The Zawose Queens and support
Tickets
Buy now- Date
- 19th Jan 2025
- Time
- 7.30pm
- Where
- Òran Mór
- Price
- £19.04* includes booking fee
- Age restrictions
- Over 14s only. Under 16s must be accompanied by an adult.
- Seating Type
- Standing
There is spirit and fire in the music of The Zawose Queens. There's the vibrations of the ancestors, coming through on traditional instruments — soaring chizeze fiddle, buzzing illimba thumb piano, ngoma drums that chatter and thunder — and voices that go deep, high and out there. There's the connection to nature, to ceremony and ritual, in their dance-inspired fusion, their blend of the organic, harmonic and modern-day electronic. There are lyrics that tell, in their native kigogo, of the passion for music, the wonders of life. Of pride in environment, in tradition. In their East African roots.
Pendo and Leah Zawose showcase the fluid polyrhythms and
rapturous polyphonic singing of the Gogo (aka Wagogo) people of the arid, hilly
Dodoma region of central Tanzania.
The most famous exponent of this musical tradition is the late, great Dr Hukwe Zawose (Pendo’s father and Leah’s grandfather).
Maisha, the debut album by The Zawose Queens, marks
the first time that women from this famous musical family take their place as
lead vocalists and performers. Emboldened by workshops in songwriting and music
production with visiting UK-based producers Oli Barton-Wood (Jordan
Rakei, Obongjayar, Nilufer Yanya) and Tom Excell (Nubiyan Twist, Onipa), The Zawose Queens began writing
their first ever songs. The resulting collection of songs range from the stripped back and
traditional-sounding to those treated with subtle electronic elements, with
beats and drops and found sounds and switch-ups.