Nyege Nyege Festival review: The irresistible urge to dance

A host of African artists were joined by acts from Europe and beyond on the banks of the Nile in southern Uganda for the region's premier music festival

(Kit Macdonald)

Even for the best-travelled among the small group of journalists, DJs and producers from the UK who made their way to southern Uganda earlier in September for Nyege Nyege Festival, there was something unbelievable about being there that never once threatened to wear off. At what other festival would the standard transport to the site be on the back of a muddy motorcycle (a boda-boda), clinging to its driver's back for dear life? At what other festival could you take a time out by walking a few steps and drinking in the majestic sight of the Nile? And at what other festival would a rogue monkey take up residence in a tree in the festival hotel's grounds, and periodically amuse itself by hurling mangoes at the giggling humans below? “I can't believe we're here,” was by far the most commonly uttered phrase of the weekend, always accompanied by a huge, disbelieving grin.

Nyege Nyege (the phrase means “the irresistible urge to dance” in the local Luganda language, and something a bit ruder in Swahili) takes place a couple of kilometres from Jinja, a small city of around 70,000 inhabitants, and one of the most curious-looking towns I've seen. The grand but decaying buildings of Main Street and the surrounding area give it the look of a Western film set, and signposts a boom-time now several decades in the past. From Jinja town it was a ten-minute boda-boda ride to the festival site, the Nile Discovery Resort, a holiday resort that was built but never opened. Heavy rain fell on each of the festival's three days, making its steep paths and embankments comically treacherous at times, but Nyege Nyege is very much a place where locals and visitors alike smile and get on with it rather than complaining.

The festival is run by a small band of European promoters who reside in Uganda and have a deep investment in the country and its musical and cultural development. This is no case of foreigners jetting in and jetting out again counting their money: these guys live in Kampala, run an amazing little recording studio on the capital's outskirts, and have an increasingly renowned record label (Nyege Nyege Tapes) releasing great music by artists from Uganda and elsewhere in Africa. The “electro acholi” pioneer Otim Alpha, whose “Gulu City Anthems” album is one of the label's standout releases so far and a must-hear for anyone wishing to delve into the music of the region, turned in a rapturously received performance at the festival that will doubtless have turned more than a few in the audience on to the label as a whole. Extra support for the festival came from the East Africa Arts program of the British Council, who supported the organisers in regional integration and international collaborations.

Along with Kampala, the Kenyan capital Nairobi is another hotbed of the east African music scene, and several acts and a significant portion of the crowd had made the journey to Jinja, which lies on the road connecting the two capitals. EA Wave, a six-strong crew of young DJs and producers, were the Nairobi act who most caught my attention. I missed their live set on the main stage due to the bill running several hours late on Saturday night, but their DJ sets at the Electro Stage and the rather misleadingly titled Chill Out Stage were energetic and excellent. The recurring issue of stages running significantly behind schedule, combined with a largely unfamiliar line-up and the intense downpours that hit for several hours each day, meant Nyege Nyege wasn't a festival where forward planning was a big priority. Instead we learned to adopt a roving approach, often working out who we were watching after arriving at a stage and swiftly moving elsewhere on the relatively compact site if we felt like it.

Musically, Nyege Nyege was pretty broad – good for anyone on an African music crash-course but also necessary to attract the predominantly local crowd in numbers large enough to make the festival work financially. (The crowds peaked at 8,000 on the packed-out Saturday, and with around half that number present on Friday and Sunday.) The quality on the main stage was therefore occasionally variable – African EDM does as much for me as EDM from any other continent – but much of the line-up was a joy. The Italian duo Ninos du Brasil lit the place up on Friday night with a riotous, percussion-driven live set that was a contender for my favourite moment of the whole festival. Some other main-stage highlights came, for reasons of scheduling backlogs, from unidentified sources, but Kampire's opening set on Friday, the “mboko pop” of the Cameroonian singer Reniss, and the Afrobeat-meets-rave of Ghana's Jowaa all stood out.

The Electro Stage, which was run by the Edinburgh crew Samedia Shebeen, was my personal favourite, both for its music and its layout and design, with steep climbs on two sides making for a cocoon-like atmosphere that we returned to incessantly. London's NTS Radio curated Friday's line-up there, with station residents A.G., Anu, Moxie and Skinny Macho all excelling alongside locals Hibotep, Abonga and DJ Rachael, whose young son Cruz, already a minor star in Uganda himself, was a delightful presence in the crowd, turning out some of the best dance moves we saw all weekend. The European/African fusion of Germany's Harmonious Thelonious was Saturday's highlight on the Electro Stage, while the Chill Out Stage behind it was so in name only, but an attractively out-of-the-way escape option when the crowds were too dense elsewhere.

Friday and Saturday's rainfall came in the afternoon and had cleared by the evening, but there was no such luck on Sunday, with a particularly intense storm taking hold around 9pm and persisting for several hours until we cut our losses and made for home. Prior to my arrival in Uganda a friend who had arrived early in Kampala told me that the pre-festival hype in the city was the strongest she had ever seen anywhere, and added that it was “miraculous” that such a small outfit were managing to pull off an event like this. Having delighted in the irrepressible excitement of the crowds at Nyege Nyege Festival and seen its organisers overcome various obstacles with general aplomb, I'd have to concur. Teething problems aside – moving the festival back a couple of weeks to take it safely out of rainy season would be advisable, and some issues obviously remain with scheduling – Nyege Nyege Festival is something worth wholeheartedly celebrating, and the skill and passion of the people behind it will likely ensure it flourishes in the years to come.

Photo credits: Kit Macdonald (Main,1-3) / Ian Duncan Kacungira (5,6)