Wako premieres tomorrow at Theater Labonita

2015 hasn’t been one of the best things as far as local film is concerned; just at the beginning, all the submissions to Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCAs) were rejected that saw Veve from Kenya become the sole East African representative, then all film makers that had promised progress as early as 2014 somehow failed to take off and yes, that poorly managed Uganda Film Festival happened again.
But the year nears the end, it’s not all that bleak, awards and sudden premieres are coming in.
One of these is Wako, earlier thought to premiere in March; it’s a film that rotates around a brother striving to save his reckless sister from cervical cancer.
But it’s not the usual awareness film; in fact, the screen play wright may have been at his best with the type of story; He uses Kampala’s underground drug and crime scene to convey a story relevant to a both female and male audience.
The film will be premiering at Theater Labonita tomorrow.
The plush red carpet event will kick off at 6pm when the actors and the crew will meet and mingle with the fans.
Tickets will be going for shs20,000/= for ordinary and VIP for shs50,000/=.
The film which had its international premiere at the Arusha International Film Festival, also won the Best Feature Film at the same do.
Wako stars Natuhwera Brighton, Ernest Robert Bbumba, Edison Ssemanda, Jayant Maru, Geoffrey Echakara and it's written and directed by Aaron Zziwa.

Zahara rocks Kampala's Blankets and Wine

Blankets and Wine is by far Kampala’s most impressionable event – the type where people mostly show up for a statement.
Last Sunday, Uganda Museum’s Gardens once again hosted the event; the tenth episode of the do that has fast become one of Kampala’s must attend.
You see, impressing a Blankets and Wine audience is easy – you make them pay more than shs80,000, they buy their own drinks, food and spend the day listening to mostly cover artistes, you ice all this with a foreign artiste that 98% are going to learn about an hour before they get on stage – anti - knowing this artiste is the most artistic venture they will ever embark on and dda being artistic is cool.
Of course none of them will want to look out dated so they will google, try to pick interest in the music as well as get the lyrics in that one day…yes, some people can dearly want!
South Africa’s Zahara was the perfect bait.
It wasn’t any different, of course the socialites had their best dresses and phones ready to snap and inform their followers that A-Pass, K!Mera and Solome are on stage, while them on the other hand are having fun tweeting about having fun at Blankets and Wine!
So what’s Blankets and Wine about?
This is one question you don’t want to ask if you want to pay for the future editions – the event is not about anything, it neither sets out to promote music or art and nor does it set out to introduce a wine culture!
Like seriously, this is the only wine event where there’s no wine tasting and beer is sold at a discount.
You would imagine that if they are not willing to take care of the wine, they should take care of the performances!
Seriously if people are paying shs80,000 for an event, they shouldn’t be fed on cheap cover songs and even the artistes that are programmed should be briefed on what the event sets out to do.
Blankets and Wine, unlike Bayimba, has an audience that doesn’t know what to love or hate – they love Zahara because it’s cool to say or tweet about being her fan and loathe local staff because the DJ tells them to.
Thus, as an artiste, you must work your ass off to simply get them off their shisha tubes, and it’s this little homework that neither A-Pass, K!Mera, Solome or Lillian Mbabazi didn’t get right – the entire Sunday show only started when Weasel joined the former Blu3 vocalist for their Vitamin collaboration.
Zahara too had a great time on that stage, thanks to FOMO, the gardens were full, which was good for photography, but in actual sense, the inspirational singer was indeed performing to a clique of less than 70 people that crammed the stage, and you can imagine half of these were South Africans.
Clad in her signature floral dresses, big hair and a guitar the artist and song writer got a section of picnic enthusiasts feed on songs in zulu and xhosa.
They sang and danced with her as others kept asking what her claim to fame was; in an emotional tone she celebrated her Phedula album by doing songs like Impilo, Indlela Yam and Okwami Ngokwakho among others.
But it was Destiny, Ndiza, Umuthwalo, Loliwe and Phedula that indeed mesmerized her audience cry, sing and wave.
Unlike the performers before her, Zahara did her best to connect with her audience engaging them on things like which songs she would perform next – of course many kept requesting for Loliwe but she kept it for the middle of the show.
When she finally played that acoustic intro of it, all the uninterested wine tasters and art buffs got to their feet to dance, and phones to either record or tweet about the moment; of course Zahara is immaculate while performing this song.
Legend says the song was inspired by her grandfather that took a train to Johannesburg to look for work and never came back. In fact Loliwe is Zulu for train.
In the times of apartheid, there was a train that took or brought workers back home after many years away working in Johannesburg, where they often had other families. Others would die there leaving kids that had never met them.
According to the artist, the song is like metaphor; “It’s like… just pick yourself up. No matter who’s your mother or father…I believe you’re not a mistake.”
When she performs it, almost everything doesn’t matter to her – maybe call it her hallelujah moment on the stage, she closes her eyes and at that time it’s just her, the guitar and the music.
She ended her set with Mandela and Phendula to give way for a DJ. And just like that, Bulelwa Mkutukana alias Zahara had left an impression on not only genuine music lovers but also artists that were part of the audience.

