Day 4 (later): Recording for ‘Influences’ with the Birara Dancers Story
…is music, which is why he is such an inspiration: But too many (most) East African musicians want to sound like 50 Cent or Justin Timberlake and too many East African radio stations sound like they are competing on Los Angeles air waves. So the second major goal of Singing Wells is to inspire current artists to pick up on the traditions of these tribal artists. One way we do this is to record ‘Influences’ sessions, where Winyo and other artists wo…
Kenya (Coast): Day 3 – our final recording day Story
…equipment for the long trip home. The village We recorded at the village’s central meeting place. Throughout recording, clothes were being washed, iron and hung to dry, meetings were being held, grain sifted, chickens chased about… We felt very much in the middle of things. The corner of the ‘meeting place’, with the rich red earth gradually moving up the light blue walls By this time, we were using the back of the truck as the studio as often as…
Day 1: The very first field recording day for Singing Wells Story
…nt to today’s artists. Part of that mission then is to help create an East African musical identity to rival the South and West African successes. We had a taste of what this could be on March 29th in Sati, when Winyo joined Bado and his father, Nyerere wa Konde, to do a new song. Bado participates in his dad’s group, but separately records his own music. Bado’s music is great, propelled by his wonderful voice, but it’s American-sounding and could…
On the eve of our very first field recording trip….. Story
…d he was humbled by the extraordinary talent in the room. 50 years of East African music, the hand-off of one generation to the next. Massive respect for each others talent and an amazing evening that only Tabu could pull off. Amazing voice: We recorded video and used the mobile recording studio to record most of the concert. We’ll post this later. In the meantime, a couple of pictures: Winyo warms up with the Swiss Bone Guitar The Legendary Ayub…
Mufu Ndosi-Luvai – Crave Music News
…“I’m glad I came across Singing Wells. The production team goes all out to unearth East African traditional music, giving account of the people’s past and present through music. The recordings are a valuable treasure, since a lot of traditional African music often goes un-notated. Singing Wells is the much needed portal for ethnomusicology research in East Africa.” Publisher, Crave [music] Magazine. …
The Kalenjin & Kenya’s elite athletes News
…sn’t cool’ to listen to it otherwise! She started appreciating traditional African music from Western Africa. Now she is much more interested in learning about traditional Eastern African music and her roots. She has been following the Spotlight series produced by Ketebul Music and first met Tabu in September 2011. She is interested in using traditional music from the Kalenjin tribes for her documentary about Kenyan runners. She says that other fi…
Paul Kelemba – Chairman of Ketebul Music News
…Ketebul Music is continuing its documentation and archiving of East African music genres, both past and contemporary. We are now in a strong partnership with The Singing Wells Project (SWP) whose goals are similar to ours in the preservation of the region’s music heritage. …
May 2011 – Jimmy reports back on the pilot phase News
…their successes deeply embedded in the music of their ancestors. Southern, Central and Western African nations have their modern music genres deeply rooted in the rhythms, harmonies and melodies of their past resulting in an incredibly strong cultural identity on the world map. Countries that have turned their backs on their roots have a struggling music stage where musicians are caught in a warp trying to experiment with styles that they are clea…
Reflections on the pilot phase by Pato News
…h modern fusion to bridge the gap between old traditional music and modern African fusion. Four hours after we left Nairobi and hunger had already crept in so we decided to stop for a quick lunch in Voi. We arrived in Mombasa a few minutes past 7pm and headed straight to Malindi. Our V.I.P car was equipped with a G.P.S courtesy of Maddo so we had no trouble in terms of directions. We got to Malindi at around 9:30pm. The restaurant at the hotel we…
Reflections on the pilot phase by Willie Bembe News
…s at me to back off….says he’s got powers and can bite my head off. In the African culture, having magical powers is very possible….so I retreat to think about what he said from a distance. DAY 5 The drive back to Nairobi seems shorter than the one to Malindi. Get to Nairobi and enjoy a nice Ethiopian dinner at the Habesha restaurant. Everyone is very tired so we let the big boys have their meeting at the Fairview Hotel. DAY 6 It’s our guest’s las…
Discovering music roots with SWP News
…cherish the end result. Jimmy and Andy are amazing. The latter’s grasp of African traditional music and how to digitally emblazon the stuff was remarkable considering that this young gentleman from the north of Britain was on his second visit to the African continent. Jimmy is a sheer professional. We irked him earlier on in Nairobi with our team turning up late for introductory sessions. And that’s one of the lessons we learnt; time and its mana…
More Ketebul voices…Steve reports from the field News
…the set and hit the road for Diani. We stopped for lunch at a place called African Pot that Maddo had spotted on our way to Kwale. The food was particularly good, and served as the perfect ending for the day. Tuskers at the African Pot At the hotel, we quickly set up on the beach just outside Jimmy’s cottage, for a recording with Winyo and Andy. Pato and I then drove Winyo to hospital in Diani to have his tooth checked. He had knocked himself on t…
What we learned from the pilot phase News
…Test the Concept: Singing Wells is about the archiving of traditional East African music and ensuring that these traditions are kept alive in contemporary music. We needed to see if this was a worthwhile concept. 2. And, how did you do against these objectives? There were a lot of lessons learned, but the bottom line is we all walked away very excited about Singing Wells and feel we’ve accomplished everything and more in the pilot: The Equipment:…
Ketebul Music website launched News
…most pressing need was for a dynamic website which would show the work of the Ketebul artists in their full glory and we think we’ve succeeded in our goal. Take a good look around the site to see how Ketebul Music is working to combine the traditional sounds of East African tribal music with the best of contemporary artists. And through Bandcamp, listen to or download the inspirational music of Kenya from artists such as Ontiri Bikundo and Makade…