Bluesmen's World(Music)

This album is like an exotic trip through the Arabian desert, and reminiscent of the glory days Led Zeppelin.
Jimmy Page and Robert Plant, former guitarist and singer for Led Zeppelin, respectively, take the listener on a journey with the use of foreign musicians and instruments including Egyptian bamboo flutes, mandolins, and bodhrans.

Much of the music on "No Quarter" has a Middle-Eastern feel to it. Page and Plant enlist the help of the London Metropolitan Orchestra and an Egyptian ensemble to create the magnificent and dreamy sound of Middle-Eastern music mixed with Western rock. The result is fabulous.

What I am most blown away with is how different many of the songs sound. Some, such as "Thank You" and "Gallows Pole," are basically the same as the Zeppelin classics. Many, however, sound as if they went in for plastic surgery. My favorite example is the first song on the album, "Nobody's Fault But Mine." I always thought the original Led Zeppelin version was alright, but when I heard Page and Plant's version, I was pleasantly surprised. It is slower,more beautiful, and, in my opinion, better than the original.
Jimmy Page and Robert Plant's "No Quarter" captures the mystery, power and life of music it self.
"No Quarter" is a breath of fresh air in a world of recycled music.

01. Nobody's Fault But Mine
02. Thank You
03. No Quarter
04. Friends
05. Yallah
06. City Don't Cry
07. Since I've Been Loving You
08. The Battle Of Evermore
09. Wonderful One
10. That's The Way
11. Gallow's Pole
12. Four Sticks
13. Kashmir

Jimmy Page: Guitars, mandolin, vocals.
Robert Plant: Vocals.
Charlie Jones: Bass guitar, percussion.
Michael Lee: Drums, percussion.
Ed Shearmur: Keyboards, organ, piano.
Porl Thompson: Guitars, banjo.
Nigel Eaton: Hurdy gurdy.
Jim Sutherland: Mandolin, bodhrán.
Abdel Salam Kheir: Oud.
Ibrahim Abdel Khaliq: Percussion.
Hossam Ramzy: Percussion.
Farouk El Safi: Daf, bendir.
Najma Akhtar: Backing vocals.
Bashir Abdel Al Nay: Strings.
Amin Abdelazeem: Strings.
Ian Humphries: Violin.
David Juritz: Violin.
Elizabeth Layton: Violin.
Pauline Lowbury: Violin.
Rita Manning: Violin.
Mark Berrow: Violin.
Ed Coxon: Violin.
Harriet Davies: Violin.
Rosemary Furness: Violin.
Perry Montague-Mason: Violin.
David Ogden : Violin.
Janet Atkins: Viola.
Andrew Brown: Viola.
Rusen Gunes: Viola.
Bill Hawkes: Viola.
Caroline Dale: Cello.
Ben Chappell: Cello.
Cathy Giles: Cello.
Stephen Milne: Cello.
Sandy Lawson: Didjeridu.
Storme Watson: Didjeridu.

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The group Makám  is founded in 1984 in Budapest. A group with many different groups, but always manages Zoltán Krulik special singers to win.Singers with a more or less the same as quality and tembre: Bognár Szilvia , Palya Bea , Ági Szalóki and crystal clear Iren Lovász . The daughter of Krulik, Eszter Krulik  plays on several CDs.Ferenc Academy of Music in Budapest. She studied violin at Liszt Ferenc Academy of Music in Budapest.   After the debut album the band gets some notoriety through the movie's Utcazeneszek Zolnai Pál (Buskers at a flea market). Now they have more than "a dozen CDs, always with a haunting quality.

Makám arrived a new turning point in it's carreer with this album - like ten years ago, when the instrumental period has changed to a vocal period. Yanna Yova focuses on todays atmosphere, musical movements and the toughts of the modern city living human being.

01.    Távol
02.    Mozi
03.    Yanna Yova
04.    Hazafelé
05.    Tolvaj idő
06.    Soha már
07.    Sms
08.    Világoskék
09.    Tova tűnt
10.    Ahmedabad

Zóra Hornai - voice
Klára Korzenszky - voice
Olga Horváth - violin, voice
Dávid Eredics - clarinet, kaval, saxophone, harmonium
Zoltán Krulik - guitar, harmonium, tampura, voice
Attila Boros - bass guitar
László Keöch - drums, cajon, udu, guiró, aquaphone, throat singing

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"After Wolf Krakowski's last outing, the stunning Transmigrations: Gilgul, he and his band, the Lonesome Brothers, took country music to the extreme margins of integration, where it met blues and traditional Yiddish music in a swirl of loss, longing, and celebrations of holiday foods. This time out, Krakowski branches out even further to mine the deep vein of musical cultures from all over the world -- reggae, tango -- without losing his beautifully mystifying meld of traditional Yiddish folk melodies or American country and folk-blues. Had he written his own material this way, we could have called him an original, but Krakowski's upside-down cake of musical mementos is actually the accompanying soundtrack for a bunch of radically rearranged Yiddish songs from the theater, pop, and folk musics. Composers from the last century, such as Abraham Levin, Itzak Manger, Shmuel Halkin, and others, are represented here in clashing forms where pedal-steel guitars meet steel drums from Trinidad on "Mit Farmakhte Oygin" (With Eyes Closed), or Kurt Weill's German cabaret meets the Italian tarantella and a crunchy electric guitar on "Dona Dona." In fact, the depths are so profound and rich here they defy categorization, other than "great Jewish music." This is the accumulated music of the diaspora of a people who have settled in almost every corner of the earth and who cling to their identity despite many attempts to wipe it -- and them -- out. Krakowski's recording, which was produced by Frank London of the Klezmatics, is, consciously or not, a signpost for the way to the future. He uses the past as a way of being inclusive rather than as a tool for revision. This is gorgeous music any way you slice it, moving, deep, sensual, and full of a warm humor to boot."