Festivals are in trouble but Bayimba must go on!

It has been a muddy ride for different festivals in Africa the past few years; with financial hardships, lack of support from many governments, to little belief in the arts from the cooperate Africa, most of the shows are generally at the brink of extinction.
For instance, East Africa’s most known festival Sauti Za Busara won’t be happening in 2016, after the organizers noted that they are having a shortage in the funding, earlier last year, Lief Music festival in South Africa had to postpone their 2014 edition to 2015, in 2014, the Festival au Desert in Mali was cancelled and the same year, another big festival where Uganda’s Naava Grey and Keko were slated to perform, Tribe One, was cancelled only months to the show.
Thus, as we went into the eight edition of Bayimba international Festival that started on Friday and ended last night, there were lots of speculations as to how it was going to play out.
Faisal Kiwewa, the director Bayimba Foundation says that festivals in Africa are not only suffering because of inflation but rather a fact that people have never thought about financing arts.
“In Africa, governments and foreign partners have not looked at festivals with a keen eye, for them such things are more about monetary returns and they see non,” he says.
Bayimba is a multidiscipline festival where revelers come to experience things like visual art, poetry, with a larger extent of music.
The programming for this year’s festival attracted a number of ethno contemporary acts like Joel Sebunjo alongside Aly Keita, Bado from Kenya, Daniel Okiror and Saba Zibula among others, but there were also some crowd pleasers from Uganda’s pop culture that included Radio and Weasel, Sheebah Karungi, Maddox Sematimba and gospel artist Levixone Lala.
National Theater, which has been the festival’s venue since the second edition was a hive of activities from 9am in the morning as the Foursum Drama group entertained Literature students with John Rugunda’s The Burden.
Much of the action started at 5pm when the likes of Kenneth Mugabi, Sirajhi Islamic Mataali and Maddox took to the stage.
Of course the numbers were not bad considering the fact that Maddox has a following and Mugabi is the kind that will force you to pay attention. But it was hard knowing whether many of these people had an idea of what the festival was about.
As Kiwewa puts it, arts is only picking up in Uganda though the situation is much better than when they started eight years back.
That time, the festival organizers had programmed acts like Didier Awadi, Papa Wemba, Baximba Waves and Percussion Discussion among others, with the ticket value at shs10,000/=, the festival was attended by merely 20 people, even the move to make the entire show free of charge didn’t save the situation.
Today, Bayimba is not really doing bad, people know the festival exists and over the years they’ve gone from being a free of charge event to at least changing shs5,000.
Like all festivals, Kiwewa says Bayimba has a direction and in this case, it was more about promoting different art forms, acoustic and live music.
But since festivals are hitting rocky times, programming an artist with his band becomes expensive and even tricky if they are not Ugandans, thus to survive with the available means, the festival this year curated a good number of performing DJs, another entertainment genre Kiwewa says they want to popularize.
On Friday in fact, the mainstage was closed by DJ Rachel yet the upper stage wrapped with the Santuri Djs from Kenya for the three days, he says DJs are trendy but programming them as performers is to present them to people as artists who they really are.
Grace Mbabazi, a Makerere University first year student that was attending the festival for the first time noted she had only come out of curiosity though was enjoying herself; “But I don’t really understand many of the things going on so I will just dance to the music.”
Festivals are necessary to preserve our culture and art, says Sheebah karungi, one of the acts at the festival.
Kiwewa says that the art festival concept is yet to sink into the minds of financers in governments, and corporate companies, because of this, many of them for the future have to survive by diversifying the funders and the little budgets – more like, the times are hard and there’s no budget, but the show must somehow go on.

