Day 3: Homa Bay and the Kochia Dancers Story
…… The Kochia Dancers Today is all about dances, so our videos will be much better than still photographs. Let us introduce you to the dancers; here in full glory are the Kochia Dancers who dance in the Ramogi style of dance (ref: for a great article on the Ramogi dance of the Luo, by Helen Odwar, click here): https://youtu.be/_qVuMFLJ9-M https://youtu.be/pwVlHnpw8Io https://youtu.be/B_M_OFRzDoU https://youtu.be/6AjxDKLPLkg https://youtu.be/2iGUcQR…
Day 2: Focus on the Nyatiti, Orutu and DRUMS! Story
…all instruments, accompanied by dancers and back up vocals; here he is performing….and posing for a portrait: He gathered a big audience….and The Singing Wells team poses with his band: https://youtu.be/9lnuEPTo1No https://youtu.be/RfDGq0WpDMk https://youtu.be/CyAm45yHzE0 https://youtu.be/JY0a4W0-8ME https://youtu.be/8canGj0fxXo The Village as ‘set’ We try hard to bring you a sense of the beautiful villages that serve as our recording studios. Ou…
Day 1: The music of the Luo – starting at Rang’ala Village Story
…singer Ogoya Nengo. We’re about 90 minutes northeast of Kisumu, our ‘base’ for two days. We are here to record the Sega Sega Band (Benga Style) and the Do Do Band (Do Do), both Luo musical styles; the Luo are Kenya’s third largest tribe, making up about 13% of the population. The Sega Sega Band Led by Osumba Rateng. This is Benga style, originating from the Luo tribes, as they gradually built on the percussive/bass sounds of the Nytati to form som…
From Kisoro to Nairobi to Lake Victoria Story
…si families and forced them to slaughter every family member. Mothers were forced to kill each of their children before they were slaughtered themselves. Rape was used to humilate and torture. Many rapists had AIDs and knowingly infected their victims. Long after the slaughter was over, the victims of rape continued to die in the thousands from AIDs. But most were burned or hacked to death long before. The ‘lucky ones’ died of AIDs. The memorial h…
Day 6: The Studio @ Traveller’s Rest Hotel, Kisoro Story
…e of our hosts from the hotel then join the group for the second shot. Now for a formal photo with Jesse, Jimmy, Francis and Tabu The ladies came to work on an ‘Influences’ session with Winyo. Here, they put down their track. Not at all phased by the use of headphones and mics, they take everything in there stride, performing a number of takes as the song develops. We start by giving them a simple click to follow the beat but quickly realised that…
Day 5 (much later): The Micyingo Group – guitar and bass! Story
…singing groups… This man was a wonderful dancer and he took centre stage. For us, he symbolised the essence of how life is for the Batwa today – a very hard life, but a life full of spirited song and dance… and this lady is their wonderful lead vocalist… https://youtu.be/pZzgr2PXZ3s https://youtu.be/gt4_CaZNN2c Then the guitar and bass took to the stage….if you are wondering where the bass is, the plastic bag turn out to be significant. We were…
Day 5 (PM): The ‘Togetherness Group’ from Kanyabukunga Story
…e audio team for the day, Andy and Willie, deploy the essential sun shield for the mixing desk. They also found an additional use for the Pelicases, and Winyo’s guitar case, as mixing table and chairs! This little girl sensibly brought an umbrella for a sunshade……and happily accepted some much needed water: And here’s a very special young lady from this community – Fiona Nyiraguhirwa. Fiona has been sponsored by UOBDU through Junior School. Everyo…
Day 5: Recording the Mperwa Dancers Story
…he lead in most dances… While spectators from every generation take a seat for the performance… Here are the videos: https://youtu.be/zFjbdw9j1io https://youtu.be/W_VV8xEYziM https://youtu.be/t8Ui32w_NbI https://youtu.be/QHo5Eb2Az20 https://youtu.be/wxzzC5qcweU https://youtu.be/mhzNpJLsZFA https://youtu.be/h_mVjup7_6s https://youtu.be/1zjh68iNClw Jessie leads the first Influences session and Winyo accompanies the lead singer and drummer on another…
Day 4 (later): Recording for ‘Influences’ with the Birara Dancers Story
…d remembers through music. But few peopele are there to listen and each performance runs the risks of being forever lost. With our mobile studios, we are able to take the studio to them, working in their environment to capture as best we can the music and dance of their community. It is important to note that these sessions are incredibly important to these communities. It is no exaggeration to say that most of them live to dance, live to sing. Wh…
Day 4: UOBDU and the Birara Dancers Story
…faced a beautiful patchwork of terracotta and green. These are the predominate colours of this trip. The dance site itself was no less beautiful: We then set up the ‘studio’ ready to record the Birara Dancers: The key sound engineers do a final check before we begin: Steve, Andy and Jesse do a final sound check before we begin. https://youtu.be/l-1IG790EOs https://youtu.be/u38YYaTQMIY https://youtu.be/uNeC4Dw4bu0 https://youtu.be/9FZeFgg4jKI ht…
Day 3: From Nairobi to Kigali to Kisoro Story
…can go. Traveller’s Rest: We stayed at the Traveller’s Rest, a hotel famed for being a meeting place for gorilla observers. They write about this on their website: “In 1955 Travellers Rest was bought by Walter Baumgartel, and quickly became a meeting place for people interested in the mountain gorilla. Amongst them was ‘gorilla-woman” Dian Fossey, who said: “Walter’s hotel was an oasis to many scientists who came here before me.”. Fossey visited t…
Day 1 & 2: Preparing to leave for Kisoro, Uganda Story
…c. Chief Sound Engineer: Commands the audio team and is in charge of input for all sessions and for completing all finished audio for that day. Assistant Engineer: In charge of set up/breakdown of set and assisting Chief Sound Engineer on day Trainee: Supports Assistant Engineer and takes tutorial from Chief Engineer during session. Chief Video Engineer: In charge of Stationary Camera and placement of Roving Camera 2 Roving Camera 1: In charge of…
Kenya (Coast): Day 4 – the road back to Nairobi Story
…orth of material. The main thing we’ve learned is how to organise the team better in terms of accountability for recordings (both video and audio). Logistically, handling all the cash required has been more painful then it needed to be. We’ll fix that. SK: With this ‘pilot phase’ we’ve now covered a lot of the ground. We’ve really proven that we can do it and we believe this is much bigger than we thought. We are collecting a wide range of materia…
Kenya (Coast): Day 3 – our final recording day Story
…s of ‘props’ including a baby doll, hay stack and lots of bowls of water and spices. Some final shots at our last village. Enjoy…. Winyo and the kids… That’s enough for now. There’s 150 pictures more for every one we show, but the internet is too slow to keep posting Jimmy…
Kenya (Coast): Day 2 continued…. Story
…n… Katana bin Kalama, with beautiful costume of shells… The Group prepares for their performance… Sengenya The most energetic group by far, brought the house down, with wonderful dancing. Led by Munyaka Chimega, they danced in the style of Sengenya (which bears their name). Non-stop dancing, multiple songs and they didn’t want to stop (but we ran out of video!). Fantastic energetic dancers that we’ve only captured on video…. …and all the kids jo…
Day 1: The very first field recording day for Singing Wells Story
…probably two dozen little kids watching. At close of day we were invited to some coconuts to celebrate the music Winyo with Coconuts Maddo, Chairman of Ketebul during our coconut break That’s it for now. This is only Day 1 of recording… we look forward to the next two days, 6 more groups, 3 more villages and of course 600 kilometres back to Nairobi. Jimmy …