This is the Other World Music section of Rainlore's World of Music, covering all types of world music not already encompassed by existing categories on this site.
In order to secure its future as an ongoing project, and indeed resume regular activity such as new reviews, Rainlore's World of Music urgently needs to raise substantial funds through some kind of sponsorship or similar. (Please also see The Future of Rainlore's World of Music on the About page, and the News entry for 2008/11/09 on the Home page.)
It has regrettably become impossible to keep Rainlore's World of Music going on a purely spare-time basis. The amount of work involved is simply too overwhelming. At the rate that for example CDs kept arriving for review and gigs were covered during 2004, there was enough work to keep two people busy on a full-time basis!
Of course, I wish to preserve the non-commercial and not for profit nature of Rainlore's World of Music, but without some kind of sponsorship the site simply cannot continue in any meaningful active way. Despite not having had any updates for about four years until its re-launch in October 2008, Rainlore's World of Music remains a popular site. The reviews and artists' profiles have always achieved excellent visibility in search results, and have also been referenced widely. There are also many new features I would like to add to Rainlore's World of Music, such as a Gig calendar to replace the old one
and a Features section that should have been added during 2004 already, plus more.
Sadly, without some form of sponsorship none of this will be possible and the site will at some point soon become purely archival.
If you think you might be able to help in any way, please get in touch through the sponsorship form. |
News
2010/08/08
At the tail-end of his recent UK tour, Anglo-Australian folk legend Danny Spooner gave me the great pleasure of dropping by and dropping off some of his recent albums. Thus, two of them are reviewed here, Emerging Tradition, a fabulous collection of (both fairly and very) recent songs from the folk tradition from down under that includes such recent favourites as Bring Out The Banners and Hey Rain (aka The Innisfail Song), and his latest album, Bold Reilly Gone Away, undoubtedly the finest and probably a definitive - if there can be such a thing - collection of authentically performed sea shanties. Both reviews feature a smashing sample track to wet your appetite! As always, Danny Spooner is folk at its very finest. More from this extraordinary, legendary singer soon.
NB - Regrettably, upload of the above news for 8th August, and the complete site update, was delayed till 17th August.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/07/04
Just one quick review today, of Breslov Bar Band's outstanding and highly infectious newly released debut album Have No Fear. The band explores the music, both traditional and contemporary, of the Breslov Chassidim - a Hasssidic Jewish community - in a modern idiom and features, among others, guitarist Allen Watsky and Kleztraphobix bandleader and clarinetist Mike Cohen. Whether you're specifically into Chassidic or any kind of Jewish music or not, this fabulous album is bound to appeal!
Regrettably won't be fully up-and-running again for a while yet.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/05/02
At long last have caught up with reviews of two outstanding albums by Latin singer (among others) extraordinaire Guillermo Rozenthuler - a kind of modern day João Gilberto and Carlos Gardel in one! If you haven't heard him before you've really been missing something extra special. The albums reviewed are Guillermo's The Blue Hour - Songs From Argentina (La Hora Azul), an outstanding collection of originals and traditional Argentine songs recorded in Buenos Aires and released in 2004 that will simply blow you away, and with his own band, formed ion 2003, Guillermo Rozenthuler & Rioplatenses' A Route To The Roots, their live debut album released in 2008, a superb collection of Argentine and Uruguayan songs (given the inimitable Rioplatenses treatment), a journey of exploration that takes the listener beyond the better known tango and milonga (although a few of these are also included, of course) and introduce him to a variety of less well known regional rhythms and styles. You really don't want to miss these fabulous albums and tanguero maravillosa Rozenthuler.
Of course, Rozenthuler is already familiar on this site through his association with Gilad Atzmon & The Orient House Ensemble through a gig review (at the Pizza, Soho) and a review of outstanding album Musik. Rozenthuler also regularly appears with all the UK's (and beyond) leading tango ensembles, most recently including El Tango Ultimo and the London Tango Orchestra.