Mixed feeling as Sheebah dares the Bayimba stage

At the beginning of the year, Kanye West was announced as a headlining act for the 2015 Glastonbury Festival in the UK.

Only days after the announcement, a British paper ran a story of how the ‘untalented’ Kanye wasn’t needed at a festival that has been celebrated by acts like Foo Fighters, Florence and the Machine, Cypress Hill, Muse and Lionel Richie among others.

What followed was a petition signed by over 130,000 music fans asking the festival to cancel Kanye West’s performance for a rock band, at one point, organizer Emily Eavis even received death threats  – of they stuck to their guns and let him perform.

It’s since been described as the mad, infuriating and electrifying.

Yet in Uganda, it’s almost the same stigma pop artist Sheebah Karungi is facing from some artisan circles since she was announced as a performer at this year’s Bayimba International Festival of the Arts that’s starting today at the National Theater.

Having featured acts like Serabi Band and Anto Neosoul from Kenya, Suzan Kerunen or Myko Ouma, they felt the festival was losing it programming her as a performer.

One of the critics in fact argued that an artist that has never performed with a live band has no business getting anywhere near any festival stage, lucky for Sheebah, her detractors didn’t have petitions to sign her off the mainstage she’s poised to take on Saturday night.

Festivals in this part of the world have always had a different energy, for the loyal attendees, these are the places they got initiated into ethno contemporary pop usually classified as world music and for some reason, they’ve come to believe the music there should sound like that.

That’s why the backlash that the Team No Sleep artist is facing doesn’t come as a surprise.

Joan Kisakye, a music fan that attended the festival for the first time in 2014 was inquisitive if Sarabi band would be coming back for another performance. On learning that they were not coming but there were others like Sheebah, with a grin she wondered if acts like Sheebah do perform at festivals!

But it’s not the first time, and Bayimba is not the first festival that has been criticized for having ‘unworthy’ performers, last year, Pearl Rhythm was taking the lashes after Jackie Chandiru’s closing performance, not that she was awful, a click of naysayers thought she didn’t represent what the gig stood for.

And so was Bayimba’s choice of Coco Finger to close the festival in 2013 – apparently Coco Finger put up a show better than many artists that have always believed to be of a festival quality.

Herman Kabubi, a coordinator of Doa Doa, one of the programmes run by the Bayimba Foundation notes that the main stage at the festival is not reserved for foreign acts or certain genre artistes. He says that the main stage is an opportunity for all acts to test themselves and try out new things.

Faisal Kiwewa, Bayimba Foundation’s director notes that artistes are briefed about the values of the festival. He says that art festivals usually look at taking different disciplines to a direction; changing art for the better.

Talking to The Observer, an excited Sheebah says she’s quite nervous knowing that festival goers can be demanding though says she’s ready and will be attending the do both as a performer and part of the audience.

“I think we need more of such shows for people to see the different forms of art that Ugandans can offer.”

Other performers include Maddox Sematimba, Levixone, Joel Sebunjo and Kenneth Mugabi among others.

All set for Bayimba International Festival

Bayimba International Festival of the Arts has successively managed to position itself as Uganda’s top multi-discipline art event.
With such crafts like theater, music, dance, visual art, poetry to animation, it’s correct to put it that the show turns its venue, the National Theater into a boiling pot of creativity.
Tomorrow, the three day annual event will once again be upon us celebrating the both local and international crafts.

