Faustino Santalices & Modesto Sanchéz - Alborada Antigua de Orense

I’m fascinated by the early regional music of Spain. The variety of songs and musical styles found in one country, even a country with many autonomous communities, is quite amazing. I’ve previously posted music from País Vasco (Basque Country), Asturias, and of course, the most well known folk music of Spain, flamenco from Andalucía. And while the music from all of these regions can be captivating, that’s only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Spain. There’s cobla music from Catalonia, the jota from Aragon, fiddle music from Mallorca, dulzaina music from Valencia, unbelievable unaccompanied shouts from the mountainous region of Cantabria, not to mention the distinct music of Navarro, Extremadura, the Canary Islands…on and on. We’re lucky it was captured on 78s, though finding much beyond hot selling flamenco records of the 40s can be a dogged struggle. It’s music that, unless we lived in these regions in the first three decades of the 20th century, you and I were not meant to hear.

Today: the wonderful sounds of the gaita galega, the bagpipe of Galicia in northwest Spain. Faustino Santalices (1877-1960) was a legendary master of both the zanfona (the hurdy gurdy in Spain) as well as the gaita, though his recorded output was quite limited. Here he is joined by Modesto Sanchéz in a gaita duet stemming from ca. 1929 on the Odeon label. They are accompanied by the tambor (snare drum) and bombo (bass drum). It seems from the description that Santalices and Sanchéz were both performing in Galicia’s Coral de Ruada at the time (also known as the Coro de Ruada). Coral de Ruada’s historical recordings have been released on a relatively hard-to-find issue by the Ouvirmos label here - they are well worth checking out, though I can’t vouch for the CD quality. They still exist today, too!

Another version (or a different take, possibly) of this song was released on a Santalices CD several years ago on the Boa label, titled Gravacions Historicas De Zanfona 1927-1949. Boa claimed it was the definitive collection of Santalices’ work, though thanks to Tony Klein who compared my version and theirs (see the comments section), we know this track is either a new discovery, or one that was simply unknown at the time of the CD’s production, and therefore left out. Either way, I hope it is new to you.

Faustino Santalices & Modesto Sanchéz - Alborada Antigua de Orense

Raúl Gardy - Ay, Rosa

You wouldn’t get very far exploring traditional Chilean music without running into the cueca. An important symbol of national identity, the cueca’s origins are cloudy (African and Spanish influences are often cited), but the dance seems to have first appeared in the early 19th century, right around Chile’s independence. After having flourished for 200 years or so, in 1979, in the midst of Pinochet’s power over the country, it officially became the national dance. (It is also, interestingly, Bolivia’s national dance.) Despite his attempts however, Pinochet did not succeed in keeping cueca solely as a patriotic symbol. It remains something far more than that, and continues to thrive in Chilean immigrant communities across the world, as well as at home.

Usually in 6/8 time, in a major key and featuring guitars, the cueca (short for zamacueca) is a courtship dance for couples, where the man symbolically plays the rooster and the woman, the hen - both of whom dance with white handkerchiefs. Cuecas were frequently recorded in the 78rpm era though they don’t grow on trees - Odeon and South America’s arm of the RCA Victor label probably recorded in the region the most. Raul Gardy’s cueca is joyful, and he is accompanied by guitars, piano, accordion, and spoons.

Raúl Gary - Ay, Rosa

For more Gardy, you could check out the CD releases Nostalgias de Chile, or Chile Tipico Vol. 3 and Vol. 4. I can’t vouch for the sound quality, but they’re out there.

There is also Jan Sverre Knudson’s article “Dancing Cueca “With Your Coat On.”

I also recommend this interesting 15-minute documentary on a gentleman trying to recapture cueca’s working-class and traditional roots. Lots of history and dancing therein.

Set Badria Anwar - Rah Wilfy

In the late 1920s, musicians from across Iraq were being recorded by a variety of companies: Baidaphon of Beirut, Polyphon of Germany, and HMV of England being the Big Three. As usual in those nascent markets, all were competing against each other for shelf space in the shops that sold gramophone records.

I chose an early piece from Iraq this week because of the appearance of a terrific Honest Jons release culled from original copies at the EMI Hayes Archive titled Give Me Love: Songs of the Brokenhearted - Baghdad, 1925-1929. Two lovely songs by Badria Anwar are included on Give Me Love, but today’s post is another of her long lost recordings, from ca. 1928-1929 or so. “Rah Wilfy” translates roughly to “My Lover Is Gone.” She is accompanied by oud, kanun, violin, and percussion. (Thanks to the Pictures Clerk for translation!)

