The Whole Music Experience

The Pleasures of Indian Ragas My introduction to Indian classical ragas was a humbling experience. It was 2003, I had just started discovering music from around the world as a music journalist (making a transition from alternative rock to world music) and I attended my first Indian classical recital. Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma (santoor) and Zakir Hussain (tabla) headlined at the King Cat Theatre in Seattle. A few thousand Indians filled the theatre to the brim, and only a handful of Anglo-Americans were in attendance. I sat next to one, who thankfully was an expert on Indian classical music. I received a comp to attend the recital if I reviewed it for World Music Central and my own website at the time Cranky Crow World Music . So I sat down waiting for the recital to begin. The musicians tuned their instruments on a carpeted-covered platform on the stage and then dove into the Alap section of the raga. Only I couldn’t tell when the tuning of t...

Steve Riley & the Mamou Playboys Grand Isle Self-Release/Independent The oil-crusted bird that appears on the cover of Steve Riley & the Mamou Playboys’ latest recording, Grand Isle is that picture that tells a story of 1,000 words. The image of the bird’s feathers smothered in oil as it stands in a puddle of petroleum mirrors the “survivor joy” that the Cajun band peppers throughout its press notes. But if you’re expecting Louisiana-style laments you won’t find many on this recording that sounds swampy while blending honky-tonk with 2-stepping Cajun fare. The band closes the recording with melancholy fiddle and vocals on the song, Au revoir (and that's the extent of sadness on the recording). According to the press notes, the Mamou Playboys took a small and intimate route with this recording, and the tracks were recorded at several locations with both modern and vintage audio and production coming into the mix. While this music might sound celebratory on the s...

Gilad Atzmon & The Orient House Ensemble The Tide Has Changed World Village Israeli Jewish multi-instrumentalist Gilad Atzmon and The Orient House Ensemble wake the senses with the album The Tide Has Changed . On the opening track I expected Liza Minnelli to appear working up a rendition of Cabaret . But this cabaret feel is short lived as the band launches into the saxophone-lead titular track. And Atzmon’s saxophone, like so many saxophones these days, raises John Coltrane’s spirit from the dead. This shouldn’t surprise anyone since Coltrane delved into the Far East exotic even performing Arabic modes on his horn and the UK-based OHE marries Middle Eastern music with American-style jazz. The Tide Has Changed reminds me of saxophone Anat Cohen’s work, she also combines Coltrane-esque saxophone with Jewish musical motifs and tosses in Afro-Latin jazz. I’m not sure what to call this musical mosaic, but let me coin the phrase, “world jazz”. OHE combines sax, clarinet, acco...

Mamadou Diabate Courage World Village The old year has barely turned over and already the stunning fifth recording, Courage by Malian kora master Mamadou Diabate, arrived on the scene. Following his Grammy Award winning Douga Mansa (2009), the new recording leans towards a fuller more contemporary sound. The kora pairs up with ngoni (Malian banjo), balaphone, calabash and djembe. The playing here is fiery one minute with rapid notes of the kora glimmering over the top of the other instruments, and ethereal on some tracks. Yet, even those ethereal moments find themselves locked in a West African groove.  A West African griot, Diabate walks the talk, and though the songs are instrumental, the musician punctuates his liner notes with morality lessons and tributes. On the track Bogna , Diabate offers these wise words about music in general, “Respect is the healing medicine of peace. Peace is the healing medicine of love. Love is the healing medicine of life. Life is the h...

Kids Got the Groove: LaVenture Middle School Music Programs Offer Students Opportunities Originally published on World Music Central, 2010.  Whole Music Experience supports music for early childhood development and K-12.  In this support you will find more article reprints and reviews with this focus on this blog. Although society benefits from a high-tech world, many K-12 school districts in the US have placed a greater emphasis on math and science skills, than on the arts and music so that students will be able to compete in the high-tech work environment. Some of the smaller school districts lack music programs and other schools that do provide musical programs, do so with a tight and shaky budget in the current economy. Research presented in books by Neurologist Daniel Levitan (This is Your Brain on Music), and Don Campbell’s 1997 book, The Mozart Effect that musical training in early childhood improves learning skills, especially in math and language. Introdu...

Vibration Series: PT Three—Tuning in to Your Musical Self The way it works with Whole Music is that I need to experience concepts of music in my life before presenting them on the blog. I also wait for information to either crop up in my subconscious (including nightly dreams), or through synchronicity (I receive an album in the mail, or find the information I need on the internet). The latest information for this 3-part series focuses on tuning into yourself and asking yourself what your musical needs are at any given moment. Lately, I’ve been feeling a lot of anger and powerlessness. I realize I’m not alone in feeling this way, but anger, especially the kind that rumble like a volcano ready to erupt, frightens me. Here I am talking about spiritual concepts to others and going on about world peace, when I feel this darkness inside my body. I have felt bombarded with bad news from every front which has also left me with a feeling of hopelessness. So having felt this way, I deci...