Being the eight edition, the organisers are looking at inviting more people to the party and thus, they have made an exciting line up that tends to cater for the millennials that are ardent followers of pop culture and as well as the art enthusiasts mostly interested in the power of organic instruments like drums, bow harps and koras.
That’s why this edition has the performances like the sassy Sheebah Karungi, the sober Maddox Ssematimba to the pumped up Radio and Weasel.
Opening tomorrow, the show will open earlier than the past editions have been, this time round performances will kick off at mid-day, as opposed to 5pm that people have been used to. However, the real party will begin at 6pm when legendary reggae artiste Maddox takes on the stage.
Last year, Maddox is remembered to have shut down the festival with a mind blowing live session of more than twenty of his crowd pleasers, as an opener this time round, he’s expected to set the mood of what is expected to be a wonderful three days.
Elsewhere, the festival brings back the Kyoto story telling corner, the garden stage which will feature artists like Kenneth Mugabi, Don MC, MC Yalla and Appolo Kagimu among others.
The festival has developed into a benchmark for the consumption of the finest arts, presenting Ugandans and visitors with a series of music, dance, theatre, film, and visual arts from renowned and upcom¬ing local and international artists.
The 8th edition of the festival is supported by principal partners DOEN Foundation, HIVOS, the Danish Council for Culture and Development (CKU) alongside Zuku TV and Africell Telecom among others.

Africa Magic Viewers Choice Awards (AMVCAs) open for 2016 entries

East Africa has not been so lucky with continental award shows of recent, always losing to the cool and rich Naija boys, at times missing out on the nomination altogether, generally it's a sad East world.

But who knows, 2016 could actually be different and thus we need to wait for it with enthusiastic minds don't we? 

And probably the reason this news has to excite you; Africa Magic, the continent’s leading provider of African content has announced the call to entry for the 2016 edition of the Africa Magic Viewers’ Choice Awards (AMVCAs).  

They  are inviting all entries for film and television works that are produced and broadcast or publicly exhibited from October 1^st, 2014 to September 30^th , 2015.”

The AMVCAs were created to celebrate the contribution of African filmmakers, actors and technicians in the success of the continent's film and television industry and with the success of the previous three editions, preparations for the 2016 edition are underway.

MultiChoice Africa CEO, Tim Jacobs, commented: “We are very excited to once again bring the AMVCAs to our viewers across the continent and indeed the world. The 2016 edition will make it four years of celebrating Africa's finest."

Mba-Uzoukwu, Africa Magic representative said that the African film and television industry continues to show tremendous growth in the kind of content we see and the quality of existing and up and coming talent. 

"The previous editions of the AMVCAs have had a significant impact on filmmaking and I am very certain that the next edition will have an even bigger impact on film and television across Africa."

The third edition of the Africa Magic Viewers' Choice Awards ceremony took place in Lagos in March 2015, and was broadcast live to DStv and GOtv audiences across the continent.

The event, which drew big names from the continent's TV and film industry, saw Nigerian superstars OC Ukeje (a second time winner) and Kehinde Bankole winning respectively, in the Best Actor and Best Actress categories.

For the 4^th edition of the AMVCAs, the organisers are inviting all entries for film and television works produced and broadcast or publicly exhibited from 01 October 2014 to 30 September 2015.

Please see entry guidelines below:

GUIDELINES:

STEP 1: Prepare a 2 to 3 minute long showreel for your online submission.

STEP 2: Log on to www.africamagic.tv and click on the AMVCA2016 banner which will take you to a submission page.

STEP 3: Fill out the submission forms and upload the clip. A unique reference number will be allocated to each completed online submission.

STEP 4: Quote your unique reference number, send a hard drive of the submitted project to one of the following, based on your region:

For Southern Africa Submissions

Attention: Head of Production

Magic Centre

137 Bram Fischer Drive

Randburg

2194

For East Africa Submissions

Attention: Head of Production

2nd Floor, MNET Offices

Local Productions Studio

Jamhuri Grounds off Ngong Road

Nairobi, Kenya.

For West Africa Submissions

Attention: Head of Production

MSS Local Productions

Plot 1652 Olosa Str,

Victoria Island, Nigeria

Why Compact MultiChoice subscribers won't have the English Premier League

Tim Jacobs, CEO of MultiChoice Africa earlier this week attributed the company’s decision to move English Premiership matches to its Premium Bouquet to the rise in amount paid for the league's rights.
While talking to journalists at a press conference in Mauritius, Jacobs says that they had dropped the premiership to Compact Plus hoping that it would garner more subscriber scale at a cheaper price to help cover the cost of the rights, but notes that the objective was never achieved.
Since the company didn't want to increase the prices of Compact Plus, they made a decision to take the beloved football league back to only the premium subscribers.
He also throws more light on the fact that when they lost right to GTV back in 2006, the public applauded though after the later left the market, the rights were re-signed at a 70% higher rate than before.

