African Evening
The instrumentation may have been mostly unplugged, but the atmosphere was positively electric at the third annual African Evening in the Narthex Centre at Norwich's Catholic Cathedral. African artists from London, Norwich and Liverpool took to the stage to play some fantastically intricate string and drum rhythms, matched by power-packed dance and vocal performances.
A dancing workshop was provided in the afternoon to prepare the crowd for the pace of things to come. This was run by three members of London-based Mbolo Percussion, dancer Aida Diop, djembe player Mohamed Gueye and dundun player Ousmane Camara.
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Leading the evening's entertainment, then, Gambian-born Sefo Kanuteh and Israeli-born Layil Barr showed some results of their current collaborative process. Sefo Kanuteh plays a kora, a traditional 21-string west African 'harp' with an ancient history. His melodic plucking is complemented by Layil Barr's baroque-infused bass viola playing. The combination is completely unique, and works a charm. Barr alternates between bow and plucking - the first providing a higher-pitched sometimes slow, sometimes staccato rhythm for Kanuteh's intricate stringwork to occupy. When plucked the viola is more bassy, and the two provide a sound which is both grounded and uplifting. Watch out for the forthcoming album, and you can see them perform their own night in St. John's Church, Bury St. Edmund's on the 11th March.
After a brief interval, three members of London-based Mbolo Percussion set up their dundun and djembe drums, while Sefo Kanuteh returns to support them on the balafons (like a xylophone). Mohamed Gueye is highly-charged on the djembe, an instrument with a great range in sound. The drum can be struck on the edge to produce a sharp, characteristic beat, or in the middle to produce a flatter, bassier thump. A skilled djembe player, as Mohamed Gueye clearly is, rattles out an intense rhythm which dominates proceedings. Ousmane Camara's dundun work provides a hypnotic, solid rhythm to contrast the dizzying tempo of the djembe. Sefo Kanuteh's polyrhythmic playing on the balafons is as frenetic as Gueye's djembe work, but brings a necessary, elevating lilt.
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The music is intrinsically tied to the dance, and so the three are accompanied by Aida Diop, who leads the crowd in movement. Having done a workshop with her in the afternoon, the crowd follow her in her triumphant stepping, swinging and raising of hands, before she descends from the stage to match the groups drumming in terms of ferocity. Stamping and thrashing her head in almost fighting form, she dominates the space in front of the stage to put on a fiery display. At one stage, she concludes her routine with a forward roll across the floor, then returns to the stage and sways gently, obviously entranced in the music, before another djembe solo sets her off in an outburst of motion again.
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Another interval then, and we come to Grupo Lokito, a Congolese group sounding out Afro-Cuban sounds. The group is the result of an initiative by Sara McGuinness, a musician who travels to Cuba every year to do music workshops there, and who has rallied together some world-class Congolese performers, now living in the UK. She plays keyboards along with the group's bassist, drummer, guitarist and two frontmen. The result is a salsa-infused infectious rhythm which gets everybody's hips popping. At one stage, the entire crowd is doing a set routine, spurred on by the two vocalists.
The annual event was initiated by Beatriz de la Iglesia, a Computer Science lecturer at the UEA - who began raising money for Medicines Sans Frontieres work in Africa several years ago through collecting and selling books. She progressed onto organising events and, on this night, she was helped in the running of the night by Michael Gyapong, and in the managing of the acts by DrumCamp's Gary Newland. Together, they co-ordinate caterers, technicians, UEA volunteers and African artists to put on a great social occasion, raising money for frontline medics and their work around the world. The night is going from strength to strength, and long may it continue.
