globalFEST 2006
 

Saturday, January 21, 2006 at 7:30 PM

Sunday, January 22, 2006 at 7:30 PM

 The Public Theater

425 Lafayette Street

New York, NY

Box office or through Telecharge:

Preview by William Farrington

AfricaSounds is excited to preview the upcoming globalFEST event in New York which should expand our musical horizons.  The artists who will be showcased are on the cutting edge, redefining the concept of world music.  Technology such as the internet has broken down geographic and cultural barriers, allowing certain artists from this generation to create their own sounds from the traditions both inherited and encountered. 

Co-producer Bill Bragin observes that "Themes sort of emerge, the present features hybrid, crossing border themes, music that is not fusion but drawing from different traditions in the artists life.  This year the festival is exposing presenters to a wide range of artists, electronic traditions, dj traditions, dance traditions. for example when DJ Dolores uses Maracatu, coco rhythms (native to Recife, Brazil), drum and bass, house and dub it is a natural organic process. many of the global FEST artists are incorporating youth culture but reflecting world cultures. "

Two of the most exciting artists, Balkan Beat Box and Frank London, draw upon Eastern European traditions but take them in distinct directions.  Frank London's new album intersects with the musical sounds that DJ Dolores grew up with.  Roxane Butterfly and Juan Carmona compositions are explorations of northern African and southern European cross currents but the artists expressions are so personal that the end listener encounters two totally unique sounds. 

Each of the 13 artists on the GlobalFEST roster have distinct artists visions yet within each are shared commonalities.  It is nice to see an organization such as Public Theatre, the World Music Institute and World Music Crash Arts take on such a project at at time when the landscape is very challenging for world music promoters and artists alike.

Roxane Butterfly's World Beats

Djellabah Groove

Roxane Butterfly is an award winning dancer, a citizen of the world based in New York. In Djellabah Groove, Butterfly and dancers Joseph Wiggan, Max Pollak, and Yoshiko Hida will collaborate with musical director Graham Haynes on cornet and effects, keyboardist Ted Cruz, drummer Victor Jones, Jennifer Vincent on bass and cello in a representation of the relationship of dance and music in Mediterranean cultures in a suite form. As the suite unfolds a different aspect of regional dance and music will be explored, particularly the relationships between Tap and Flamenco dance, Berber music and American Blues, Gnaoua music and dance and fusion-jazz and electronica.  Morroccan musicians will join as guest artists on percussion and violin.

Artist's Statement:
"Tap is the griot of Jazz. It was there before it all started. The seeds of empowerment growing under the feet stomping in Congo Square. Hollywood's brainwashing machinery where feathers and glitters replaced the bottle-caps nailed onto the soles of buck-dancers. And then the very slow Fall off the Jazz shelf itself... Enduring the most severe bastardization and ostracism, Tap owes its survival to a few individual destinies such as Gregory Hines'.  To me, Tap illustrates the triumph of the human mind against all oppression.   Today, Tap extends far beyond black-America and its message applies to any communities striving for the assertion of their identity. As a mixed individual, as an artist, as a woman and as a citizen of the planet, I wish to reflect the creative process of this uniquely empowering art form and express how it has affected my life, my vision of the world and my ability to survive in an environment which only reality is change. I have asked composer / cornetist Graham Haynes to design a musical landscape which illustrates the variety of influences that shaped up my musical identity, from growing up in the Mediterranean (in the north-African neighborhood of Toulon, Southern France) to my intense years of training in New York among the famous bebop dancers known as the Original Hoofers as well as my various collaborations with hip hop and afro-Cuban artists. I want my work to help transforming the perception of Tap, of women in the field and in the world in general and question the status of artists in a society moving everyday faster to the pace of technology." Courtesy of Roxane Butterfly's official website

Frank London's Klezmer Brass Allstars

Carnival is freedom, the day on which tables are turned, the elite become boisterous drunks, housekeepers are queens, the truth is spoken without fear of retribution. It is this world that Frank London and the Klezmer Brass All Stars lead his listeners into on their latest CD 'Carnival Conspiracy in the marketplace all is subterfuge'. "The whole nature of the thing (Carnival) is giving yourself over to absolute joyous exaltation and ecstasy. The release date is January 10th so the globalFEST show is the coming out party and it
promises to be a blowout with 30 piece band. As fans of the new klezmer scene know the London and the band have been known to drive an audience into a convulsive frenzy and one can imagine the effect of the Maracatu rhythms will have.