Thom Jurek, All Music Guide

01. My Father And Mother
02. Dona, Dona
03. I'll Never Steal Again
04. With Eyes Closed
05. A Waste Of Your Tears
06. You Will Be Mine
07. Spin, Dreydl
08. Deep Pits, Red Clay
09. One Hundred
10. Let's Just Think About Today
11. Buddy, Have A Smoke With Me
12. Zingarella

Wolf Krakowski - vocals, acoustic rhythm guitar

THE LONESOME BROTHERS:
Jim Armenti - guitars, mandolin, violin, balalaika, batar
Ray Mason - bass guitar, guitar
Tom Shea - drums, guitar

Seth Austen - National steel guitar, 12-string guitar, mandola, mandolin
Doug Beaumier - pedal steel guitar, dobro

Bejegyzés közzététele

Fraidy Katz - back-up vocals
Daniel Lombardo - percussion
Frank London - trumpet
Corner Mentos - steel drum
Brian Mitchell - accordion, organ
Charles Neville - saxophones
Jaye Simms, Pamela Smith Salavka - back-up vocals
Beverly Woods - tsimbl

Link

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Daissa is a Gypsy word meaning ‘yesterday ’and ‘tomorrow ’and thus provides the perfect title for an album that harkens to the past yet sounds thoroughly contemporary. La Kumpania Zelwer combines elements of street theater and circus alongside vibrant music from the Gypsy tradition with references to Indian,Yiddish and Breton culture. Bandleader Jean-Marc Zelwer is a multi-talented musician who has even gone so far as to create his own instruments to get a specific sound he’s after. There are no limits to Zelwer ’s fertile imagination.

"Kumpania Zelwer is the brainchild of composer and multi-multi-instrumentalist Jean-Marc Zelwer. Zelwer plays everything from nyckelharpa to santur to glass xylophone. His eight-piece band plays everything from washboard to toy piano to singing saw. This eclectic assortment of household appliances would yields a colorful pastiche of sound. Zelwer and company use these and more conventional weapons of mass construction such as accordion, cello, trumpet, violin, and tuba to create a sound that mixes elements of klezmer, cabaret, and street theater, with touches of Gypsy and Breton music for good measure. Daissa is a wild ride and one well worth taking.

The album kicks off with the dramatic traditional Yiddish song "Birobidjan" (Listen!), about an autonomous Jewish region of the Soviet Union founded by Stalin. The optimistic lyrics belie the dire minor key of the melody. Vocalist Francesca Lattuada's powerful alto gives the piece the theatricality it deserves. Another highlight is the loopy instrumental "C'est pas tour les jours Shabbat," with its circus-like oom-pah tuba and clashing tonalities on piano, clarinet, and trumpet. The vaguely nightmarish "Balagan" (Listen!) features glass bottle xylophone and trumpet with a gouache of spooky organ and altered voices in the background. Particularly beautiful is the "Shir Hashirim (Song of Songs)," with its droning violin and santour accompaniment. "Polvere" a Corsican cante jondo (usually performed a cappella) gets a chamber music treatment with violin, cello, and nyckelharpa.

Zelwer has created street shows using dozens of musicians and has made a career of writing music for the stage. The theatre that is in his blood translates quite successfully to disc. He uses the sounds at his disposal as an impressionist painter might have used various brush strokes and combinations of color. The result is a richly textured canvas with all of the emotional impact of the best art."

Peggy Latkovich

01. Birobidjan
02. Daissa
03. Lekhayim! (A la Vie)
04. Opazdyvaia Na Messu
05. En Retard Pour la Messe
06. Trotz Alledem (Malgre Tout)
07. C'est Pas Tous Les Jours Shabbat
08. Balagan
09. Le Roi des Schnorrers
10. Shir Hashirim
11. Terra Incognita
12. Polvere (Poussiere)
13. Kiddush-Ha-Shem
14. Trois P'tits Tours et Puis Savon

Jean-Marc Zelwer - Accordion, Clarinet, Nyckelharpa, Glass Xylophone
Maryam Chemirani - Vocals
Dimitri Artemenko - Violin
Pierre Rigopoulos - Zarb Drum
Jean-François Ott - Cello
Michel Feugere - Trumpet
Sylvie Cohen - Keyboards, Toy-Piano, Water Drums
Sylvie Jérusalem - Tuba
Francesca Lattuada - Vocal

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Egy Kiss Erzsi Zene (Erzsi Kiss Music) makes a fusion of existing and fictitious languages; bridges are built between well-known and imaginary continents. This music is a flow of never-ending improvisations; lyrics without lyrics, free associations are the basis of the diversity of their music which includes elements of dark ballads, chansons, rock of the '70s. In brief: the "ethno-rock" cavalcade. The band was formed in 1996. Since then they have great success, in Europe they were invited to many international festivals and clubs. Initially the vocal arrangements were in focus, which by now has been balanced with instrumental arrangements interpreted by the jazz musicians of Erzsi Kiss. It is a jubilant music that the band creates with a virtual world: many instants and emotions.

Described as having an eclectic blend of ethnic musical influences Erzsi Kiss and her band have an enthusiastic following in their Hungary. It can only be a matter of time before this spreads beyond that country's borders.

"The music can be a little bluesy, a little jazzy, a little Serbian, a little Russian or Arabic, we can play and travel as much as we want, because we have no language restrictions. Human imagination and musicality are the only things that can limit us."

Erzsi Kiss

01. Papabej
02. Ana Lytindi
03. Tomma Holahi
04. T.W.
05. Pulepo
06. B.B.
07. Rie
08. Lipinka
09. '69
10. Röné
11. Debödöp
12. Kavicsos
13. Francia II.
14. Hmm
15. 79
16. Papabej II.
17. Ahi M Põ

Erzsi Kiss - voice
Árpád Vajdovich - bass guitar, ud, voice
Hunor G. Szabó - drum, percussion, guitar, kalimba, voice
Márton Sütő - guitar, accordion, voice
Linda Kovács - voice
Anna Szantner - voice

Link

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Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan Shahen-Shah-e-Q_awwali (The Brightest Star in Qawwali) is a title reserved for the leading voice and spirit of qawwali, the devotional music of Sufi Islam. No other term better describes the late Qawwali master.

There are great singers, and then there are those few voices that transcend time. The late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan could not only transcend time, but also language and religion. There was magic when he opened his mouth, a sense of holy ecstasy that was exciting and emotional. It wasn’t uncommon even for Western listeners, who didn’t understand a word he was singing or follow his Sufi traditions, to be moved to tears upon hearing him.

