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Ever since her childhood, Ogoya Nengo, baptized Anastasia Oluoch in about 1940, would excite listeners around her village with her singing abilities. Very soon she had received her stage name, Ogoya Nengo (which, in the Dholuo language, means "the most precious and expensive singer in the region"). Her 2014 debut album, Rang'ala (Honest Jon's Records), was recorded and produced by Sven Kacirek and Stefan Schneider (Kreidler, to rococo rot, Roedelius Schneider) at various spots around Rang'ala Village, Siaya County, Kenya. Now Ogoya Nengo And The Dodo Women's Group present their second album, On Mande, marking the first release on Schneider and Kacirek's TAL imprint. On Mande presents an even richer instrumentation than its predecessor. We hear nyatiti lute, asili flute, orutu strings, and box guitar, which are swiftly interwoven with fierce rhythms of ohangla drums, various types of shakers, and the scintillating vocal parts of Ogoya and the Dodo Women's Goup. Dodo is a popular traditional female singing style of the Luo communities in the Siaya region of western Kenya. Men are welcome to support the singers on drums, stringed instruments, and flutes. The music on this album may have its origin in the past, but it is truly a contemporary version of a traditional folk music that is unique in that it is a living culture -- a continuously developing art form -- and therefore has an important place in contemporary music. Sven Kacirek and Stefan Schneider were fascinated by this music from their first encounter with Ogoya Nengo in 2013, and decided to record her music without any overdubbing or additional effects. Both musicians, with their individual backgrounds in electronic music and jazz respectively, found access to dodo music through its strong sense of repetition and its complex rhythmic structures, from which they drew parallels to various forms of contemporary electronic music. The recording of On Mande took place in a simple clay building next to Ogoya's house. Most of the songs on the album are songs to honor family members and people of the community -- the best electrician, the most popular wrestler -- while others are played at weddings, funerals, or drinking parties. CD in cardboard sleeve with printed inner sleeve and insert.
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