Set Badria Anwar - Rah Wilfy

While I generally refrain from deep ruminations on this website, I thought I’d just write about Give Me Love as well as some thoughts on current reissues of historic recordings. Nobody asked me, of course, but these issues actually mean a lot to me. (In hindsight, I see I may have gotten long-winded, but what the hell…)

First, I think Give Me Love is an important collection. There has not been, until now, any serious survey of Iraqi historical recordings released - certainly not one with such a wide variety of styles. Musically, it is superb in my opinion - the taksims are amazing, the songs beautiful, from Kurdish melodies to Iraqi Jewish songs. I’ve little to say in that arena, as I was simply very impressed with the selection. Because of Honest Jons’ access to the Hayes Archive they were able to use untouched file copies of these exceptionally rare recordings, or perhaps even the metal masters, for their transfers. (For those who are wondering, 78rpm masters have shockingly less surface noise than the final product, the mass-produced gramophone record copy of the master, which often contained loads of garbage, or filler, along with the shellac - Paramount Records used sand and cement in their mix, for instance, making virtually all of their records sound like crap.)

That does not happen often. Very few companies exist which still have accessible masters or clean file copies of their original 78s, much less are willing to work with a small label for a release. EMI and Hayes are the major exception. And, the transfers are alive: I’ve listened to Give Me Love a few times now and although I (and my ears) waver a bit on this thought - and I may change my mind still again - I have come to believe that we are finally getting to a point where, taking into account a number of factors, the majority of surface noise can be removed from a 78rpm recording to the actual BENEFIT of the recording itself. There are far too many CDs of historic international folk music (not to mention historic anything) which have been hampered by overzealous noise reduction in their transfers. Of course, on the flip side, some of these recordings are so rare (I’ve seen around 4 Iraqi records in the past 5 years, say), you have to take what you can get sometimes. In other words, I’d probably buy this if it was dubbed from an old Certron cassette tape. (And as if it even needs to be said, I clearly am in no way a professional engineer - I just do the best I can with what I present on Excavated Shellac. Better the stuff is out there than not, is my opinion. Just wanted to get that out of the way.)

On Give Me Love, it sounds like the musicians are next to you. Well, next to you in mono. As I mentioned, achieving this sonic quality depends on a host of important factors: condition of the original record, turntable, tonearm, a wide variety of specialized diamond cut needles of various sizes, analog noise reduction equipment, digital noise reduction equipment, equalization equipment and methods, and the most important factor, a finely tuned ear. It is expensive, time consuming, and surely a monetary loss in the short term. But, I think Honest Jons got it right. And that’s good for both music fans, and scholars of this music.

Another thing Honest Jons got right is the design. Because I still prefer the tactile sensation of an LP (a DJ at heart), I purchased their double-LP issue of Give Me Love. Graphically it is beautifully done - and the design is current. While this may seem secondary to many, I believe the presentation of historical music is absolutely vital to its survival. These releases cannot and should not appeal only to the converted, the record collectors, the ethnomusicologists. They have to break through to new audiences, new listeners, people willing to take a chance. Releases like this, if they are to continue, absolutely must at the very least attempt to appeal to younger generations by methods of marketing, distribution, sale, and especially presentation. If not, the consequence is that the releases, the listeners, and by proxy the music, will become even more elitist, more rarified, more segregated - precisely what shouldn’t happen. This doesn’t mean dumbing down these releases, it just means an overhaul. The design of Give Me Love is, well, pretty damn attractive. It makes one feel that this is an important record, filled with mysterious lost music that is different than what one has experienced.

With all that said, I’m not above some critique. While comparatively minor, I had a few related problems with Give Me Love - in particular, problems with the notes which accompany the LP.

Despite its savvy design, Give Me Love presents itself, rightly I think, as a historical document, and includes a short essay on the backstory behind these recording sessions, with information on some of the artists and quotes from correspondence between HMV employees in Iraq and the home office. Why is it then that there is no detailed recording information (dates, specifically) for any of the tracks? This information could be extremely helpful to those wishing to study further, it would be very brief in terms of space to annotate, and would almost certainly be accessible in the Hayes Archive, as HMV kept scrupulously detailed recording ledgers. Since Honest Jons had full access and permission from EMI, why not list the original record catalog numbers, too? I realize that including this information may go against the whole “reaching out to new audiences” idea I just mentioned (in other words, it might be useless to most consumers), but I think not including it and still attempting to be a historical document is disingenuous. This is new territory they’re working with, and why not go for broke - those adventurous enough to purchase the record may appreciate that detail somehow. Plus, it firmly places these works in a specific place, at a specific time.