Ali Khan, who died in 1997 at the age of 48, was a Qawwali, a singer of devotional music of the Sufi sect of Islam. Trained by his father, the master singer Ustad Fateh Ali Khan, he kept up a 600-year family tradition by taking over leadership of the “party” (the general term for a Qawwali group, comprising singer, harmonium and tablas) in 1971, following recurring dreams that he was singing at the Muslim shrine of Hazratja Khawaja Moid-Ud-Din Christie in Ajmer, India (which he would eventually do).

In his improvisations, his voice would soar skyward to heaven, carrying his audience with him. While the core of his work and his life was the Sufi texts, the mystic holy poetry of the spirit, Ali Khan didn’t limit himself to that in his career. He was happy to sing the love poems known as ghazals, to perform vocal exercises, and even lend his talents to Bollywood and Hollywood, to range into ambient and dance music. But none of it was at the expense of his soul.

Throughout the ’70s and early ’80s he released literally hundreds of cassettes—trying to make order of his entire discography would be a nightmare—and his reputation grew, not only in his native Pakistan, but also internationally. The year 1985 proved to be the turning point for him, as he appeared not only at the WOMAD festival in England, but also had his performances in France recorded for an epic five-CD set that perfectly illustrated the qualities of his art. The songs stretched out, allowing Ali Khan to show his genius for extemporization, turning a sound, word or phrase over and over, examining it, flying with it, before releasing it and moving to another, using them all as enlightenment for the soul, a prayer and devotion. At his best, and his best seemed to occur often, he was like a bird, swooping and rising, his voice as free as the sky.

After Paris, the momentum gathered. He signed with Real World Records, which meant that for the first time his records would have high-profile international distribution, and released Shahen Shah, whose title came from his nickname. It wasn’t hardcore Ali Khan, but lighter and more melodic, a disc that seduced those who hadn’t heard him before.

01. Shamas-ud-doha, Badar-ud-doja
02. Allah, Mohammed, Char, Yaar
03. Kali Kali Zulfon Ke Phande Nah Dalo
04. Meri Ankhon Ko Bakhshe Hain Aansoo
05. Nit Khair Mansan Sohnia Main Teri
06. Kehna Ghalat Ghalat To Chhupana Sahi Sahi

Lead Vocals: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
Chorus: Asad Ali Khan, Ghulam Fareed, Iqbal Naqbi, Mohammad Maskeen
Tabla: Dildar Hussain
Vocals: Mujahid Mubarik Ali Khan
Vocals [Pupil]: Atta Fareed
Vocals, Harmonium, Leader [Musical Director]: Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan

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Umalali is not a group name, but the Garifuna word for voice. The Garifuna are descendents of African slaves who escaped from a massive shipwreck in 1635. They intermarried with Carib and Arawak Indians and evolved their own culture over the centuries. The were never conquered by the slave masters, but have been a marginalized minority for years, with a population centered in Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and Belize. The United Nations UNESCO arm recognizes their music and culture as a threatened one, part of humanity's intangible treasures. The Garifuna Women's Project is a collection of traditional and composed songs by various well-regarded Garifuna female elders and youngsters. Garifuna music has elements of African, Caribbean, and Native American music, in particular the soca of Trinidad, the reggae of Jamaica, and the rhythms of Cuba. To North American ears the sounds are both strangely familiar and slightly alien, blending many common elements in a unique way. The album was produced by Ivan Duran, the white Belizian who started Stonetree Records to document the music of the Garifuna.

The songs are traditional, even those that are newly composed, because the Garifuna see music as an ongoing process of creation. Since it's a way to convey cultural knowledge and communicate with the ancestors, songs are not owned, although everyone knows who composed the most popular tunes. Duran and the backing musicians made no attempt to keep the music traditional, since the Garifuna, like seemingly everyone else in the world, are tech-savvy and own computers and cell phones. The album is best listened to as a single piece of music - a ceremony, if you will - but individual performers and arrangements do stand out.

"Barübana Yagien" sounds like a combination of calypso and Congolese rhumba, while Silvia Blanco's singing calls to mind the sound of Mali's Oumou Sangare. The driving bass drums and sinuous electric guitar keep the tune moving at a rapid pace. "Hatie," by Sarita Martinez, is the tale of the hurricane that devastated Central America in 1961. It lays spaghetti Western guitar twang on top of a rolling punta rock backbeat complemented by strong call-and-response vocals. Marcela Torres has a forceful alto that stands up to the bass drums that sound like the throbbing heart of West Africa on "Anaha Ya." Sofia Blanco, one of the album's strongest vocalists, and Silvia's mom, sings lead on "Nibari" and "Yündüya Weyu." The first is a greeting to a new grandson and again sounds like the women's vocal music of Mali. Blanco's keening vocals are given minimal accompaniment by drums and guitar to preserve their primal power. "Yündüya Weyu" is more uptempo, with hints of Cuba, West Africa, and Brazil in its paranda rhythm. "Lirun Biganute" is Julia Lewis' lament for her murdered son accompanied only by a treble-heavy electric guitar that sounds oddly like an autoharp.

Garifuna women have been given the task of bearing their culture on to future generations.
By combining traditional vocals with modern arrangements, Duran and the Garifuna Women's Project singers hope to attract young people and world music lovers to this vital, irreplaceable culture.

j. poet, All Music Guide

01. Nibari (My Grandchild) - Sofia Blanco
02. Mérua - Chale Torres, Desere Diego
03. Yündüya Weyu (The Sun Has Set) - Sofia Blanco
04. Barübana Yagian (Take Me Away) - Silvia Blanco
05. Hattie - Sarita Martinez, Desere Diego
06. Luwübüri Sigala (Hills of Tegucigalpa) - Marcelina Fernandez "Masagu" Guity
07. Anaha Ya (Here I Am) - Chale Torres
08. Tuguchili Elia (Elia's Father) - Elodia Nolberto
09. Fuleisei (Favours) - Silvia Blanco
10. Uruwei (The Government) - Bernadine Flores, Damiana Gutierez
11. Áfayahádina (I Have Traveled) - Chale Torres
12. Lirun Biganute (Sad News) - Julia Nunez

