Showing 1 - 4 of 4
A timeless musician
Life, John Clewley, Published on 26/09/2023
» Eliades Ochoa was a key member of the legendary Buena Vista Social Club, which was established in 1996 and organised into a stellar ensemble of Cuban musicians, many of whom performed Cuban music of the 1940s and 1950s -- bolero, son and danzon. An album was released to great acclaim and a film documentary of the group garnered an Academy Award for director Wim Wenders.
Top tunes this June
Life, John Clewley, Published on 20/06/2023
» Veteran kora master Toumani Diabaté and Kayhan Kalhor soar to the top spot on the June edition of the Transglobal World Music Chart with a new release on Real World, The Sky Is The Same Colour Everywhere. Diabaté is well-known for his cross-cultural collaborations, from his early days with Ketama, a flamenco, jazz, West Africa fusion, to later work with the London Symphony Orchestra (Korolen), while Kalhor is an award-winning Kurdish-Iranian master of the kamancheh (fiddle) and setar (lute).
Three is the magic number
Life, John Clewley, Published on 30/01/2018
» This week World Beat considers three stringed instruments from Africa: the valiha from Madagascar, kora from West Africa and oud from North Africa (which may have originated in what was Persia). All these instruments are plucked and 10 years ago, a bright spark in the music business thought it would be a good idea to bring together three master pluckers of these three instruments to see what music they might create. The result was the 3MA project release back in 2008.
Sounds from Soweto
Life, John Clewley, Published on 08/03/2016
» I first saw the all-singing, all-dancing Mahotella Queens back in the late 1980s, when they were on their epic tour of Europe, Asia, and the Americas, with their incomparable backing band, Makgona Tsohle, and leader singer, Simon "Mahlathini" Nkabinde. After years of having their movements restricted in their own country, they found themselves celebrated all over the world for their irresistible mbaqanga music, a genre they helped create in South Africa's "townships" in the 1960s.