In this Sunday’s SAVVYZΛΛR session we continue to honour Halim El-Dabh with the second iteration of our project Here History Began. Tracing the Re/Verberations of Halim El-Dabh coming to you through the air.

16:00 - 17:00

It Is Dark and Damp On the Front: Treading the Sonic Path of Halim El-Dabh WITH Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung

In this lecture, Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung waves us through the sonic cosmologies of Halim El-Dabh. Travelling across geographies and temporalities, he situates Halim El-Dabh as one of the most integral composers, creative ethnomusicologists, Pan-Africanists, and sonic philosophers, whose work evokes an African manifestation of the sonic domain. Manifested through the relationship between sound and body, and body and community as means of transcending the musical into the embodied, Ndikung expands sonority as a form of knowledge that is experienced within the repertoire of African allegories, myths, and cosmologies. The perception of the music goes through the vibrations of the gestures and movements of the body, in the sensitive relationship between colours and sounds, not only in that which is audible, but also in what can be felt in a synesthetic way through means of varied forms of frequency.

17:00 - 18:00 A Starlight Friction in the Universe WITH Joe Namy

This feature, composed by Joe Namy, is dedicated to the expanded rhythmic cosmologies of Halim El-Dabh, unpacking his lifelong devotion to drumming with selections from his recorded history spanning over 70 years, including electronic works, orchestral compositions, solo improvisations, and pioneering field recordings from all over Africa. We’ll also hear some excerpts from an interview with Halim, in his own voice.

Photo: Courtesy of Kent State University Libraries. Special Collections and Archives and Photography Unit (Kent State University Communications and Marketing). Copyright: Bob Christy.