Dale Davis (Sax (Tenor)), Gil Abarbanel (Engineer), Jacob Edgar (Liner Notes), Andy Palacio (Translation), Andy Palacio (Transcription), Sofia Blanco (Vocals), Ivan Duran (Arranger), Ivan Duran (Guitar (Bass)), Ivan Duran (Guitar (Electric)), Ivan Duran (Keyboards), Ivan Duran (Guitarron), Ivan Duran (Producer), Ivan Duran (Engineer), Ivan Duran (Slide Guitar), Ivan Duran (Liner Notes), Ivan Duran (Art Direction), Ivan Duran (Lap Steel Guitar), Ivan Duran (Sound Treatment), Silvia Blanco (Vocals), Sarita Martinez (Vocals), Desere Diego (Vocals), Desere Diego (Vocals (Background)), Bernadine Flores (Vocals), Marcelina Fernandez "Masagu" Guity (Vocals), Damiana Gutierez (Vocals), Elodia Nolberto (Vocals), Julia Nunez (Vocals)

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Funky and fiery family brass band from Ukraine, playing the wild and sweet wedding music of Podolia, singing some heart-rending a capella songs. Fresh, deeply rooted, breathtaking.
Ukrainian musicians Konsonans Retro’s acclaimed debut CD A Podolian Affair brings back to life the Jewish Brass Band music of the area through the collaboration between the musicians of the local Baranovsky family and Berlin-based clarinettist Christian Dawid.

Odessa was the only city in which Jews were not governed by a rabbinical council, which meant that they were free to evolve into a secular, civil society which meant tavern-going and music-making. The Ukraine’s large Jewish population influenced the brass band music of that area. The Baranovsky brothers and their cousins play trumpets, accordion, trombone and barabon in the band, having been trained by their elders, Moise and Maria Baranovsky. Vasyl Baranovsky started playing in his father’s orchestra at the age of four, so he remembers many old pieces which are now perhaps only known to him. Christian Dawid, who arranged all the pieces, and London-based drummer Guy Schalom, successfully meld a Western sensibility on to the Baranovskys’ traditionalism.

"On this recording, Dawid sits in on woodwinds, and Britain's Guy Schalom joins in on drums, complementing the band's usual baraban. The result is a Podolian Dirty Dozen Brass Band—lively, exciting, wonderful harmonies, even wonderful vocal harmonies on slipped-in Ukrainian tunes like "limonchiki" (part of the "Freylekh No. 5 medley") and "Oy u hayu pri Danuy. The album closes with a single voice singing a Ukrainian love song, accompanied only by accordion, and then breaking into two voices and what sounds like an entirely different song—a bonus celebration of human voice transcending even the exuberance of the full Konsonans Retro.

The cross-fusion is still happily in progress. Gennadiy Fomin, from Kharkov klezmer, joins with Dawid band in a local "Podilska". Some of the tunes are strikingly unfamiliar. The Moldavskiy Dans (the liner notes say that "dans" is the local term for what Jewish musicians would traditionally call a "zhok" or "hora") is a lovely waltz-ish number. The "Niviy Sher" would seem more familiar to denizens of a balkan dance night than an American Jewish wedding, and the "Khasitsky Freylekhs" is a sweet-sounding Hasidic (?) Freylekhs. Their brassy Hasidic "Shabes Nign" is very different from the arrangements with which I am familiar, but is still unmistakably "Shabes Nign." As noted by the reviewer on the Blog in Dm, Podolia is the birthplace of Hasidism, so it is wonderful to hear local versions of these songs, as well as to reconnect with the source, so to speak.

This is the most exciting brass band with a Jewish repertoire since, well, probably since Frank London's Klezmer Brass All-Stars or the Panorama Jazz Band. It's also a funny reminder. Here in the States, we think it interesting and a bit normal that our friends play here in a bluegrass band, there in a Celtic band, and over there in a klezmer ensemble, cleverly keeping the repertoire's mostly separate. In Konsonans Retro we see one band with a repertoire spanning all of Eastern Europe's cultures, playing one or the other as appropriate, and all as smoothly and perfectly as the other. What a wonderful discovery."

Ari Davidow

01. Moldavskaya Polka
02. Freylekhs No 5
03. Bulgaryas
04. Kurka Chubaturka
05. Khusidl & Bulgaryas
06. Sher No 2 & Sher No 7
07. Podliska
08. Doina & Sher No 13
09. Moldavskiy Dans & Sirba
10. Noviy Sher & Hora
11. Oy U Hayu Pri Dunayu
12. Zagnitkiver Sher
13. Moldavskaya Hora
14. Shabes Nign
15. Khasitsky Freylekhs
16. Trombon Hora
17. Moldovenyaska
18. Khasitsky Tanets & Horo
19. Akh Ty Dushechka

Christian Dawid: clarinet, alto sax
Vasyl Baranovsky: trumpet, bayan (4, 11, 19)
Volodymyr Voronyuk: trumpet
Volodymyr Baranovsky: accordion
Vitaly Baranovsky: trombone
Oleksandr Voronyuk: tuba
Vyacheslav Baranovsky: baraban
Guy Schalom: drums

Guest:
Gennadiy Fomin: clarinet (7)

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The names of Nikola Parov and Ágnes Herczku should not be introduced as their common work started 10 years ago and the several edited CDs prove that their work hasn’t lost interest and lead to new ways. Three years ago their solo CD entitled ‘I’ve got a lover’ showed that the folk songs are capable to revive in new conditions. Nikola Parov has selected the music in this CD from his existing and ever improving repertoire. It was recorded when the songs were fully developed and proved timeless based on the audience’s feedback. Thus, the Hungarian version of a composition of Richard Thompson is also on the CD, in addition to folk songs from the Balkan, Greece and Hungary.
An interesting feature is the song ‘To the woman’. As a difference from the other songs, the singer is the composer himself: Nikola Parov. The composition has been in the drawer for 2-3 years waiting for a male singer. Finally it was the song that has made the decision: it showed that it’s the composer who can sing it more honestly.

