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Send us your review:
Describe the atmosphere and live music at a local pub, restaurant, festival, church or temple, club night.... inspire other people to check it out!
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Musician: Usifu Jalloh
Location: London
Instruments: percussion/voice
Music: Sierra Leonian / High Life / Kumbe
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HOW I CAME TO THIS MUSIC听听听听听听听听听听WHERE I PLAY听听听听听听听听听听A FAVOURITE SONG |
  
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 听听Listen (45'21") to Usifu Jalloh perform live in the World on your Street tent at Womad 2002.
听听Listen (3'42) to Maambena Gedda performed by Usifu
听听Listen (1'47) to Usifu talk about his music
Where I Play:
I perform literally everywhere! At schools, big festivals, birthday parties, weddings - I was even invited to perform for King Hussain in Jordan a few years ago.
At weddings - mostly they want us to play the drums and sing Gumbe songs. In fact once we start playing the drums at a Sierra Leonian gathering the dancers usually don't get the chance to perform. You start playing and everybody jumps up and starts to dance and they join in the singing too.
My mainstay drum is the Djembe, which is the carved wooden drum. I also play the Kongoma or thumb piano and the harmonica. Then there's Kelege - the long wood block with slits of various lengths which determine pitch and Djung Djung or Kenkeni, which is the bass drum of percussion. I play Shekere, the gourd rattle some people know  as Kabase and I dabble around with the xylophone (we call it Balangi in Sierra Leone) and the talking drum or Kora. I say that because some of these instruments, like the Balangi and Kora, are specialist - I play them, but I'm not an expert in them.
When you go into a school with all the drums you can tell the young people are thinking, "There's no way on earth I can drum like this!" But at the end of the workshops, they're drumming very well because I adapt what I do for them. So, for example, in Africa I'd say to a drummer "Let's play Manjani" or "OK, let's go timaniman-timaniman-timaniman-pidim-pidim-pim-bin", and they'd understand. I've adapted that into English and I'll say "let's go you'reverynice-you'reverynice-you'reverynice-thank-you-very-much". Within a few minutes the young people find themselves playing exactly the thing I just played which seemed so mysterious! You can see them blossoming - drumming, dancing, singing and story telling all help them build self-confidence.
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