Officially Sanctioned Fakelore aka Band Bio: In the early 19th Century, before the transformation of Israel, the deterioration of the old traditions of Yiddish and East European Jews, and the migration to the new worlds in search of new beginnings, there was a notorious band known as "Di Shikere Kapelye"- " The Inebriated Orchestra" (Also known as the "Band of Drunks"). A group of musicians that gave birth to the soul of Klezmer and gave Klezmorim their imperishable bad reputation.  There is very little information that is solid fact behind this story, however the few facts we do know come from either oral accounts that were passed down through friends and families of perhaps, the original band members, and from court records of irate clients and rigid governments who pressed charges against the wild band. They were often asked to perform but never invited to stay, perhaps due to the spontaneous musical collaborations in the main plazas of various towns after all the bars and pubs had closed. As the group became known more for their rebellious behaviors rather then their musical talents, many members separated from the original band and formed new bands that mixed dizzy sounds and undefined dances. Their far-reaching repertoire became a strong influence for the future of klezmorin. The original styles of klezmorim, have failed to surface until a number of extraordinary brass musicians were brought together by Frank London. The group of musicians met in "New York City's Knitting Factory" bar to combine their knowledge, history and talents and create magical sounds together.  They threw back several cocktails in memory of the old traditions and uncovered secrets and tales of the incredible lost sounds, creating "Frank London's Klezmer Brass All Stars".

The Frank London website is at: www.franklondon.com

Daara J

Photo courtesy of Wrasse Records

Official band biography, courtesy of Wrasse Records: We need a new term for a new kind of hip hop that is not about bitches, bragging and bling, and Boomerang will do nicely. The word conveys perfectly the sense of a music that thrives on two-way influences flying back and forth. What hits you immediately when you listen to Daara J’s new album is its great musical quality “In our music, the melody is always the starting point”. At their beginning because of their lack of means, it meant rapping on some instrumental French or American raps compiled on a tape, or with only the backup of a beatbox or of a few percussion instruments. In that case, one of them would sing the melodic parts. Talk about harsh apprenticeship? But in adversity and unrewarding environment, N’Dango D, Aladji Man and Faada Freddy learned to make the most of anything that came to hand. A precious teaching they still currently put into practice. Thus Si La Vie N’est Pas Belle” starts with a harmony borrowed from the zulu music, “Boomrang” with a Mandingo traditional melody and for the occasion, Rokia Traore, one of the greatest divas of Malian music. They all speak various languages, absorbing all styles of music on their journeys. A mixture of French or American rap, reggae, roots, soul funk and Cuban music.

Photo courtesy of Wrasse Records

The Daara J is at: www.wrasserecords.com
 

Juan Carmona

Photograph by the LSUE Office of Public Relations

Juan Carmona, like the Mamou Playboys worked hard to establish himself within his tradition. Flamenco was the music of his forbearers, however  as a french born gipsy Carmona was raised within multiple traditions. He was already an accomplished musician when he returned to the historical home ground of the music, immersing himself in his surroundings amongst the great flamenco practitioners. Flamenco is still central to the music but it has broadened to include an array of north African rhythms and chants that interact with the guitar in a conversational manner.

Website for Juan Carmona: www.juancarmona.com

Daby Touré

Daby Toure courtesy Real World-Narada

Daby was born into a well-known artistic family from the Soninke community that straddles Mauritania and Senegal.  He left Africa for Paris in 1989 and has since been working on his own personal brand of music that strives to be something completely different while not totally abandoning his roots.  His first solo work is entitled “Diam” and is a collaboration with “digital wizard” Cyrille Duffay focusing on smooth arrangements and a minimalist approach that showcase the unique timbre of Daby’s voice.  Our first impression of a Daby composition was that this was simplistic acoustical pleasure with an electronic sheen.  Themes from songs on his debut solo album include “Iris” which is a song about those who've been deprived of their freedom, “Mi Wawa” which stresses the importance of respecting one’s own roots, “Dendecuba” which is a  homage to ancestors and grandparents, “Hammadi” a homage to Hammadi Tene, a great dancer who made Daby and his peers dream when they were young and “Bary” a shepherd who worries for both his family and his herd as the rains don't always come when hoped for.  It will be very interesting to catch Daby live at Global Fest 2006 to hear his live interpretations of songs that, on disc, are well crafted internationalist pop in the singer songwriter tradition.

