Nairobi Now t-shirts available again!

Dear readers and supporters of Nairobi Now,
We’ve just received a new batch of t-shirts: have a look and buy one if you want to support us.
Thanks!

How do you want Nairobi Now to improve?

Dear readers,
Nairobi Now is now 2.5 years old, and needs a redesign just as much as new ideas and new content.
It would be great to hear from you how you want Nairobi Now to improve, increase coverage of events, etc
Among the things we are exploring is allowing users to post their own events directly, publishing features on the art and entertainment world, requesting reviews, and more – but it’s now time to hear from you
All constructive criticism is welcome – let us know what you like, what you don’t like and what new things you want to see on Nairobi Now.
And, just as importantly, get in touch if you want to get involved with Nairobi Now and help making it better.

Thanks!

Blankets & Wine, Oct 4 2009 @ Tayiana Stables

Blankets&Wine is the premier afro-based,picnic-style music festival in East Africa designed to showcase outstandig musicians in the emerging genres of afro-based music.

1:30pm: MC OPENING REMARKS
2:10 pm: Opening Act
2:45 pm Eddie Grey& the House of Grey: http://www.reverbnation.com/eddiegrey
3:50pm Mc Remarks
4:00 pm: Wendy Kimani (TPF 2 second runner Up)
4:50pm MC REMARKS.
5:00pm-5:25pm Special DJ mmix (surprise DJ act)
5:30- 6:10pm Suzanna Owiyo: http://www.suzannaowiyo.net

Sorry for the lack of updates!

Dear Nairobi Now followers, subscribers and event organizers,
Our apologies for the lack of updates over the past few days.
You all know this is a service done with very limited (aka zero) resources and solely for the love of the arts.
The past few days have been very, very hectic around here, hence the silence.
Sorry for the inconvenience, and enjoy all new events posted from now on!
Have a great weekend!

Concert: Sauti Sol, Dela, Stan, Aug 8 2009 @ August 7th Memorial Park

For more information: http://penyafrica.com/

Conference on Maasai Culture, Jun 18 2009 @ Alliance

Conference on Maasai Culture by Eric Fayet
At 7.30pm at Alliance Française salle polyvalente
Tickets: 700/-
Historian, journalist, author, Eric Fayet has lived for one year in Brazil then in Tanzania – in 1997 et 1998 – in Arusha, where he worked in civil cooperation for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He has returned many times to write a text on Maasai people, the first of a collection. “Maasaï. Légendes de Tanzanie” is a collection of 22 untold stories, illustrated by a Tanzanian painter, followed by a second part on today’s Maasai life, illustrated by photographs.

Support Nairobi Now with our new T-Shirts!

After the preview at the Nairobi Is Now party, we’ve just put online a few pictures of Nairobi Now’s t-shirts.
Have a look at the t-shirts and if you like what you read on this website, please consider supporting us! Thanks and see you around Nairobi, the arts & cultural scene keeps growing every single week…

Play: Kenyans Made in Heaven, Apr 28 – May 3 2009 @ Alliance

Heartstrings Kenya presents Kenyans Made in Heaven
Directed by Samwel Mwangi and Victor Ber
Created/ concepted by Dan Ndambuki aka Churchill.

Dates: 28th April – 3rd May
Times: 6.30pm weekdays, 3 & 6.30pm weekend.
Venue: Alliance Française’s Auditorium
Charges: 500Ksh

Synopsis
God could not be everywhere and so he created Kenyans
God in heaven is a very pleased man right from the time our nation Kenya was created.
He looks at Kenyans and asks himself a simple question: “If I created Kenyans in my own image, how come they do not look like me?
They look like politicians, muggers, thieves, robbers, hawkers, pastors, carjackers, bankers, businessmen, students, teachers, managers, directors etc etc!
In this hilarious rendition and portrayal of the comedy, we will try to find out why Kenya is a unique country insofar as the way we relate to God, (read religious matters).
This will take us through the daily life of a Kenyan and how he falls onto religion for consolation.
What would happen if God, after creating everything and resting on the seventh day, He decides to create Kenya on the eight day?
This comedy will try to explore if that is the exclusivity that Kenyans needed to be able to go through life the way they would love to. Hilariously we will discover that God could not be everywhere, so He created Kenyans.

Sunday Salon, Apr 19th 2009 @ Kengeles Lavington

Kwani Trust is inviting you to Sunday Salon on Sunday 19th April 2009 7pm at Kengeles Lavington, Lavington Green. Entry ksh300. Free entry before 6.30pm.