01. KataKata
02. Virágok vetélkedése
03. Szívet szívért
04. Télben szamár, nyárban ló
05. Történet a Múzeum utcában
06. A nőnek
07. Utolsó tánc
08. Fodo
09. Megéred még
10. Troitza bratya
11. Ya stani
12. Rabszolgád lettem
13. Rustyuluj

Ágnes HERCZKU - vocal
Nikola PAROV - guitars, kaval, mandolin, buzuki, gayda, violin, vocal, flutes

Featuring:
Sándor FÖDŐ - piano, percussion
Szlobodan WERTETICS - accordion
Dániel SZABÓ - cimbalom
Andreas LEHOUDIS (Sirtos Band) - vocal

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Big thanks Frankie for the CD!

French world-music band Lo’Jo’s seventh studio album is a sea voyage across time and space. Cosmophono opens with a brief invocation from singer Nadia Nid el Mourid, then a loping drumbeat and simplest of phrases on piano hoist the rhythmic mast of “Petit Courage”, so that lead singer and keyboardist Denis Péan can sail from the bordellos of Marseille to tropical bars.

Lo’Jo fuses language and sound into a savvy synthesis of cultural influences from Eastern Europe, North Africa, and the Caribbean. Péan’s throaty voice recalls the rougher French chansonniers of the ’50s and ’60s. His lyrics, however, suggest the earlier influence of the legendary poet Arthur Rimbaud. Péan weaves rich, at times surrealistic images and the band creates soundscapes full of colour, emotion, light and shadows. The songs, all credited to Péan and Lo’Jo, draw on cabaret, circus, rock, and folk traditions. Listening to Lo’Jo is like being in Rimbaud’s drunken boat, riding the ocean swell after one more slug of absinthe.

Tony Montague

01. Petit courage
02. Je prends la nuit
03. Sur des carnets nus
04. Pays natal
05. Café de la Marine
06. Dresseur de hasards
07. Slam
08. Sur l'Océan
09. La nuit de temps
10. Yalaki
11. Rue de la Solitude
12. La liberté

Denis Péan: vocals, Indian harmonium, piano, sampler, little bells, basin, baskets.
Richard Bourreau: violin, imzad, kora, kamel n’goni.
Nadia Nid El Mourid: vocals, bamboo, bells.
Yamina Nid El Mourid: vocals, kamel n’goni, soprano saxophone, bells, triangle.
Kham Meslien: bass guitar, double bass, sanza.
Franck Vailllant: hand drums and cymbals.

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The songs on Voices on The Eastern Wind were gathered from a wide variety of sources including ethnographic recordings collected by KITKA members while doing field research in Eastern Europe, transcriptions of recordings made by Eastern European folk artists and ensembles, modern Balkan composers' interpretations of folk melodies and original compositions and arrangements by Director Bon Brown.

These "Angels of the Steppes" bring to life rich and beautiful songs of Bulgaria, Macedonia, Russia, and the Ukraine. The women of Kitka (Keet-kuh) are based in the San Francisco Bay Area, yet come from varied ethnic backgrounds. The spirit and beauty with which they sing transports you to the villages of older cultures and traditions with a feeling of the immediacy and drama of life uncomplicated by faxes and cellular phones. They sing of rivers and enchanted forests; of rushing to meet your sweetheart at the village working-bee; of helping a woman decide between the marriage proposals of a swineherd and an ox-cart driver. The ten singers use vocals almost exclusively; a gaida (Bulgarian bagpipe) is used on one cut; cello and cymbalom on another, and a third track has the accent of dumbek. Excellent in arrangement and harmony, Voices on the Eastern Wind will delight fans of all vocal traditions.

Backroads Music/Heartbeats

Rapturous and subtle--the layered singing varies from earthly harmonies to pristine heavenly sonorities."

Dirty Linen Magazine

Sends listeners into a trance with free-form fantasias of lush, sinuous, and dissonant contrapuntal lines."

Sing Out! Magazine

01. The Eastern Wind
02. Tikho Nad Richkoyu (Ukraine)
03. Duynel Idi Ut Oftcetya (Bulgaria)
04. Moma Bega Prez Livade (Bulgaria)
05. Bratets Kosi (Croatia)
06. Haydutin Stuyan (Bulgaria)
07. Predite Prelye (Croatia)
08. Dimyaninka (Bulgaria)
09. Son Mi Doyde (Bulgaria)
10. V Serykh Sumerkakh (Russia)
11. Zaspala Li Si Yagodo (Bulgaria)
12. Na Pat Yodam (Bulgaria)
13. Pustono Ludo I Mlado (Bulgaria)
14. Ya Ti Postilam (Bulgaria)
15. Ay Mori Milke (Macedonia)
16. Yofcharche Mlado (Bulgaria)
17. Vetar Vee (USA)


Kitka:
Bon Brown, Shira-Devra Cion, Catherine Rose Crowther, Anastacia Metcalf-Cuzzillo, Deborah Dietrich, Julie Graffagna, Janet Kutalas, Ann Moorhead, Michele Simon, Sonia Wyman (vocals)

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Ethno-folk from Rybinsk, from around the Volga river.
"Folk-project "Raznotravie and Mitya Kuznetsov" from Rybinsk of Yaroslavl region, Russia. It is one of a few musical projects, which brightly represent Russia in the direction of world music. As the basis of creation "Raznotravie and Mitya Kuznetsov" is assumed ancient Slavic poetics, melodics and musical traditions of the different countries of the world. The poetic and musical style speaks about the uniqueness of the project, which is characteristic precisely for the Rybinsk Volga river Region and Poshekhonia , whence by birth almost all musicians of group. Poshekhonia is a big part of land to the north from central region of Russia with the wild woods, fields of various herbs and lost villiages. Many russian people still shure that Poshekhonia is unexisted and mistical place. The name "Raznotravie" takes it roots in the ambiance of nature of this land which stores the memories about ancient time in every wood, in every herb. That is why the name could be translated as "Manifold Herbs". But in russian it brings very bright, wild, and ancient image in one word. The history of the project:
The group "Raznotravie" was founded in 1997. In summer of 1997 group recorded the first concert program "Seven". In January 2000 "Raznotravie" invited multiinstrumentalist and performer of folk music Mitya Kuznetsov (known by group "Sedmaya Voda") to be producer and arranger of the new studio album. Close collaboration made it possible to find conceptually new sounding for the group "Raznotravie" and record album "Katorga". After recording the album Mitya Kuznetsov offered to combine songs of "Raznotravie" and his own solo programm. The result of joint operation is the adapted to stage show-project, which combined in itself the original creation "Raznotravie" and ancient russian folk songs performed by Mitya Kuznetsov and presented in his solo album "Pigeon book".

