Okavango: An African Orchestra: Feb 25, 2011
When: February 25, 2011 at 8pm.
Where: Glenn Gould – (CBC) at 250 Front St. West, Toronto.
Admission: $25 tickets on sale at Glenn Gould Studio or 416-872-4255.
The idea is to harmonize several musical instruments that many African artists use to create music. The instruments are used in a variety of musical genres from North Africa, East, Central, South and West Africa.
This concert has never been attempted before; the idea came into fruition based on the concept of the Okavango Delta, a basin in the Kalahari Desert in Botswana where animals come to graze and drink water. Animals of prey as well as predators are forced to coexist and share the meager resources because of the harsh environment around them. Similarly, musicians in West Africa who usually play the kora, balafon or drums would not use an instrument from East Africa such as the krar to create music or vice versa. A Malian kora for instance would sound alien to a farmer in the Ethiopian highlands who is used to the one string fiddle, ‘masenko’. Hence, the theme ‘Okavango’ represents a meeting place of these various African instruments to create a sound that accommodate the different nuances, tones and rhythms of these instruments in an orchestra setting. We believe this is the introduction of a new voice into African music.
Okavango African Orchestra will feature some of the local African musicians performing for the first time in an orchestra setting with traditional and contemporary instruments. The Orchestra will compose of; Daniel Nebiat (Eritrea krar), Pasipamire Gunguwo (Zimbabwe marimba and mbira), Donne Roberts (Madagascar guitar), Nuudi Kooshin (Somali kaban), Sadio Sissoko (Senegal kora), Waleed Abdulhamid (Sudan bass and guembri) and Walter Maclean (Ghana percussion).
Batuki Music Society would like to curate Okavango to help foster the development of local African artists and to explore new artistic work.
When: February 25, 2011 at 8pm.
Where: Glenn Gould – (CBC) at 250 Front St. West, Toronto.
Admission: $25 tickets on sale at Glenn Gould Studio or 416-872-4255.
