Table of contents for May 2023 in Songlines

EXILE. It wasn’t the intention, but this issue has undoubtedly taken exile as its motif. For the musicians of Dur-Dur Band Int., exile is the genesis of their collective story. The band’s members were at the heart of a thriving music scene in Somalia in the 70s and 80s, until civil war dispersed them across Europe. Reunited, the album they’ve made together is incredibly the first studio album of Somalian music for three decades. That is only part of what they want to achieve though, Abdinoor Allale tells us that the plan is to return “and bring live music back to the scene,” with one big caveat: “until the country’s safe, it is difficult to do anything.” The Tashi Lhunpo monks are also in exile, part of a wave of…

DRC: Denis Lokassa Kasiya, better known as Lokassa ya Mbongo, has died aged 80. Lokassa was bandleader and rhythm guitarust of the Soukous Stars and also performed with Tabu Ley Rochereau’s Afrisa International… INDIA: ‘Naatu Naatu’ became the first song from an Indian film to win the Oscar for Best Original Song, beating entries by Lady Gaga and Rihanna. The song features in RRR, one of the most expensive films in Indian history, and soundtracks a dance sequence impossible to forget… PERU: when enterprising YouTuber Ioanis Patsias saw that Rosalia had left Peru off her 15-country Motomami tour last year, he decided to fill the gap, taking on the role of the Spanish singer and recruiting eight dancers to do all the costume changes and dance numbers, with the same…

Two bandleaders, British-Caribbean saxophonist Ahnansé and Colombian multi-instrumentalist Daniel Michel, came together in 2019 as part of a British Council-supported project to take British jazz musicians to Colombia. The relationship has since blossomed, leading to numerous live shows, as well as a soon-to-be-released album featuring an extended cast of UK and Colombian musicians. They named the project Mestizo. ‘[It] means ‘mixed’ and is a term for people of mixed heritage in Colombia,’ explains Ahnanse, adding that ‘the purpose of the project is to see what you can build from a cultural mix.’ Ahnanse is known for his work with the southeast London jazz collective Steam Down while Michel is the founder of Bogotá label Mambo Negro and driving force behind Colombian Afrobeat orchestra La BOA. When asked to describe how…

THURSDAY MAY 18 Constantinople & Ablaye Cissoko (Hall One) The ensemble’s Traversées programme features Kiya Tabassian (setar), Ablaye Cissoko (kora) and Patrick Graham (percussion). A poetic encounter between strings and voice from the epics of West Africa to the Persian court. Traversees was one of Songlines’ albums of the year in 2020. Ialoni – Georgian Song (Hall Two) This award-winning female choir herald from the magnificent mountain hideaway of Georgia in the Caucasus. Performing since 2009, they perform the spectacular polyphonic folk repertoire for which their country is famous, along with sacred pieces and urban songs. SOLD OUT! FRIDAY MAY 19 Vieux Farka Touré (Hall One) One of the world’s most respected guitarists, Vieux plays songs from his last solo album Les Racines, a tribute to the Songhai music of…

Get in touch – we’d love to hear from you! Folk gone fogey! I realise this is an age old debate but I’m still having my say. I saw Gigspanner Big Band last night at a 220-seat sell-out gig in Didcot. As ever, they were bloody brilliant. While there, my 25-year-old niece noted that she was probably the youngest in the audience. So I did a quick scan and she was almost correct. The breakdown was roughly: Under 20s: 1; 60+: 213. I notice a far more equal age spread at rock, blues, jazz, world and classical events than folk gigs Fast forward to a world in which these bands’ fans die and there are no longer any gigs. I don’t know the answer, but banishing the word ‘folk’ might…

Meg Baird Furling Drag City In the two decades since co-founding Philadelphia’s psychedelic folk explorers Espers, Baird has released notable solo recordings Dear Companion (2007), Seasons on Earth (2011) and Don’t Weigh Down the Light (2015), but she’s mostly been a committed collaborator with the likes of Steve Gunn and Will Oldham. She’s also explored her familial folk roots in The Baird Sisters, worked with harpist Mary Lattimore, played drums with Philadelphia punks Watery Love and contributed drumming, vocals and poetry to Heron Oblivion with her partner Charlie Saufley. Many of these strands come together here on a determinedly solo collection co-produced and recorded in California with Sauflley, mostly before March 2020. She plays drums, mellotron, organs, synths, and vibraphone (in homage to her hero Tim Buckley?), and sings over…

