Best of Singing Wells 2011 News
…performance was unique and special – we loved them all – so picking just 10 songs for a ‘Best of’ album was not easy. Here are our final choices….it’s just a small reflection of what was an extraordinary year of recording music in East Africa. We hope you enjoy listening. Please get in touch and let us know what you think. Just send us an email – we’d love to hear from you. Email Victoria You can see and hear more on our YouTube channel : Singing…
Why “Singing Wells”? News
…life of the Samburu tribes people. We think that ‘Singing Wells’ is a very good name for our project which aims to preserve, celebrate and share the unique music traditions and heritage of East Africa. More on Kenya’s singing wells BBC World Service video on how the singing wells in the village of Daaba have changed the life of the local community: …
A Year in Review March 2011 – March 2012 News
…eld recordings (up to 8 microphones and 3 digital cameras) throughout East Africa. PROJECT BENEFITS TO EAST AFRICA : We are on a journey. When we started, we knew the critical importance of capturing the cultural legacy of East Africa with tribal music, before it was lost to all of us forever. We were reminded of the importance of this in December, when one of the most extraordinary musicians we’ve recorded, Okumu K’Orengo, died only weeks after o…
Guy Morley – No Nation News
…Guy Morley is music programmer for the Big Chill festival – one of the highlights of the UK’s cultural calendar, and is the founder of No Nation, an independent arts programming, production and promotion company. No Nation has developed links across East Africa and has recently worked on a project for Sound and Music looking at the influence of early American country music in Africa. …
AMF receive grant to fund Batwa recordings News
…identify, record, preserve and promote the cultural music heritage of East Africa. In taking the project to Uganda to document and record the traditional music and dance of the Batwa, we can help to stem the tide which is threatening to obscure the music traditions of this ethnic group. The SWP will ensure that the unique sights and sounds of the Batwa are fully and professionally documented, preserved for the future and promoted to a wide audienc…
Recording music & dance of the Batwa News
…fe. The United Organisation for Bawta Development (UOBDU) was founded in 2000 to address land problems and develop sustainable livelihoods. UOBDU has identified four key areas of support: land & housing; education and adult literacy; income generation and forest access & benefit-sharing. By way of example, the Batwa Cultural Trail is a new initiative launched by the Uganda Wildlife Authority and UOBDU. The trail will provide an income for Batwa an…
May 2011 – Jimmy reports back on the pilot phase News
…etter to ‘go to the music’ then try to bring all these talented musicians 900 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…
Reflections on the pilot phase by Pato News
…see the images my love was capturing. Day 2: Off to Malindi I was up by 5:00am in the morning, and was all showered and packed shortly after.I had breakfast and by 6:30 I was out of the house. Nairobi has serious traffic jams and to get somewhere on time one has to leave early. When I arrived at the studio Steve was already there and the rest of the team joined us later and as per Steve’s itinerary we left at 12:00 sharp hihihi. We split in two g…
Discovering music roots with SWP News
…s lurked in the background with brotherly advice. March 26, 2011, about 22.00 hours, JKIA Nairobi. Ketebul had partnered with Abubilla on the Singing Wells Project, just about the best thing, in my view, that has happened to the dwindling fortunes of Kenyan traditional genres of music. Tabu and I were at the airport to receive James Jimmy Allen and Andy Patterson from Abubilla. I’d met Andy towards the end of 2010 on his first visit to Africa and…
More Ketebul voices…Steve reports from the field News
…h a MacBook Pro laptop running on pro Tools 9, MOTU traveler interface, a 500mb external hard drive, and 2 ART headphone amps. There was also a 2 bags with mic and instrument cables, power extension cables, 8 pairs of headphones, mic stands, boom poles, 2 Rodes NT5 mics with dead cats (no animals were harmed in the acquisition of the dead cats!), 1 shure sm58 and 1 shure sm57 mic, and 2 AKG C414 mics. Patrick, our video guy, also made it to the st…
Meet the team from Ketebul Music News
…ct’. Winyo will lead ‘Influences’ This is an extraordinary team, with huge passion for Singing Wells. Our goal is not simply to ‘archive’ 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
…ebsite 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 from working with Abubilla Music and Sideways Recordings we were well placed to understand the functionality that a music organisation needs in their web site. Taking this experience we developed a dynamic design and implemented a custom installation of WordPress, enabli…