19-02-2020 > WORLD:MUSiC:MiX # 33 selected ETHNiC FUSiON tracks 1996-1984

AFRICANDO

19-02-2020 > WORLD:MUSiC:MiX # 33 selected ETHNiC FUSiON tracks 1996-1984 # WmW:   Africando, The Klezmatics, Danyel Waro, Mahotella Queens, Strunz & Farah, Oliver Mtukudzi, Rabih Abou-Khalil, Astor Piazzolla, Los Lobos, Pata Negra, Issa Juma And Super Wanyika Stars, Dead Can Dance, Lizzy Mercier Descloux

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1996-1984

Africando represents a cross-cultural collaboration between top-ranked, New York-based, Latin musicians and African vocalists. 
Africando
Gombo (Boncana Maïga / Nicholas Menheim) 5:10
Diaraf 5:37
from Gombo Salsa 1996
On Gombo Salsa, Africando moves into even higher and hotter musical territory. The band continues to polish its radiant mixture of classic mambos, sones, boleros, and cha-chas. However, on this album listeners do not hear the voice of Pape Seck. He died unexpectedly in 1995 before the release of their second album. His raspy, gritty voice will never be forgotten by all music lovers the world over. His phrasing and timing, combined with an earthy, sensual feel, place him among the immortals. With his irreplaceable loss, Africando decided to employ other great soneros from Africa and Cuba. The result is the strong vocal front line of Medoune Diallo, Nicholas Menheim, and Ronnie Baro. Bolstering this lineup is the venerable veteran Gnonnas Pedro from Benin, who assures listeners that in the music lies the truth...

Inimitable N.Y.C. band blends klezmer music and socially conscious lyrics with contemporary rock, funk, and avant-garde jazz.
The Klezmatics
Man in a Hat (The Klezmatics / David Lindsay / Traditional) 3:03
Khsidim Tants (Traditional) 4:17
from Jews with Horns 1995
Picture the Reverend Horton Heat with a yarmulke, if you like. Or "Fiddler on the Roof" with Coltraneian complexity. Just don't expect somber religious music. The Klezmatics' brand of Jewish klezmer is as spirited as it is spiritual. The fast numbers, which dominate their third album, are frenzied celebratory drinking songs -- a true revival of the community spirit which spawned this eastern European brand of folk music. All that happiness poses a sequencing challenge: Where do you put the few downbeat stylistic diversions (a Yiddish labor song from 1889; a thunderously moving, jazzy clarinet improvisation; an eerie poem with a classical arrangement)? Jews With Horns suffers a little for hiding most of its variety at the end of the album. But that's a quibble in the face of such top-notch musicianship...

Danyel Waro was born and raised at the Ile de la Réunion, a French territory in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar. A descendant of French colonists, he is the most renowned proponent of the Maloya, a compound rhythm which had its origin in chants of enslaved workers on the sugar cane plantations, a sort of "blues à la Réunion." Maloya is seen as a strong force of Réunion identity and was at times even banned by the French authorities governing the island. Whereas the archaic Maloya consisted first of all chants sung over traditional percussion instruments, Waro must be credited with having expanded the Maloya style to transport a message and through his performances, music, and lyrics, live up to a new unity. 
Danyel Waro ‎
Batarsité 8:05
Tikok 7:15
from Batarsité 1994
...WARO was born in Le Tampon on the southern slopes of the volcano that forms the island of Réunion and exemplifies the island’s heritage as someone who is of mixed race having been descended from both colonists and slaves. Having grown up in the most primitive conditions with no running water, no electricity and subjected to a hard life of eking out a living from the land, the lack of luxuries left its toll on WARO’s psyche which has forever connected him to the land and the plight of a colonized island that still suffers from the ramifications of the historical injustices. These traditional musical forms have been used as a political weapon to sharpen the psyche and instill a sense of pride amongst the people who have suffered from the fervent,  even militant dominion of France’s iron fist throughout the centuries....

The Queens, often heard in concert and on record with deep-voiced "groaner" Simon Mahlathini, represent the South African township style with absolute perfection. Established in 1964 as a session harmony group, they came to prominence in the '70s with their tough vocal style and rock-solid mbaqanga backing band.
Mahotella Queens
Women of the World (Eileen Butler / Mike Pilot) 3:01
Africa (Allan Schlosberg) 4:28
from Women of the World 1993
Although usually heard backing the groans and surging vocals of Mahlathini, the Mahotella Queens can certainly perform on their own. A working unit since 1964, they show on this new release that their harmonies and leads deserve attention on their own. There are celebratory praise songs such as "Africa" and the title track...

