Roaring Abyss

If you go out around music bars and venues in Addis Ababa, you will enjoy a very characteristic scene, but if you want to get an idea of the different sounds from the country, you will get a very narrow view of it; in some places some Amhara or Gurage music may be found but … what about the rest? There are more than eighty different nationalities and cultures spread all along the mountains and deserts. Nowadays many of the traditional instruments in Ethiopia have been replaced for electronic keyboards, and many local traditional bands have been reduced to a front(wo)man. But there are still some musicians spread along the country playing the music they learned from their fathers and mothers; intruments like the Krar, Washent, Masinko or Kabero, are nowadays roaring and bouncing against the hills of this land full of contrasts and diversity. In order to unveil the music universe and keep a record of this endangered music tradition, the filmmakers spent two years performing field recordings around every corner of Ethiopia, documented in this audiovisual poem.

Quino Piñero

Quino Piñero is a sound engineer, music producer and documentary filmmaker who has been working since 2001 between Africa and Europe under his label SolySombra Recordings. Parallel to his music/ documentary productions, Quino has worked as a sound engineering lecturer with the Spanish Agency of International Cooperation (AECID). At the moment he is based in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) working on his next documentary project for which he’s collaborating with legendary and upcoming local musicians.