Zulu góspel, American gospel, ethnic songs and pop!

Nabbaale Harriet (mezzo), Kimeze Joshua (baritone), Kamoga Morris Julius (bass), Mayanja Louis (bass), Ssenteza Derrick (bass and director)

1500 concerts. Performed in 14 countries in Europe. Recorded 7 CD’s. Also recorded a Virtual Library for African Voices, by Eduardo Tarilonte; have collaborated in the sound track of an Anglo-American production of the film, “The House” by Roque Baños. And in Sept 2021 they performed in Vatican for an event organized by Pope Francis!

Five singers with an amazing capacity of capturing the attention of their audience immediately… Five singers who bring warmth with rich voices… The comments at the end of their concerts keep coming back: Impressive performance, amazingly rich and deep voices, fun and enthusiasm…
Three of the five members of Aba Taano were trained in the tribal choir of “Música Para Salvar Vidas” in Uganda by Jingo George (Music director of the Catholic Church in Uganda) as from 2005. In 2008 they decided to form Aba Taano (“The Five”, in their language in Luganda), still trained by Jingo George, but by then, three of them started music lessons at AIM, a Korean school established in Kampala where the director of the ensemble, Ssenteza Derrick obtained his degree.
Their debut was in Spain, at the African pavilion of the International Fair for Water in Zaragoza. During that period in August 2008, they performed 8 times a day, for one full week. It was immediately proven that they had an amazing capacity for attracting publics. After eleven years of performing together, they gave over 1500 concerts, recorded 6 CD’s and won 11 international prizes.

The first prize they obtained was in Riga (Latvia), at the World Choir Games. There were 29,000 singers from 420 choirs. Before the opening of the Games, the participants were requested to send their own version of the official song of the Games “My Song”, composed by the Latvian composer Eriks Esenvalds, to be sent three months before the beginning of the Games. Already before the Games, they were given the prize for the best version of this piece.

At the Games they won a Golden Medal in the category of Spirituality and Faith. From that day they started to work on the next competition in Lithuani, in 2015, where they received 6 prizes, (1st prize, Audience prize, expressivity prize and various medals). Then in 2018 they received the Audience Prize and 2nd Prize (no first prize was given), at the Leipzig Competition, and in 2019 the 2nd prize in Tampere, Finland.

Aba Taano has sung in Spain in huge halls like the Palau de la Música in Barcelona, Teatro San Pol in Madrid…, but as well in France (Boulogne Sur Mer), Germany (Frankfurt, Berlin, Leipzig (Gewandhaus)), in Holland, Belgium (at the Flanders Festival), Portugal, Austria (Inntöne Jazz Festival), Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Czech Republic, Hungary and Finland. Everywhere they performed the reaction of the public was the same. Obviously they have performed in Uganda and Rwanda over the years.