The Whole Music Experience

Egypt Noir Nubian Soul Treasures Various Piranha (Germany) Anyone who has been listening to world music in the last 2 or 3 decades will be familiar with both Egyptian and Nubian music. The serpentine melodies, pentatonic scales, call & response vocals, and marriage between Oriental and western music certainly has the ability to attract a wide following, especially the younger crowd hungry for exotic dance grooves. The music on Egypt Noir (performed by an array of younger and classic musicians) entices with its musical mix. You’ll hear the lush Egyptian-style orchestra arrangements with call & response vocals skimming over the lush surface, plenty of raspy sounding shawms (an oboe-like instrument), heart-thumping polyrhythms and you might think a celebration is taking place. It is. Take a listen to the rousing beats, Cuban-style horns and saxophone and you’re in for a cosmopolitan musical treat. I’m listening to Egypt Noir for the third time as I ...

Le Trio Joubran À l’ombre de mots World Village In 2008 I had the great pleasure of interviewing Le Trio Joubran for an arts supplement article. Unfortunately I missed the trio’s concert at Western Washington University, though I was told that the musicians performed for a receptive audience. The Palestinian oud-playing brothers compose and play seamless pieces performed on ouds crafted by their own hands. The music wraps sublime, melancholic, and fiery emotions into its own poetic expression. But mostly, this recording with its CD and DVD (same program) provides a requiem for a favorite Arab poet. You can see those ouds and the brothers’ passionate performance on the DVD portion of À l’ombre de mots , which features a concert commemorating the death of the renowned Palestinian poet and activist Mahmoud Darwhich (Darwash). And in fact, the late poet’s voice appears ghostlike reciting his poetry along with the oud compositions. The camera zooms across the musician’s faces, s...

Natacha Atlas Ana Hina World Village I have admired Middle Eastern vocalist Natacha Atlas' rich vocals for a long time, but not until now am I able to hear those vocals in an acoustic setting. Her newest album, Ana Hina , produced and arranged by Harvey Brough is a gem. Atlas' vocals find themselves backed by a lush east-west orchestra. And the choice of material covered also spans east and west with covers of Fairuz, Rahbani Brothers, Abdel Halim Hafez and Nina Simone. I have enjoyed listening to Ana Hina from the first moment I placed it in my CD player. The beautiful melodies sung in Arabic, Spanish (on La Vida Callada ), and English provoke a spellbinding quality--a magic carpet ride, if you will. Hearing the Appalachian folk classic, Black is the Color (once covered by Nina Simone as a piano solo), certainly adds another dimension. And the inclusion of a poem by Mexican artist, Frida Kahlo which becomes a musical dialogue between Atlas and multi-instrumentalist Cl...