The rest of my complaints are niggling and petty and I fear I’ve gone on too far as it is. If you’ve read this far, I appreciate your interest…the most important part of this post is of course way up above: the music.

Obey.

Stamps and Stickers, continued…

Here’s another gallery featuring examples of stamps affixed to various worldwide 78rpm labels. Many of these are import/export stamps, which were common in certain markets. Yet another example of the forgotten…click to enlarge…

İslam Yusufov - Song About Stalin [?]

Who couldn’t admire a man like Moe Asch (1905-1986), the farsighted individual who began Folkways Records in 1948? Here was someone who not only understood the value of both current and historical recordings of international folk music at a time when few others did, but against all odds released completely original takes on field recordings (Tony Schwartz, Sounds of the Junk Yard), blues (Elizabeth Cotten, Reverend Gary Davis), spoken word (Huey P. Newton, Al Capp), and contemporary electronic music (Tod Dockstader, Halim El-Dabh), just to name a few genres where Folkways tread under Asch’s hand. If you think the amazing Secret Museum of Mankind series started it all, Asch and Henry Cowell were onboard in the 1950s with their multivolume Music of the World’s Peoples, as well as with two collections of early international recordings collected by Erich von Hornbostel, and a familiar little something called The Anthology of American Folk Music. As many doubtlessly know by now, Folkways is now Smithsonian Folkways, and virtually every one of their releases is available through download, on a store-bought CD, or on a custom CD.

However, before Asch started Folkways, he manned other labels. First, there was “Asch” and later, “The Disc Company” (whose slogan was “The Folkways of the World on Records”). Disc Company, before going bankrupt ca. 1947 (a whole separate story), released, among other things, a series of five far-reaching box sets of international music on 78rpm, recorded “on location.” Three of them (Cult Music of Cuba, Folk Music of Ethiopia, and Folk Music of Haiti) were recorded by ethnomusicologist and general editor of Disc’s “ethnic series,” Harold Courlander. The fourth box set, American Indian Songs and Dances, was recorded by a gentleman named Charles Hoffman.

A little mystery surrounds the fifth and final set in the series, the fascinating Folk Music of the Central East USSR - which included today’s musical offering. Courlander was most likely not involved and it was Moe Asch instead who chose the recordings. Where the recordings came from, however, seems to be an unknown. The best guess that has been posited is that they came from Herbert Harris, the man behind another small New York label, Stinson. Harris, a CP member who owned a Soviet-themed movie-house on 46th Street, became the owner of a swath of Soviet 78rpm recordings given to him when the Soviets pulled their exhibit from the 1939 World’s Fair, after the Hitler-Stalin pact. Asch, in the early 40s, had a business relationship with Harris and both Asch Records and Stinson released recordings from Harris’ Soviet collection. Could this group of Central Asian recordings also have stemmed from Harris?

Who knows? One interesting tidbit is that, after the bankruptcy of The Disc Company, several of those Disc box sets were eventually reissued by Asch on Folkways, on 10″ and 12″ LPs. Courlander’s Cult Music of Cuba, Folk Music of Ethiopia, and Folk Music of Haiti are three examples. What became of Folk Music of the Central East USSR? A few tracks made it to the 1951 Folkways release Music of the Russian Middle East, but the rest vanished, and can only be heard on the original Disc 78rpm records.

Today’s piece is one of the vanished, featuring a fierce, plaintive vocal by Yusofov (a more accurate spelling of his name). Thanks to intrepid Excavated Shellac reader ‘volkan’ who provided very helpful information, we know that this piece of music is NOT, as it states on the label, from Georgia at all! It is in fact Azeri music, sung in the Azeri language, and performed in the Ashik style (a type of folk poetry), with accompaniment on the tar. And, unless I’m going deaf, there is no accompaniment of the balaban on this track - thanks also to volkan, we can confirm that the balaban is not a cello as stated, it’s a double-reed wind instrument.

So, the question is, was this a pressing error? Was the “Song of Stalin” actually not included on the original box set? I double-checked all of Folkways’ historic Central Asian material currently available and this song does not appear on any release. Even Henry Cowell, who wrote the notes to the original box set, could say little about the music as he knew it:

Very often well-known old melodies have new words added, as in the case of the Georgian “Song of Stalin” in this album, which is a traditional type of tune.