TOP OF THE WORLD https://content.markallengroup.com/songlines/2023/05/06-Rakiya-Su-Katamam.mp3 https://music.apple.com/gb/album/ask/1659465525?at=10lwtw Altın Gün Aşk Glitterbeat Records Psychedelic Anatolian folk-rock band Altın Gün return to traditional sources for their latest album while still managing to produce something so fresh and invigorating that it doesn’t feel retrospective or musty. All ten tracks are versions of Turkish folk tunes and songs with a 1970s psych twist, involving traditional instruments such as saz alongside synths and guitar – all of it drenched in plenty of wah-wah and fuzz. The Turkish guys who run my local corner shop absolutely love it (particularly the love ballad ‘Leylim Ley’), which I find reassuring. Aşk slams into earshot with the pounding beat, spacey synth pads and distinctively Turkish guitar riffs of ‘Badi Sabah Olmadan’. There are some slower numbers, like ‘Güzelliğin on Para…

Classical Brought to you by Sansara / Tom Herring Traces Platoon In an era of bitesize, hyperlinked, free-associative streaming, it’s lovely to come across a proper recital. The tracks on Traces – the fifth album from London-based Sansara and their founder-director Tom Herring – are impeccable: these are top-notch choral performances. But that sort of goes without saying in today’s over-abundant British choral market. What sets it apart are not only some unusual repertoire choices but also the dialogues, musical, textual and thematic, that run through it. This isn’t just another ‘pieces we like about night’ job. Ethel Smyth’s knotty ‘Komm, süsser Tod’ – a piece that we should definitely be hearing more of – grows directly out of Brahms’ ‘Warum ist das licht gegeben?’, a musical chain of influence…

Kevin Bourke Kevin has enjoyed nearly fifty years of adventures in music, film and theatre as a writer, broadcaster and presenter. This issue he speaks to Catriona Price (p16) about her Orkney-inspired latest album. Anita Bhadani Anita is a Glasgow-based freelance writer and journalist, interested in the arts, culture and politics. For her Songlines debut she has chosen 10 of her Raga Fusion favourites (p82). Gonçalo Frota Gonçalo Frota is a Lisbon-based music journalist, who writes for Público.. An expert on all things fado, he was the perfect candidate to speak to the genre’s latest star, Duarte (p19). Songlines was launched in 1999 and is the definitive magazine for world music – music that has its roots in all parts of the globe, from Mali to Mexico, India to Iraq.…

The devastating earthquake in Turkey and Syria left millions homeless and resulted in more than 50,000 deaths. In its wake, musicians and listeners alike have turned to sound to help. A new group of Middle Eastern musicians exiled in Turkey, Danûk, are donating the Bandcamp profits for their upcoming album to victims of the disaster. The album, Morîk, produced by Snarky Puppy’s Michael League, draws its source material from an archive of Kurdish folk songs recorded by Austrian and German travellers at the start of the 20th century. The album was produced before the earthquake. Nevertheless, for these artists, its music provided comfort and a site of focus amid the terrible events: “The earthquake brought us closer to our music. Our first single, ‘Axir Zemana’, speaks of the end of…

EDINBURGH TRADFEST (April 28 – May 8) will feature music from Rhiannon Giddens & Francesco Turrisi, FARA, The Foghorn String Band and a ton of tune-filled troubadours. You can also catch a screening of the award-winning biopic on Shooglenifty… Scandinavia can be found in London at NORDIC NIGHTS (May 3). Artists include Ævestaden, Whammyboy and Niilas… An explosion of Gypsy Jazz is happening at the GYPSY JAZZ FESTIVAL OF LONDON (May 4-7). Experience the energy and virtuosity of RAKA Balkan Band (UK), Fapy Laferti (Brazil), Julien Cattiaux (Paris) and more… Americana fans can get their fill at BLACK DEER FESTIVAL (June 16-18, Kent) with Steve Earle, Kurt Vile & The Violators, Angeline Morrison and Bonny Light Horseman… Lankum, Dur-Dur Band Int., Lady Maisery, Horace Andy, Arushi Jain, Juni Habel and…

