Dave Otieno

Electric Guitar
KENYA

Dave Otieno is one of Kenya’s leading guitarists with over 35 years of experience. He has performed and recorded with Kenyan Bands and musicians like The Mushrooms (of ‘Kenya Hakuna Matata’ fame), Suzanne Owiyo, Eric Wainaina, and Ayub Ogada, to name a few. Dave was commissioned by the Ethiopian Government to help put up a recording studio in Addis Ababa for the Mega Creative Arts Centre in 1995. some of the people he worked with in Addis are, Mulatu Astatke, Chachi Tadesse, Gigi, and the now famous Tsedenia Gebre Markos, who was his student and translator before he learnt to communicate in Amharic. Dave has toured extensively, some highlights being the Joy of Jazz festival in South Africa, The North Sea Jazz festival in Holland, Festival Mundial in Holland, the Folklife Festival at the Smithsonian, Washington D.C. in 2014, and recently with Kenyan Blues Band, ‘The Itch’ at the Wilder Festival in the Kenyan Rift Valley, where the Nile Project also featured.