I expect to likely have to take a break from updating the site for about six to eight weeks due to surgery shortly, but more will follow ASAP.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/03/28
The world of music, and world music in particular, lost one of its greatest advocates and champions with the death of Charlie Gillett at the age of a mere 68 following a long illness on 17th March. Gillett's many achievements include the seminal book The Sound of the City, the first comprehensive history of popular music, the discovery of, among others, Dire Straits and Ian Dury's first band Kilburn and the High Roads (the latter of whom he also managed), several long-running radio shows including The Sound of the City on BBC London 94.9 from 1995 to 2006 when he sadly had to relinquish it due to health issues and Charlie Gillett's World of Music on BBC World Service since 1999. In the 1980s, he was also the first DJ to play Montserratan soca singer Arrow's perennial monster hit Hot Hot Hot on British radio, and Charlie Gillett was also one of the influential group of people who - reluctantly - coined the term "world music". Gillett's enthusiasm for world music was as tireless as his efforts to promote it, both in the UK and internationally. Many international world music artists acknowledge owing their career to Gillett. In 1991, Charlie Gillett was awarded the Sony Gold Lifetime Achievement Award, and in 2006 The John Peel Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music Radio by the Radio Academy.
Gillett's weekly half hour BBC World Service show, Charlie Gillett's World of Music, was compulsive listening for anybody with half an interest in any kind of world music. Charlie Gillett will be sorely missed by all whose lives he touched.
Our thoughts at this sad time are with Gillett's wife Buffy, daughters Suzy and Jody and son Ivan, and two grandchildren. RIP, Charlie Gillett.
A special feature in the form of a television review may serve to further draw attention to the plight of the British brass band. BBC2's A Band For Britain, broadcast on consecutive Mondays this month, focused on one of the many of the remaining brass bands that are failing, the Dinnington Colliery Band, and, with the more than capable help of the unstoppable and irrepressible Sue Perkins at its helm, attempted to revive this band with a proud 100-plus year history. The programme also served as a last-minute wake up call to the peril the glorious brass band movement faces, and maybe it can serve as a rallying cry to save our glorious British brass band heritage before it's too late!
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/03/14
One album review and an article this week hope to draw attention to two - almost - "cause celebres". The album in question is the magnificent The Music Lives On: Now The Mines Have Gone, featuring The Best Of Colliery Bands, while the article, Double Zed Music - Everything Accordion! explores one of the finest accordion resources on the web.
The Music Lives On: Now The Mines Have Gone is a compilation album featuring some of the greatest British colliery brass bands surviving today, as well as some of the finest brass band music selections. The album was released to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the end of the last great miners' strike on 3rd March 1985, as well as to celebrate the survival of the colliery bands and the brass band movement.
Sadly, however, it seems to me that celebrating the survival of the brass band movement may be a little premature when so many former colliery and other brass bands have perished since the 1980s, and many more are struggling to survive today - both financially and in attracting new membership. When even a quite well-known band from a basically fairly prosperous corner of southern England so very nearly faced extinction a few years ago, it certainly became very obvious that the whole brass band movement was facing problems. And it's not only the demise of the mining industry and its support for the colliery bands that's been at the root of these problems. Far more, and more seriously, it is changing public tastes and attitudes. Sadly, the glory days of the height of the most widespread popularity of British brass bands of the 1970s and early 80s have long gone. The days when brass band was televised regularly by the BBC, when brass band even penetrated the pop charts, when in 1977 the Brighouse & Rastrick Band scored a massive and unprecedented singles hit with The Floral Dance and were only prevented from reaching the No. 1 spot by the release of Paul McCartney's Mull of Kintyre, or when new-wave pop star Jona Lewie had a monster hit with brass band accompaniment in Stop The Cavalry that was only stopped from reaching the No. 1 spot by the sad death of John Lennon and the speedy re-release of some of his records. And who could possibly forget the 1970s Hovis Bread TV commercial with Shaftesbury's Gold Hill standing in for a road somewhere in what we were supposed to believe to be Yorkshire, with a young lad carrying a loaf up the steep hill to the unforgettable strains of the second movement of Dvorak's Symphony From The New World played by a brass band (if memory serves, the Black Dyke Mills Band?)!
