It is no exaggeration to say that African folk music adds the soul to choral music. In fact, modern choirs transcend historical musical barriers by incorporating elements of popular cultural rhythms.
Watching the Nairobi Chamber Chorus perform a choral arrangement of what the choir’s director Ken Wakia describes as the most “widely travelled” Kenyan song, Koth Biro, was one of the most enchanting moments of their 20th anniversary concert at the Michael Joseph Centre, Nairobi, last Sunday.
“Twenty years is a long time and we deserve the bragging rights as one of the most successful choral ensembles in the country and the region,” said Wakia.
He proudly enumerated their many accomplishments, like performing for Queen Elizabeth II’s Diamond Jubilee at Windsor Palace, UK, in 2012 and touring with world renowned German film composer Hans Zimmer.
The highlight of last weekend’s show was the world premiere of a new song by British composer Gavin Greenaway whom the choir first met as conductor of the Hans Zimmer tour. Greenaway visited Kenya in February this year, at the invitation of Wakia.
“Gavin wrote the music for a new song and sent it to me saying “I have no idea what words you want to put to this arrangement,” recounted Wakia.
So, he assembled a team lead by choir secretary, Mark Onyango, who wrote the words to Sauti Ya Amani, a celebration of peace and unity in Kiswahili and English. Guest pianist Michael James accompanied the choir for the performance of the song during the concert and it will no doubt remain a fixture of their repertoire in the years ahead.
The 20th anniversary concert was a rare opportunity to enjoy a diverse musical repertoire from the much-travelled ensemble.
In fact, as Wakia revealed his intention while forming the Nairobi Chamber Chorus was always for the group to tour across Kenya, despite pressure from his members who were eager to travel to other parts of the world.
The concert programme was selected to reflect the two-decade musical journey of the choir that was founded by Wakia, a trained teacher whose love for choral music was inspired by legendary composer and conductor Boniface Mganga. Mganga was the founding director of Muungano National Choir, arguably Kenya’s most successful choral group of all time.
“I didn’t want to create another Muungano because that already existed,” Wakia told the audience last Sunday. “I had to create a group with a distinct identity and that took a bit of time to figure out.”
Two decades later, multiple international tours and a with a proud pedigree of singers, the Nairobi Chamber Chorus is peerless in the country’s choral field.
“Many of the present members are university students who were probably two or three years old when the group was formed,” said Wakia.
He himself was a student at Kenyatta University when he was asked by his then choirmaster, Annetta Miller, to deputise as a conductor of the institution’s choir during a tour of Tanzania.
Wakia later studied choral conducting at the University of Miami in Florida, US, as a Fulbright Scholar.His big break came when he was selected for the World Youth Choir, an international ensemble of the best choral singers from around the world, for a tour of Japan in 1997.
Incidentally, one of their choir’s current singers Melvin Truphena Apiyo, has just returned from last month’s World Youth Choir tour in Spain & France. The popular African-American spiritual Kumbaya set a reflective mood for the concert with its message of universal peace and harmony.
Wakia’s longtime associate Noah Ochomo took over the conductor’s role for Every Time I Feel the Spirit, the uplifting spiritual that dates back to the period before the American Civil War.
The audience reacted warmly to Nimerudi Mashambani, a piece flavoured with lively percussions written by iconic choral music teacher and composer David Okuku Zalo that extols the virtues of going back to the farms as a source of livelihood.
There was also an opportunity for what the conductor calls “cultural exchange within Kenya” as the drums and rhythm of the Luo folk song Sigalagala (ululation) and the Kikuyu Nyumba Ya Mwari Witu (home of our daughter) livened up the auditorium.
There was a touching, heartfelt performance of Ukuthula (silence), the Zulu prayer for world peace, fan favourite Wana Baraka and a medley of Ayub Ogada’s classic Kothbiro (arranged by Canadian composer Alison Girvan and Nkosi Sikeleli Afrika.
The concert repertoire reflected their global influences, such as an arrangement of the traditional Japanese song Yuyake Koyake (often translated as “the dusk”), by composer Akira Miyoshi.
The choir also performed a German piece Herr, Bleibe Bei Uns (Stay with us, oh Lord) that had been introduced to them by the production team they worked with on the Hans Zimmer tour and a tune which has now became a part of their repertoire.
“The reason I started this choir was for cultural exchange because nothing brings peace like music,” said Wakia. “We want to bring the world to Kenya and not just take Kenya to the world.”
Few ensembles can so charmingly transport their audience from African- American spirituals to choral arrangements of cultural music from Kenya and the world, all in one concert.