Read his full statement here: http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/tim-jacobs-why-multichoice-moved-premiership-to-premium-bouquet/219346/

Multichoice celebrates variety African content

It was a magical night filled with #OnlyTheBest of African entertainment when MultiChoice Africa kicked off its second #OnlyTheBest Content Showcase Extravaganza in spectacular style at the Outrigger Resort, Mauritius.
The event, dubbed 'Night of a Thousand Stars' saw all the glitz and glamour of Hollywood, Bollywood and Nollywood come to life on the island paradise, as guests that include Genevieve Nnaji, Rita Dominic, Desmond Elliot and Ramsey Nuoah were given the full movie-star treatment.
Flavour, Stonebwoy and The Mavins kept the guests on their feet with their popular hits while last year's MCs IK and Eku proved that they still had the gist, it's like they were picking up from where they stopped last year in Trau Aux Bitches, they kept the glamorous proceedings running smoothly.
Guest also experienced host IK who also brought his popular show, High Lites with IK, to the stage with a delightful interview with Nigerian crooner Banky W alongside music by DJ Sousa.
MultiChoice Africa's CEO Tim Jacobs who welcomed guests  promised that the video entertainment service provider will do all it can to make only the best content available to its subscribers on any platform, on any device and at any time.
“We believe television is an extremely powerful tool that can educate, entertain and inform. The evolution of this medium has become fast and furious and as a business we are constantly evolving to stay ahead,” he said.
Jacobs lauded the success of MultiChoice’s GOtv DTT (Digital Terrestrial Television) offering, which currently operates in 8 countries, bringing low-cost digital television to homes and supporting governments in freeing up vital broadcast spectrum by switching from analogue to digital signal.
He also acknowledged the challenges which the business faces. “Our growth over the last 20 years has been a result of massive investments we have made in people, content and technology – but as with any business, not all of these investments or changes have hit the spot…. so we have from time to time re-evaluated our position and made changes to our strategies. At the end of the day however it is really our subscribers we have to thank for staying with us, trusting us to deliver the best television experience and customer service to make their experience world class,” said Jacobs.
However, it wasn't all magic for the organizers, only a day after the openning, Multichoice was put on spot for prioritizing Nigerian content over that from other countries.
Officials from the pay TV agreed that it's true they may have had most of their strategies on East Africa wrong and they are thinking of going back to the drawing board.

Qwela Junction: Paying tribute to the Sax

It was a night where the elegant yet always literally recognized role of the woodwind S shaped instrument invented by Adolf Sax in 1840 came to the fore. To help achieve the kind of celebration were the Sax aces; Michael Kitanda, Happy Kyazze, Brian Mugenyi, Janzi Band’s Joseph Kizito alias Jose Sax and the queen herself, probably the only female saxophonist in the country, Maureen Rutabingwa alias Mo Roots.
That was Sunday at the Serena Hotel, code named Qwela Junction, The Sax Aces. For guidance, the show sought maestro Isaiah Katumwa and Legendary Afrigo Band frontman Moses Matovu.
Here are pictures from the night.

 

