Central Uganda: Day 2 – Kampala to Budaka Story
…troupe, with drummers, than a chorus. This didn’t mean the vocals weren’t good, but to say they were not central to the performance. At the center, were the group’s stories, their actors and drama. James Isabirye said of the Busolwe Post Test Club , “They are a meeting point between formal education and village music. Although they perform traditional music, they also will also work in different formats, and are more formally trained. They act as…
Central Uganda: Day 1 – From Entebbe to Kidinda Story
…which were 8 men who collectively played the Amadinda, a 22 key wooden xylophone. There total group size is 15. The musical style is Kadinda. The group lead is Waswa Hood and he started playing when he was 17. There were two other original members: Kiwuwa Buruhan and Sulayiman Sserubiri. The group started in 1939 performing for the Kabaka (the Ugandan King), but then stopped performing in the king’s palace in 1966 when the king was removed. The 22…
Discussions with Peter Cooke: ethnomusicologist and Ugandan music expert News
…re, London, I received my first lesson in playing the Kiganda amadinda xylophone from the South African musicians Andrew and Paul Tracey before their evening show Wait a Minim.” “My work in Uganda led me to begin exploring that country’s traditional music initially with the aim of collecting useful materials for teaching purposes. That exploration has continued since then, apart from during the chaos of the periods of the rule of Amin and the Seco…
Central Uganda: Day 0 – Nairobi/London to Entebbe Story
…dinner and a few free drinks (we had charmed some flight attendants on the plane to contribute to Singing Wells with a few whiskeys). Most of us then went to bed for the night, deciding to have one final evening free of our London friends. Patrick, however, woke up in time to be a ‘greeting party’ to the London arrivals. Message from Abubilla Music Foundation Team Representing the AMF are Jimmy Allen (Founder), sound engineer Andy Patterson and Vi…
Happy new year from Singing Wells News
Happy new year! We hope your 2016s have gotten off to a good start, and that you’ve been bringing in the year by listening to lots of traditional East African music. Before we start posting exciting news about the upcoming year, here’s a quick recap of what we got up to in 2015: 1. We went discovering the lost music of the Ugandan Kingdoms In Nov/ Dec 2015 we travelled between Kampala and Jinja in Uganda in search of the lost music and musicians…
Winyo’s a pretty good photographer too… Story
Meeting Ketebul: an interview with Tabu News
…. Our problem with artists in Kenya is that they lack that identity. Being good is one thing but being unique is another. We see a lot of copycats, so when someone comes along that has a genuinely unique sound that is influenced by traditional roots we get very excited. What kind of challenges do you think Singing Wells faces? One of the biggest challenges we face is that we don’t get our artists to perform enough to build their identity. We have…
Our top 5 Singing Wells songs for March News
…avourite moment, when Keith stands up and the dude behind him pulls his chair back – as if they both know he can’t stay sitting down when playing a rhythm that good! Harri What are your favourite Singing Wells songs? Tweet us your thoughts: @singingwells…
Hitching a ride Story
…Looks like a good way to get along…….
Ten More Singing Wells Stories News
…uth, the Music, the Village & Development Elsewhere, we have argued that a good musical group is a good proxy for a strong village and a strong village is critical to the development of Africa. A great way to know you have a good musical group is when you see the youth are still involved and passionate. The songs, so many of them about rites of passage, about courtship, demand the strength, the energy, the naive joy of youth (we’ve also pointed ou…
Current Leading Figures News
…don’t think Julius is trying to say the brass band is Ugandan. He is very good at respecting Ugandan traditions but he is also letting the children experience other things. He is opening spaces. By the way, brass bands are very important for certain occasions, like marches. He is providing a great service. Brass music is very good and I love it.” Tabu argued, “He knows the traditions. It is not what you play, but how you play it. He is so steeped…
Music Depositories and Archives around the World News
…ogie CREM (Research Centre for Ethnomusicology) is a French institution in Paris, which houses an extensive archive of world music; a vast and crucial resource for ethnomusicologists and PhD students. Collaborations with Government departments, other institutions, and state funding has lead to a proportion of their material being made available to listen online, which opens this archive up to the public – when previously it was for research purpos…
A History of Recording East African Music News
…) and found […] local scholars, some of them trained in the UK, were doing good work with minimal resources and doing some fine fieldwork with video-cameras.’ He ends with ‘There are plenty of Ugandans who understand the value of a good archives. They need to be able to persuade their government to fund them properly. They also need to pull together.’ Nearly all of Cooke’s material is available online at the Peter Cooke Uganda Collection, British…
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. …
James Isabirye and Tabu Osusa Discuss East African Music News
…t than it does to work with a traditional instrument, to learn how to be a good player, a good performer. To do something unique. That is too hard. It seems easier to copy a Beyonce video. Tabu: And the copies never work. They are terrible. I have worked with people that have become amazing artists, but when they first came to me, they were terrible. Bad copies of Beyonce trying to make it big overnight. It doesn’t work that way. Audiences want so…
Ketebul Music: A Year in Review News
…o have great Kenyan content and then our people will want it because it is good not due to regulations. Spotlight: We are also working on Spotlight on Kenyan music Volume 6, having released Volume 5 in 2013. We have focused on the Kenyan Coast and it will be released next 2014. We are also supporting Kenyan Music Week. This is an annual event and we are going to support each decade for each day, for our five days, for our 50 year history. This wil…