Showing 31-40 of 67 results
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Twenty-five years of musical magic
Life, John Clewley, Published on 19/03/2019
» This year is the 25th anniversary of the World Beat column. It began all the way back in February 1994. That's right, in the last century. We survived the millennium and have forged ahead into the 21st century.
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Sounds celebrating Mandela centenary
Life, John Clewley, Published on 24/07/2018
» This month World Beat joins the international celebrations to mark the 100th anniversary of the birth of Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist and visionary leader. Mandela was born on July 18, 1918, and passed away on Dec 5, 2013, having served 27 years in prison for his resistance to the racist apartheid system then operating in South Africa.
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Creating a buzz
Life, John Clewley, Published on 19/02/2019
» Some years ago, I reviewed Colin McPhee's marvellous book, A House In Bali, about life and gamelan music (traditional Balinese music -- mainly percussive and driven by metallophones or gongs) in Bali during the 1930s. Published in 1947, the book details how a young man, after hearing some rare gamelan music on old records, journeys to Bali in 1929 to seek the music that will change his life. It is an enchanting book, well worth reading.
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Musical archaeology
Life, John Clewley, Published on 10/07/2018
» James Cagney is regarded as one of the first gangster tough guys of Hollywood. Films like The Public Enemy (1931) made him a big star and his tough-guy persona belied his background as a dancer. If you look at the opening scene to his 1932 film Taxi, you'll hear him speaking fluent Yiddish, a "High German" language that originated with Ashkenazi Jewish communities and was later fused with other German dialects, as well as the Hebrew, Aramaic and Slavic languages.
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It came from the swamp
Life, John Clewley, Published on 04/04/2017
» New Orleans, as the crucible of jazz, has a unique musical heritage. The Big Easy, as the port city is often called, has always been a melting pot of cultures. Here Spanish and French colonists mixed with French Acadians, Irish workers, other Europeans and Native Americans to produce a musical culture that has been a seminal element in the development of popular American music.
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The grooves of Cameroon
Life, John Clewley, Published on 01/08/2017
» When it comes to popular African music from Central Africa, the DR Congo is most often considered as the most important in the region for developing many of the dance crazes that swept the continent and made waves on international stages; think of Congolese rhumba or any of the dances that followed, from soukous to ndambolo. But what about some of the other countries in the region?
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Verbal duels and bawdy lyrics
Life, John Clewley, Published on 18/04/2018
» World Beat was at the Korat Festival recently to check out the activities based around paying homage to the Thao Suranari Monument, or Ya Mo, as it is known locally. Korat, or Nakhon Ratchasima, is often thought of as the gateway to Isan, the northeastern region of the country.
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Remembering Kak Channthy
Life, John Clewley, Published on 03/04/2018
» The news last week that the lead singer of the Cambodian Space Project, Kak Channthy, had died in a car crash in Phnom Penh has shocked her fans in Cambodia and across the globe. She was 38 years old.
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The true king of rock 'n' roll
Life, John Clewley, Published on 31/10/2017
» "They call, they call me the Fat Man cause I weigh two hundred pounds. All the girls they love me, Cause I know my way around. I was standing, standing on the corner Of Rampart and Canal, Watching those Creole gals …"
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The roots of Chicha – Peru's jungle beat
Life, John Clewley, Published on 19/09/2017
» Ever since Paul Simon used the Peruvian orchestral tune El Condor Pasa in his song of the same name, the image of Andean music is one of locals playing panpipes, dressed in traditional costumes. Think also of soprano Yma Sumac and her exotica music from the 1950s.
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