Tales Of Mugabi
Following the massive success of People of the Land, the creative partnership between Kenneth Mugabi and Joses Arins Emanzi continued to deepen. As Joses' focus expanded heavily into cinematic sound design and TV series, Kenneth learned to completely trust and depend on his sonic direction. This trust culminated in Tales Of Mugabi, a fiercely ambitious, history-making project. Moving away from traditional studio tracking, Mulika Studios set out to record a full-length, mainstream secular album completely live at the Kampala National Theatre. Spearheaded entirely by Joses and his business partner Isma Ssemujju, this groundbreaking project pushed the limits of Ugandan live audio engineering, triumphing over tight budgets and technical constraints to deliver an intimate, emotionally raw masterpiece.
Client
Kenneth Mugabi
Year
2025
Role / Services
Live Recording, Stereo Mixing & Mastering
Location
Kampala, Uganda
The Case Study
The Creative Challenge: Groundbreaking Live Captures While live album tracking is common within Ugandan gospel and church spaces, pulling off a completely live, high-fidelity tracking session for a mainstream secular artist was an unprecedented and ambitious task. The goal was to capture the organic energy of the stage, the precise nuances of the instrumentation, and the raw ambience of the audience at the National Theatre. However, operating on a lean budget meant the team had to work with equipment sourced by external parties rather than their own curated gear. On the day of the shoot, the primary lead vocal microphone suffered technical issues, forcing an immediate, last-minute substitution. In post-production, some of these compromised mic choices created significant hurdles. Furthermore, Joses was mixing the project in a newly configured studio room, requiring him to quickly adapt to a fresh set of room acoustics while executing a mountain of meticulous mix revisions to get the album exactly right. The Mulika Approach & Solution With our business administration and structural planning now highly matured, Mulika Studios executed the entire production with a remarkably lean, elite crew. Joses Arins Emanzi and Isma Ssemujju took complete ownership of the logistical and technical setup, working alongside a few stagehands to prep the entire theater space. Joses deployed a Midas M32 console, meticulously routing and tracking every channel to ensure pristine, isolated, and clean signals despite the unpredictable nature of a live stage. When post-production presented challenges with the vocal microphone and the new mixing environment, Joses leaned heavily on creative, emotion-driven mixing. Through absolute persistence and a relentless revision process, the studio ironed out every technical flaw, prioritizing the raw emotional delivery and musicality of Kenneth’s performance. The Results & Impact Tales Of Mugabi stands as a triumphant, boundary-pushing testament to Mulika Studios’ technical grit and cultural impact. Joses and Isma proved that premium, commercial live albums can be executed flawlessly in the region without massive, bloated crews. To preserve the premium exclusivity of this historic record, the album was intentionally kept off standard digital streaming platforms (DSPs) and released exclusively as a direct-to-fan experience on www.kennethmugabi.com. It remains a definitive jewel in our portfolio—proving that when the limits are pushed, Mulika Studios delivers legendary results.
To deliver a premium end-product, we leveraged our state-of-the-art treated studios and the latest in digital-analog hybrid hardware. Every stage of production, from location tracking to the final audio stems delivery, was run through strict quality checking to ensure broadcast standard output.
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