Meetings with artists brought Kenjah to attend and perform on the stage in the Roskilde Festival 1997 and the Skagen festival in Denmark, welcoming thousands of people during the summer. Accompanying with percussions the band Radiohead during their event, he also gave some traditional Mauritius Island drumming and singing performances during the Amsterdam Roots Festival 1998 in Holland. He also performed on a tour through Denmark introducing the Seggae music concept from Mauritius Island, passing by the cities of Lonstrup, Skagen, Ebeltof, Esbjerg, Arhus, Odense, Copenhagen, and Christiania.
The years Kenjah spent in the south of France as well as in Spain, Barcelona, and San Sebastian enriched Kenjah s knowledge in an unsuspected way regarding Latin and Hispanic music. During his adolescence, he was naturally attracted by the gypsies who met around the fountain of the old city of Montpellier to play and sing Flamenco music, the music of the gypsies. Kenjah remained for hours to contemplate, listen to, analyze and deconstruct their spirit and techniques. And it was quite natural that many years later that he mixed those rhythms and harmonies with the Seggae style. When he came back to Paris at 16 years old, he discovered the headlights bands of the 70's psychedelic rock 'n' roll movement (Pink Floyd, The Doors, King Crimson, Led Zeppelin, etc). At this point, he entered the ATLA professional music school *and performed in Paris in concerts halls such as New Morning, La Cigale, L Elysee Montmartre, and the Hard rock cafe, under various musical formations. Travels abroad awaited him...
Crossing Morocco from the north towards the south, Kenjah was deeply marked by the Moroccan musical authenticity. The *derbouka rhythmic technique and the *Gwana trans, or the meetings of artists such as Maalem Mahmoud Gania were as many lessons as new sources of inspiration for Kenjah. Morocco marked the beginning of a long tour in Western Africa: Mauritania from Nouadibou to Nouakchot and Choum to Attar, crossing a part of the Sahara.
From Dakar via Rosso, Kenjah finally landed in Senegal. Not delaying in the north, he moved fast towards the south in the village of Kafountine. He remained there one year and concentrated on the training of the western traditional African drums (djembe and bugarabu). He took part in the lessons of the great djembe fola M. Keita and other griots of the village, then later in the capital Dakar he met other western Africa musical formations such as Sekouba, Bambino, and Toumani Diabate. This voyage was an astonishing experiment which definitly changed the musical approach of Kenjah.
From the age of 20 to 24, Kenjah lived in Mauritius, and there studied in particular the sega with the sega players of Beau Bassin. He carried out a rigorous training of the principal instrument of the sega, the “ravanne” (large tambourine). He has on many occasions played and jammed with local celebrities such as Racine Nou Ancetres and Ricardo Louis, and he also learned how to build himself some ravannes of various sizes. The sudden and violent assassination of his model of inspiration Kaya, creator of the Mauritian music style called “Seggae,” which is a clever mix of sega and of reggae, shattered him. From that day he decided to devote his lifetime and all his inspiration to emancipate the message of his Master. More information about Seggae music can be viewed on www.ilemauricekaya.free.fr
Kenjah lived and traveled in India for one year. There, he studied the Indian traditional music approach in the “Performing Arts” of Benares, took part in the master class of Pandit Lal Mani Mishra and Premlata Sharma, and joined the festival of Sankat Mochan (Benares). He continued his voyage by an excursion in the Rajasthan, turned over to reside in New Delhi, then in Dharamsala in the area of Himachel Pradesh (provisional residence of the Dalai Lama), a high place of worship and retirement spot for many international artists. He took part in the concerts of assistance to the Tibetan refugees, then moved towards Nepal from Katmandu to Pokhara, crossing part of the Himalayas in search of the roots of the Nepalese musical culture.
Kenjah currently resides in Japan, in the town of Sapporo on Hokkaido Island. Here he tries to take profit of this long musical initiatory voyage . He proceeded to the realization of his first album “UNDERCOVER” (Seggae Boy Studios) in 2007. He lives off his music, sings for commercials, video games (Nintendo), TV dramas and performs in many Japanese concert halls (Kyo Iku Bunka Kaikan Hall, F45 Hall, Mole Club, King Xhmu, Moerenuma Pyramide). He continues to take part in the concerts for the O.N.G. He formed the Jamwords band, composed of Senegalese percussionists playing an original world music repertory (Reggae, Seggae, traditional African, Gypsy, and Latino). Kenjah currently works on the realization of 3 different albums of reggae-seggae-world-music concepts, and he regularly performs on japanese stages.