Project:
Dancehall to Gengetone and back - new avenues in soundsystem culture
Status: Completed
Timeframe: October 2024 - July 2025
Project description:
This project brought together artists with exceptional skills from disparate backgrounds to explore linkages within their work, backgrounds and related youth culture movements. It investigated the similarities and differences between strains of dancehall and soundsystem culture from Jamaica currently being cross-pollinated with electronic music from Germany, and urban youth cultural phenomena from Nairobi, Kenya in the form of the genres of ‘gengetone’ and ‘arbantone’. These genres are heavily influenced by dancehall, and face similar backlash in terms of demonisation and perceived underclass transgressive behaviour and attitudes. The project reframed this dynamic as part of a larger decolonization of musical languages and opened up dialogues between participants that will inform new strains of global hybridity. It presented the results of this dynamic cultural exchange at 3 major locations Santuri / Kilele in Nairobi, Karneval der Kulturen in Berlin, and at Europe’s celebrated new club space, Open Ground in Wuppertal, Germany.
The project was undertaken as a reciprocal residency connecting Gavin Blair (Gavsborg, Equiknoxx Music), a Jamaican producer, DJ and performer based in Berlin, and SnSe and Rafiiki - artists from Nairobi focussed around Santuri East Africa, the award-winning music innovation hub.
Phase 1: Research and Project Development at Kilele Summit, February 2025
The first phase of this project saw the creation of a new artistic partnership between Rafiiki, and SnSe, two artists active in the gengetone sub-culture. Under the name Arif, the pair created a set of new music and performed it at the showcase finale of Kilele 26.
Images and footage: February 18th, 2025
In parallel, Luca Jacob, (CEO of Piranha Arts, the organisation that produces Karneval Der Kulturen and WOMEX), attended Kilele in order to prepare for the 2nd Phase of the project in Berlin, in June. Luca appeared on the Signal Flow panel about international partnerships and collaborative opportunities, and participated in workshops and meet ups to better understand the cultural context the project takes place in.
Phase 2 - Germany residency, June 1st to June 21st, 2025.
Over a three week period in June, SnSe and Rafiiki travelled to Berlin to begin the residency proper, in collaboration with Gavin Blair, aka Gavsborg. The Jamaican producer has lived in Berlin for some years, and is widely hailed as an innovator artist blending dancehall with electronic music.
Artist profiles:
Gavsborg
Hailing from East Kingston, Jamaica, Gavsborg is the founder of Equiknoxx/Equiknoxx Music. Gavsborg has been producing for over ten
years, with his first success being the Billboard charting single “Step Out” by Busy Signal.
Gavsborg’s left-field approach to production has afforded him the opportunity to work with a wide variety of artists and labels fro different corners of music such as: Sam Morton, Addis Pablo, DDS, Busy Signal and more.
Outside music production duties, Gavsborg has toured extensively, both solo and with the Equiknoxx Collective as a DJ & live music
performer making stops all over Europe, Australia, the Americas, the United Kingdom, Africa & Asia.
SnSeAs a producer based in Nairobi, Kenya, SnSe is fully dedicated to releasing electronic
contemporary dance music coming out of this city, its suburbs, projects & slums. New sounds,
forms and structures with their own set of poetics and cultural identity.
Using the Kenyan cultural landscape as an inspiration for his eclectic brand of gengetone,
dancehall, reggaeton, and genge, SnSe is breaking into the scene with an urgency that has
seen him already work with many upcoming as well as established artists and producers.
RafiikiRafiiki is an East African singer and songwriter based in Nairobi, Kenya. She is an enterprising artist who explores her African heritage
through her compositions.
Influenced by reggae, hiphop and RnB, Rafiiki incorporates rap, poetry and native musical styles into a Kenyan contemporary framework that is refreshingly her own. Her exploration of the voice as an instrument in itself, pushes the boundaries of songwriting, her warm, husky voice granting the listener a profound musical experience.
Her discography includes Mapambano, Light The Incense, Spy Fro Nai, Kunitisha, State Of Mind and Nawiri
Writing and recording @ Morphine Raum
Captured by Shutterdust, the team spent two days collaborating at Morphine Studios, Berlin.
Karneval Der Kulturen, June 9th, 2025
The Karneval der Kulturen is the largest manifestation of cultural diversity in Germany and Berlin's No.1 street parade. Since 2016, the Karneval der Kulturen has been firmly established at Piranha Arts.
The artists made their first joint performance at Karneval Der Kulturen in Berlin. The event was organised by Luca Jacob, the co-collaborator in the project. Each artist played DJ sets on the Tropical Disco Soundsystem, a regular fixture at the Karneval.
Images by Shutterdust.
Open Ground, Wuppertal: June
Capturing the Hard Wax foundational sound through its bookings Open Ground has since become one of Europe’s most exciting new clubs. The space has put its sound first and foremost and can be considered one of the best sonic club experiences worldwide, featuring a state-of-the-art Function One setup combined with specially designed acoustics.
Under this project, a Kilele Summit showcase was organised with Open Ground Club, featuring each residency artist, a combined performance and additional appearances by KMRU, the renowned Kenyan sound artist, and Mina, a UK bass music DJ.
Open Ground does now allow photographs inside the club, but these are somegraphics from the interaction.
A recording was made of the performance, which can be heard here:
Additional activities in phase 2:
The artists performed at Maya Club for a Kaneval afterparty, as well as at Catalyst Insitute for a graduation event. They also rehearsed and recorded at Jane Arnison’s studio in the Tempelhof facility, and met with various collectives and individuals within the cultural space. They also recorded a radio show on Refuge Worldwide, which can be listened to here:
Phase 3 - Nairobi residency, July 11th to July 21st, 2025.
In July, Gavin travelled to Nairobi to be hosted by Santuri / Kilele. Working with SnSe and Rafiiki in the Santuri Studio, and at various pop up studio locations, the trio continued to work on material for the final showcase. The event was prepared in collaboration with the Umojah Soundsystem, and took place on July 18th on The Mall rooftop.
Images:
Jadili Panel
As we warm up for the Dancehall 2 Gengetone showcase on Saturday 19th, we kicked things off with a special Jadili Session.
We unpacked the connection between these two defiant music movements. How did Dancehall shape the Gengetone sound? And how is Gengetone carving out its own space in global music culture?
This project was made possible with the support of the International Kollaboration Fund of the Goethe-Institut.
https://www.goethe.de/en/kul/foe/int/ikf/024/dgb.html
Santiuri East Africa
Basement, The MallWestlands, Nairobi, Kenya