VIDEO: Nile Project Makes Waves at BU
With deft movements, Steven Sogo tunes his idono; his hands slide up and down the smooth wooden bow, checking the tension in the metal string, adjusting the position of a resonating gourd. The traditional African instrument is played in nations along the Nile River such as Burundi, where Sogo hails from.
It’s a long way from Burundi to a classroom in the College of Fine Arts at Boston University, where Sogo is playing today.
Sogo is a part of The Nile Project, a multinational, multiethnic initiative designed to change the conversation around both music and water contributions in the countries within the watershed of the Nile River, the longest in the world. Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, Uganda, Congo-Kinshasa, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, and Eritrea are all nourished by the Nile, and decisions on water conservation and management – or the lack thereof – taken by one nation invariably impact all the others.
“Originally, I wanted to be a part of this project because of the music,” Sogo said. “The Nile Project has been like a school for me, a school on the importance of the river.”
The Nile Project is wrapping up its weeklong residency at Boston University with a panel on water politics in the Nile Basin at 3 p.m. at the Pardee Center for the Longer-Range Future, as well as a sold-out concert. The residency also included classroom visits and seminars, such as the College of Fine Arts event where Sogo plays the idono. Music students accompany him, improvising harmonies on the phrase “Salaam-a,” from the Arabic word for peace.
Joining Sogo is Kasiva Mutua, a groundbreaking drummer from Kenya. Born into a culture where drums are a sacred instrument played only by men, she was named the best drummer in the nation as a senior in high school.
“In college, I had a relationship with the Nile,” Mutua said. “I used to sit along the river with a drum, a beer and an iPad, just playing.”
After completing her university education, she broke the glass ceiling in the Kenyan music industry, but quickly became curious about what lay just beyond the borders.
“In Kenya, we have a big problem where we don’t listen to music from many other nations. I wanted a chance to collaborate with artists from other places,” Mutua said. “Similarly, many in Kenya don’t think about ourselves as a Nile nation; we think about Lake Victoria. But what we do to Lake Victoria creates problems for people downstream. I want to go home after this project and tell everyone in Kenya: guys, this is OUR water.”
The Nile Project was conceived by Egyptian ethnomusicologist Mina Girgis and Ethiopian American singer Meklit Hadero in 2011. Their mission is to “educate, inspire, and empower the citizens of the Nile basin to foster the sustainability of the Nile River’s ecosystem.” The main component of the project is music; they are working to approach the issues of water politics and cultural conflict in the area through musical collaboration.
The Nile Project is presented by the BU Arts Initiative. It is cosponsored by the African Studies Center, an affiliated center of the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, along with the College of Fine Arts and World Music/CRASHarts.