Central Uganda: Day 2 – Kampala to Budaka Story
…loss as the female singers performed. Animals were sacrificed during the story to bring hope and health to the village (very brutal throat slitting of a fairly battered foam cow, lamb and chicken). Bamiisi Muwulire: This was a song to rally people to listen to the stories of the band. Daudi: This was really a dance, a performance play, with many actors. The story was about a village boy that had gone astray – lots of partying, lots of late nights…
Central Uganda: Day 0 – Nairobi/London to Entebbe Story
…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 Vicki De…
Who’s looking at you? Story
…This little fan joined us along Lake Victoria to record some of the best Nyatiti players in Kenya in November 2011….
What’s in the box? Story
…November 28th, 2011 – Jimmy’s 51st Birthday and we’re at Rang-ala Village, Nyanza, recording the Ogoya Nengo. As a surprise, the village arranges a little birthday celebration. And in this lovely life box was a live chicken to ease Jimmy’s transition into middle age. The village and Jimmy fared better than the Chicken that became the centre of a lovely Birthday meal……
Our top 5 Singing Wells songs for March News
…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 were later invited to Ketebul Studios in Nairobi to form part of our influences series. I love this song…
Ten More Singing Wells Stories News
…e session): The Royal Instruments of Uganda As mentioned, James is working to restore the royal instruments of Uganda. He supports the Bugando Musican Ensemble, which we recorded (click here) and he is trying to restore the The Bigwala (trumpet). There are few surviving musicians and we recorded some of the few players surviving. But what we loved about Uganda is all the great the instrument bands, from the Xylophone, to the Likembe, to the Adungu…
Music Depositories and Archives around the World News
…oken word, instruction, and sounds from around the world’ and is committed to ‘to cultural diversity, education, increased understanding, and lively engagement with the world of sound.’ They currently have more than 3,200 albums and 45,000 tracks and, through the dissemination of audio recordings and educational materials, are seeking to expand this legacy. Their vast content is relatively easy to search – though of course it helps to know what yo…
Tracey Instrument Collection News
…r cowhide sound of the laced ‘Uganda drums’.’ It is made from legavaan, or rock monitor (a large type of lizard found in South Africa), skin which gives it the ‘crackling’ sound. The legavaan is now actually endangered in Uganda, as it is demanded so much for drums, lyres and fiddles. Endara log xylophone The xylophone is 263.5cm long, made up of 16 roughly cut keys and tuned to a pentatonic scale. It is played using one beater, which is attached…
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
…they listen and guess what –everyone is listening to them. James: We need to move from being a nobody – neither a American/Englishman (but trying to be one) nor a Ugandan. We need to move from being a nobody to being somebody, to understand what makes us unique. When we hold festivals, we ask the musicians to talk to the audience, tell them their stories and who they are. For almost every festival, I am told by some government official that they…
Report from Womex 2013 News
…splay, and some even got played by some of our fellow Womexians as this photo from Louise shows: I gave an interview for Icelandic radio about the project. And around 150 people entered our competition to win an iPod shuffle – direct from one of our listening station. We’ll be making the draw soon. Cards in the Kalabash We were pleased to host a few meetings for our friend Guy Morley who used our stand as a meeting place. We were delighted also…
Clowns Story
…On our first recording day during the Northern Uganda Field trip 2012 we had the pleasure of working in front hundreds of children who slowly climbed a tree to watch the proceedings. They were delighted by the cameras and we had a lot of fun showing them their smiling faces. This little boy was the biggest show off….
NME News
…It’s always nice to find your videos featured elsewhere, so when we found quite a few of our Singing Wells videos featured on NME we thought it was pretty cool. Although the content is generated by YouTube, it is always great to have a little bit more publicity for our cause! …
The Batwa Community Story
…ty. Batwa communities suffered from poverty and exclusion and were offered little stake in the tourist industry which has developed in forests where they once lived. The plight of the Batwa in Uganda is now being recognized and there are initiatives in place to support their communities and help them reclaim their traditional way of life. The United Organisation for Bawta Development (UOBDU) was founded in 2000 to address land problems and develop…
The Key to Sustainable Aid in Africa? Perhaps we should follow the music. News
…sic heritage of the region and to help make this legacy relevant and fresh to today’s audiences. The last five years has only re-enforced our commitment. On our first goal, we only have to remember that we were probably the last folks to record Okumu K’Orengo, one of the great Nyatiti players, before he died. On our second goal, we only have to remember Francis and Jessie playing together in Kisoro. And as we plan for our next trip to Kampala this…
A recording studio which fits into the back of an SUV Story
…st Hotel in Kisoro, Uganda!) We can also combine the two recording units into one to increase the number of inputs, while still working off battery power. The laptops use Avid ProTools recording software – an industry standard for recording and music production. The microphones we have chosen are industry standard models used in studios the world over but, most likely, not seen in the villages of East Africa. The equipment has been carefully selec…