A “traditional type of tune” eh? Not much to go on, Henry. Perhaps others in the fray can help? In the meantime, Woody Guthrie put it best in a letter to Moe Asch:

I can’t understand one single word of this Central Eastern lingo, but by hearing these songs I know more about our humanly race than I could learn by reading a thousand Congressional Reports.

Ashoug Esslam Yousobof - Song About Stalin

(Much info gleaned from Peter Goldsmith’s Making People’s Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998.)

Signe Flatin - Skuldalsbruri

This week, I am very happy to present another guest post, this time from psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and musician Tony Klein of Uppsala, Sweden. Tony has also produced a fantastic collection of vintage, hard-edged Greek music titled Mortika, available in the US through CD Roots. He’s been a supporter of Excavated Shellac since its inception, and I always appreciate his opinions and musician’s input. When he sent me this piece, words failed me. It was a joy to work on, and it is an absolutely breathtaking piece of music. - JW

Tony Klein:

Here is one side of a rare disc featuring Signe Flatin Neset (11th December 1912 - 20th July 1975), who in her time was considered to be one of Norway’s best Hardanger fiddlers. Born in Sejord in the part of Western Norway known as Telemark, she was the daughter of fiddler Kjetil Flatin, and married to fiddler Leiv Neset. She was already travelling round the country playing concerts with her father by the age of 14, and first played on the radio in 1934. At the mature age of 47 she was the first woman to take first prize in the national folk music contest ‘landskappsleiken’, and that record remained unbroken for thirty years after her death. She apparently recorded over a hundred tunes, both for Arne Bjørndal’s collection in Bergen, and for Norwegian national radio, NRK, but strangely, there appears to be only one single tune played by her currently available on CD, “Floketjonn” on the CD Folkemusikk Frå Telemark.

The Hardanger fiddle, known in Norwegian as the ‘hardingfele’, is a folk violin mainly associated with Western Norway. There is some controversy over its age, and the earliest known example is dated by some as 1651 (there is an excellent picture of this fiddle in both the later editions of Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians). It has four playing strings like the normal violin, has a flat fingerboard and a rather flattened bridge to facilitate drone playing, and is usually heavily decorated. The main feature which distinguishes it from the conventional violin is the group of four or five sympathetic strings running under the fingerboard and bridge, which is a feature it has in common with the baroque viola d’amore. Further, compared to the normal violin it is usually narrower, with deeper ribs and a more arched belly and back. The form of the instrument was gradually modified to resemble the violin, much due to the work of Eric Johsen Helland (1816-1868). Nowadays it is mostly played at the chin with a chinrest; originally it was mainly held at the chest.

There are apparently over 20 known tunings. The most usual is a-d’-a’-e” (melody strings) and d’-e’-f#’-a’ (sympathetic strings). Folksongs, ’slåtter’ (a generic term for folk dance tunes) and bridal marches are its staple repertory.

Particularly in Signe Flatin’s area of origin there is a special kind of tune based on the repetition of two-bar phrases. Our tune seems to be of this kind. Its title, Skuldalsbruri, means ‘The Bride from Skuldal’. This is the title of a ballad which may date from the 18th century and has a familiar, gruesome story: betrothed against her will to a young man of dubious repute, the bride stands up in the boat and declaims a verse in which she lists her fiancé’s misdoings, whereupon she throws herself overboard and is gone forever. The famed fiddler Myllarguten is said to have created the tune based on the verses.

This disc was one of five 78s of Hardanger fiddle which I stumbled over at the weekly open-air flea market on Vaksala Torg in Uppsala, Sweden, about 15 years ago. Had I been looking for them I supposed they’d never have shown up! I’m happy to be finally able to share some of this fascinating music on Jonathan’s excellent website.

Signe Flatin - Skuldalsbruri, Gangar efter Knut Dale - Hardingfele

Thanks to Google Books and to two angels, Jessica and Sofia at the Västerbotten Museum in Northern Sweden, who gave me access in no time at all to the relevant page in the International Catalogue of Recorded Folk Music, published in 1954, Jon and I were able to date this recording to 1947, when Signe Flatin was 35 years old.

I also wish to acknowledge Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians and the eponymous Norwegian Wikipedia articles on Signe Flatin and Skuldalsbruri for most of the above information.