Readings will be from Jambula Tree and Other Stories: The Caine Prize for African Writing, 8th Annual Collection, published 2008.
Titled after the short story by the 8th winner of the Caine Prize for African Writing, Uganda’s Monica Arac de Nyeko, the Jambula Tree anthology contains the latest in African writing with a selection of stories from across the continent.The book includes 18 short stories- the winner and shortlist (5 stories) plus 12 stories written at the Caine Prize writers workshop held in April 2008 in South Africa.In the book are stories that deal with topics as wide apart as love, war, manhood, marriage and the African urban experience.

READERS
Monica Arac de Nyeko is from Uganda. She was shortlisted for the Caine Prize for African writing in 2004 for ‘Strange Fruit, winning the prize in 2007 for ‘Jambula Tree’.

Kingwa Kamencu is a writer based in Kenya. Her first book ‘To Grasp at a Star’ won the National Book Development Council Award 2003, The Wahome Mutahi Prize 2006 and the prestigious Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literarure 2007. She was one of the two Kenyans nominated Rhodes Scholar to Oxford where she will be proceeding for further studies later in the year. She serves as deputy secretary general in PEN International’s Kenya Chapter and writes for the authoritative media monitoring magazine Xpression Today (E.T). She writes poetry, essays and fiction.

Kaume Marambii is a self-employed businessman running an agri-business in Kenya called Golden Acres Ltd. He has a degree in Veterinary Medicine from the University of Nairobi, a post-graduate Diploma in Information Technology from the University of Sunderland, UK. He was also a 2003-2004 Reuters Digital Vision Fellow at Stanford University, USA. This is his first work of fiction.

Memory And Conflict: The Role Of Artists, Image And Text, Apr 16th 2009 @ Goethe-Institut

Kwani Trust in conjunction with Goethe Institute invites you to a discussion titled :
Memory And Conflict: The Role Of Artists, Image And Text
Date: Thursday, 16th April 2009 at 6pm at Goethe-Institut

What are the defining texts and images of the post elections violence period? What were the texts and images that gave us a harbinger of the things that came? For the first time in Kenya’s history, cartoonists, photographers, poets, writers, essayists and journalists rallied around their respective forms and that one momentous event in the history of Kenya to provide an answer to the above questions.

The discussion is part of the activities leading to the launch of Kwani? 5, Part 2:Revelation and Conversation.
Part 2 of Kwani? 5, the second 400 pages of a twin edition, starts off where the 1st volume ends, to further examine Kenya in the context and violent aftermath of its 2007 elections. Writers, photographers, poets, cartoonists provide collective narratives on what we were before, and what we became, during the epochal first 100 days of 2008. The issue also features a extended travel piece based in Uganda that comparatively explores the concept of ethnicity, and the history of a peoples in a space other than our own.

The panelists include:
Joy Mboya – Kenya Burning Exhibition
Billy Kahora – Kwani Trust
Boniface Mwangi – Photographer
Patrick Gathara – Cartoonist
David Kaiza – Writer
Earnest Waititu- Mainstream media monitor
Tom Odhiambo – Facilitator

(Re)Membering Kenya: Governance, Citizenship and Economics – Session 2, Apr 15th 2009 @ Goethe-Institut

At 6.00 pm
info: +254202224640, prog2[at]nairobi.goethe.org
The public lecture series, supported by the Ford Foundation and Goethe-Institut Kenya, brings together academics, members of civil society groups and the general public to engage with issues that were thrust into the limelight by the jolting events that unfolded after the December 2007 general elections. These crises constitute a watershed moment for Kenya in many ways. It is necessary to pause and ask not just what went wrong but also why it went wrong.
Organisers: Dr. George Gona and Dr. Mbugua wa-Mungai, in cooperation with Ford Foundation

Session 2:
1. Capturing the State: Corruption and Governance, by Mwalimu Mati
2. (Re)Defining Leadership Models, Prof. Eric Aseka

Pecha Kucha Night, Mar 26th 2009 @ RaMoMa

What do an architect, a designer, a flower pot apainter, a tattoo artist and a photographer have in common? They SEE things that you and I wouldn’t. Come to Pecha Kucha Night to see and hear more. 14 presenters will unleash their creative minds on you in 20 images of 20 seconds each. The Theatre Company director, a flip flop maker, an architect, an abstract painter, film makers, a photographer, interior designers, a flower pot painter, a magazine editor, an earth painter, a jewelry maker and a tattoo artist will all be presenting at RaMoMA gallery TONIGHT, the 26th March at 20:00, Adults 400/- and Students 200/-. There will be snacks and drinks for sale. Come and network with Nairobi’s most creative talents. (via kenyabuzz.com)

