Blog
11.04.02 Singing Wells 7, Recording at Ketebul Music
Written by Jimmy
We are reporting back formally on the Singing Wells Project over at Singing Wells Website (click here). Here we are reporting more ‘behind the scenes’ – this blog covers our last day in Nairobi and an extraordinary opportunity to record with the Ketebul team and their artist network.
71 Hours to Monday: The Global Journey Continues As many of you know, we are re-recording 71 Hours to Monday as a ‘global song’, which we will use for fund raising for the Abubilla Music Foundation (click here for more). We’ve recording extraordinary percussion with Samba Drummers in Campo Limpo outside of Sao Paolo Brazil (click here for more) and a String Quartet on the roof tops of London. We’ve followed this with work in the Ketebul studios adding bass and lead guitar, a nyatiti and amazing vocals. Here are the pictures:
- The Lyrics: Priscah helped type up the lyrics for the third verse. Here they are in English and Swahili, as well as the originals:
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- The Original Lyrics for the third verse:
I’m dancin’, prancin’, aggressively financin’
A Saturday evening with you.
I’m rummin’ and cokin’ and frequently stokin’
them romantic fires in you.
And I’m wakin’ in my efficiency, in an efficiency graveyard
Boxed in my apartment block.
Alone again on a Sunday, dreadin’ a Monday
About to shoot that damn clock…
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- The Revised Lyrics, roughly translated into English, for the third verse:
I BELIEVE IN THIS SHOWBIZ AND I WILL FINANCE ONE SATURDAY WITH YOU
LIKE A BONFIRE IN YOUR HEART I CONTINUE TO PLANT HEAVY ROMANTIC FIRES
I WAKE UP LONELY FROM THIS LIMBO
IN THIS SHACK WHERE I HAVE BEEN PRESERVED
ALONE THIS SUNDAY AGAIN
DREADFUL OF A COMING MONDAY
POOR ME I ALMOST BASHED THE CLOCK
- The Swahili Lyrics: The brief was to a) maintain the basic concept, especially about the clock, while b) following the rhyming pattern with whatever works in Swahili. You see Makadem sorted brief a with English lyrics, but look at how he kept the rhyming in Swahili. Amazing!
NAAMINI HII FANI NA MIMI NA DHAMINI
JUMAMOSI MOJA MIMI NA WEWE
GOGONI-MOTONI-MOYONI MWAKO
NAZIDI KUTIA MIALE MIZITO YA MAHABA
KWA UPWEKE NAAMKA KUTOKA KWA HILI KABURI LA MAISHA,
BANDANI NILIPO HIFADHIWA
PEKE YANGU TENA JUMAPILI HII
NIKIHOFIA JUMATATU IJAYO
MASKINI KIDOGO NIIBAMIZE HIO SAA……..
We also added some bass to Winyo’s version of Footprints and Winyo and Ayub and Bishop wrote a new song. A great day in and out of the studio.
Jimmy