Kings Place’s annual Folk Weekend this year will include Ímar, Leveret, a new duo of Sam Sweeney & Louis Campbell, and Skye piper Brìghde Chaimbeul with Ross Ainslie and Steven Byrnes. Audiences can participate too, with workshops in Boss Morris Dance and Raga Fusion. “The interesting thing about the weekend is the huge range of music,” Rob Harbron of Leveret explains, “and different approaches on display in a weekend comprising music that you’d superficially put in the same category of ‘instrumental folk music.’” Entitled ‘No Voices’, the weekend aims at ‘changing perceptions about instrumental music in the contemporary folk scene.’ Chaimbeul tells Songlines it “is a brilliant opportunity to showcase the wide variety of instrumental music within folk traditions, how it fits into a contemporary setting… There won’t be any…

Violinist and composer Catriona Price is no stranger to the pages of Songlines, either as one quarter of Orcadian fiddle ensemble Fara or half of folk duo Twelfth Day. She’s even written a Postcard piece for us about her ongoing ‘Routes to Roots’ collaboration project with musicians from Malawi, Brazil, Canada and Mongolia. But she’s ‘Introducing’ her solo debut Hert (Orcadian Scots for heart), a thrilling 50-minute suite for string quartet, vocal trio, harp, piano, flute, drums and bass, commissioned by Celtic Connections as part of their New Voices series. Inspired by poetry from and about her native Orkney, it premiered at the 2020 Celtic Connections but has only now been released in album form after a pandemic-induced pause. “I was able to go ahead and do something I’d been…

It’s a cliche about India that it is spiritual and it’s a cliche about music that it connects with the divine. But some cliches are true! This struck me vividly at a performance called Seeking the Divine, in Banyan Tree’s Ruhaniyat festival which ended in February in Pune. The first section featured three groups from the western part of the country – one from Maharashtra, in which Pune is located, another from Kachchh in Gujarat, a little further north, and the third from still further north in Rajasthan. They were all singing songs of Mirabai – a hugely popular poet and saint in the 16th century who became totally devoted to the god Krishna and left her husband to praise him. It’s said there were several unsuccessful attempts to assassinate…

“As a younger musician I’d fixate on certain songs, the ones where you can keep going back and hear different things each time,” says Arooj Aftab, a singer and composer of inherited heritage and left field smarts. “I always wondered how people went about making those songs with secrets.” She knows now. Largely because, well, she’s been doing it. Last year Aftab scooped a Grammy award in the new Best Global Performance category for her rendition of ‘Mohabbat’, a South Asian ghazal famously sung by Pakistani idol Mehdi Hassan and refreshed with microtonal embellishments, repeating minimalist patterns and a jazz-meets-indie-pop flair. Sensitively interpreted, the result of years spent studying, mulling, waiting until things felt right, ‘Mohabbat’’s slow-flowing gorgeousness won fans including Barack Obama, who put the track on his coveted…

At the head of the main prayer hall in Tashi Lhunpo is a gold-plated image of the meditating Buddha. To the left is a photo of the Dalai Lama and to the right the only known photo of the Panchen Lama, the spiritual leader of the monastery. He’s a little boy aged six with red cheeks, called Gedhun Choekyi Nyima, staring directly at the camera looking rather alarmed. The Dalai Lama and Panchen Lama are the first and second spiritual leaders in Tibetan Buddhism and have been likened to the sun and moon. A couple of generations apart, each has helped find and ascertain the new reincarnation of the other. The 10th Panchen Lama, who submitted a petition in 1962 criticising Mao’s policies in Tibet, was detained by the Chinese…

VARIOUS ARTISTS River of Revenge: Brazilian Country Music 1929-1961 (Vol 1 & 2) Death is Not the End The pop and crackle of early recording gear, the guttural twang of handmade instruments, hand-me-down harmonies and country songs of love and betrayal – you’d be forgiven for thinking this is a description of the early American folk recordings collected by Alan Lomax. But as artists like Leadbelly were laying down classics on rickety rigs, musicians in rural Brazil were on a remarkably similar journey. Música caipira was born in the ‘outback’ region of north-eastern Brazil in the 1920s. A forerunner to música sertaneja, the Brazilian equivalent to US country and western, the sty le is rooted in Portuguese troubadour folk traditions. However, the stripped-back recordings that survive from this era are…