Live music, Mar 6th-7th 2009 @ Tamambo Tapas

Friday 6 March From 9pm
amazing vocals
Eddy Grey with HOUSE OF GREY

Saturday 7 March From 8.30 pm
LIGAYA me and my guitar

Free entry
contacts: 0207124005 / 0722385089

Reporting Environment and Nature, Dec 18 2008 @ Goethe-Institut

Reporting Environment and Nature
Screenings & Presentations
18.12.2008
6.00pm
+25420 2224640
prog[at]nairobi.goethe.org
Many films about Africa’s nature and environment have until now been largely produced by non-Africans. Broadcast management on the continent believes that production of environment and nature films is expensive and requires a lot of trained manpower. However, the advent of low cost, yet effective production equipment has now off set these fears.

A three-week workshop organized by Deutsche Welle and held at Goethe-Institut Nairobi brings together broadcasters and a selected number of independent producers to work together on environment and nature film projects/productions. Under the guidance of Michael Kraus of Deutsche Welle, DW-Akademie, the participants will produce films, which, for a change, are made from an African perspective for Africans. This evening presents the films to the audience.

Kuona Trust Art Centre Open Day, Dec 20 2008 @

Do join us for the Kuona Trust Art Centre pre-holiday celebration Open Day, Saturday December 20th between 11am and 3pm
It should be a great day.

Kuona Trust Art Centre
Likoni Close, Likoni Lane, off Dennis Pritt Road, Hurlingham
PO Box 4802, Nyayo Stadium 00506
Tel: (254) 0202405960/1
Mobile: 0721 262326, 0733 742752

Help save the Phoenix Players Theatre!

Dear Theatre-lover,

It gives me great pleasure (and relief!!) to announce that if the support we have got translates into action – Phoenix WILL rise from the ashes. Various suggestions have been given and many have asked how they can support. Here are various ways (certainly not exhaustive!)
1. Take up (or renew) Membership. This supply of cash helps alot. Corporate Annual: 40,000/=; Annual Single: 6,000/=; Annual Double: 12,000/=; Student: 2,600/=.
2. Come and watch plays – bring friends along. Those you bring may end up taking membership. I know traffic can be a nightmare but with proper planning you can battle it atleast once a month.
3. Let us know the kinds of plays you want to watch. If you liked something – let others know. Likewise, if you didn’t – let us know
4. Consider taking Theatre Nights as a way of entertaining staff, clients etc. It is an alternative to having it at some hotel where your bar bill at the end will be enormous!! Who knows – some of your guests may end up taking membership
5. Help with advertising. Either give us e-mail addresses so we send them updates, or simply forward what we send you to everyone in your data base
6. Consider ways in which Phoenix can partner with your company. You promote Phoenix among your clients and we do so among our patrons
7. Consider including us in your CSR programmes. We really do need support. No theatre in the world can survive on box office takings alone. In other countries theatres get government grants and corporate support. Companies that donate to the arts get tax rebates. We have not got to that stage yet so we really need support from the corporate world. Consider it as nurturing talent which your company can later tap from.
8. Donate your time, services, materials (you’ll be surprised to learn we can use ANYTHING you have to offer). We need people who can market us, sell membership, sell corporate nights (commission? let’s discuss). We need internet service, paint, canvas, paper, printing services – prorammes, brochures, business cards, etc.
9. Send us ideas – no matter how wild!! – on how we can improve our plays.
10. Come and enjoy some wonderful music featuring the best hit music. Friday 12th to Saturday 20th December. Adults: 500/= Children: 300/=.
Call Lucy on 222 55 06 for tickets.
Please go through the list above (which, I repeat is not exhaustive) and let us know how you can help.
Asante sana for keeping Phoenix Phlying!

Regards,
Ian Mbugua
Director
0722 700 449 / 0733 948 849

Retracing the Benga Rhythm, Dec 4 2008 @ Kenya National Theatre

Concert & DVD Launch of Retracing the Benga Rhythm
Featuring Sukuma Bin Ongaro, Queen Babito, DK Mwai, Ochieng Nelly, Francis Danger
From 4pm, Thursday December 4 at the National Theatre
Free Entry

Download flyer of the event

Japanese Movie: Equinox Flower, Nov 29 2008 @ Japan Information Culture Centre

Friday 28th November 2008 at Japan Information and Culture Centre
3.30 pm to 3.45 pm Japan Video Topics
3.45 pm to 5.45 pm Japanese Feature Film “EQUINOX FLOWER” (Director: Ozu Yasujiro) (IMDb)

