The Boy with the Headphones Story
…ous singing. By the end of the session everyone was joining in with the performance. We had attracted a large audience of local people who had gathered on the hillside, including, of course, this group of three young Batwa boys who were intrigued with all our recording equipment. Andy invited them to listen to a playback of one of the songs through his headphones and this particular boy overcame his shyness to have give it a try. We could see ho…
Man on the Pier Story
…d just finished our first field day – in Sila in Gede District. Along with the first recordings, we had also recorded the first influences session. We headed back up the coast to the historic coastal town of Malindi, which had been our base for the previous night and was set to be again that night. We decided to see a little of the town on the way back to the hotel, and we stopped off at the pier. This gentleman was sitting with his bike. Jimmy as…
The origins of Singing Wells Story
…been invited to a local town for a simple recording. Singing Wells allows for the whole group to perform, singing and dancing in front of ten microphones and three digital cameras.’ Video engineer, Patrick Ondiek, adds, ‘I love producing the final videos and getting phone calls from my friends asking me ‘how did you find these musicians?’ I feel like I’m on the cutting edge of music, bringing these talented musicians to my Nairobi friends.’ In ad…
Day 8: Entebbe to Nairobi and Ketebul Studios Story
…n’t heard the story. The man will be forced to pay whatever sum of money demanded by the offended husband and will even be expected to give up his shamba – the small plot of land upon which his family depends. As late as the 70’s, the other consequence is the offending husband would kill the adulterer. Whenever the song is sung today in the villages, some audience believes the song is pointing at them, accusing them… Kirori: This is the band leade…
Day 7 (pm): Recording at the Airport Guesthouse, Entebbe Story
…song is essentially a lament that a male suitor doesn’t have enough money for the woman’s bridal dowry. Watmon is pictured above with a plastic flute (traditionally it’s made of bamboo – but he said these are hard to come by) which he played during the last song. We then shut down and said goodbye to the band. We then had a very sad farewell first with Akello who headed back to Kampala, then our drivers William and Emmanuel, then to Vicki who hea…
Day 7 (am) – back to Kampala: Naguru to Entebbe Story
…orbikes and taxi’s driving past and planes flying overhead. Everything was for sale by everyone who walked by. No sleeping cattle. No flower beds. But, as always, there was wonderful music. The first group was the Adungu Cultural Troupe, masters of the Adungu. We had interviewed their leader on our ‘recce’ trip earlier. Here’s the band: We’ve had the odd adungu here and there in the north, but never the full ensemble. There’s the big bass adungu a…
Hannah interviews Evelyn Ojok – Acet, Northern Uganda News
…s is because one of our women is sick, normally there are no men in the performance. In Gulu when I want to meet with the other women I play drums and they all come, usually in the evening. I want to push the music to it’s highest level so that we can get some sponsorship from NGOs or from the Ugandan Government. I have opened up a bank account for us to make this easier and my prayer is that we will be able to become professional performers and b…
Northern Uganda: Day 6 – Soroti to Kampala (a driving story) Story
…duction of soundcloud copies of audio, on line copies of 3 camera video performance, full publication of all interviews and finalization of all archiving. Studio Follow-up: our final repeatable model is our set of routines around bringing artists we’ve ‘discovered’ during a field visit back to Nairobi for some studio recording with professional musicians. We experimented with the Batwa and Otacho Young Stars and we’ll going to take it further this…
An Evening with Mserego Mwatela Group News
…f touch’? A: Maybe it’s the friends I pick, but I’m viewed as a role model by my friends. I play the percussion and cymbols for the band and dance and it is viewed as very cool. I can’t help but be involved. My parents were students of my grandfather and I grew up with this music. It is in my blood and I feel a duty to protect my culture, to give back to it, to make it strong for my children. This music is critical to our village near Malindi, Tha…
Northern Uganda: Day 6 – Soroti to Obuell-Lira to Soroti Story
…ll. No night driving is a Singing Wells rule given how scary the roads are. We actually left at 12:45 and got about 20 minutes outside of Soroti only to have a car breakdown. So we had to turn around and get back to Soriti for a quick welding (by a guy on the street in flip flops..). We didn’t leave Soroti until about 15:30, knowing we now faced 330 kilometers of tough roads. At least there was a pretty sunset! Jimmy On the road to Kampala…
Northern Uganda: Day 5 – from Pakwach to Soroti (a road trip) Story
…nth person has a chicken to sell you and the poor creature is swung around by its feet for hours and days before being sold. Every ninth person is selling nuts or grasshoppers from a bucket or woven basket. Every seventh person is selling fruit of some type from a woven basket,. Every fifth person is sitting next to a blanket that is laid out to display their wares. You get a lot of blankets with eggs, but sometimes sunglasses, nails, electic sock…
ATTA is following Singing Wells News
…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. It se…
Northern Uganda: Day 4 – night recording at Fort Murchison Story
…the fire light, and the flickering flames add mystery and drama to the performance. For some of the music, and we thought about Oramba yesterday, the song are fireside songs. Oramba is a hunter and the song is about the village wondering whether he will come back with a kill. Oramba is fierce, running around with a spear, lunging at the audience. Think about what that would be like for the children as Oramba drifts into the shadows only to fly ou…
Northern Uganda: Day 4 – Pakwach to Widiang’a, Nebbi Story
…Omiya Charles playing Mbeta. We loved these musicians the fun of the traditional dances. You got mad at the stubborn girl, you got scared when the hunter returned and you celebrated for the new chief. On the way to Fort Murchison where we were staying, we saw some spectacular stormy scenes as we crossed the River Nile:…
A day in the field with Singing Wells News
…for recording. We decide on two or three different ‘backdrops’ for the performances and park vehicles in the centre so that we can easily rotate the setup while leaving the back end of the audio equipment setup in place. We have two mobile recording units, each capable of recording from four microphones plus other sources at a high resolution to Apple MacBook Pro laptops. The benefit of the systems we have chosen is that they can run off the batt…
Northern Uganda: Day 3 – from Gulu to Awach to Pakwach Story
…s doing something other than music, so usually about 15-20 can make any performance. In general, the men all play instruments and the women all dance. They call their music ‘folk’ because it combines traditional musical styles with modern themes of war, disease, etc. Their lead singer is Wokorach Walter and their main likembe player is Ocora David. Here, they are warming up… Let’s set the scene of a typical performance and please watch the videos….