Arooj Aftab, Vijay Iyer, Shahzad Ismaily Love in Exile Verve Records This extraordinary collaboration can broadly be described as Sufi electronica, but it transcends musical genres. Arooj Aftab is a grammy-award winning Pakistani vocalist, composer, arranger and producer based in the US who sings in Urdu. She calls her music neo-Sufi-and has released three albums under her own name as well as performing songs for film soundtracks. Vijay Iyer is a prolific pianist, composer and educator with particular interest in improvisational music. Shazad Ismaily is a multi-instrumentalist session musician and composer. As a trio they have been performing together since 2018 and their spontaneity and improvisational abilities have led them to an almost extra-sensory level of performance. Iyer’s piano and surging electronics provide a foundation for the music while Ismaily’s…

Northern Lights Festival Tromsø, Norway, Jan 2 - Feb 4 Perhaps the best way to beat the January blues is to lean into the cold and visit the Arctic Circle, and Tromsø’s Northern Lights Festival was the perfect excuse to do so. Set in the idyllic northern Norwegian city, the festival featured concerts for every taste, from the Sámi music of Niko Valkeapää to the introspective jazz of trumpeter Nils Petter Molvær. There was even an evening of what was described to me as ‘Schubert lieder for the pub’ from the duo frankågunnar. On the Tuesday, Norwegian fiddler Susanne Lundeng performed music from her new album Følge, which skirts the worlds of folk and jazz. It was a pleasant set and between numbers, she addressed the mainly local audience and…

Frontera (Virgin, 1999) The breakthrough. Drexler had found his sound, with plenty of percussion, Uruguayan rhythms and a forward-thinking spirit that had a Manu Chao-esque verve for a borderless world. Eco (Warner, 2004) ‘Todo Se Transforma’ (Everything Changes) is still his most popular song, an effortlessly-catchy melody with that glitchy-guitar riff that can’t help but stick in your mind. The title track and ‘Guitarra y Vos’ aren’t bad either. Bailar en la Cueva (Warner, 2014) Drexler was ready to throw some shapes, adding cumbia guitar lines and melodies that swung from the hip; it’s still the most experimental and joyful album he’s released to date. Salvavidas de Hielo (Warner, 2017) Lyrically this album is hard to beat, its opening track ‘Movimiento’ building on a TEDx talk he did in 2019…

Outside the front entrance of a village pub in mid-Cheshire, an autumnal drizzle just about starting, a motley gang has assembled with all manner of strange costumes and disguises. An ambassador has already run ahead to warn the bar staff and order a round. Then, as one, the group open their mouths and start singing: ‘Here come one, two, three jolly good hearty lads, and we’re all in one mind / For this night we come a-souling, good nature to find / For this night we come a-souling as it does appear / And it’s all that we are souling for is your ale and strong beer.’ Inside, some unsuspecting patrons look around quizzically, wondering what the fuss is about. Once the singing has finished, there is a loud knock…

Musical gripes, rants and raves… There’s a peculiar duality to being an anti-caste musician. When I say ‘caste’ I’m referring to the caste system, an outdated form of social strata plaguing all major South Asian religions, whose influence continues into the present day. We are aware of caste from birth in our brown communities, with the tier you’re born into often defining everything from social mobility to who you are allowed to marry. Regardless of what anyone benefiting from it might tell you, it continues to exist wherever South Asians might settle and we are in dire need of more conversations around it. I released my concept album about the system, A Sacred Bore, back in 2018 with an international tour. My visits to Ontario and Québec were especially illuminating,…

01 Ravi Shankar Portrait of Genius (World Pacific Records, 1965) It’s impossible to overstate the influence and enduring legacy of Shankar. Over six decades the sitar virtuoso made an irrevocable impact on the global stage and his contributions to Indian classical music continue to endure. Portrait of Genius is a fitting entry-point to his mammoth back-catalogue. Especially notable is the 20-minute closer, ‘Raga Multani’, which encapsulates his once-in-a-generation vision and skill. 02 Tenderlonious Still Flute (22a, 2021) Flute solos float and weave across a series of raga soundscapes, deep house and electro funk cuts during Tenderlonious’ genre-defying sixth album, which sees the London-based multi-instrumentalist innovating to stunning effect. A thoroughly fresh and innovative gem, Still Flute encapsulates the spirituality and flow inherent to raga for a new generation. 03 Purbayan…