Sunday Salon, Nov 23 2008 @ Kengeles Lavington

Sunday Salon Nairobi – A Prose Reading Series
Four readers, four unique voices In a tranquil outdoor setting
Sunday 23rd November, 7-9pm
Kengeles, Lavington Green
Entry Only KSh. 300

Featuring: Juliet Maruru, Moraa Gitaa
+2 Screen Writers from the Kenya Film Commission & Kwani Trust Screen Writing Workshop

& Musician Maia Von Lekov

ABOUT THE FEATURED WRITERS & MUSICIAN

Moraa Gitaa was born, bred and raised in the port city of Mombasa. She has lived and worked in the coastal beach town all her life and only a year ago moved to Nairobi where she is a fulltime writer and is working on plans to initiate an organization that provides books for disadvantaged children residing in informal settlements and those challenged by dyslexia, a condition that had challenged her daughter.

She attended the Aga Khan group of schools in Mombasa and studied Administration and IT at the Coast College of Commerce.

‘CRUCIBLE FOR SILVER AND FURNACE FOR GOLD’ is her debut novel published in Canada. She has a finished crime fiction novella (INDECENT PROPOSAL) and an inspirational text (I DARED TO DREAM) that is due to be published by StoryMoja.

Until most recently she was the Kenya staff writer for G21 for 4 years and is currently a correspondent for the American publications Mshale and African Magazine. She has penned a couple of book reviews for the Sunday Nation. Moraa has several short stories published in various anthologies including G21’s Africa Fresh!–New voices from the first continent (2007) and Author-Me’s Author Africa–2008 Anthology,some of which were submitted for the Caine Prize for African writing.

In 2005-2006 with 11 other screen-writers they co-authored and created a concept in the form of a new TV crime detective series titled CID Nairobi but are yet to get funding for the 13 series shoot. She has refused to be the ‘SAFE’ under 35 year old writer that most traditional local publishers have been looking for! That is why some people refer to her as a rebel writer, unorthodox and unconventional!

She cites her greatest inspiration as her thirteen year-old daughter Tracy and the Kenyan-African woman who struggles daily to ensure she provides for her family.

Moraa has also submitted her second novel ‘THE DEVIL IS IN THE DETAIL’ to the Canadian publishing firm. She is working on her third novel provisionally titled ‘SHIFTING SANDS’, of which a chapter excerpt titled ‘From Shifting Sands to Deeper Dimensions’ won the NBDC(K) National Book Development Council of Kenya Literary Awards Book Week 1st Prize in the Adult Fiction Category at the 11th Nairobi International Book Fair September 2008.

Juliet Maruru is a 20 something year old writer, a semi-trained kindergarten teacher, a writer and Editorial assistant at Storymoja. Her yet to be finished adventure novel for teens(looks like she has not given up on teens completely), might yet be published some time next year, but you can read her work on www.jmaruru.wordpress.com.

She loves to read, to write, to work with kids. Her motto adopted from a city then off a tolerant lawyer declares that ‘she floats..’ She needs to judging from the umber of times she finds herself in a deep end.

Juliet will be reading her short story, ‘There goes my Career’ which she describes as ‘one more story about surviving in the big wide world, drowning a little bit, then finding my stroke again, and loving it all’

Maia Von Lekow represents another amazing side to Kenya’s dynamic musical scene. Her voicevand style has an affinity with female jazz vocalists of the 1930s and soul and folk music
of the 1960s. In all her compositions, Maia is blazing new trails in Kenya; experimenting with different styles, and creating a hybrid sound that is her very own.
Funk, groove, and soul…all this describes the music Maia creates. Music is not something she merely enjoys; it defines who she is. Whether busking on street corners while backpacking around the world, or jamming with friends at university in Melbourne, Maia’s sound has developed from playing with musical talents from around the world, injecting her own personality, background and culture into her
sound. Her first single, Altered Light, was the result of collaboration with a funk bass player in
Melbourne. Since then, Maia traveled to Berlin and continued writing, singing and collaborating before coming home to Kenya and continuing her work with artists, friends and producers. Drift, Maia’s first album, is a culmination of her travels, her meetings, her collaborations and her experiences; a global cross-pollinated vibe. Maia weaves her adventures, stories and memories into this album producing jazzy riffs with folk licks to soulful percussive dub, a unique addition to Kenya’s music scene.In Kenya, Maia has performed for numerous awareness campaigns including the Korogocho Slum Campaign and a UN (youth) campaign on awareness in Mathare and Kibera slums, raising money for various schools in those areas. Maia has also composed jingles for various advertisements in Kenya and Berlin and music composition for a South African/Canadian theatre production, Crossroads, that raises awareness in Africa on issues of rape, gender-based violence and HIV/AIDS (www.cmfd.org). Her latest composition was featured in the much-acclaimed Kenyan production, “From a Whisper”, depicting events of the 1998 bombing in Kenya.
In her creative forays around Kenya’s extremely rich cultural scene, Maia has been
able to find a highly motivated, talented and original individual. Together, this duo
has brought life to the imaginings and possibilities of Drift.

