Music Group 2021-05-13 World Music

  Leslie

  From Taiwan: The indie rock band is 曹東沒有派對 — No Party for Cao Dong. The song is 如常 — Same old, same old.

       From Uganda: The singer is Veronica Luggya, stage name Vinka, and the song is Chips Na Ketchup.

For this week, I chose contemporary songs from Taiwan and Uganda. Both countries have a place in my heart because I lived in each for a short time. When I listen to the music that young people are listening to today, I am a little blown away because it is so different from what I heard when I lived there. I can't listen to the music without it bringing back some emotions and experiences of those days, and some concern for their current situations.

  Myndall

  Brief history of Gamelan

       Gamelan concert

I took a World Music class in my first year of college. Gamelan impressed me the most; I love the percussive instruments. Per Wikipedia: Gamelan is the traditional ensemble music of the Javanese, Sudanese and Balinese peoples of Indonesia, made up predominantly of percussive instruments. The most common instruments used are metallophones played by mallets and a set of hand-played drums called kendhang which register the beat. This first video is a brief history with a description of each instrument (3:16). The second video is a beautiful Gamelan concert (8:45). I'd watch the first 5 minutes or jump around.

  Deb

  Ennio Morricone — The Ecstasy of Gold — Theremin & Voice Play time is 2.47

German-Sorbian musician and composer Carolina Eyck was introduced to the theremin by her parents at the age of 7. She took her first theremin lessons with Lydia Kavina.

Composed by Morricone for the legendary movie The Good, the Bad and the Ugly featuring Clint Eastwood and heavily used by Metallica before the shows. Ennio Morricone, OMRI (Italian: [ˈɛnnjo morriˈkoːne] 10 November 1928 — 6 July 2020) was an Italian composer, orchestrator, conductor, and trumpeter who wrote music in a wide range of styles. His credits include the "spaghetti" Westerns that made Clint Eastwood a star. The prolific composer also wrote music for Once Upon a Time in America, The Untouchables and Cinema Paradiso. Having received an honorary Oscar in 2007, he went on to win one in 2016 for Quentin Tarantino's The Hateful Eight.

HOW DOES THE THEREMIN WORK?
The theremin is an electronic musical instrument. It was invented in 1919 by Russian physicist Leon Theremin. Besides its unusual appearance, the theremin is also unique in that it is played without being touched. The theremin typically consists of a box with two metal antennas which create an electromagnetic field. The musician stands in front of the instrument and moves his hands in the proximity of the two antennas, which forms a capacitor between his hands and the antennas. The capacitance of the electromagnetic field varies by the distance between the player and the instrument. The upright antenna controls the pitch. When the right hand approaches the antenna, the pitch gets higher. When the hand moves away from it, the pitch gets lower again. Small, rapid movements of the right hand can create vibrato. The loop antenna controls the volume. Approaching the antenna makes the volume softer. So, the left hand is responsible for dynamics and articulation. The electric signals from the theremin are amplified and sent to a speaker system.

  Gary T.

  Highlife Music - originated in Ghana in the 19th century.

       2nd example. This one has a nice African rhythm vibe to it.

Highlife Music has the structures and rhythms of traditional Ghanian music (Ewe drumming known for sophisticated cross rhythms and polyrhythms similar to Afro-Caribbean music) but is played on Western instruments. The music is popular in Western Africa of course, but also the United Kingdom and Australia. These are 2 audio clips of a group named Osibisa that formed in 1969 and are still playing today The band was made up of 4 African and 3 Caribbean islanders and are considered godfathers of Highlife music and the new Hiplife music scene. I heard the first song around 1972/3 when my brother brought the album home from college. I thought the beginning was so unique (at the time) that it has stuck with me for these last 50 years. When the topic of world music came up last week, this song immediately popped into my head. Listen to the first two minutes or so to where the band comes in and turns into a kind of a marriage between Santana and Tower of Power).

  Larry

  Afro Celt Sound System Live — Bing video

       Démarche voluptueuse — Epris d'une gazelle — YouTube

       Amadou & Mariam — Senegal Fast Food — YouTube

As Mary had mentioned, Afro Celt Sound System (ACSS) was a frequent performer at the WOMAD festivals (a traveling World Music festival founded by Peter Gabriel back in the 1980s). ACSS blends Celtic music with African rhythms and has collaborated with many Pop & World Music artists like Peter Gabriel and Sinead O'Connor. For more of the Afro influence, listen from 14:00 - 15:05. For more of the Celtic influence, listen from 48:00 - 50:10.

L'Ensemble Aromates is a French musical ensemble that in 2004 released an album of Andalusian/Moorish music. Listen from 6:00 - 8:52 (the end).

Amadou and Mariam are a musical duo from Mali. They met at a school for the blind where they both played for the institute's orchestra. The first two minutes will give you a feel for the song.

If you have the time and like North African/Tuareg music, I would recommend checking out Tinariwen and/or Mdou Moctar. If you like modern psychedelic (world) rock, I would also recommend Kikagaku Moyo.

  Mike

The Ramayanan Monkey Chant tells the story of Prince Ramayana defeating the Monkey King, surrounded by hundreds of "monkeys" all chanting the single syllable "chak". The performance starts at 1:09 and abruptly ends at 3:52. Then the video gets weird…

  Liz

  cheb i sabbah toura toura — Bing video

       (OPTIONAL) Cheb i Sabbah — OptiMystiK Recording Session w/ Munshi Khan, Chugge Khan, Nathu Lal

First link: a video from DJ Cheb I Sabbah featuring the song "Toura Toura" from the album La Kahena. I suggest listening to the first three minutes of the audio-only clip. DJ Cheb's music repeats and embellishes, with the aim of inducing a trance state. I've also included a brief bio, and a link to an entirely OPTIONAL short video (about 4 minutes) showing DJ Cheb interacting with some Indian musicians.

Cheb I Sabbah (formerly known as DJ Cheb I Sabbah) grew up as Haim Sérge El Baaz, a Jew of Berber (Amazigh) descent in Constantine, Algeria. He moved to Paris in the 1960s, and, more or less by accident, became a DJ. His complex cultural background may have prompted him to mix musical styles. By the late 1980s, he was pushing boundaries on the dance floor, seeking ways to work African, Asian, and Arabic music into the mix. Then, as the world music movement unfolded, Cheb i Sabbah began recording traditional and classical musicians himself and used those tracks to create new works — effectively, music composed by a DJ.

Having completed four recordings, Sabbah returned to his native North Africa to gather the raw material for his most ambitious project to date, La Kahena, a set of eight pieces created from music by eight different acts, all featuring women singers.

He was nominated in 2006 by the BBC for the Awards for World Music in the "Club Global" category.

Cheb i Sabbah died on 6 November 2013 in San Francisco after battling stomach cancer for more than two years. He was 66 years old.