Photo: Claire Huteau (2017)
Meïkhâneh
La Silencieuse
Buda Music
La Silencieuse is the second album by Meïkhâneh, a musically expansive trio from Rennes, France, that brin…
Global Frequency
Photo: Andrew Cagle Hello Psychaleppo Toyour Hello Psychaleppo’s third release, Toyour, draws inspiration from a wide variety of sources, some musical, some literary, and all celeb…
Rahim AlHaj Letters from Iraq: Oud and String Quintet Smithsonian Folkways Iraqi-born composer Rahim AlHaj’s latest album, Letters from Iraq, is his most ambitious to date. AlHaj…
OY Space Diaspora Crammed Discs This issue’s special section on climate dystopias set me wondering what kind of responses to an uncertain future dwell in the world music community. One…
Beats Antique Shadowbox Antique American composer Henry Cowell traveled to a variety of countries in the 1950s on behalf of the State Department, building bridges between cultures conside…
Liu Fang (center) plays the pipa during a rehearsal with the Matangi Quartet. I have great respect for all musical traditions and have enjoyed collaborating in past decades with great musici…
Tajaliyatt Afoforo Music Club Tajaliyatt is the second album from the ambitious Achref Chargui Trio. Composed of the aforementioned Chargui, a Tunisian oud playe…
Ibrahim Maalouf Kalthoum Impulse! “Umm Kalthoum is the quintessential Arab,” Uncle Jihad said. “She’s probably the one person whom all Arabs can agree to love . . .”—Rabih A…
Vincent Segal & Ballaké Sissoko Musique de Nuit Six Degrees Now that a representative sample of the world’s recorded music is available at no greater cost than an hour’s worth of drill-do…
Amjad Ali Khan and Rahim AlHaj The sarod is an instrument used in North Indian classical music whose origin is shrouded in mystery and no small amount of controversy. What is not in dispute is Amjad…
From the opening ascending arpeggio of “Taquito Militar,” the thoughtful interplay between guitarist Berta Rojas and Argentina’s most beloved chamber group, Camerata Bariloche, takes center stage on…
Photo by Tanya Traboulsi If ever an album has been created to invite the uninitiated to dip a toe into the deep water of contemporary Arab music, it is Alif’s debut release, Aynama-Rtama, re…- Lara Candland and Christian Asplund. Photo: Curtis Asplund “World music” has become part of an advertising lexicon promising the buyer of CDs entrée into unfamiliar conventions. The operatic creation…
- Photo by Somak Sarkar. West Bengali singer-songwriter-politician Kabir Suman. Go look up “Bangladesh” in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Hmm. There is an entry for “Bengali…
- Inuit solo throat singer Tanya Tagaq Gillis. Photo: Sarah Race The Inuit people of the Canadian Arctic share an ancient form of music called katajjait (throat…
