New Reviews: December 6, 2004
Reviews by Tom Orr
Monica Salmaso
Iaia
(World Village 468035, 2004)
As lavish and layered as Brazilian music can be, Monica Salmaso
tends to keep it simple. Her choice of songs reflects deeply upon Brazil’s
African traditions and folkloric wisdom as well as modern political and
cultural concerns, though on much of this disc her velvety voice is
accompanied by little more than piano, acoustic guitar and percussion.
In spite of this, the music is alive and electrifying. Compositions by
greats like Tom Ze, Chico Buarque and Dorival Caymmi are interpreted,
quite nicely so. Salmaso’s lovely crystalline tones effortlessly grace
arrangements where both rhythmic bounce and pensive starkness are
utilized to good effect, capturing the poetic essence of songs like
“Estrela de Oxum” and “Sinhazinha (Despertar),” making them her own
but also sharing them intimately. This music won’t get the party
started, but it’ll be great to cool things down in the wee hours
afterward.
Marcel Khalife
Caress
(Nagam Records NR 1015 CD, 2004)
Though not the only contemporary master of the Arabic lute known as the oud,
Lebanese-born Marcel Khalife sure does take the instrument in directions
that are both enticing and adventurous. Heading up a quartet that also
includes acoustic bass, piano and percussion, Khalife can wield the oud
with the same finesse as a classical musician, the tricky turns of a jazz
man or the eloquence of a musical poet. This CD celebrates varying degrees
of each, along with the duality of Islamic and Christian cultures in his
native land and the underlying belief in music as a guiding hand toward
peace and understanding. Khalife and his players are an astonishingly
versatile bunch, moving easily from solo to group passages, navigating
freeflowing grooves in and out of Arabic modalities and coming up with some
trailblazing sounds. (You might think you don’t want to hear an oud jamming
alongside a vibraphone, for example, but it sounds great here.) Sometimes
celebratory, sometimes solemn, sometimes as pensive as chamber music,
Caress will, true to the title, rub you all the right ways.
Various Artists
South Pacific Islands
(Putumayo PUT 231-2, 2004)
There are 25,000 islands in the South Pacific. Through prehistoric migrations
as well as more recent colonization and territorial claims (not to mention
sheer vastness), the region has a cultural diversity that’s equally large in
scope. It would be easy to associate the music of the South Pacific with any
number of exotic stereotypes, and it is to this compilation’s credit that if
you played it for someone without showing them the cover, they’d likely be
hard-pressed to tell you its geographic origins. Four of the 11 tracks are
by New Zealand-based band Te Vaka, whose music would seem to represent the
best combination of traditional and contemporary. Their selections are solid
and catchy, but the remainder makes the grade, too. New Caledonia’s Ok! Ryos
shine with percolating rhythms and harmonies that might put you in mind of
Zimbabwean or South African music, Papua New Guinea is given a good showing
with a choppy acoustic toe-tapper by O-Shen and Telek’s more introspective
style and Matato’a conveys the enigmatic grandness of Easter Island in their
guitar-and-percussion driven style. Though by the end of the disc I wished it
were longer with more artists represented, the music had really gotten under
my skin. It’s equal parts sunny and serious, and world music lovers in general
will find it quite worth their while.
Various Artists
The Rough Guide to Mediterranean Café Music
(World Music Network RGNET 1143 CD, 2004)
I would gladly frequent any café that regularly played music of
this sort. The Mediterranean Sea is where Europe, North Africa and
the Middle East converge, making it not only a body of water around
which wars have led to the rising and falling of empires, but one where
cultural influences have crossed this way and that over the centuries.
The 16 cuts on this cd are from almost as many countries, some showing
more overlapping of musical genres then others. But whether showcasing
specific styles like Greek rebetika and Algerian rai or showcasing how,
say, Arabic and flamenco strains mix it up in the music of Javier Ruibal or
Barrio Chino, everything here sizzles. Yasmin Levy’s Sephardic sound invokes
mystical longing as does the Berber flair of Jil Jilala, musically
underrepresented places like Albania and Corsica get their due thanks to
Eda Zari and I Campagnoli respectively and the whole album stirs your desire
to investigate further. And isn’t that what a great compilation is all about?
Tom Orr is a Southern California-based freelance writer, actor, percussionist, 9 to 5-er, husband, daddy, and aspiring deep thinker. He acquires more music than he has time to listen to, and feels the only solution is to acquire even more.