Combining elements of Latin and Middle Eastern music (Jorge Strunz is Costa Rican while Ardeshir is Iranian), this acoustic guitar duo's world-jazz fusion style offers an interesting blend of music. 
Strunz & Farah
Caracol (Jorge Strunz) 4:28
Américas (Luis Perez Ixoneztli / Juanito Oliva / Jorge Strunz) 5:36
from Americas 1992
The latest from this dazzling and astonishing guitar duo surpasses 1990's award-winning Primal Magic with blazing intensity and passion. Their uptempo flamenco sound really vaults way beyond standard fare. Jorge Strunz occupies the left channel, while Ardeshir Farah holds down the right. Visual images abound, conjuring up remote, romantic islands, tropical rainforests and warm, moonlit waters. "Américas" melds the flair, dexterity and cultural roots of their combined Latin American and Middle Eastern heritages with the surrounding septet of tremendous musicians.

One of Zimbabwe's greatest musical and cultural icons, Mtukudzi's distinctive mix of styles and traditions earned its own genre as "Tuku" music.
Oliver Mtukudzi
Chipembenene 5:58
Ngwarai Vana Vangu 4:15
from Mtukudzi Collection 1984-1991
A musical and cultural icon in his native Zimbabwe, Oliver "Tuku" Mtukudzi's songs reflected the daily life and struggles of his homeland by blending together a number of South African music traditions including mbira, mbaqanga, jit, and the traditional drumming styles of the Korekore to create a distinctive style that his fans affectionately dubbed "Tuku music." An inventive guitarist and passionate singer, Mtukudzi was also an astonishingly prolific recording artist, releasing 67 albums during his four-decade career.

The musical traditions of the Arabic world are fused with jazz improvisation and European classical techniques by Lebanese-born oud player and composer Rabih Abou-Khalil. The CMJ New Music Report noted that Abou-Khalil has "consistently sought to create common ground between the Arab music mileau of his roots and the more global musical world of today."
Rabih Abou-Khalil 
Remembering Machghara (Rabih Abou-Khalil) 7:14
Nida (Rabih Abou-Khalil) 6:43
Dreams of a Dying City (Rabih Abou-Khalil / Duke Ellington / Irving Mills / Juan Tizol) 11:05
from Roots & Sprouts 1990
In a satisfying stylistic experiment, Lebanese composer and oud player Rabih Abou-Khalil has decided to put together an album of jazz numbers with no Western instruments other than Glen Moore's standup bass. There is Yassin El-Achek on violin, but the violin is almost as much a Middle Eastern instrument as a Western one... This album represents the expatriate Lebanese composer-musician in his prime.

It's not hyperbole to say that Astor Piazzolla is the single most important figure in the history of tango, a towering giant whose shadow looms large over everything that preceded and followed him. Piazzolla's place in Argentina's greatest cultural export is roughly equivalent to that of Duke Ellington in jazz -- the genius composer who took an earthy, sensual, even disreputable folk music and elevated it into a sophisticated form of high art.
Astor Piazzolla
La camorra I, tango (Astor Piazzolla) 9:26
La camorra III, tango (Astor Piazzolla) 11:06
Sur: Los Suenos (South: The Dreams) (Astor Piazzolla) 2:57
from La Camorra: The Solitude of Passionate Provocation 1989
Recorded with his quintet and originally released in the late '80s, La Camorra features some of tango master Astor Piazzolla's finest moments. The album was recorded after Piazzolla's last major U.S. tour, and La Camorra highlights the intensity of his composition as well as his playing.

East L.A. barrio band that draws gracefully from rock, Tex-Mex, country, folk, R&B, blues, and traditional Spanish and Mexican music.
Los Lobos
La Guacamaya (Traditional) 2:05
Estoy Sentado Aquí (Cesar Rosas) 2:28
La Pistola y el Corazón (David Hidalgo / Louie Pérez) 3:27
from La pistola y el corazón 1988
Los Lobos used the commercial breakthrough represented by La Bamba to turn to their first love, Mexican folk music, and recorded this excellent collection of norteño songs. If this is a band that seems to do too many things well, in a sense they are at their best when they narrow their focus, and they are certainly masters of their style here.

Pata Negra (literally, Black Leg, which is the best cut of ham in Spain) was formed in the 1980s by brothers Raimundo and Rafael Amador. Combining flamenco with amplified blues guitar, they scored their first hit with the EP Guitarras Callajeras and then again with Blues de la Frontera. The band has broken up and regrouped several times following musical differences between Raimundo and Rafael.
Pata Negra
Bodas de Sangre (Rafael Amador / Federico García Lorca) 3:04
Pasa la Vida (Romero San Juan / Garrido Lopez) 3:51
Blues de la Frontera (Rafael Amador / Raimundo Amador) 4:13
from Blues de la frontera 1987
Flamenco is both a romantic, alluring music and a dynamic, aggressive one, particularly when played and sung by masters of the idiom. Rafael and Raimundo Amador are contemporary players who understand this dualism, and illuminated it through all nine selections. Raimundo Amador provided punch on electric and flamenco guitar and bass, while Rafael sang with both lightness and spark and answered his brother's flashy chords and passages with equally hot, sensual lines and phrases.