01. Hard Labour
02. Sinful soul
03. Yarilo
04. The curve path
05. Grave cross
06. Lullaby
07. I do not care
08. Her name
09. About the thief
10. The Bride

Mitya Kuznetsov – back vocals and instruments
Mikhail Posadsky - voice
Vyacheslav Kamenkov - guitar
Valery Ershov - bass guitar
Pavel Davydovich - drums
Anna Kuznetsova - hurdy-gurdy

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Get ready for a whole new approach to Masada music! Expressive and passionate, Basya Schecter, Ayelet Rose Gottlieb, Malika Zarra and Sofia Rei Koutsovitis are four of the most creative vocalists around. Each the leader of a dynamic band of their own, they come together here in an intimate a cappella setting to interpret eleven songs from Zorn's remarkable Book of Angels. With lyrics in Hebrew, Yiddish, Ladino, French and Arabic drawn from Rumi, Fernando Pessoa, The Hebrew Bible and more, the Masada vocal project is perhaps the most hauntingly beautiful installments in the entire Angels series. Dynamic and evocative New Jewish Music from four powerful women vocalists!

1.Uzziel
2.Ahaha
3.El El
4.Tehom
5.Moloch
6.Balam
7.Melech
8.Tarshish
9.Asaph

Ayelet Rose Gottlieb: Voice
Sofia Rei Koutsovitis: Voice
Basya Schecter: Voice
Malika Zarra: Voice

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In December 1970, on the Feast of Saint Jean, three young men of that first name performed together at a folk festival in Brittany, a province in Western-most France. The audience was dazzled by their energetic treatment of Breton and other Celtic styles and knack for close-harmony singing. Jean Chocun, Jean-Louis Jossic and Jean-Paul Corbineau were dubbed Tri Yann An Naoned ("Three Jeans From Nantes" in Breton) and quickly became regional favorites. As time went on, Tri Yann morphed from an all-acoustic trio into an eight-piece ensemble capable of integrating unplugged traditions, medieval balladry and rollicking folk-rock into a empowering statement of Breton pride.

The band's homeland, Brittany (Bretagne in French, Breizh in Breton), is one of the original six Celtic nations. Boasting a magnificent coastline and a long and colorful maritime history, Brittany has been host to a significant Celtic presence as far back as the 5th century. The natives have been actively seeking to secede from France since 1532, when their last autonomously ruling duchess married a French king. But modern Bretons, despite centuries of repression, have successfully reclaimed their native tongue and brought ancient folkways more-or-less intact into the present. The worldwide '70s folk revival that galvanized musicians in England, the U.S.A. and Ireland also made major landfall here, sending droves of young song collectors fanning out into the countryside, searching for living repositories of their heritage. Thanks to harpist Alan Stivell and politically galvanized poet-singer Giles Servat, along with Tri Yann and other pioneering bands, fest-noz (night festival) dances, which are descended from harvest celebrations, have once again become commonplace while several record labels have assembled extensive catalogues of local music. A profound sense of shared identity has been aroused and the Breton people are a force to be reckoned with.

Why Tri Yann has such a low profile outside of Brittany and the rest of France, where the group has long since garnered a devoted following, remains a mystery. The band's sound, which fuses Breton bagpipes and bombardes (a member of the oboe/shawm family) and medieval instruments onto a framework of powerhouse rock, is remarkably accessible. Plus, the group's spectacularly staged-and-costumed concerts routinely fill entire stadiums while its gold-and platinum-selling albums provide a timeline for the development of Breton music over more than three decades. Suite Gallaise (1974), which explores songs from the three bandleaders' native Pays Gallo where French is commonly spoken, is a lively example of the group's early acoustic sound, although some tracks are already leaning toward folk-rock. An Heol a Zo Glaz (The Sun Is Green, 1981) is a flawless concept work, ranging from a militantly pacifist ecological cantata sung entirely in Breton to "Si Mort a Mors," an Irish-inspired ballad about the last Duchess of Brittany that is one of the band's signature pieces. Cafe du Bon Coin (1983) draws heavily on Irish material while Portraits (1995) constitutes a musical gallery of personalities the band is intrigued by, from ancient times to the present.

01. Marie-Camille Lehuédé
02. Madeleine Bernard
03. Gerry Adams
04. Arthur Plantagenest
05. Goulven Salaün
06. Olivier Herry
07. Brian Boru
08. Alodda
09. Anne de Bretagne
10. Guillaume Seznec - le voyage
11. Guillaume Seznec - le proccs
12. Guillaume Seznec - l'adieu
13. Guillaume Seznec - le bagne
14. Guillaume Seznec - la délivrance
15. Seznec est innocent !

Jean Chocun (lead vocal)
Jean-Paul Corbineau (lead vocal)
Jean-Louis Jossic (lead vocal, bombarde, chalémie, psaltérion, cromor)
Gérard Goron (vocaux, batterie, percussions, mandoloncelle)
Louis-Marie Séveno (vocaux, basse, violon, rebec, dulcimer électrique,)
Jean-Luc Chevalier (guitares acoustique et électrique)
Christophe Le Helley (vocaux, veuze, flutes médiévales, flute a bec, tin)

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This wasn't really intended to become an album - that it has is the result of fortunate circumstances and the musicians' desire to let a wider audience enjoy the magic result of the spontaneous coming together of unaccompanied vocal music from Russia and Bulgaria.
The background: the Bulgarian Voices Angelite choir went on a long concert tour with Sergey Starostin and Mikhail Alperin of the Moscow Art Trio. Spending plenty of time in each other's company, they - inevitably perhaps - started to experiment with singing together, each contributing material from their own traditional background. They were so pleased with the intensity and beauty of the result that they felt it should be heard outside of hotel and dressing rooms. At the Edinburgh Festival in 1999, the opportunity arose to make a recording in Grey Friar's church. And here it is.
The album presents pure unadulterated vocal music, beautiful and deeply relaxing, almost meditative. Perhaps to increase this effect on the listener, it includes about 9 minutes of trailing silence - to stop you rushing back to your stressful lives after diving into this sea of calm.
A journey well worth taking. The only minor criticism is that it is so short. It will leave you wishing for more.