Skarvelis, Kavouras, Peristeris - Pono, De Me Lypasai

I’m really happy to announce that we have two phenomenal guest posts over the next two weeks - get ready! Today’s post is from musician David Murray, who not only has a fascinating collection of Chinese opera 78s which he offers to the public over at Haji Maji, but he’s also an expert in Greek rebetika. His post today is very special - an extremely rare record, with his copy in the best known condition. Enjoy! - JW

David Murray:

I threw on a CD of old rebetika 78s while cooking dinner one night. I’d listened to the CD a couple of times over the years, but never really paid much attention. Somewhere around the fourth song, I suddenly stopped in my tracks. I couldn’t believe how amazing this bouzouki player sounded. Why hadn’t I noticed it before? I listened a few more times. And the next day and the next day, until I eventually resolved to figure out what this was all about (the CD was printed only in Greek). The bouzouki player turned out to be Spyros Peristeris.

Peristeris was born in Smyrna in 1900 and was musically trained in Istanbul, playing mandolin, guitar, piano, bouzouki, and other stringed instruments. By the early 1920s, he was living in Greece and working as a musical director for the Odeon/Parlophon labels, supervising recording sessions and often playing various supporting instruments for singers like Andonis Dalgas, Rita Abadzi, Roza Eskenazi, and others.

Bouzoukis and rebetika were becoming increasingly popular, and in 1932-1933, Peristeris played on and directed the first recordings of this new genre with the great Markos Vamvakaris. Markos was a self-taught bouzouki player (”My only school was the hashish den.”) who had been playing for only a few years. His playing and singing were rough, and he had a strong rhythmic style that captured the essence of the rebetis character: smoking hashish, fighting, etc. Markos went on to record hundreds of songs and was very popular throughout the 30s and 40s.

Peristeris stayed in the background, scouting talent, directing recording sessions, writing and arranging. He, too, played on hundreds of records, sometimes playing under the pseudonym “Georgiades,” sometimes anonymously (including playing the bouzouki on some of Vamvakaris’ own records!). His material covered many styles of rebetika, folk, cabaret, popular, and more, but most of his sought-after recordings come from a run of 50 or so rebetika songs he recorded from about 1934-1940. On these, Peristeris played bouzouki or guitar (in a bouzouki style) with a trio or quartet.

His technical grace really stands out with these small, well-recorded groups. The playing is syncopated, fast, highly ornamented and full of twists and turns. A very different sound than Vamvakaris’ strident, pulsing rhythm.

The singing on these records were by some of the best Greek vocalists ever recorded: Kostas Roukounas, Zacharias Kazimatis, or Jiorgos Kavouras. All three singers sang in an old school style that was replaced by a simpler rebetika sound.

The majority of these records also feature guitarist Kostas Skarvelis and many are his own compositions. Not only was he one of the great songwriters of the rebetika era, he also, along with Kostas Karipis and a few others, played on the vast majority of rebetika recordings.

Occasionally a baglama was included and some feature a great, but uncredited, accordion player. Regardless of the exact makeup of the group, these recordings stand out as one of the major strands of influence in rebetika, and popular Greek music in general.

Here’s one of my favorites from these sessions. A Skarvelis zeibekiko sung by Kavouras and played in the key of G minor.

Skarvelis, Kavouras, Peristeris - Pono, De Me Lypasai

Translation:

Pono, De Me Lypasai (I’m in Pain, Don’t You Feel Pity For Me?)
(1937, Kostas Skarvelis gtr., Jiorgos Kavouras vcl., Spyros Peristeris bzk.)

My eyes cry for you day after day,
My heart aches and breaks into pieces

I’m sighing but you don’t pay attention, you’re heartless, you don’t feel pity,
You’re having fun with somebody else
and you forget what you had promised

You don’t even come to see me,
You don’t care where I am
You only gave me cause to suffer

You faded me away, you hurt me,
May you not escape from suffering, too -
May you experience the same pain in your heart and be ruined.

(Thanks to Nikos Politis and Kostas Ladopoulos for the translation.)

Brüder Baldauf - Original Meister Jodler-Potpourri

When you think “yodeling” you think “lederhosen,” right? Corny? Irritating? Music for tourists?

I have to admit that to some degree, I do too, partly because Alpine yodeling has been ubiquitous and commercialized in the media for the past fifty years (or more), even without The Sound of Music hammering away at our collective memory. In the elitist world of record collecting, it is completely uncool. It is relentlessly harmonic and romantic. Will I defend it? Sure, why not.