Despite the occasional flashes of brilliance since those days (such as 1995's Brassed Off movie), somehow the braas band movement never quite captured the wider public imagination to anything like the same extent again. In the 1970s, there were some 20-30,000 brass bands in Britain, yet today we are left with a mere 500-1,000 perhaps, and many of those are struggling. And this is a very sad state of affairs indeed. Brass band music is not only absolutely glorious music, it's as quintessentially British as Yorkshire pudding, cheddar cheese, pork pie, the great British banger, a sense of fair play and tolerance, the glorious British landscape, excentricity, the Last Night of the Proms, the British sense of humour, jellied eel, pie and mash, fish and chips, 'warm' beer, panto, the boat race, Ascot, the Grand National, Mrs. Beeton, curry and chips, the institution of the monarchy, wippets and greyhounds, cream teas, and whatever else you might care to think of. The brass band is a British tradition and heritage to be immensely proud of and that ought to be cherished and nurtured. Isn't it time we all in Britain took more of an interest and pride in some of the best and finest traditions of the land and kept our heritage alive and well? Before it's too late?
One really has to hope that The Music Lives On: Now The Mines Have Gone, as well as the currently running BBC 2 television series A Band For Britain (about the struggles and revival of the Dinnington Brass Band, aided by irrepressable TV presenter Sue Perkins) will go some way in helping to widen popular interest in brass band music and the heritage as a whole.
Double Zed Music - Everything Accordion! explores what is probably the greatest single accordion music resource on the web, ZZ Music. Everything from accordion albums by a huge variety of artists, accordion sheet music, books and more to accordions of the highest pedigree from Claudio Beltrami.
Again, accordion music, especially in the UK, tends to be rather neglected and/or ignored. All too often, the accordion is still regarded as either something somewhat old-fashioned or "humble". Yet, neither could be further from the truth. The accordion is one of the most versatile instruments around and finds a place in just about any type of music you could think of, from folk right up to jazz and classical music - concertos have even been written for it, including a contemporary one in the last ten years by accordion maestro extraordinaire Romano Viazzani (three of his solo accordion albums were recently reviewed on this site). If you labour under the very much misguided impression that the accordion is simple or "humble", then you really ought to have a look at - and more importantly, a listen to some of the finest accordions around as played by some of its finest exponents. Even the accordion's still more "humble" cousing, the concertina, is anything but. Not only could a good quality instrument cost you enough to have to extend your mortgage, but again it has found its way into all manner of musical styles including classical - indeed, many a folk concertina player is classically trained on the instrument.
The accordion is at least very much alive, but it certainly is deserving of much wider popular interest in this country especially. Maybe you'd like to explore a little further?
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/03/07
The 2008/09 version of this page has now been archived.