Anja Beinroth

01. At Night
02. Travelling Tatars
03. Sun Prayer
04. Sergey's Ballad
05. I Was Fooling the Turkish
06. Not the Last One


Sergey Starostin (Vocals)
Nadia Vladimirova (Vocals)
Sonia Iovkova (Vocals)
Tatiana Douparinova (Vocals)
Youlia Koleva (Vocals)

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"Germany and Russia haven't had a history of amicable relationships through the years. The twentieth century was a particularly bad time, as each took turns in occupying the other for extended periods. However, this hasn't stopped Russian musicians being welcomed when they've gone searching for greener pastures in the West as they look to make a living from their craft. Which explains how the Russian group Ersatzmusika comes to be based out of Berlin Germany and is about to release their second CD, Songs Unrecatable, on the German label Asphalt-Tango.

If you download one of the first things you'll notice is the lyrics are in English, and that's not because they've been translated, it's because almost all the songs on Songs Unrecantable are sung in that language. Although to be honest lead singer Doubrovskaja's accent is so thick that if you're only listening casually chances are you're going to assume she's singing in Russian. To be fair, it's not just her accent, the music the band plays is so different from what most of us are used to hearing when it comes to Eastern European folk, the combination of the two makes for a sound so alien to our ears you can be easily forgiven for not noticing she is singing in English.

Before anyone starts jumping to any conclusions about brooding Russians or anything equally stupid, by mood I'm referring to the fact that Doubrovskaja sounds likes a Russian accented Marlene Dietrich. Yet while both she and Dietrich evoke smoke filled cabarets with dim lights, musically, lyrically the two women are miles apart. For while the former's stock in trade was sultry love songs, the latter's lyrics drip irony onto music that tastes of a little bit of everything from Balkan beat box to traditional folk sounds. There's actually something eerily familiar about Ersatzmusika's overall sound that escaped me for the longest time, until it struck me how much they reminded me of The Doors in their slower and more pensive moments.

While they might share certain characteristics with other performers and have drawn upon various styles, it's doubtful you've ever heard anything quite like Ersatzmuzika before.

Where one has come to expect a lively sound inspired by polka's, the heady influence of gypsy violins, or other rural traditions, you find moody, atmospheric sounds which are a far more accurate reflection of life today. The lyrics in turn are a match for this sound as they offer commentary on humanity's checkered history and uncertain future.
The opening lines of "Gypsy Air", the first track on the CD, give you a good idea of the band's appraisal of our past: "Woe filled times we must abide / woe betide him who knows not this...Let us compile a list/Of the wrongs that man commits / Never shying ignominy / Clipped the wings, ducked the tail/Little boy, Nagasaki."

However it's not only the past they are concerned with as they capture the true price of the greed and materialism that plagues today a little later in the same song with the following lines, "That tenderness' needs must contrast / With tender, its negation."
I don't think I've heard a condemnation of a system that puts selling above caring phrased so succinctly and directly before. Now, lest you think they're only a one note band, they also show themselves capable of being darkly humorous. "Oh Pterodactyl", track seven, is a darkly delightful examination of our genealogy. "There has of late been much debate / Bout what is round and what is straight / And why no politician / Could have a forebear simian / But oh pterodactyl / To you we owe a / Oh pterodactyl / A debt of honour / Oh pterodactyl / Although that Noah / Oh pterodactyl / Wants to disown ya."

t's hard to describe the experience of listening to Songs Unrecantable by Ersatzmusika simply because there's not much else like them around to offer up as a comparison. Their accents mark them as Eastern European, and there are elements of their music that reflect that heritage, but not in the way we've grown accustomed to hearing them as presented by world music labels. This is an edgier, more contemporary, and urban sound which, while it doesn't discount its heritage, uses it as its springboard to something new instead of just recreating what's been done before. It's only fitting though considering their song's lyrics, which are not only predominately in English to allow for more universal comprehension, are also far more relevant to today's world than what we're used to.

Recently we've seen how young musicians from backgrounds as diverse as Balkan and Roma have begun to make their sound more contemporary while maintaining a connection to their traditional music. Ersatzmuzika is on the leading edge of the movement intent on proving anything old can be new again and in the process are creating some great music."

Richard Marcus

01. Songs on a Gypsy Air
02. Wild Grass
03. Train-slow Adagio
04. It's the Russian Beat
05. Berceuse
06. Tver (feat. Unterwasser)
07. Pterodactyl
08. HMS RIP DTs
09. Winter
10. Unredeemed
11. Letter from Baltimore (feat. Unterwasser)
12. Antediluvian
13. Incantation vs. Causation

Leonid Soybelman - guitar
Ruslan Kalugin - guitar
Phil Freeborn - guitar
Konstantin Orlov - bass
Michail Zhukov - drums, percussion
Irina Doubrovskja - vocals, accordion, piano, keyboards
Thomas Cooper - vocals

Link

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Music, for a play but complete enough on its own, telling the life story of fictional Provençal character Maurin, by Provençal sax/flute player Montanaro using classical, renaissance and various traditional European influences, featuring a Slovak Chamber Orchestra and, somewhat dinner-jacketed in this context, Hungarian bands Vujicsics and Ghymes.

Miqueu Montanaro plays many instruments: alto saxophone, accordion, varoius flutes and others curiosities. The instrument speaks the language Montanaro taught it : jazz, music from east of Europe and improvised music.

01. Maurin des Maures
02. Mauresca
03. Parlo sourlet
04. Lei bofets
05. Lo fuoc
06. Bomians e Carboniers
07. Lei - Chivaus Frus -
08. Les gendarmes
09. Scotisch de l'auberge
10. La sirene et le faune
11. Romance
12. Maurin des Maures (Reprise)
13. Lo Manteu de Sant Martin
14. Dins l'auberga
15. La bravade
16. Fanfarnette
17. Mauresca
18. La chanson de Maurin
19. La mort de Maurin

Miquéu Montanaro : flutes, saxophone, galoubet-tambourin, accordion

Vujicsics Ensemble:
Eredics Gábor - accordéon, tambura, percussion,
Eredics Kálmán - contrabasse, derbouka
Brczán Miroszláv - cello tambura,
Szendrődi Ferenc - bratsch, tambura
Győri Károly : tambura solo,
Borbély Mihály - clarinette, saxo soprano

Ghymes:
Szarka Tamás - violon, koboz,
Szarka Gyula - contrebasse
Behr László - cymbalum, percussion,
Nagy Mihály - clarinette, tambour
Buják Andor - clarinette, bratsch (alto)

Link

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Big thanks Frankie for the CD!