"Diam" album cover

Daby Toure's website is at:  www.realworldrecords.com/dabytoure/
 

Niyaz

Niyaz by Dorothy Low

Sufi mystical traditions meet electronic dance in the Music of Nyaz. It is the voice of Azam Ali that unites and transforms. Ali and
multi-instrumentalist Loga Ramin Torkian are Niyaz which means need or yearning in both Farsi and Urdu. Their self titled debut is produced by Carmen Rizzo known for his use of modern technologies with a variety of artists.

Niyaz means need or yearning in both Farsi and Urdu. The lyrics sung are the words of 13th century Farsi poet Jalaluddin Rumi and mystical Urdu poetry from the Indian subcontinent.

Rizzo says " Azam and Loga were coming from a more organic kind of artistry while I was more in the head space of  modern sounding records. We didn't want to alienate either dance music or traditional world music listeners, but at the same time we wanted to create something fearless."

Niyaz will be performing at the International Sufi Music Festival March 3rd, In Spain at end of may and touring Canada in the first three weeks of July.
 

NIYAZ - World music for the 21st Century is at: www.niyazmusic.com

Las Ondas Marteles

Photo Courtesy Label Bleau

Y después de Todo: Canciones De Miguel Angel Ruiz is the result of a trip to Cuba by Parisian guitarist Sebastian Martel. Martel returned to France with a fascination for the Bolero, a smooth, sophisticated, sentimental song form with African based rhythms native to 18th century Cuba where the cultures mixed. He also came under the influence of an artist he met there Miguel Angel Ruiz. Martel made arrangements Ruiz's poems and just as the lyrics of Boleros captured the poetry of the 1800's Ruiz's words came to life in the music. After his trip to Cuba Sebastian began performing with his brother Nicolas and bassist Sarah Murcia. The trio, Las Ondas Marteles, decided after Ruiz's death  to pay tribute to him by recording the arrangements.  Guests on the album include Idelus, Miguel Angel's daughter, vocals, Ibrahim Maalouf trumpet, and Vincent Segal cello and percussion.

Press: "A jewel is born resulting from an encounter between the Cuban poet Miguel Angel Ruiz and the Martel brothers. Las Ondas Marteles offer us fourteen little Caribbean pearls. With elegant songs and heady melodies, the Martel brothers have literally "put in music" sometimes roguish but always sentimental stories by Miguel Angel Ruiz. From time to time, the simultaneously frail and strong voice of the Cuban poet is punctuating these top-quality songs. "Papito"'s Havana is warm and welcoming and invite us to come and join it for a dance." ELLE - Song "Cuban Rhapsody" - April 5th, 2004

Balkan Beat Box

Balkan Beat Box (press photos from band website)

Balkan Beat Box is an idea Ori Kaplan and Tamir Muskat began discussing over four years ago while touring with Firewater. Both grew up in Tel Aviv but didn't really get to know each other until playing in the rock band. Balkan Beat Box is more than its name suggests. "Its an extension of our lives and awareness" says Ori Kaplan as he is driving to his Brooklyn apartment after a day working in the studio. Its hard to imagine two musicians with a more diverse musical resume. "It contains the diasporic/ immigrant experience in New York and Israel is a big melting pot of sounds North African, Mediterranean, klezmer." That experience is in the variety of rhythms on the tracks of their self titled CD on JDUB Records, and in the way they compose.  Both artists have worked as DJs around the world and  on the record have put
together raw elements and materials that we had been using as DJs - Arabic, Brazilian, Gypsy, punk, traditional Romanian, and contemporary beats. A song may begin around a beat or the vocals. On Hassan's Mimuna (celebration) they created an arrangement around Gnawa musician Hassan Ben Jaffer vocal and worked similarly on Bulgarian Chicks. another captivating track Adir Adirim features Israeli vocalist Victoria Hanna.  Uniting musicians from a variety of traditions is more than just a compositional element. it reflects common experience and unity in desire for peace in the middle east and beyond clearly expressed in the smoldering skanking rhythm and Tomer Yosef's vocals on La Bush Resistance. A European tour follows on the heels of their globalFEST appearance and when they get back to recording Ori looks forward to doing something with the tuareg musicians Tinariwen.
 