As the leading guitarist, Kato Change is one of Kenya’s most promising guitarists. Born into a musical family, Kato has been musically prolific since the age of three, tapping on the
drums, experimenting with harmonicas, and ultimately teaching himself the guitar.

Europe-Kenya cultural forum, Nov 19th-21st 2008 @ GoDown

The GoDown Arts Centre in association with Alliance Française de Nairobi is organizing a Europe-Kenya cultural dialogue forum at The GoDown Arts Centre from 19 to 21 November 2008. The forum will involve presentations and exchanges between European missions in Kenya and various Kenyan stakeholders in the art, media and culture sector.

Samosa Festival, Nov 15th-30th 2008

The South Asian Mosaic of Society and the Arts (SAMOSA) Festival which was first organized at the GoDown in 2005, is a cultural tool conceptualized by AWAAZ. It has showcased the South Asian community within East Africa through a series of exhibitions, discussion forums, concerts and dance performances. The vision is to make the SAMOSA Festival, with its emphasis on cultural fusion, become an item on the world cultural calendar, to be mentioned in the same breath as the Zanzibar International Film Festival, the Grahamstown National Arts Festival and the North Sea Jazz Festival.

Previous festivals have successfully focused on aspects of the past. This year’s SAMOSA runs between 15th and 30th November. The theme is “Celebrating Daily Life”. It will allow us to highlight what is joyous and beautiful in the day to day interactions of each and every one of us.

Please visit the festival website for more information.

Italian Jazz: Actis Dato New Quartet, Oct 31st 2008 @ Italian Institute of Culture

October 31st @ Italian Institute of Culture
6.30 for 7pm – free entrance

The most original and amusing group of new italian jazz, whose music successfully combines sound and extemporaneaous entertainment-
Italian Jazz: “Actis Dato new Quartet”
With Carlo Actis Dato (saxophones & bass clarinet), Beppe Di Filippo (alto & soprano saxes), Matteo Ravizza (bass), Daniele Bertone (percussion)

Italian Jazz: ACTIS DATO New QUARTET This is the most original and amusing group of new italian jazz, whose music successfully combines sound and extemporaneaous entertainment. The group draws over jazz, mediterranean and middle-eastern ethnic music, afro and funk rhythms, caribbean, oriental, east-european sounds, old italian-like songs, here and there adding hi-ronical flavours and sonorities that recall tropical sea-side resort atmospheres or pop songs.

read more about the band

To All Nairobi Bloggers Out There: Nairobi Now needs your help!

Dear Readers, and dear Nairobi bloggers.
Nairobi Now started a year and a half ago almost as a joke, but became over time one of very few online sources of information for anything in the arts and entertainment in Nairobi.
We are now reorganizing our work – being a volunteer effort, it is hard to keep up at times – and there’s so much happening in Nairobi that no one ever knows about

This is why we would like to request your help to expand our coverage of events, by making Nairobi Now a truly participatory blog.

Nairobi is home to a vibrant web community, great bloggers are based in the city, and it would be fantastic to engage all of you in producing a better NairobiNow: with even more information about upcoming events, reviews, commentaries and anything else you’d like to see on this website.

Please send an email to nairobinow[at]gmail.com to suggest ideas and start blogging with us on this platform!

ps: if you have never blogged before but want to help us out, just contact us – you can learn in minutes!

Theatre: Just Between Ourselves, September 13-14th @ Alliance

JUST BETWEEN OURSELVES
by Allan Ayckbourn, produced by Jewels of Purpose
Sat. 13 & Sun. 14 September at 3, 6 & 8pm
Alliance Française auditorium, Tickets: 400/-

A comical story revolving around 2 men and 3 women. Denis is an unhappy man who lives with his wife Vera and Mother Marjorie, who is jealous of her son’s wife and is determined to do anything to make her life miserable. When Denis decides to sell his car to Nail, he receives more than he bargained for…

Patrick Mukabi exhibit, August 16th – September 18th @ Le Rustique

At Le Rustique Restaurant in Westlands– Works by Patrick Mukabi
Opening August 16th at 3pm

see flyer of the exhibit