VeDaKi (Vershki Da Koreshki) is a meeting of different cultures, rhythms, languages, energies, forces of the world (Africa, India, Russia, Tuva, Europe), and joining them together in search of natural understanding and communication, link between traditional and modern, roots and improvisation (not without humour and hope).
It was planted as an experiment; it stayed alive; it keeps giving its fruits.

"Any improvisation comes from tradition
Any tradition implies improvisation
Any living specie takes their form
Any living specie contains them both
All living species share them "

01.Xame Nge - Golubka
02.Samm - Mak
03.Mariama
04.Zalivochka - Buleen nu Tanqal
05.Djougal
06.Mlada - Faleme
07.Papa Ndiaye
08.Adunna - Kak u nas
09.Jot na - Posledny Denechek [Last Day]
10.Zaglyanet li solnce - Dundu ak Dee
11.Djibanee

Accordion, Piano [Acoustic Piano], Jew's Harp, Flute [Reed Flutes],Talking Drum - Alexei Levin
Double Bass - Vladimir Volkov
Vocals, Xalam, Instruments [M'bira, Kongoma, Calebasse], Talking Drum, Horn [Cow Horn], Flute - Mola Sylla
Vocals, Zither, Flute - Sergey Starostin

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"Well, it had to happen sooner or later. It was only a matter of time before the world would experience its first Japanese klezmer big band, and what a joy it is. Saxophonist Kazutoki Umezu, in some ways the John Zorn of Japanese avant-garde jazz (he's worked with many of the downtown New York crowd), assembled Betsuni Nanmo Klezmer, a 19-piece ensemble, and delivered Ahiru, a joyous explosion of klezmer tunes as seen from afar. "Odessa Bulgarish," a ripsnorting dance number, leads off the disc, a wonderful basis for strong solos and extremely tight arrangements. The next two pieces are both fantastic in and of themselves and display awesome chutzpah: "Tum Balalayke" and "Bay Mir Bistu Sheyn." The sheer nerve in trotting out these warhorses, replete with Yiddish and English vocals, would be enough to make one bow one's head in admiration, but Umezu pulls them off with such aplomb, good humor, and imagination that the listener just shakes his head in amazement. The compositions combine a solid conviction in the music with freewheeling imagination in such a way that a klezmer fan presented with them in a blindfold test would arguably be very hard-pressed to identify them as being of Asian origin. Ahiru is a very fine argument for the idea of klezmer music being transcendent over national and cultural boundaries. When they close with "Dos Geshrey Fun der Vilder Katshke," a ridiculously fantastic arrangement of Mickey Katz' parodied Western song "The Cry of the Wild Goose," one has -- almost -- become inured to the shock, the gall. Then one collapses into helpless, overjoyed laughter. An amazing album."

Brian Olewnick, All Music Guide

01. Odessa Bulgarish (traditional)
02. Tum Balalayke (traditional)
03. Bay Mir Bistu Sheyn
04. Kandel's Hora (traditional)
05. A Nakht in Gan Eydn
06. Dos Geshrey Fun der Vilder Katshke

Kazutoki Umezu: clarinet, bass clarinet (4), alto saxophone (3, 6)
Wataru Okuma: clarinet, bass clarinet (3, 4)
Kazuhiro Nomoto: baritone saxophone bass clarinet (4)
Kanji Nakao: soprano saxophone
Takero Sekijima: tuba, alto horn (4)
Hiroshi Itaya: trombone
Yoko Tada: alto saxophone
Ayumi Matsui: violin
Yuriko Mukojima: violin
Hidehiko Urayama: banjo
Chan Koyo: accordion
Jyoji Sawada: double bass
Yasuhiko Tachibana: double bass
Yasuo Sano: kit drums
Yasuhiro Yoshigaki: kit drums
Sachiko Nagata: marimba, percussion
Yoko Ishizaki: marimba, percussion
Koichi Makigami: vocal
Nammy Tokyo: vocal

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Boundary-hopping can be dangerous in world music, where the merging of two or more traditions can spell crossover nightmare. But cultural synthesis works wonders in the case of the rapturous meeting of Tuvan group Huun Huur-Tu and the Bulgarian Voices-Angelite (formerly with the French name Le Mystere de Voix Bulgares), on the album Fly, Fly My Sadness. The meeting is more logical than you might expect, both cultures having originated in the Asian Altai Mountain area and migrating to their respective homelands. On music composed or arranged by Mikhail Alperin, the two celebrated groups find a common ground, especially in terms of their vocal techniques-the Tuvan throat singing and the beguiling harmonic sense of the Bulgarians, for instance-at once non-western and similar to folk traditions in the west.

01. Fly, Fly My Sadness
02. Legend
03. Wave
04. Lonely Bird
05. Mountain Story

THE BULGARIAN VOICES ANGELITE
Tzetza Bekova, Ekaterina Bogdanova, Kera Bogdanova, Tatiana Douparinova, Tonia Iankova, Nadejda Illieva, Kostadinka Inkova, Sonia Iovkova, Nadejda Karporova, Krastina Krasteva, StaimenkaOutchikova-Nedialkova, Youlia Peneva, Nekla Petkova, Kostadinka Ratzova, Elka Simeonova, Tania Tzambova, Petia Tzvetanova, Tania Velitchkova, Nadia Vladimirova

HUUN-HUUR-TU
Kaigal-ool Khovalyg (Vocal, Igil, Toschpulur, Tschansy)
Anatoly Kuular ( Vocal, byzaanchi, khomuz, amarga)
Sayan Bapa ( Vocsl, doshpuluur, marinhuur, guitar)
Alexey Saryglar (Vocal,tungur(drum), dazhaaning khavy (rattle)

Link

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