Government Song Woman For this radio documentary, Rhiannon Giddens travels in the footsteps of Sidney Robertson Cowell, a great depression-era ethnographer who masterfully recorded American and Irish music. Available on BBC Sounds. Cindy Pooch ‘Issemou’ This eery track from Pooch’s upcoming debut EP narrates a night-time walk through an African metropole. Ladaniva ‘Shakar’ The latest single from the up-and-coming France-based duo is an effervescent dose of Balkan pop. Malin Makes Music – Not For Everyone – debut EP from Malin Lewis and their group featuring the glorious anthem of inclusivity, ‘Trans’, a fine showcase for Lewis’ customised smallpipe. Israel Fernández & Diego del Morao ft. Pional ‘Al Tercer Mundo (Bulerías)’ – flamenco star Fernández is on top form on this fierce bulerías with lively guitar from Diego del Morao, and Fernández’s emotive…

On sale May 12 Angeline Morrison (pictured)’s pioneering take on Black British folk music, Lankum prove that they are anything but trad, as well as Brighde Chaimbeul, The Mary Wallopers and others as part of a survey of folk’s newest voices. Tinariwen discuss life in the desert and Gao Hong & Kadialy Kouyate team up for a meeting of pipa and kora. There will be ‘zombie folk’ from Estonia’s Puulup and British comedian James Acaster will show off his eclectic music tastes. We reveal the winners of the Songlines Music Awards and have your summer sorted with our UK Festival Guide. Plus, Kayhan Kalhor & Toumani Diabate’s new collaboration, Meral Polat’s fierce Kurdish soul and Bela Fleck’s latest all-star project.…

Solomane Doumbia Ségou to Lagos Mieruba There are many names that come to mind when one thinks of the great Malian musicians, but despite serving as long time percussionist and occasional arranger to the Malian superstar, Salif Keita, Solomane Doumbia is not a name that often crops up on the international scene. Incidentally, neither is that of the late Tidiani Koné, saxophonist and founder of the Rail Band. But with any luck, this album will succeed in putting both those names on the map. Ségou to Lagos leads us on a musical journey from Mali to Nigeria and back again in homage to Tidiani Koné, which highlights his importance as one of the first artists to bridge the gap between the musics of Mali and Nigeria, laying the ground for…

Alice L’Oiseau Magnifique Bongo Joe The charm of Alice’s second album, L’Oiseau Magnifique (The Magnificent Bird), lies in its simplicity. The songs are performed by mother and daughter Lisa and Yvonne Harder with graphic novelist Sarah André, their three voices accompanied by lo-fi synth and body percussion. The album is delightful — the songs have a spontaneous feel, tinged with a folky energy and a playful quirkiness to the vocals that are both captivating and comical; the trio’s inviting harmonies are front and centre, the instrumentation sparse and uncluttered. Composed in French, L’Oiseau Magnifique is a work of storytelling, taking you out of your daily routine and into a strange, magical world that toes the line between tongue-in-cheek humour and philosophy. Lyrical gems such as ‘No one can multiply fish…

“When I go into a performance now, I know that it is not about me, it is about allowing people to truly feel.” Pouring her all into her work, Dada Masilo has captivated audiences in her native South Africa and around the world with her singular high-speed dance. She is revered for redefining the classical repertoire by uniting different dance styles to create enthralling, hybrid transformations. In 2019, she won plaudits for reimagining Giselle and she now brings The Sacrifice, an original dance and score, inspired by Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, to the UK. Masilo has embraced her own cultural heritage, replacing European ballet with Tswana, the traditional dance of Botswana, while mimicking soundscapes from across the region. “I first saw Stravinsky’s piece when I was in the…

“We are convinced,” say the Yoshida Brothers, “that the Tsugaru shamisen bridges the gap between the past and the future and connects countries and cultures.” Originally from the city of Noboribetsu on the island of Hokkaido, Japan, siblings Ryōichirō and Kenichi began studying music at five years old. In 1990, at 13 and 11 respectively, the brothers apprenticed themselves to master musician Takashi Sasaki the First. Rising to prominence by way of national competitions, the brothers released their debut album, Ibuki, in 1999. Now acknowledged as the premier exponents of their craft, they have toured across the world to international acclaim. The brothers’ chosen instrument, the Tsugaru shamisen (whose name also refers to a form of folk music) is a fretless, plucked three-stringed lute with an ancient history of which…