http://www.kasiisiproject.org/playlists/AfricaQuiet.htm

1. Ayub Ogada (Kenya) - Kothbiro - 5:32
Ogada is of the Luo tribe of northwest Kenya. In this song a cattle herder, seeing a storm coming, quietly tells his children to bring in the cows.

2. Danone O’Sow (Ivory Coast) - Tesegu - 4:18
Danone O'Sow has lived in New York City since the late 1980s. This song is a lullaby: Sleep, my dear, don’t be afraid, you are close to my heart.

3. Geoffrey Oryema (Uganda) - Solitude - 3:51
Geoffrey Oryema grew up in Kampala, the capital city of Uganda. He was trained in western music as well as the traditional music and instruments of Uganda. His father was a minister in Idi Amin's government. This song is dedicated to his mother, who was widowed in 1977 when Amin’s operatives secretly assassinated his father and the rest of the family fled the country.

4. Samite (Uganda) - Wansuta - 4:48
Samite (pronounced "sah-mee-tay") is a flutist and songwriter originally from Kampala, capital of Uganda, and now living in Ithaca NY. Samite’s wife died several years ago. This song addresses her, speaking of the care she bestowed on him in years past. He promises to rejoin her soon.

5. Germain Rakotomavo (Madagascar) - Ibiaza Vola - 3:55
Rakotomavo is (or perhaps was) headmaster of a school in Madagascar’s capital city of Antananarivo. He composed this refective tune, which dates from the late 1980s.

6. Abayudaya (Uganda) - Mwana Talitambula - 1:18
The Abayudaya are a tiny community of Jews who live near the city of Mbale in eastern Uganda. This community arose about 90 years ago when a Ugandan general, alienated because he had not been treated well by the British colonial government, moved out of the capital and immersed himself in the Old Testament, living strictly by its precepts. When told that he was living like a Jew, he decided he was in fact a Jew. He gathered a community around him that still survives. This recording comes from the Smithsonian Institution. Singing in the Lusoga language of eastern Uganda, a mother is encouraging her small child to take its first steps.

7. Miriam Makeba (South Africa) - Congo - 2:50
Miriam Makeba is in her 70s now (January 2006) and close to retirement after a long and honored international career. In this song a child has drowned in the Congo River. The mother laments as the villagers listen.

8. Habib Koité (Mali) - Sinama Denw - 3:25
Habib Koité adapts Malian sounds and rhythms to the acoustic guitar. "I'm afraid for the African culture. We are the richest continent from nearly every perspective. We have to become conscious of our possibilities." His music is available in the west on Putamayo. This song is about the unhappy situation when multiple wives in a household cannot get along: the children are unsettled and worried.

9. Ntomb’khona Dlamini (South Africa) - Thula Thula - 3:11
Ntomb'khona Dlamini is from Durban in South Africa. She has appeared in New York City in "Serafina" and "The Lion King", and she has performed for Presidents Carter and Clinton. This lullaby has been recorded many times by many superb singers including Sibongele Khumalo. It is simple: Child, don’t cry, don’t cry, your mother is coming soon, led by a star in the sky.

10. Rokia Traoré (Mali) - Kélé Mandi - 4:09
Rokia Traoré is sometimes compared in Mali to Tracy Chapman of the US. This song, in the Bambara language of Mali, is about personal growth by accepting and absorbing the essence of another person, which opens us up to giving equally of our own essence.

11. Samite (Uganda) - Agalilala - 1:40
A traditional Ugandan song that inspires peace and happiness.