Balkan Beat Box (press photos from band website)

BBB are Tamir Muskat and Ori Kaplan Joined with the gifted
musicians / composers Itamar Ziegler, Dana Leong, Tomer Yosef and other greats

MUSICIANS:

PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST!
Accomplished with tools and disciplines (extreme instrumentalism, DJ'ing across the globe) and a strong urge to create a new musical breed that surpasses the old reality borders and takes just people and culture in their extended roots from East to South, From Romania to Yemen, Balkans to North Africa, Ramallah to Tel Aviv, around our little Mediterranean pond there is more common to us then the news and politicians let people think.

The Balkan Beat Box website is at: www.balkanbeatbox.com

Steve Riley & The Mamou Playboys

Photos courtesy of LSUE

"Steve Riley" says globalFEST co-producer Isabel Soffer "is the most
traditional of all the 2006 artists."Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys have to answer to the toughest critics, the Cajun community of southwestern Louisiana where authenticity is of greatest importance. After all it is more than music it is their history, their heritage. If traditions are passed from generation to generation in the way the title of their latest album suggests then Dewey Balfa is the "Domino" that connect Riley and Fiddle and horn player David Greeley to past Cajun generations. Both apprenticed with the master before forming the Mamou playboys in 1988. They have walked the line between changing the music and developing their own sound making careful choices such as singing in French because as Greeley explained to Steve Winick December 96 issue of Dirty Linen "It's French music. It's not just the language itself, but the music is influenced by the language."  Riley agreed. "If we start singing English," he said, "the music is gonna
change."  About "Domino" Riley told Africasounds recently that the music is always changing, in their early years they played strictly traditional, later experimenting  and lately writing in a rootsy style. "We have three song writers in the band and there's allot of collaboration and we are still digging up great old tunes". One, the simple but really powerful  Marie mouri (Marie has died) is an arrangement for the poetry of a 18th century slave named Pierre, who taught himself to read and write. An 1934 Alan Lomax field recording is the source of an a capella song by Elita Hoffpauir, 'Les Clefs De La Prison', that is sung in three part harmony. Originals include the title track by fiddler player David Greely and 'River of Time by guitarist Sam Broussard, and 'Elise' by Riley for his daughter.
 

Photos courtesy of LSUE

The website for Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys is at: www.mamouplayboys.com

Lura

Cape Verdian music conjures images of Cesaria Evora’s mourna music which reflects the lament of Saudade, however a younger emerging artist named Lura is focusing on the African traditions in the islands music in a far more upbeat fashion that includes the accordion-driven funana.  Because each of the many Cape Verdian islands are separated by large distances, many unique music styles have developed due to geographic separation.  The most famous of these is the Mourna which is a cross pollination between Western Europe traditions and African ones focusing on themes of Saudade (loss and longing).  These themes can be haunting and melancholie however dozens of other Cape Verdean musical styles exist and Lura's music references this trove of rhythms previously hidden to those not intimately familiar with the variances of Cape Verdian music.

Lura, who grew up in Cesario’s shadow (as all younger Cape Verdian musicians do) has instead chosen to focus on a greater breadth of songs that appear to be mostly upbeat, polyrhythmic and African in their focus.  Lura released her album stateside in May of 2005 entitled: Di Korpu Ku Alma (Of Body and Soul) on Escondida Music on May 17, 2005. According to Lura’s official press release, drought and economic limitations drive many Cape Verdeans to live abroad. (There are nearly as many Cape Verdeans living in the U.S. as there are Cape Verdeans in Cape Verde!) “In the poems and lyrics of Cape Verde, we speak a lot about immigration,” explains Lura. “A lot of people move away to make a better living. We talk a lot about rain because there is so little rain. And we talk about food, because sometimes it is very difficult to get food. A lot of things you have to buy from outside; from Portugal, the U.S., Holland. And we talk about the relationship between parents and their children, because so many families are far apart. But the words talk about immigration in a symbolic way.”  These complex messages are reflected in Lura’s music which takes these themes and applies them to very upbeat, uplifting rhythms focusing on the joy of coming home.

