Rediscovering Afropop and its influences News
…ecording and preserving this music it can continue to inform, inspire and influence a new generation of artists to carry the traditional music of East Africa into their songs. Listen to our bridge artists now. …
Discussions on music and culture with a young Kenyan News
…itage… it’s not ‘cool’. Do you think losing the cultural music heritage of East Africa is a shame? It’s a massive shame! But the western style of living is so appealing – just look at how Nairobi is evolving; it’s all coffee shops and Nike trainers and rooftop bars. The Singing Wells Project ideologically makes sense to try and preserve our musical culture and traditions, but trying to make it relevant and interesting to young people is going to b…
Meeting Ketebul: an interview with Tabu News
…important? Singing Wells is important because we’re trying to capture our East African heritage. Many of the musicians we record from remote tribes are old and we run the risk of the traditional music in Kenya dying out, we don’t want to see that happen. Further, most recording studios are in the city: Nairobi. It’s not possible for those living in the villages to come here, so if we don’t go to them to record, these guys may never be heard and t…
Our top 5 Singing Wells songs for March News
…h every song on the site, getting to know the amazing traditional music of East Africa! It was tough to pick, but for my first blog post I thought I’d share my top 5 songs so far. 1. Otacho Young Stars – Amilo Love The Singing Wells team first encountered the Otacho Young Stars group on a trip to record the music of the Luo in Western Kenya in December 2011. They were later invited to Ketebul Studios in Nairobi to form part of our influences serie…
Singing Wells is on Bozza! News
There’s now a new way for audiences to discover and listen to traditional East African musicians and music groups recorded by Singing Wells. Head over to our Bozza page here. About Bozza “Bozza is a plug & play solution for musicians, poets, photographers & film makers to promote and sell their digital products to their fans throughout Africa. The platform is available to emerging and established artists from around the continent and can be easil…
Current Leading Figures News
…Foundation that brings you Singing Wells. Described as a ‘key part of the East African music industry’, Tabu has been a promoter, producer, composer and band manager and, since 2007, the founding Executive Director of Ketebul Music. However, the projects in which he is involved reach far and wide, with his expertise and passion not just being limited to the invaluable work he does at Singing Wells and Ketebul Music. Tabu co-chairs the committee o…
Music Depositories and Archives around the World News
…o giving some background on the culture and history of the recording. From East Africa, they have a 60 minute episode on Kenya – you can listen to recordings of the singer Suzanna Owiyo in Nairobi, the rain songs in the north of the country which frequently suffers from terrible drought and the Massai who sing of the dangers of cattle raiding – and two others on Uganda; one featuring the Bugandan Royal Court Music and the second is about the Busog…
Archiving Guidelines News
…nformation for smaller would-be archives, such as those wishing to archive East African music, concerning both the digitisation of audio or the online storage of the data. It cites two viable options for open repository software, which are basically softwares that allow organisations to give access to their data. The first is DSpace, “very popular and widely adopted repository within the higher education and research sectors, although knowledge of…
A History of Recording East African Music News
…is music, which he gathered from across the world; beginning in the Middle East in 1966 and spreading through North and East African from 1969 till 1975. He later went on to record across the Pacific Ocean for ten years, from 1978. He is stated to have recorded hundreds of tribes and is commended for forming close relationships with them, which allowed him to gain permission to record their music. Mary K. Oyer, b. 1923 Mary Oyer graduated from G…
Tracey Instrument Collection News
…endongo is a type of lyre that can be found in many variations throughout East Africa and is considered the national instrument of the Baganda people. It is specially a Kiganda bowl lyre, with the face of the bowl covered with the skin of legavaan and laced to cow hide at the back. Klaus Wachsmann speculates that the instrument came to Uganda with the Luo people from Sudan in the late 15th and early 16th centuries, and, after passing through the…
ILAM, Repatriation and Jimmie Rodgers/Chemirocha News
…l music we are recording – most notably the massive influence of gospel on East African music, which, in turn was created in large part by Black-American music, directly inspired by early African village music. We listen to the likembe music in Uganda and here the steel drums of Calypso music. We listen to Benga blues and here the music of Cuba, demanding that we look further into the circles travelled between musicians between the Congo and Cuba,…
James Isabirye and Tabu Osusa Discuss East African Music News
…s able to listen in on a fantastic conversation about on the topic ‘Why is East African music under such threat?’ Both James and Tabu are passionate about the topic, but more importantly they are committed to addressing the threat through their efforts to develop musicians committed to traditional music. Tabu: There are so many reasons our musical culture is threatened. I know that Hugh Tracy blamed Christianity. The churches came to the land and…
Ketebul Music: A Year in Review News
…Professor, gave us access to a collection of music and photos, from music promoter Peter Colmore. We are getting all the genres of Kenyan music. I would like the book to be done by types of music. It needs to involve DJ’s, musicians, writers, etc… We have almost all the material. It is now about making a big impression. My dream is we launch this book during the Smithsonian conference next year in Washington DC. In terms of artists, Winyo is doin…
The Birara Batwa Community Story
…music relevant to today’s artists and audiences. We want to celebrate and promote the music heritage of East Africa in a contemporary context. We are doing this with ‘Influences’. We were staying at The Traveller’s Rest Hotel in Kisoro and the staff kindly allowed us to set up the studio under the verandah and it was there that we recorded our first ‘Influences’ session – a fusion of Batwa music from the Birara singers and contemporary music from…
Preserving Threatened Heritage News
…Wells, our goal is “to record, archive and share the traditional music of East Africa for two important reasons – to sustain and celebrate the extraordinary cultural music heritage of the region and to help make this legacy relevant and fresh to today’s audiences.” And it is always great to hear of stories where others are attempting to do the same, especially in countries so close to our heart, such as Uganda. An article on the website of the Ug…
Report from Womex 2013 News
…ows on the other side of the hall – they seemed to be doing something with records… Further investigation showed us that they were creating vinyl records from CDs – they would do one track free of charge. We are therefore now in possession of a copy of a Vinyl record with the track Missing on it! One for the Abubilla collection certainly!…