Nabokov, Nicolas [Nikolay]

Nimbus.

British record company. Founded in 1971, it achieved early success mastering high-quality LP records, and in 1982 became the first British company to manufacture CDs. Its unsuccessful financial involvement with Robert Maxwell in the late 1980s led to the stripping of the manufacturing plants in Britain and America, and later to the inauguration of Nimbus Technology and Engineering (NTE) to design and construct CD mastering equipment. In the 1990s NTE became one of the developers of the DVD.

Nimbus's early recordings of Vlado Perlemuter, Shura Cherkassky, Bernard Roberts and the Chilingirian Quartet helped consolidate its reputation. A discernible ‘Nimbus sound’ stems from the use of single microphone technique, ‘Ambisonic’ surround sound recording and spacious acoustics. To this end the company built its own studio in Monmouth, South Wales, where piano, chamber and some orchestral music is recorded. Its major recordings include Perlemuter's complete Ravel piano works (1973), Roberts's complete Beethoven sonatas (1978–9, and on CD, 1982–5), the first cycles of Beethoven and Schubert symphonies on period instruments (by the Hanover Band, 1982–90) and ongoing series of Bach organ music (by Kevin Bowyer, 1992–) and Haydn symphonies (by the Austro-Hungarian Haydn Orchestra, 1988–). A world music series was inaugurated in 1987, and the ‘Prima Voce’ series of transfers from 78 r.p.m. discs in 1989. Among the company's other artists in the 1990s were the clarinettist Karl Leister, the violinist Daniel Hope, the pianists John Lill, Mark Anderson and Martin Jones, the composer George Benjamin, the Vienna Piano Trio, the Brandis and Artis Quartets of the Berlin Philharmonic Octet and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales.

DAVID A. THREASHER

Nimo, Koo [Amponsah, Daniel Kwabena; Boah-Amponsem, Kwabena; Ko Nimo, Konimo]

(b Ofoase, Asante District, Gold Coast, 3 Oct 1934). Ghanaian musician. He moved to the Asante court in Kumasi when his sister married into the royal family in 1941. He attended Adisadel College in Cape Coast, and in 1954 moved to Accra to study medical technology and play guitar in a highlife group, I.E.'s Band. Returning to Kumasi in 1955, he performed on GBC radio where he was assigned his stage name, began songwriting and married. In 1962–5 he studied biochemistry and music in England. His début recordings as ‘Koo Nimo’ were released in 1966. His songs are typically scored for male vocals, one or two acoustic guitars, bass mbira and struck idiophone. His songs in highlife style, such as Aburokyiri Abrabo (‘Overseas Life’) display Western-influenced harmony and guitar styling, whereas songs in indigenous forms such as odonson and kurunku are more traditional. His thumb-and-forefinger guitar-picking style has been referred to as palm wine guitar. A storyteller in song, his Asante-Twi lyrics comprise traditional proverbs. Themes include village life, marital problems, Asante history, philosophical reflection and modern life. He has toured the USA, the UK, Australia and the Caribbean. He is the subject of several films and the recipient of numerous awards including the Grand Medal for lifetime service to Ghana in 1997.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

and other resources

J. Collins: ‘Konimo: a Ghanaian Folk Guitarist’, Musicmakers of West Africa (Washington DC, 1985), 93–100

J. Latham, ed.: Ashanti Ballads (Glasgow, 1988) [lyrics and stories by Koo Nimo]

A.L. Kaye: Koo Nimo and his Circle: a Ghanaian Musician in Ethnomusicological Perspective (diss., Columbia U., 1992)

C. Owusu-Sarpong: ‘Entretien avec Kwabena Boah-Amponsem’, Le Griot, iii/2 (1995), 15–19

recordings

Crossing Over, videotape, dir. C. Laird and W. Bampoe-Addo, UNESCO (Trinidad and Ghana, 1988)

Osabarima, perf. Koo Nimo, Adasa Records ADCD 102 (1990)

ANDREW L. KAYE

Nimrī, Tawfīq al-

(b Husn, near Irbid, 1922). Jordanian traditional composer and singer. After the sudden death of his father he was brought up by his grandfather, a poet-singer and rabāba player who regularly took his grandson to church to pray; there al-Nimrī began to learn religious chants. At an early age he sang at wedding celebrations, and subsequently developed his interest in music by studying the ‘ūd with Alfred Samāwī in Husn. After the establishment of the broadcasting station in Jerusalem in 1936, al-Nimrī performed many of his songs for broadcasts. Like most Jordanian musicians of his time, he had a trade other than music; he worked as a watch-repairer while pursuing his interest in singing and composition. He studied music theory in Jerusalem with Yūsuf Batrūnī. He also took lessons with Muhammad Mahfūz in Damascus. In 1949 he joined the Ramallah broadcasting service; in 1959 he was appointed director of the music section of the newly established radio station in Amman and in 1963 became the administrator of the same section. He still held this position in 1999 and received the Independence Badge of Honour for his long service and dedication.

His first recorded song, Qalbī yihwāhā (‘My heart loves her’), brought him fame in Jordan and the neighbouring countries. He wrote more than 500 songs, most of which he performed himself; he composed the texts for many of his songs in the manner of a traditional poet-singer. His style is folkloric; the words of his songs are in an east Jordanian dialect, while the tunes are Jordanian folksongs or melodies composed in a similar style. His compositions in the idiom of art music were less successful. He played an important part in the spread of Jordanian traditional song throughout the Arab world, participating in many national and international conferences and festivals.

ABDEL-HAMID HAMAM

Nimsgern, Siegmund

(b St Wendel, Saarland, 14 Jan 1940). German bass-baritone. He studied with Sibylle Fuchs in Saarbrücken, where he made his début in 1967 as Lionel in Tchaikovsky’s The Maid of Orléans and sang in Enescu’s Oedipe (1971). In 1972 he was engaged at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, and the following year made his début at Covent Garden as Amfortas. He sang Telramund at the 1976 Salzburg Easter Festival and made his Metropolitan début in 1978 as Pizarro, returning in 1981 as John the Baptist (Salome). His repertory also included Don Giovanni, William Tell, Caspar, Macbeth, Boccanegra, Amonasro, Iago, Escamillo and Scarpia, which he first sang in Chicago (1982). His malign Pizarro was a particularly vivid interpretation, as can be heard on his recording with Masur. He excelled in Strauss (Barak, Kunrad in Feuersnot, Mandryka and Altair in Die ägyptische Helena), while his Wagner roles included Gunther, Alberich, Klingsor (both of which he recorded), Kurwenal, the Dutchman and Wotan, which he sang at Bayreuth (1983–5). His voice was keenly focussed and finely projected, while his scrupulous musicianship made him a noted interpreter of such 20th-century roles as Bartók’s Bluebeard (of which he made a commanding recording with Boulez) and Prokofiev’s Ruprecht (The Fiery Angel). Nimsgern’s evenness of production and firm legato were also admired in the concert repertory, especially in Bach, and he made recordings of the Christmas Oratorio, the St Matthew Passion and several cantatas.

ELIZABETH FORBES