Lwere drums his way to the banks

When I meet Francis Lwere in Mpambire village, Mpigi District, he is seated under a shade on a bench, applying final touches on a drum.
He is weaving and tightening the upper skin of the drum to the bottom using animal skin strings while sharing a bench with one of his partners who is curving a vacuum using a spear in one of the drum frames.

Starting
He says drum making is a business he ventured into in 2015 inheriting from his father who had just retired due to old age.
By the time he took over, the business was on its knees and Lwere needed to borrow some money from friends to resuscitate it.
His neighbours regarded him with contempt as he chopped wood outside his house every day to carve music instruments.
“I had some skills. All I needed was some money to start afresh. I managed to raise Shs80,000 which I used to buy the raw materials including craft knives, animal skins, needles and tree trunks,” says Lwere.

He believes that the making of traditional music instruments reflects the dynamic creative impulses of a society. To get raw material, Lwere travelled deep in Mpigi to source for wood in forests. He says the local people were hesitant to help him because they assumed he was only there to make instruments for sale just like his father.
He says he decided to recycle because he was uneasy with cutting down trees, but in 2016, he went to the forest and was able to collect wood pieces already cut and discarded by other people.

He also bought some pieces from piles collected for sale as firewood.
“My aim was to create good instruments so I decided to blend my carpentry experience with various cultures to create them,” says Lwere.
“I used traditional designs, local materials and experience and picked up wood pieces rather than cutting down trees but most importantly because I wanted to do it like the local artists would and create traditional music blend that sounds professional,” he says.

Business picks up
He bought hides and skins and started making the smallest drums that are hanged in living rooms.
Every time he made a sell, he reinvested the proceeds in the business to keep it growing. From size four, which is the smallest drum he sells, he advanced to size six until a time when he was able to make the biggest drum size.
“After making a sell, I go on the lookout for animal skins and hides from different traders and dealers in the village to make more drums. When the skins and hides become scarce in the local community, I travel to Kampala to different abattoirs to buy them,” says Lwere.

In the past, Lwere bought one animal skin at Shs50,000 apiece but lately the price has dropped to as low as Shs15,000 when the hides are flooded on the market.
Lwere has so far made more than 400 wooden music instruments including drums, flutes and African xylophones that can also be used to play traditional tunes especially from Buganda.

Process
According to Lwere, the process of making a drum starts with scouting for tree species desired for drum making.
Lwere gets the wood that will give him the size of the frame of the drum from either his forest or buying it from those willing to sell.
The cost of a log is determined by its size but on average, it ranges between Shs90,000 and Shs400,000.

When he has acquired the frame, he uses a spear, an axe and a panga to drill a vacuum from the top to the bottom.
All this is done when the log is still wet before putting it under the sun to dry for five or more days.
When the log is eventually dry, he buys a fresh cow skin that he spreads under the sun with the help of improvised tree stamps to stretch it so that it dries well.
The drying process takes approximately three to seven days depending on the intensity of the heat from the sun.

When the skin is then dry, he dips it in water to make it wet and soft to make coating it on the drum frame easy and stress free. At this stage, he, again, gives the skin three to four days to dry on the frame after cutting off the surplus skin that hangs on the frame sides.
In the four days, he uses these skin cuttings to prepare strings on the side that he later uses to weave and tighten the bottom and upper skin on the frame together.
He finally puts the drum under the sun to dry before putting it in the display house.
“When I am to make a drum that is amplified (with base), I have to use a skin that was obtained from a bull because these skins are hard and strong. If I want to make a loud drum, I use skins obtained from female cows,” he observes.
He says it is very satisfying to have instruments that are handmade and locally produced by artisans using local knowledge.
“Sometimes wood in the forest is scarce and because of this, the finishing production process of some drums is interesting. I place aluminium iron sheeting on the inside to keep the drum light and prevent it from rusting, then I cover it with animal skin on the outside to maintain its traditional appearance,” he says.
In a week, he says he makes between 10 to 20 drums but that this is determined by the availability of skins and hides and frames.

Benefits
From the business, Lwere says he has managed to build a home. He is happy that he has also built friendship with people who constitute most of his clients.
He has been able to train some people on how to make drums and charges them a weekly or monthly fee depending on how fast they learn.
When a customer buys a drum, at say, Shs70,000, Lwere says the profit margin becomes small compared to when he sells one drum at Shs150,000 where he makes a reasonable profit of between Shs20,000 to Shs50,000 per piece.

These are mostly clients who buy in bulk and those who buy a single piece. It is from customers who buy a single piece that earn him a reasonable profit. In a month of good business, Lwere is able to make Shs500,000 as profits.
The smallest drum costs Shs50,000 and the bigger drum costs Shs200,000. There are also bigger drums of 36 inches, similar to those that are drummed at the Buganda King’s palace that cost as much as Shs1.4m. Long drums, locally known as Engalabi cost between Shs80,000 to Shs150,000.
“I want to inspire other young artists to follow my approach, that even discarded wood can be made into something creative,” he says.

Challenges
Like any other business, Lwere does not run without any challenges. For example, the tools and materials to make drums are sometimes hard to come by. For instance, the cost of frames sometimes shoots up when the cost of trees goes up, or when the trees that can produce the best drum frames are scarce. When he is able to find one, the owner sells it expensively.
There are also times when the skins and hides are expensive, meaning that he has to cast his nets wider in search for hides to buy, beyond Mpigi and Masaka.

Planning
In two to five years’ time, Lwere hopes to have grown the business to be able to supply drums to many schools beyond Mpigi District. He also has plans of diversifying into livestock farming.
Besides making drums, Lwere also makes other traditional musical instruments such as shakers and traditional wooden mortars for pounding ground nuts, millet and traditional hubs.