Uganda Film Festival: A festival is no one night stand

The third edition of the UCC sponsored Uganda Film Festival wrapped on Friday at Serena Hotel. As you could imagine, there was merry making as a section of film makers came together to reminisce about the year it has been and also ponder about the future.
This year, unlike the past events, the gig was one of the low key ones – the festival was coming for the third time but it felt like a debut, more Ugandans had no idea of what was happening or even a fact that local films exist but above all, more film makers were rather disgruntled than supporting the event.
For instance, many feel like the festival has failed to create the desired awareness for itself and the industry at large, making matters worse, local films are still finding it hard to make it to different cinema screens across the country.
In fact, one film maker had even intimated that it’s because of their loss of belief in the festival that the film entries have drastically fallen; - the first festival had a record of 189 films, last year only 179 films were submitted while this year, there were 132 entries.
However, an official from UCC noted that the drop is related to other factors rather than loss of trust, for instance, he says that for the first edition in 2013, the festival accepted entries from as far as 2005 thus the big number of films.
In 2014, he says they invited foreign film makers to submit and thus the domination of the winners’ list by Tanzania’s Zamora. This time round, they only invited Ugandan films made between June2014 and June 2015, thus the decline of 47 films.
Some film makers though rubbish this as a mere theory, they reason that even last year, there were less than ten foreign films submitted altogether.
But besides the bickering, this UFF edition had started with a cocktail at Serena Hotel, much as it was a great gesture on the part of the organizers, it was highly criticized by the public especially by a fact that they would chose to start a film festival with a Sheebah/Pallaso climax rather than a film screening or again ending by recognizing exhibitors rather than create a way forward.
The films did screen though; Magic Cinema was hosting corporate screenings every day at 7pm and director Joseph K Ssebagala’s Call 112 and House Arrest, Hassan Mageye’s The Tailor and Donald Mugisha’s Boda Boda Theives among others were screened. Other screenings were at Acacia Mall’s Century Cinema, Cineplex, and Cinemax in Makerere.
But a film festival is not a one night stand, it’s a journey and it must involve all the little players that help the industry grow – I think all interested Ugandans know where to get services of a drone camera owner, Wakaliwood’s beaten camera stands or a Zuku TV decorder.
When such service providers are programmed for a festival, they must come to present opportunities, for instance, the Zuku TV tent was supposed to have a representative that would help film makers with information regarding Zuku TV’s content acquisition policy, not some bimbos yapping about the number of channels on the pay TV platform – it is a film festival not a trade fair!
The award night, we had eleven feature film categories; Best Feature Film, Film of the Year, Best Sound, Best Post production,  Best Screenplay, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress, Best Cinematography and Best Costume. These were strategically filled by eleven films; Boda Boda Theives, House Arrest, Call 112, Akatiro, The Tailor, Situka, Galz About Town, The Curse 1870, Hanged for love, Evil Mother and My Rising Sun.
Now judging by the complexity of making a feature film, especially in a country or economy like Uganda where the Script, Editing, Story conceptualization and Directing are done by the same person, you need to be super human to emerge victor in all these areas  by yourself, and if you have another film to shoot with partly the same cast who too have other projects to work on, it is super impossible.
But that aside, it’s ridiculous for UCC to tell us that from the 132 entries this year, they found eleven films that succeeded at everything. These films had the best scripts, the same had the best screenplay, and the same films had the best sound, they were so perfect that their casts were the best in both lead and supporting roles!
But they were not about to stop, we had incidents where, Ronnie Lugumba was nominated for Best Actor for his Hanged for love role and Deyby Wadsen was nominated for Best Actress in the same film, just like Hassan Mageye and Kalema Nisha in The Tailor – True there are rare cases when directors front two main characters but this mostly happens in ‘Buddy Movies’ – the type where the two lead characters complement each other, they live together, win and in some cases die together – these are films like Rush Hour, where we had Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, these characters almost share the same amount of screen time and usually together, can we say the same about the two actors in Hanged for love?
We understand they had a team of five judges that came up with the nominees and eventually the winners, but isn’t this number too small for 132 entries, some of which would drag to the bone, can we even be sure they watched all these films?
Considering the fact that only two of these judges were Ugandans, can we be sure they understood the narrative?
Generally, if UCC is going to organize a festival, they should work with people that understand what a film festival and a closing award show is like, there’s more to the day than fancy foods and long legged ushers – a festival is a journey that starts the moment an idea is conceptualized and each edition starts the day the other ends.
It’s not about glossy banners and calling upon sponsors but an activity where the industry sells itself to the people, for instance, the day there was a masterclass on funding, the idea thing wasn’t to bring a creative to tell you how to get loans, UCC had to get their sponsors to tell film makers want they would need from you if they are to release the money taps your way.
Uganda Film Festival  or UFF is a brilliant idea, but if they continue running this great idea like a school canteen, time will come when even the past winners don’t want to be associated with it – considering the fact that it even adds no props at the national level, at the moment!