Finally, it has come to our attention that there appear to be a few minor problems with our web forms, specifically with radio buttons and check boxes, with some browsers. This is continuing to be checked out, but as everything seems to work just fine in Internet Explorer, it seems likely that the problem lies with the other browsers in that they may not have fully implemented this aspect of forms. In which case there appears little that can be done about it other than to suggest you temporarily switch to Internet Explorer in order to use our forms, if you are affected. Flash based forms might be another option longer term.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/02/28
A further review of a sensational Nicolas Meier album to close the month. On Vivaldi - Four Seasons, guitar genius Meier is multi-tracked on acoustic, electric and synth guitars as the Modern Guitar Orchestra. Consisting of the whole of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons with the addition of Meier originals in the form of a brief intro and three pieces forming an epilogue which also feature two solos by special guest, veteran jazz guitar ace John Etheridge, this album represents an excursion into the classical/Baroque realm by the versatile Meier. A very tasty sample track accompanying the review gives you a flavour of this exciting album.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/02/15
Three reviews of albums hot off the presses this month are of particular interest to any world music aficionado. Jazz flute and Latin / Afro-Cuban jazz giant Mark Weinstein's latest release, Timbasa, is his hottest to date and could set anything alight! This is Latin jazz / Afro-Cuban jazz at its very finest, with an incredible percussion ensemble led by the percussion warlock Pedrito Martinez, and a sensational new rising star of Latin jazz piano in Axel Tosca Laugart who has to be heard to be believed. Indeed, Weinstein's album Timbasa just has to be heard to be believed - it's incredible! To help you, there's a fabulous sample track with the review, the Miles Davis classic Milestones. A killer of an album! Even if you just like to groove, this is a must!
The other two albums reviewed are two eagerly awaited releases from jazz guitar wizard Nicolas Meier, also out this month. The Nicolas Meier Trios' Breeze features two trios, one acoustic, the other electric. Providing a superb showcase for Meier's guitars, this 'unplugged' album is almost outrageously thrilling and addictive. The Electric Trio in addition to Meier features drum genius Asaf Sirkis, who needs no introduction, and also bassist and harmonica player extraordinaire Pat Bettison, both also members of the Meier Group. The Acoustic Trio features the percussion of Spanish born Demi Garcia (of among others The Alec Dankworth Quintet) and from the world of soul, bassist Paolo Minervini. If you plan on buying only one jazz guitar album this year, Breeze should be the one! To help you decide, the title track provides a gobsmackin'ly delicious sample track on the review page. Meier's very personal brand of here mainly jazz, flamenco and Latin fusion is irresistable.
The second Meier album is the Meier Group's Journey, a fantastical journey through a soundscape created by Nicolas Meier's very personal brand of Turkish-informed and flamenco and Latin influenced fusion, is likewise not to be missed. Meier as ever is bursting with ideas and his great strengths as writer and leader, in addition to player, shine. Meier Group co-conspirators are legendary reed supremo Gilad Atzmon, here on clarinet, soprano and alto sax, and supreme maestro of the traps Asaf Sirkis, along with Patrick Bettison on bass and his surperb harmonica and classsy Uruguyan pianist Jose Reinoso. A 'supergroup' indeed, with three leaders of such calibre as Meier, Atzmon and Sirkis coming together. Journey is a dream of an album full of strong, imaginative themes and inventive improvising. To make your mouth drool, there's a taster sample track in the form of the title track of Journey with the review.
A further review of another Nicolas Meier album is already lined up for the next update.
Rainlore's World of Music
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2010/01/31
Long overdue perhaps, but better late than never, are reviews of one of the very finest of today's maestros of the accordion, Romano Viazzani's albums from 2007. A trio of outstanding solo accordion releases, they could and indeed ought to be treated as a boxed set but work equally well on their own. Piazzolla - Ángel Suite / Bobiç - Liturgical Suite, Encore, and Viazzani takes Stok cover a huge gamut of styles and genres, form Baroque, contemporary classical, via Argentine Tango and Italian dance classics to contemporary music and rock/pop. A veritable gourmet feast for any music lover, and especially for the accordion connoisseur. There's bound to be something for any world music lover here. Tasty sample tracks accompanying each review (if you don't have Flash Player 8 or later set up yet, now's the time!) should wet any appetite to crave more. To buy, just go to the ZZ Music label's web site. (This small Indie label seems to specialise entirely in accordion - something long needed.) Of course, Romano Viazzani will already be familiar on this site, at any rate to jazz lovers, through his long association with the great Gilad Atzmon's extended Orient House Ensemble. The present recordings are accordion at its most glorious. More, please!
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