Lura's website was as follows: www.luracriola.com

DJ Dolores

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Press photo by Maria Chaves from DJ Dolores official site

DJ Dolores, (Helder Aragao de Melo) performs live with his group Orchestra Santa Massa so that his turntables laptop and samples interact with, vocals, traditional and modern instruments. He keeps a low profile huched over his equipment interacting subtlely while the band takes center stage. They include Maciel Salustiano on the rabeca, a 16th century violin common in folk music of that region, percussion instruments and drums and guitar played by Fabio Trummer and the strong vocals of Isaar Franca. Bill Bragin festival co-producer says of Brazil's DJ Dolores "When DJ Dolores uses maracatu, coco
rhythms (native to Recife, Brazil), drum and bass, house and dub it is a
natural organic process.  The maracatu rhythm originated amongst the slaves of Recife for their ceremonial crowning of the Congo king and is now part of carnival celebrations. Coco, another traditional rhythmic style native to Recife, is traditionally performed by a circle of singers clapping their hands, improvising lyrics. The tirador de coco starts the improvisation and is answered by background vocalists in a call and response form. A tambourine or the beat of feet on the ground accompanies the singing. The incorporation of these traditions into a modern context began in the late 80's in with the manque beat scene.
 

Press photo by Maria Chaves from DJ Dolores official site

Auktyon

Auktyon Joe's Pub from Auktuon's official website - Live at Joe's Pub

Auktyon started gigging in 1983 in Leninigrad. The world has changed alot since, for one the iron curtain has fallen. The band's line up has been pretty stable considering. However, unfortunately GlobalFEST will be their first tour date since losing percussionist Pavel Litvinov who died of a stroke December 15th.

Since 1986 the group has released 9 Auktyon albums and numerous other collaborations.  To better grasp their sound, start with subversive punk, personality of the band... mix in the dizzying array of instruments and musical sources and you have a sound, unforgettable, while defying categorization.

Zach Dundas writing in Willamette Week Online describes the band's show: "Auktyon's music put a hot iron to most of the hundred or so crowded into the narrow Persian-themed club as the final witching hour of North by Northwest 2000 passed. Spirals of maniacal horns, a thunder of drums and guttural vocals spun from the stage. Auktyon first formed in the days when deviant music was anathema to the rusting Empire that still believed it was Building Socialism. After decades of fighting like blood-hungry pit bulls for the right to shriek, these eight guys turned everything loose in a cacophonous victory rite."

Auktyon band is:

Leonid Fyodorov - vocals, guitar, percussion
Oleg Garkusha - show, declamation, vocals
Viktor Bondarik - bass
Dmitry Ozersky - keyboard, percussion, trumpet
Nikolay Rubanov - saxophones, bass-clarinet, jaleika
Boris Shaveinikov - drums, percussion
Pavel Litvinov - percussion
Mikhail Kolovsky - tube, trumpet
Mikhail Rappoport - sound engineer

Auktyon Joe's Pub from Auktuon's official website

The Auktyon website is at: www.auktyon.com

Keren Ann

Keren Ann photo courtesy Metro Blue-Blue Note

Keren Ann makes sublime music in the singer-songwriter tradition and is able to draws listeners into an intimate world where she is a master of her craft.  She performs a collection of quiet, reflective songs influenced by Bob Dylan, Suzanne Vega, Russian literature and Jewish folk music.  Her compositions are diverse, multi-textured soundscapes that, when performed live, should fare well at smaller venues.  Keren Ann will be showcasing her most recent release, Nolita, follows the well received American debut Not Going Anywhere.  Although we missed her on her US debut, we look forward to catching Keren Ann live at Global Fest 2006.

The Keren Ann is at: www.kerenann.com