An Evening with Mserego Mwatela Group News
…with his father’s group and then he founded this group in 2007. They use a number of styles, most notably Sengenya, which we covered fully in our March 2011 field recordings in Malindi. We interviewed Swalhe Mwatela Massai and his grandson, Ali Tungwa : Q to the grandfather: In contrast to Uganda, we have seen many villages in Kenya where the traditional music is only played by the older generation. And yet your group is so young and vibrant. Ho…
Northern Uganda: Day 6 – Soroti to Kampala (a driving story) Story
…here’s file management. We need outstanding file management for 5 reasons. First, we need to make sure everything is backed up often and twice. We’re in harsh environments, recording through dust and rain, bouncing along rough roads (we are reminded of this fact because as we typed about dust and rain we were travelling slowly but dramatically through a pot hole the size of Rhode Island), with equipment going through 1.5 gigs of data A DAY. Second…
Northern Uganda: Day 6 – Soroti to Obuell-Lira to Soroti Story
…s. In 1992, the Uganda Army then re-took control of the area. One of their first acts was to go to each village and accuse them of collaborating, typically killing the men under the assumption that they must have fought with the rebels. For Joshua, this was a terrifying moment because the band was known to have played to the rebels. Again, a group of soldiers came into their village and again their mission was to kill the men and boys of the villa…
Northern Uganda: Day 5 – from Pakwach to Soroti (a road trip) Story
…udly in the colours of their sponsors. There are three sizes of shops. The first is the cement block, typically 20 feet wide, 20 feet deep. You enter it and see things on shelves. Sometimes the block has 4 doors, each like a storage shed. Behind each door is a shop. You seldom see anything that has anything to do with the sign out front. Then there is the box. This is about twice as wide as the door. If the door is open, the shop is open. Usually…
Northern Uganda: Day 4 – night recording at Fort Murchison Story
…el. They had about 15 bul (drums) and 2 drummers and a smallish ndara (xylophone). Their lead male singer was about 6 foot five and commanded the whole group and the growing audience with a loud voice, great dance and fun drumming. They sang Myeli, Wuon Nyaci, Cwara Rac, Ngeta Romo, Atyekedec Gen, and Apako Orang’a. Each of their songs followed a rough pattern: the lead singer sang out the main theme of the song and the drumming started. The dance…
ATTA is following Singing Wells News
…guest at the World Travel Market at Excel and I met representatives from a number of organisations and companies in the travel and tourism industry operating in the East African counties we are visiting during our field recording trips. I met Nigel Vere Nicoll, Chief Executive of the African Travel & Tourism Association and explained a little about Singing Wells and our aims to record and celebrate the cultural music heritage of East Africa. It se…
Northern Uganda: Day 4 – Pakwach to Widiang’a, Nebbi Story
…nt imaginable: The Flute (yep, a flute) The Ndara (the amazing Ugandan xylophone) The Rigi-Rigi (similar to the Kenyan orutu) The Agwara (trumpets) The Adungu (the harp we’ve encountered every day now) The group was formed in 1993 and is professional, touring Kampala and other parts of Uganda, sponsored by NGO’s and typically campaigning for things like HIV Awareness, Cultural preservation, etc… Except for the fact they wear clothes under their an…
Northern Uganda: Day 3 – from Gulu to Awach to Pakwach Story
…y sang so softly and it was such a big crowd. But we gave her a lapel microphone and put a microphone directly on the Adungu and recorded. Afterwards, when we turned her up in the mix a magical voice and sound emerged – the ancient lady sitting on the blanket in the middle of this village, surrounded by 100’s had a beautiful, strong, pitch perfect voice. Incredible. She sang: Two Man Dong Lakee Cok Mon Alwak Munu Keya Here’s Two Man Dong: https://…
A day in the field with Singing Wells News
…microphones are set up we ask the musicians to perform a few bars of their first track to check the microphone gains and record levels. The video team check their shots and talk about who will be covering which part of the footage. Then, once we are setup, we begin to record the performances. Takes are logged by the day, so the first take of the day becomes take number one. Note taking and logging is incredibly important as one recording trip can…
Northern Uganda: Day 2 – from Gulu to Acet Story
…atured the Uvure, a wonderful horn. The Uvure in action… Omee Odokomit Our first group was Omee Odokomit, who played Apiri style. The group is led by Evelyn Ojok and was formed in 1981, disbanded for the war and reformed in 1999. The leader summons the band to practice by playing drums… They are all female dancers, with whistles and Gara (ankle shakers). They played all four of their songs one after another without a break: Oluma Lareku (a war dan…
Northern Uganda: Day 1 – Entebbe to Gulu Story
…to Gulu at around 2PM (yes, we tend to spend a lot of time getting mobile phone cards!) and headed out on a 360 km drive to the town of Gulu in Northern Uganda. Within minutes we were deeply immersed in the ‘classic’ East African road scene: big tall white bags of coal, with grass helmets, bricks in various stages of manufacturer (either drying or firing), pyramids of potatoes, tomatoes on patches of blankets under trees, tiny goats tethered near…
The Tribal and Musical Structure of East Africa – Worldmap Research News
…rica is there, now we can only add to it! There was also the difficulty of classification. There are hundreds of different language groups and dialects between tribes in East Africa, meaning that within the huge range of instruments there were also a number of different names for them. This became very interesting to discover however, and over time that information could gather on the map, making it more comprehensive. What did you find most inter…
Day 8: Ketebul Studios with the Otacho Young Stars Story
…Having recorded the Batwa in the Ketebul studios in December 2011, we follow this with our first studio recordings from the Nyanza trip – starting with the wonderful Otacho Young Stars…
Day 6: Recording the Tugen & back to Nairobi Story
…‘Chebet‘ : about a beautiful girl from Tugen. It’s done in four parts, the first part when her mother presents her, the second part where she sings, the third part when her grandmother presents her and the fourth part when her mother sings her praises. ‘Rirenech’ : a prayer from mass. This is started by the song Kim about God being great and strong. He has created mighty things. ‘Ribwech’ : about handing over responsibility from older to younger g…
Day 5: Recording the Marakwet Story
…el all this way to train on the red dirt roads around Iten. She answered: “First, the altitude (roughly 2300 meters) is perfect – right at the peak of natural altitude where you can still train hard, but so high that the lungs are pushed to the limit. Second, for such high altitudes, the weather is great and allows year round training. Few places at this altitude allow year round training. Third, Iten is all about inspiration. Foreign athletes are…
Day 4: the Pokot Tribes Story
…hing Else Everything else from today can be divided into three key events. First, we survived the drive. There were a few scary moments, the first being driving to the village for the shoot – straight up a very steep hill. This was not a hill for most humans and certainly wasn’t a hill for cars and certainly not cars filled with Ketebul folks and all our equipment. We got up and down, but we imagine there were a lot of prayers said during those 20…