Rediscovering Afropop and its influences News
…acted as influences (see more on our influences work here) and have helped newer genres form. The same works in the opposite direction of course, and African popular music has emerged as a combination of traditional African music and an adoption of certain elements – particularly some musical instruments and recording techniques – from Western music. Last week I was in a taxi driving through Nairobi’s Westlands and talking to a girl about Sauti So…
Our top 5 Singing Wells songs for March News
I’m new to Singing Wells and I’ve spent the last few weeks listening to pretty much 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 we…
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…
Music Depositories and Archives around the World News
…mmercial material and field recordings in many formats, with supplementary newspapers clippings; over 10000 sound recordings dating from 1940 to the present day. As it is housed at the University, it is an invaluable resource for students, especially those who study Anthropology or African Studies. Often material is bought by the archive to complement the research projects of students, but some material is also donated, with regional emphasis on E…
Archiving Guidelines News
…they are still able to be played back in the long term, due to support for new media or data formats – as in conjunction with OAIS. Chapter 7, Small Scale Approaches to Digital Storage Systems, is of particular use because it contains straightforward information 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…
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. …
ILAM, Repatriation and Jimmie Rodgers/Chemirocha News
…Africa is forever evolving. It is wonderful that Jimmie Rogers inspired a new song and it is amazing that the Otacho Young Stars were inspired to sing a song about a factory manager. At Singing Wells, we do not celebrate static village music – that would be to deny the very essence of music, which is to evolve organically as the musicians are inspired by new things. We simply want to celebrate the evolution of music that innovates while building…
James Isabirye and Tabu Osusa Discuss East African Music News
…have is our ‘everything now’ culture. 50 years ago, if you got a job, you knew that if you worked hard and stayed with the job and got promoted you could buy a home for your family, or a car. Or help your children to be educated. Once you got a job, you knew not to lose it. Now people work for a little bit and then quit and they complain about how hard life is. I tell them, “Why did you stop the job? You just lost a home, or education for your chi…
Ketebul Music: A Year in Review News
…13. Here is the voice of Tabu. “A New Studio: Our first big milestone is a new studio. We refurbished our studio and brought in new equipment. We used our own savings for this to build a better studio and are very proud. Nick Lader, a sound engineer from the UK, helped improve the studio with bass traps, etc… so we could really do a better job. Nick was very hands on and did a great job. He now does a lot of work with us, mastering and mixing our…
Preserving Threatened Heritage News
…our heart, such as Uganda. An article on the website of the Ugandan daily newspaper, New Vision, warns about the need to preserve ‘Bigwala’, the royal music of the Busoga region. Bigwala music is performed at ceremonies such as coronations, funerals and, recently, other social events. It is the music of gourd trumpets and is accompanied by a specific dance. UNESCO cites Bigwala music as playing ‘a significant role in contributing to unity among t…
Report from Womex 2013 News
…da. Find out more about the film here: http://www.sweetdreamsrwanda.com/ New Friends at the festival We met a lot of new friends – as that was the point of our being there. We were spreading the word of the project and its aims and objectives, with listening stations for passers by to listen to the music we had recorded. We had a few instruments from our collection on display, and some even got played by some of our fellow Womexians as this phot…
SWP Uganda 2013 – our proposed itinerary News
…ing which will focus on the music of the Baganda and also the recording of new newly arranged songs for our Influences series. First, our Baganda musicians. We will be recording Albert Bissaso Ssempeke, who plays a variety of Baganda instruments including the Ennanga (bow harp), Entongoli (bowl lyre), Amadinda (xylophone), Endere (flute) and Engoma (drums). We have also arranged to record a performance from the Kadinda Players, a Baganda group led…
Group of the Month – Otacho Young Stars News
…one of which was ‘Charles Manager’ sung in English -about the arrival of a new manager to a sugar plantation. The irony being that they are thanking him, just for doing his job properly. This was one of the songs the group re-recorded at Ketebul studios – re-named Mr Manager and available on YouTube here: You can find links to the field reports below – along with a link to the group page for the Otacho Young Stars. We’ll be posting clips and recor…
The Birara Batwa Community Story
…e the Influences series. Since our visit to Kisoro we have been in regular contact with the local NGO the United Organisation for Batwa Development in Uganda (UOBDU). Their latest report to us included the following information about the Birara group: “This is one of the communities that is still cherishing music and dance as the Batwa culture it is still leading and very creative. The community members also share the knowledge on culture and pass…
The Key to Sustainable Aid in Africa? Perhaps we should follow the music. News
…we plan for our next trip to Kampala this Autumn, we can’t wait to publish new songs, new dances and new stories from East African music. But, we always recognized that there was a hierarchy of needs in East Africa. No matter how threatened the culture of music was, we understood that East Africa was facing ‘bigger problems’ – be it famine, disease, tribal conflicts, etc… Music was important, but the threat to music stood at the end of a long list…
A recording studio which fits into the back of an SUV Story
…adding to our equipment lists all the time as we refine our methods, learn new techniques and face new challenges. For our next field recording trip to Uganda (November 2013), this is the list of everything we will be taking with us: 2 Apple MacBook Pro 2 MOTU Traveler MK3 Audio Interface 4 Headphone amps 8 Sony MDR-V600 headphones 2 Shure mics & stands 2 Rode Lavalier omni-directional mics 2 Rode NTG-1 condenser Shotgun mics 1 Matched Pair of AKG…