Adamu and Abbu are the guitarists featured on most of the tracks on World Defeats the Grandfathers, a compilation of recordings made between 1982 and 1986 by Issa Juma, a Tanzania-born vocalist and bandleader who became a star in Kenya. Juma, a key figure in the creation of Kenyan Swahili rumba, scored numerous hits with the band Les Wanyika. After leaving the band in the early 80s, he led a number of successful ensembles, all with some variation of Wanyika in their names - Wanyika Stars, Super Wanyika Stars, Waanyika, Wanyika Super Les Les.
Whatever the band name, Issa Juma stretched the boundaries of Swahili rumba, adding Congolese flavor and elements of Kenyan benga to the mix. Still, the tracks collected on this delightfully, if puzzlingly titled collection, don't vary greatly in format or style, despite having been recorded in five different sessions with varying personnel. The sound is rhythmically supple, guitar-driven, and relaxed; every track runs eight to nine minutes, giving the players generous (and sometimes excessive) space to stretch out.
Issa Juma And Super Wanyika Stars
Barua [The Letter] 8:34
Mwanaidi 8:51
Wacha Waseme [Let Them Talk] 8:53
from World Defeats the Grandfathers / Swinging Swahili Rumba 1982 - 1986
2010 release. Wanyika is Swahili for "wild ones," and it's a fitting moniker for the various related Wanyika bands that dominated the nightclubs, recording studios and radio waves of Nairobi, Kenya, from the early 1970s into the 90s. The Wanyika bands defined Swahili rumba, the dance music popular throughout East Africa: swinging rhythms, ringing electric guitars and strong, earthy vocals. Issa Juma was one of the founders of the Wanyika dynasty and, with his powerful baritone and rhythmic phrasing, the most distinctive of its singers. (His voice has been likened to that of the Jamaican reggae singer Toots Hibbert of Toots & the Maytals.) A prominent member of Simba Wanyika and then Les Wanyika, Juma formed his own Super Wanyika Stars in the early '80s and produced hit after hit until an untimely stroke ended his career in 1988. World Defeats the Grandfathers collects the biggest and best of these hits in one rollicking CD that brings the sound of "the wild ones" to America for the first time.

Dead Can Dance combine elements of European folk music, particularly music from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, with ambient pop and worldbeat flourishes.
Dead Can Dance
De Profundis (Out of the Depths of Sorrow) (Dead Can Dance) 3:58
Mesmerism (Dead Can Dance) 3:52
Circumradiant Dawn (Dead Can Dance) 3:17
from Spleen And Ideal 1985
With this amazing album, Dead Can Dance fully took the plunge into the heady mix of musical traditions that would come to define its sound and style for the remainder of its career. The straightforward goth affectations are exchanged for a sonic palette and range of imagination. Calling it "haunting" and "atmospheric" barely scratches even the initial surface of the album's power. The common identification of the duo with a consciously medieval European sound starts here -- quite understandable, when one considers the mystic titles of songs, references to Latin, choirs, and other touches that make the album sound like it was recorded in an immense cathedral.

Globetrotting French musician whose eclectic body of work encompasses New York's no wave scene and authentic African rhythms. A musician, songwriter, poet, painter, author, and actress, Lizzy Mercier Descloux enjoyed a recording career as eclectic as her résumé would suggest, breaking boundaries as one of the pioneers of New York's no wave scene as well as fusing African rhythms with R&B and pop, anticipating the worldbeat movement before it became a music business buzzword.
Lizzy Mercier Descloux
It's All My Imagination 3:32
Wakwazulu Kwezizulu Rock 2:42
Confidente de la Nuit [French Version] 3:02
from Zulu Rock 1984
Originally released in France as Mais où Sont Passées les Gazelles back in 1984, Zulu Rock is the re-release of Lizzy Mercier Descloux's third and, for many, best album, with a variety of alternate tracks -- sung in French, often with different titles from the originals -- added to the reissue. Some years before Paul Simon scored both attention and protest for his Graceland album, Mercier Descloux had arguably not only beaten him to the punch but had created a more exuberant and fascinating record -- Simon's studied ruminations can have their place, but Mercier Descloux, simply put, actually sounds like she's having fun. A quote from ZE Records' Michel Esteban -- "this South African music reminded us, as incredible as it may sound, of the Velvet Underground" -- sums up how easily Zulu Rock's blend comes together, rejecting exoticism in favor of kinship and play...