Al compás del mundo - programa #121

Al compás del mundo - programa #121 - Spring Potpourri

It’s spring! Which, I suppose, means different things in different places. Boston just got dumped on with hella snow; San Francisco is seeing cold (relatively), clouds and rain; and we here in Tequisquiapan, Queretaro in the middle of Mexico are suffering our way through 80-degree blue-sky days. I remember youthful exuberance in Madison, Wisconsin, when we played baseball on a March day when the temperature suddenly reached 50 degrees. We dodged patches of snow that still remained, but I guess that’s also something from the past that remains a wistful memory. Anyway, I’m searching for a theme for this week’s program that really has nothing to do with spring. But look! And smell the blossoms! The Kazakh folk group sings of flowers and Roma Indians from Rajasthan dance for the sheer joy of being alive! Regrettably, Johnny can’t dance as per Clifton Chenier and Billy wishes Stackalee hadn’t doubted his reading of the dice. But mostly it’s a positive bunch of tunes we’re putting forth here and I believe it gives “potpourri” a good name. - J.H.

Run list for Al compás del mundo - programa #121, – Spring potpourri
First broadcast 3-28-2024

01 Kiyohiko Senba and his Haniwa All-Stars -- ちゃーのみ友達スレスレ (Japan)

02 Yanti Bersaudara - Gumbira (Indonesia)

03 Yishak Binjaw - Libey Ma'aduley (Ethiopia)

04 Crimi - Mano d'Oro (Algeria-Italy)

05 Kader Tarhanine - Al Gamra Leila (Tuareg, Algeria)

06 Ihya Boudkir and Ahwach Ntfarkhin - Tiyt ajig a lward (Morocco)

07 Indian Rajasthan Gypsy dance (India)

08 Kazakh folk group - My Flower (China)

09 Kostas Nikitas - Ale Ale (Greece)

10 Eteria - Ой вийди Грицю (Ukraine)

11 Carmen Amaya - Tondero (Spain)

12 Lisandro Mesa y los Hijos de la Nina Luz - Cachaco Sabanero (Colombia)

13 El Piporro - Don Baldomero (México)

14 Frank Hutchison - Stackalee (USA)

15 The Jubalaires - Noah (USA)

16 Clifton Chenier - Johnny Can't Dance (USA)

17 Arthur Big Boy Crudup - My Baby Left Me (USA)

18 The Movers - Balele (South Africa)

On an alley, one dark and drizling night...

Comments

British Invasion - 1960s

I wanted to declare “Kick out the jams, mo’fos!” as a signpost towards the message in this week’s Al compás del mundo radio show, but that actually came about a little later. As humanity descended ever deeper into the Cro-Magnon state, Iggy Pop and the punks claimed that honor. What we have here instead, is a post-WWII let’s shake up the political order a bit, and no, not everyone has signed up to be an unconscious consumer attitude. There’s something afoot with these lads. Not exactly revolutionary fervor, but most certainly promoting a change in the general way of things. Recalling Che Guevara’s famous quote “Do Wah Diddy Diddy”, the Animals, Yardbirds, Rolling Stones et. al. pouted and preened – some more than others – in a way that hadn’t quite been done before. Youthful vigor ensued. These groups pushed the evolutionary chain of popular music a step further and we’re all better off for it. Set list Al compás del mundo programa #183, 6-5-25 - The British Invasion, 1960s 01 Yar...

India y Nepal y Tibet

W here a human voice is heard in today’s program it’s often starkly different from what most Westerners might find pleasing and melodic. But I must remind my listeners that the West probably did not invent the concept of vocalizing as accompaniment to plucked/blown/percussed musical instruments. Why do we sing in the style that we do? I imagine there are knowledgeable tomes wrestling with that idea. I ’ve read that vocals were meant to imitate the sounds made by instruments...or vice versa? The chicken or the egg? I’m not here to answer that question, in spite of the college course I had taken of “Music Cultures of the World” decades ago. What I offer is the opportunity to pay attention to and digest musical expressions performed by people steeped in the traditional ways of their culture. T here is a geographic component to lumping together India, Nepal and Tibet as the Himalayas served to isolate and circumscribe the peoples of those northern regions. But here’s where I fud...

Guitarras del mundo

Choosing music and writing about “the guitar” opens many doors. I could have gone off in any number of directions and with a singular narrow focus - but I didn’t. Instead, I threw a whole bunch of varied tunes against a wall to see which ones stuck. Sometimes there’s a continuity and other times none: just two aesthetically pleasing pieces that worked well in tandem and, hopefully, were preceded and followed with similar morsels. Usually, that is how these programs come together. I receive a divinely inspired revelation for a certain theme, region, or style of music and build it from there. Baden Powell, Brazilian beatnik poet and guitar master, seemed to me an obvious choice to begin the program. From there (as you can well see) we stick around Latin America a bit; segue into Spain, notorious as a guitar hotbed; head South to North Africa for the venerable Bombino (yes, again!) and more of that desert blues ilk; logically morph into a short blues set and settle at the bottom sid...

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