ATTA is following Singing Wells News
…their guest at the World Travel Market at Excel and I met representatives from a number of organisations and companies in the travel and tourism industry operating in the East African counties we are visiting during our field recording trips. I met Nigel Vere Nicoll, Chief Executive of the African Travel & Tourism Association and explained a little about Singing Wells and our aims to record and celebrate the cultural music heritage of East Africa…
Northern Uganda: Day 4 – Pakwach to Widiang’a, Nebbi Story
…start to the day. Today it was all about music of the Alur tribe. We drove from Pakwach across the Albert Nile Bridge into the Nebbi district to the village of Widyanga. The Music Alur Kingdom Troupe We set up amongst the ‘five layered’ thatched roof huts, settled down around the cows, goats and a really music loving chicken and recorded one single band, The Alur Kingdom Troupe, with every instrument imaginable: The Flute (yep, a flute) The Ndara…
Northern Uganda: Day 3 – from Gulu to Awach to Pakwach Story
…meter journey to our lodgings on the Nile near the Albert Nile Bridge next to Pakwach, Uganda. A long drive through the national park. We could say it was beautiful, but it was pitch dark. After driving about 100 kilometers in the dark, we suddenly saw the hills ahead in a dark red. As we got closer we realized the hills on both sides were on fire in a controlled burn. We drove through black and dark red for about 15 minutes. We then just we saw t…
A day in the field with Singing Wells News
…valier omni-directional mics 2 Rode NTG-1 condenser Shotgun mics 1 Matched Pair of AKG C414 XL Microphones 1 Matched Pair of Rode NT5 Microphones2 Rode professional boom pole 1 K&M telescopic mic stand/boom 1 Canon EOS 7D 1 Canon EOS 60D 1 Canon EOS 5D 1 LED video camera lights 1 Flip HD video camera ThinkTank sun screens (for the laptops) Various Canon zoom and fixed lenses Plus at least 9 Sandisk memory cards and 15 portable back-up drives and a…
Northern Uganda: Day 2 – from Gulu to Acet Story
…) and the Gwara (calabash or tambourin with Samba drumming, in this case a tortoise sized shell that they hit with a brush of wire). In addition, one of the groups featured the Uvure, a wonderful horn. The Uvure in action… Omee Odokomit Our first group was Omee Odokomit, who played Apiri style. The group is led by Evelyn Ojok and was formed in 1981, disbanded for the war and reformed in 1999. The leader summons the band to practice by playing drum…
The Tribal and Musical Structure of East Africa – Worldmap Research News
…an from committing adultery. 1% of Ugandan women undergo the procedure, compared to 95% of Pokot girls. Times are changing, however. Since the Female Genital Mutiliation or ‘FGM’ Act in 2009 the practice has been on decline, but this year in particular Pokot men have come to women’s aid by rejecting the practice. There were reports in February of this year of men demonstrating with large placards against FGM. One man, Mr Lotolim, a resident of Jum…
Northern Uganda: Day 1 – Entebbe to Gulu Story
…pala. As promised Kampala traffic was a nightmare. The William Team (Jimmy/Pato and Hannah) tried to take a short cut, but the road was closed and we ended up winding through some very poor areas around Kampala with a truck not designed for essentially footpaths. All the time, the high rises of Kampala were in view but it felt like an altogether not very nice place. The harsh divide between wealth and poverty is alarmingly clear, and the architect…
Northern Uganda: Day 0 – London to Entebbe Story
…bags were gratefully recovered and we took a taxi for an 8 minute journey to the Airport Guesthouse Entebbe, where we were greeted by our old friends, Jan Willem Van De Kamp (the owner of this hotel and the Travelers Rest in Kisoro), Charles and Simba (the Rottweiler who feast on Kisoro locusts during our locust attack). They ran a lovely hotel and greeted us warmly with Nile Specials! We handed off a pile of Batwa DVD’s for them to take back to…
Day 8: Ketebul Studios with the Otacho Young Stars Story
…to 10 Batwa musicians and 5 Batwa babies travelling from Kisoro to Kampala to Nairobi and recording some great songs over the course of four days. We now want to repeat this for every field visit and decided to invite the Otacho Young Stars, the great find of our field visit to record the Luo, and Ben Kisinja, the great Kalenjin musician we recorded earlier this week. Saturday was all about the Otacho Young Stars. Let’s remind you who they are – h…
Day 6: Recording the Tugen & back to Nairobi Story
…we travelled to Nakuru and then half of us travelled on in the pitch black to Nairobi. The Nakuru crew, in the white van, was stopped cold by a broken alternator belt. The other car was able to flag down a matatu (small van public transport that fill the roads everywhere) and head back. We agreed to take off the belt altogether and get them to Nakuru before dark (with no power they had no lights). They made it. The second jeep soldiered on to Nair…
Day 5: Recording the Marakwet Story
…raditional Dancers. Kathy talked to the tribal elder about them. They come from Tot, about 50km from where we were recording. They had walked here the night before and had been practicing all night and morning before we arrived at noon. Most of their songs are about peace and unity between the Marakwet and Pokot tribes. They are also about important historical events and praising ceremonies such as weddings, births, circumcisions and funerals. The…
Day 4: the Pokot Tribes Story
…ech. Click here to go to Song Translations Everything Else Everything else from today can be divided into three key events. First, we survived the drive. There were a few scary moments, the first being driving to the village for the shoot – straight up a very steep hill. This was not a hill for most humans and certainly wasn’t a hill for cars and certainly not cars filled with Ketebul folks and all our equipment. We got up and down, but we imagine…
Day 3 continued – an interview with Steve Kivutia Story
…sted in first class audio equipment and can record using 8 mics directly into Pro Tools. But during the March Pilot programme, we realised that the visual experience was as important as the audio. So for our November trip we invested in two more digital cameras and worked out our new Camera 1-3 approach. Camera 1 is static group shot. Camera 2 focuses on instruments. Camera 3 is context. This worked extremely well but created a separate issue – lo…
Singing Wells – Origins News
…cord the amazing musicians of the Batwa tribes, bringing many of them back to Nairobi to record them in Ketebul Music studios. We have designed two mobile recording units which can be assembled just about anywhere. The Ketebul and Abubilla audio and video engineers who support Singing Wells talk of the amazing experience working in the field. As Steve Kivutia says, ‘Nothing is more satisfying than watching the musicians listen back to their own re…
Day 3: Kitale to Kapsokwony, Kenya Story
…Sigerer’. Kathy interviewed him about all his songs and this is a classic (to go to Kathy’s Blog on Songs from Day 1, click here). Sigerer tells the story of two bulls in Teriet’s family that we were stolen and taken to Uganda. The family dog was able to follow the scent and led a posse of 20 armed men 75kms to a butchers where sadly one bull had been killed. The surviving bull, Sigerer, was re-taken and brought back to Kitale. In celebration, the…
Day 2: Nairobi to Kitale & an interview with Pato Story
…g Wells Project Manager and Chief Sound Engineer, Throat to Choke Patrick (Pato), Chief Video Engineer, Camera 1 (fixed centre) Willie, Sound Engineer Eddie, Sound Engineer, Influences Musician Nick, Intern & Trainee Video Engineer, Photographer (stills) Jimmy, Video Engineer, Camera 2 (instruments) Hunter, Video Engineer, Camera 3 (performance, context, audience) Kathy, Video Engineer, Stills and Interviewer Kiplagat, Fixer We are also joined for…