| Alan Facts | NAME: Alan Cawson
FESTIVAL LIKE: The Streets of Brighton
FESTIVAL DISLIKE: No Spiegeltent
ALL TIME FAVE SHOW: La Clique
MY BEST KEPT SECRET: My Digital Compact Cassette player |
The ensemble, which included Risengo Makondo and Eddie Shearer, was put together specially for this event, and for the most part it worked very well especially in the playful repartee between Kanda and Makondo. The music featured a fascinating array of instruments, some traditional like the zeze – a kind of African violin – and some improvised like Kanda’s electric guitar home-made from a 5-litre oil can.
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A highlight was the lively duet of electric thumb pianos that had the audience tapping its feet and joining in the refrains. Kanda’s evident passion for his music was infectious, and by the end it was clear that had this performance been in a club rather than a theatre the whole audience would have been swaying and dancing. For me the best part of the set was the marvellous guitar playing of Kanda and Shearer, especially in the final song. It was great to see an audience so involved in African music, and I hope it will encourage the festival organisers to build on this success with more African music next year. | 
