Tag Archives: world music

La Sonera Calaveras’ Numero Uno!

La Sonera Calaveras is a Scotland-based Cuban son group, featuring a number of very talented musicians led by Gerardo Ballesteros, who sings lead vocals, plays percussion and shares songwriting credits on the majority of Numero Uno!, their first album. Held … Continue reading

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Ibrahim Ferrer’s Ay, Candela, Eliades Ochoa’s A la Casa de la Trova, and Omara Portuondo’s Sentimiento

Ibrahim Ferrer, Eliades Ochoa and Omara Portuondo were three of the main participants in 1996’s groundbreaking, multi-platinum Buena Vista Social Club recording that returned Cuban jazz to the world stage. The Cuban state recording company EGREM, through its New York-based … Continue reading

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Benny Moré’s Ritmo, Juan Formell y los Van Van’s Por Encima Del Nivel, Irakere’s Bacalao Con Pan, Chucho Valdes’s Virtuoso, and various artists’ Guantanamera

The Escondida label continues its releases under the Cuban Essentials title, highlighting some of the best music and musicians from the vaults of the Cuban state recording studios, EGREM. Begun in 2005 with career overviews of some of the famed … Continue reading

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The Klezmer Conservatory Band’s Dance Me To The End of Love

Brendan Foreman wrote this review. If one would consider KlezRoym New School, then the Klezmer Conservatory Band is thoroughly Old School in their approach to the music. All of the usual forms of klezmer are here: the frenetic freylekhs, the … Continue reading

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Various artists’ Allons en Louisiane

A relatively small area of the state of Louisiana produces much of the recorded Cajun and zydeco music in the world today. This is some of the most vibrant and soulful music ever produced in North America, and many of … Continue reading

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Frank London, Lorin Sklamberg, and Rob Schwimmer’s The Zmiros Project; and Marilyn Lerner & David Wall’s Still Soft Voiced Heart

Judith Gennett wrote this review. “There are gates in heaven that will not open except by melody and song.” — Jim Loeffler, liner notes to The Zmiros Project “Zmiros” are hymns sung during the circum-Sabbath meals. The Zmiros Project sets … Continue reading

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Various artists’ The Kingdom of Zydeco

Brendan Foreman wrote this review. As a companion to his superb book The Kingdom of Zydeco Michael Tisserand has compiled this equally superb collection of zydeco music. It only makes sense to provide a soundtrack to a book devoted to … Continue reading

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Taberna Mylaensis’ L’anima du munnu

Brendan Foreman wrote this review. Being stuck in the middle of the Mediterranean as it is, Sicily has been visited, invaded, and colonized by just about every culture that lines that sea, as well as a few who dropped in … Continue reading

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Selim Sesler’s The Road to Keşan: Turkish Rom and Regional Music of Thrace

Brendan Foreman wrote this review. It continues to be a great time for the traditional music lover, especially now that Rounder Records has begun distributing the music of Traditional Crossroads, a record company in New York that specializes in the … Continue reading

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KlezRoym’s Sceni

Brendan Foreman wrote this review. This is a lesson that I find myself learning over and over again: Never, ever underestimate humanity’s ability to reconfigure venerable art forms into new, often strange objects. Just when I thought I had klezmer … Continue reading

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