is one of the most important musicians in Benga. I interviewed him on March 10th to learn more about his playing style. This is what he told me: “I started playing music in school and I had a cousin Aoka Meja, who had a guitar. We copied the style of Adero Onani…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Day 4 – Nkubu to Mukuuni to Nairobi Story
…man 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 we headed for the Fairview, a 20 minute drive…
Central and Eastern Kenya: Day 2 – Muranga to Kangema to Nkubu Story
…was at the table from 18:30 to 23:30 each night. We counted 478 individual trips to our table she made on one night alone. Working Practices: A Typical Field Recording Session The basic steps we use in a typical session are as follows: Arrival/introductions/set-up The interview team immediately sits with the groups and talks through how the session will work and then collects information on the group, the songs and the instruments and musical styl…