Kenya (Coast): Day 3 – our final recording day Story
…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…
Kathy’s reflections on her Singing Wells experience News
…rmances. I really felt for them if they thought they hadn’t done something right in the performance. For instance if they started singing before the clapper board was out of the shot they had to start again. This unnerved and embarrassed them and they had to regroup before they could sing again. I felt it was important to talk to them before the performances to put them at ease, let them know what was going to happen and ask if they had any concer…
Kenya (Coast): Day 2 continued…. Story
…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 joined in… https://youtu.be/m0eG1EcIpNM The kids By now you know, we are surrounded by the children at every recording… here are a few more… We even had an audience high on the hills….. Jimmy March 2011 …
Interview with Fifty Cows – fixer for Singing Wells News
…eed clean drinking water when in fact they need better medical care. He is now getting a Masters in International Relations at the U.S. International University in Nairobi. He is focusing on conflict resolution. He wants to be a peace ambassador in Kenya using his childhood experiences as examples. He feels like much time and so many men were lost because of war. He is well known throughout the Kalenjin tribes because of his radio shows. Fifty Cow…
Kenya (Coast): Day 2 – recording in the village of Kibarani Story
…nd begin setting up. We are about 10 folks and the musicians are another 10-15. We then start the first song and by the end of the session we are generally surrounded by 50-100 kids… Behind the Scenes We have good routines now: We set up our little tent (right) We set up mic stands We set up mics and while folks are setting up, Pato interviews the group leaders That’s it. We’ll follow up with this afternoon’s action in the next blog… Jimmy…
Day 1: The very first field recording day for Singing Wells Story
…ly 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 …
On the eve of our very first field recording trip….. Story
…ub Ogado …and his legendary goatee …and his legendary Nyatiti From left to right, Joyce, Alfred and Tabu. Joyce is from the Ford Foundation and supports Ketebul. Alfred helped introduce Ketebul and Abubilla This was an evening to represent everything Ketebul is about – bringing new East African artists to the world, but rooting them in the generations of music that came before. This seems a perfect send-off to record village music. We leave tomorr…
May 2011 – Jimmy reports back on the pilot phase News
…kms to Nairobi. In addition, we confirmed that Ketebul absolutely has the right set of sound and video engineers to lead these sessions in the future – they have all now been fully trained and have already begun to record sessions on their own. They will be leading the November sessions. If you are interested in the Ketebul’s team’s views of the sessions click on any of these links: Tabu, CEO of Ketebul Music; Maddo, Chairman of Ketebul Music; St…
Lake Turkana Cultural Festival 2011 News
…o allow them to undertake the trip to this remote area of North West Kenya, 800 km from Nairobi and home to the Turkana and Samburu tribes and the original ‘singing wells’. When Steve Kivutia (Ketebul Music) presented the idea of recording music at the Festival to the AMF, it seemed a perfect fit with the objectives of the Singing Wells project and the trustees were happy to approve a grant to cover the costs of travelling to the Festival with the…
Discovering music roots with SWP News
…nd that’s one of the lessons we learnt; time and its management (everyone knows about it but can’t keep it). The Ketebul Team is now eager to arrive at work stations hours early in the future phases of the actual recording of SWP. The Abubilla Team’s modus operandi rubbed off us in a highly positive way. I observed coordinated responses and easy flow from equipment set up, material capture to equipment disassembly on the part of the Ketebul crew….
More Ketebul voices…Steve reports from the field News
…from the village up above in droves. We set up quickly on the back of car number one, it was now early evening and the sun wasn’t blazing hot, so we saw no need to put up the tent. We were also trying to get some recording done before sun down so we wanted to get up and running ASAP. On location in the river bed… Supaki Kalazi played 4 songs in the Mwanzele style. Every now and then, a motorcycle would ride past, and we would all cringe knowing t…
Meet the team from Ketebul Music News
…hive’ the traditional music of East Africa – it is about making it relevant to new generations and contemporary music. This is the right team to make it happen. Jimmy…
More on the launch of the Ketebul Music website News
…created the new Ketebul Music site for us. They’ve delivered a great site right on brief and within a tight budget which is a big bonus for the Singing Wells funds. Here are a few words from Wesley Burden about the challenge we gave them…… “Ketebul Music required a website design that delivered a strong sense of the colourful music of East Africa and the traditions that their non-profit organisation aims to help preserve. Using our experience fro…