Day Zero: February 15, 2020 – Assemble in Zanzibar Story
…e (see below) about real life, about real women, about love and sex… She always sang about these things through metaphors and the poetry of Swahili. But we had so many artists laughing with us as they told us the meanings of her songs. And with a wink and a smile, they’d all say, ‘Well this one is about a finger, or a chest, or a flower, etc… but you understand what she really meant.’ In Singing Wells, we have celebrated too few woman, who we…
Day Two: January 19, 2019 From Tarime to Buturi to Bariadi Story
…tyle: We then recorded the band in freestyle. https://youtu.be/XoaHli19b2U One observation from Day One: These groups have the energy and youth of many of the groups we recorded in Uganda around Lake Victoria, which makes a lot of sense as these groups are from areas very close to Uganda. What you feel when you record these groups is that the music here remains very central to youth culture – these are young, athletic performances full of energy…
Day One: 7 March 2022 (Shikangania and Mukumu) Story
…to their Boda Bodas (motorbike taxis) and disappeared into the dark night, one by one. We drove back to Josephine Garden at Ilesi where we spent our second night. Profile: Super Phoenix Band Julius Khamoyi Shivaji was born on June 5th 1966 in Shisalachi, Ikholomani sub-location in Kakamega County. He started his musical journey in 1990 as a member of the choir at his local church. He took up the stage name Itenya in 1999 when he joined the Phoenix…
Day Four: 10 March 2022 (Rongo) Story
…ely trying to put into practice some of the suggestions we made to them on ways of improving their performances. Most of them were ready to experiment with new ways of playing their traditional musical instruments, as well trying to devise standard tuning for them. Furthermore, we appreciated the fact that our intentions were well received and that the musicians did not consider us to be some arrogant city slickers trying to teach them their own c…
Support Singing Wells Page
…the Singing Wells project Sponsor a Music Group£250 Your Gift to Us Your money will be used to support the Singing Wells project to record the songs of one traditional music group, help us tell their stories and keep their music traditions alive. Your donation to the project will be spent in East Africa, funding the recording session in the field and will go towards a gratuity payment for the music group, which they can use to help them continue…
Day Two: February 17, 2020 (Stonetown) Story
…for Diana”) who had helped them develop their look and movements. They had one lead singer and two men on drums. One planning a small drum and the other playing three large drums on the floor while he stood and leaned over. Overall they were very impressive and unique. Truly beautiful. 3. Zam Zam Group – From the hotel we moved on to the Dhow Countries Musical Academy, which is located in the old custom house. Here, we recorded the Zam Zam grou…
Day 4 – Tuesday 4th July 2017 Story
…n 1951 from a certain Undego Koile. He stated that he never owns more than one instrument and usually gives out the old one to a school teacher who uses it in class. He is equally proud of the fact his son is learning how to play, while he confirms no formal teaching actually happens. Traditionally the only way to learn the nyatiti is by observing and trying out. On the topic of gender taboo, Ogutu commented he does not recall ever seeing a female…
Day One: January 18, 2019. Assemble in Tanzania Story
…and we typically have two general mics for the group and 5-6 specific microphones for singers and musicians, b) we have three video cameras operating – one wide shot for full performance, one close up to capture details of instruments and one roving camera to provide a second angle on the performance and c) we interview all group leaders to understand group musical styles and background, instruments and songs. In almost every village, we struggle…
Field Recording Report by Kahithe Kiiru Story
…raditional lyre; ISIRILI – a one-string fiddle; LUENGELE– a percussive idiophone composed of a wooden bowl struck with wooden sticks on both the outside and the inside; ENG’OMA – a generic term for drums, use it for several drums of different shapes and sizes; CHICHUKA – shakers made out of gourds; metal ring struck with wooden sticks metal plate used as a drum-set cymbal. The charismatic Namatete played for us 6 songs and did one of his song (“Oc…
Serengeti Group Group
…ing where the two lead dancers ‘nodded’ their head in almost a trance like way to the music and to their large eight-stringed instrument. We were mesmerized. Their instruments included the: Zeze, Virandi (shakers), and Ritungu (eight stringed instrument, huge Nyatiti). The group had three musicians in ‘red’ and two dancers in ‘white.’ The dancers were performing a ‘head nodding’ dance which was mesmerizing and was extremely unique. The athleticism…
2. Naizungwe Drums – progress report 1 Story
…cut down, the logs have been hollowed out and the skins have been formed. One of the early milestones was finding a tree out of which to craft the largest of the drums, no trivial task given the size and type of tree required. Here is our first video, James Isabirye talking about the tree and introducing the project: https://youtu.be/bZUxKhTGmCA The lead drum maker is called Muhamudu Kaziba (in the left of the video above). He comes from a famous…
1. Introducing the Naizungwe drums Story
…and will be posting about the project’s development, 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 yo…
Day 2: Sunday, 2017 February 19th Story
…ing for three reasons: We had the whole day so were able to record a large number of songs and do an “Influences” session. This gave the village children time to get to know us and understand our mission. By the end they were singing along to all the songs. In addition to being a professional musician, Leo also teaches music to school children so he is a natural with kids. On all the songs that he did, he had the whole village singing and laughing…
Day 1: Saturday, 2017 February 18th Story
…s. At 14 years old, I would sit at my drums just trying to recreate that one riff. It took me three months of non-stop listening to get it down. And that was just 30 seconds of his lifetime of drumming. All I want to do is master his style.” As Daudi mentioned, Mzee Morris became the sound of Tanzanian news. The TBC announced each hour with a drum riff of his drums. Every hour, for decades. He was honoured in his time, with the then Prime Minist…
Our journey to the Royal Drums: in the words of James Isabirye Story
…e drummers. I thought I was in great shape, because I knew Sebuwufu, a xylophone player who knew all about the drums and agreed to help me. Together, we found out that Peter Cooke had recorded the drums and we listened to some of these recordings. But then, Sebuwufu passed away in August 2015 and I realised I had a big problem now. He might have been the last person who knew the drums. But I remembered that Sebuwufu had heard of someone named Musi…
Central & Eastern Uganda: Day 4, Part 1 – Reflections Story
…ent written for five or six different musicians – the Royal Drums, the xylophone, the flutes, the trumpets all follow this pattern and there are magical moments that happen in such complex song-writing. Are all instruments the same? Here we are less sure. The xylophone is extraordinary and continues to thrive outside of palace life. Xylophones didn’t disappear in Uganda village life after the fall of the kingdoms in 1966 because they were part of…