Sape by Alena M of Anak Adi Rurum

I remembered the first time I met the Murang family in St Joseph's Cathedral. It was on one occasion where the Children Ministry asked me to attend one of their practises - for a christmas play during a homily I think. They they were both Joel and Alena and yup, at that time, they were much smaller and of course shorter than myself....

Anyway, I got the opportunity to work with Alena and her Performing Band namely Anak Adi Rurum where they performed for the 10th Anniversary of the Borneo Rainforest World Music Festival last year and they will be perfoming again at this year's Rainforest.

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(Alena on a Sape)

The person in charge of them - Nikki Lugun - came to us and acquired our service to record some of the songs in which will most likely to be release during the Rainforest. It was a fun and exciting experience for the girls as most of them have never been in a Recording Studio. Further to that, it was also their first time in a local radio station (Cats FM).

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(An Antique Modified Sape with Pickup)

According to Nikki, it is actually taboo for girls to actually touch and play the Sape as tradition has it that only Man are allowed to use this traditional instrument. However, most of the younger generation are not interested to learn how to play the Sape which makes it almost an extinct instrument like some of the other traditional instruments which is found in the museum, but on one knows how to play it.

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(mBox2 top; Samson Headphone Amp bottom)

Anyway, it also gave us a chance to test our recently acquired mBox2 which is running on Pro Tools Software and I would like to think that Kamarul (our Production Manager) would agree that it's one rock solid kicking hardware for recording - well even though it's only a 2-track recorder.

We are hoping to proceed further with the installation of Pro Tools HD and to start with at least a 32-Track Recording Interface and gradually up-grade from there.

Do visit our website at http://www.cats.fm/ and if you're interested to know more you can send an e-mail request to our Production Manager - En. Kamarul - at aneeqafeeq@yahoo.com