Yodeling itself is positively stone age. There are a number of theories regarding its origin, one being that it has something to do with the echo between hills, peaks, and valleys in the Alps, another being that it originated in various cultures with the domestication and subsequent herding of animals. A call and response of rural agrarian peoples. Although echo is an important factor, the latter theory has the most hold in scholarly writing it would seem, though there are still all manner of theories regarding this throat music most commonly associated with Alpine Europe.

Nevertheless, the determining factor of yodeling is of course the “epiglottal stop” used as the singer moves from the “low chest voice to the high head voice or falsetto - or vice versa,” as Bart Plantenga described it in his world history of yodeling - the, um, only book-length history of yodeling on the market. Plantenga does yeoman’s work in dispelling the myths about the music (though the fact his book is titled Yodel-Ay-Ee-Oooo doesn’t exactly help the music’s cornball stature), and rightly brings up the fact that nods to, or embraces of, yodeling, are everywhere in musical history - from Beethoven, to Jimmie Rodgers, to Pharaoh Sanders’ work with Leon Thomas on Impulse and Strata-East.

One area which is particularly proud of its yodeling history is Tyrol in Austria, which is where this piece stems from, recorded ca. 1930s, and pressed in Vienna. It is a naturjodel, a yodel without words, meaningless in content, devoid of the romantic lyrics that are often associated with Alpine yodels, with a simple guitar and zither accompaniment. While I could find no information on the Baldauf brothers, it’s a musical statement that anyone can digest and respond to. It may even sound…pretty.

Brüder Baldauf - Original Meister Jodler-Potpourri

Salima Mguzi and Party - Kisongokele Pt. 1

By far, the most popular posts on Excavated Shellac feature African music. In honor of that, I’ve decided to post something from East Africa this week, as a give-the-people-what-they-want goodwill thank you gesture. However, if you’ve come here only looking for African music, please take a look around and try another piece out. You never know what might grab you - perhaps a Bulgarian harmonium track, or a Turkish taxim. One of the main thrusts of this blog is variety of palette, after all.

This week’s sonic diversion comes from Uganda, performed by members of the Nyoro/Haya culture. A group of singers accompanied by drum (ngoma) and the Nyoro/Haya rattle (nyimba). It stems from around the mid-1950s on the beautiful Jambo label.

Jambo’s story is very interesting. It was the first independent East African record label, established in Nairobi, Kenya by two British gentlemen, in 1947, under the umbrella of East African Sound Studios, Ltd. They sent tapes to England and had their records pressed by Decca, which were then shipped by air freight back to Nairobi (a three-day flight distance at that time). By 1950, the company had fallen on hard times and there was a management shake-up, after releasing slightly over 200 records. The studio was closed down. East African Sound Studios, Ltd. was taken over by the African Ground Cotton Company. Otto Larsen, a Dane, was asked to help set up and manage a record pressing plant in a new building in Nairobi, and Jambo resumed in the early 50s, continuing to repress the best selling of their 200 or so records. Thus, the birth of the new East African Records, Ltd.

Amazingly, Larsen and crew continued to repress those same 200 records until 1955, when Larsen took it upon himself to start a recording studio in a Nissen hut on the property, which was formerly used to make cardboard pots for planting (a side venture of East African Records, Ltd., as was the sale of jukeboxes). Larsen began to travel in the region (Dar Es Salaam, Kampala), making further recordings for Jambo, and recorded much local talent in Kenya, many of whom traveled to audition in Nairobi. Taarab music was recorded, African acoustic guitar, accordion-based pop, Hawaiian waltzes from the Seychelles, and rural Ugandan music, such as we have here - pressed and packaged by Kenyan hands.

By 1955, other independent labels were active in the region: Capitol Music Stores, Mzuri, AGS, Rubina and Rafiki, and Munange, to name a few. The majors were active as well: HMV, Columbia, and Gallotone and their subsidiary, Trek. Jambo continued pressing 78s (and 45s) until 1961, when it became Equator Sound Studio. They had released a total of about 1,000 records.

Salima Mguzi and Party - Kisongokele, Pt. 1

Much of the information on Jambo came from Flemming Harrev’s informative article “Jambo Records and the Promotion of Popular Music in East Africa: The Story of Otto Larsen and East African Records Ltd. 1952-1963.” In Perspectives on African Music, Bayreuth African Studies Series 9, edited by Wolfgang Bender, 103-137. Bayreuth, Germany: Eckhard Breitinger, 1989.