Run List Al compás del mundo #210, 12-4-25 - African instrumental music 01 Diely Moussa Kouyate - Bamananke (Guinea) 02 Francis Bebey - Easter (Cameroon) 03 Mohamed Saïdou Sow - Kor-Soumayé (Guinea) 04 Lemaditsy - Talily (Madagascar) 05 Dumisani Maraire & Ephat Mujuru - Chemutengure (Zimbabwe) 06 Hafez Abdu ar-Rahman - an-Nekri wa ash-Shajan (Sudan) 07 Ballake Sissoko - Sy (Mali) 08 Haja - Te Hody (Madagascar) 09 Keletigui Diabaté - Koulandian (Mali) 10 Celestine Ukwu and his Philosophers National - Okwukwe Na Nchekwube (Nigeria) 11 Johannesburg Street Band - Thimlela (South Africa) 12 Grand Papa Diabaté - Lamban (Guinea) 13 Mulatu Astatke - Yekermo Sew (Ethiopia) 14 Mory Kante - Woloukoro (Guinea) I’m ready to admit to thirty seconds of consternation in naming this week’s show. Is “African” sufficiently precise? Am I guilty, like so many, of designating the continent as a single entity – as in “Places I’d like to visit include Paris, Rome, Rio de Janeiro, Africa...” Would I ...

  Al compás del mundo is a multi-cultural radio program on streaming platform Radioactiva.TX out of Tequisquiapan, Mexico. And when I say “multi-cultural” I mean what I say! In the program’s Spanish language intro I point out “You never know what you’re going to hear.” In an effort to feature something different every week, past programs include music from Colombia, Black and White blues, psychedelia, jazz and complements, bluegrass-folk, 1950’s rock ‘n roll, the music of French speakers, South and North Africa, Cuba, Eastern Europe, New Orleans sounds, Latin American protest music, the British rock invasion, Palestinian and Arab music, and much etc. When I don’t focus on a particular region or style, I will throw out a potpourri of everything under the sun. In short, eclectic is the byword.  List for show #209, 11-27-25 - Iran and Kurdistan Today’s program will present an hour’s worth of the music of Iran (Persia and Iran are synonymous and each has ancient historic roots.) I...

Leon Theremin and the Orchestra I’m showing my age with today’s Al compás del mundo playlist. Most all the music represented here is from 20-50 years ago. A couple exceptions are Iranian-Canadian Sina Bathaie and Chile’s Föllakzoid, both a nod towards rave culture…which has its origins in the mid -1980s, an old school trip out which lingers on to this day. Experimental music has been around for who knows how long. Rebels always come out of the woodwork when popular taste imposes limitations.  And electronics have influenced and become the medium as far back as the theremin, invented circa 1918. There’s one more ringer in this group (experimental yes, electronic, no) and that’s Steve Reich’s piece, an excerpt from “Pulse.” The chorus and instruments are organic and live – no recorded sounds and no overdubs. That this sort of music has drawn devotees in great numbers and from all parts of the world would make a case for a commonality in human artistic perception and acceptance. Who s...

  Rarely do I focus on a single artist or group in putting together my weekly radio program Al compás del mundo. There have been many dedications to the distinctive and varied sounds of specific countries or regions but rarely does the spotlight shine on one individual. Today’s exception stems from the fact that Allen Toussaint was more often in the background than a performer, yet came to represent the music of his native New Orleans like few others. [Continues below.] Al compás del mundo Listo 207, 11-13-25 – the music of Allen Toussaint, New Orleans 01 Aaron Neville - Hercules 02 Ernie K-Doe - So Good 03 The Rubaiyats - Omar Khayyam 04 Lee Dorsey - Sneakin' Sally Thru the Alley 05 Willie West - Greatest Love 06 Allen Toussaint and The Stokes - Two Cents 07 Curly Moore - Don't Pity Me 08 Jessie Hill - Oogsey Moo 09 Benny Spellman - If You Love Her 10 Betty Harris - Bad Luck 11 Allen Toussaint - Poor Boy, Got to Move 12 Maurice Williams - How to Pick a Winner 13 Etta James - W...

  Al compás del mundo  206, 11-6-25 - global potpourri list   01 Alogte Oho - Mam Yinne Wa (Ghana) 02 Jagwa Music - Mchawi Ndugu (Tanzania) 03 Polibio Mayorga - Altas Horas (Ecuador) 04 Nimco Jamaac - Buuraha U Dheer (Somalia) 05 Cheb Mohamed Sghir - Zoujouha Laaroubia (Algeria) 06 Pasteur LappÉ - Sanaga Calypso (Cameroon) 07 New Tutenkhamen - Joburg Bound (Zimbabwe) 08 Phuzekhemisi No Nothembi - Solo Ngiyathokoza (Ndebele, South Africa) 09 Saodaj - Pokor Lèr (Reunion) 10 Kaxgar Kizi - Chirayliq (Uyghur, China) 11 Nair Band - Mongolian Brown (Mongolia) 12 bAnda con Εύη Σεϊτανίδου - Ομάλ   (Greece) 13 Les Négresses Vertes - Enfer et paradis (France) 14 Matmatah - Les moutons (France) I suppose most of my potpourri programs take off for a global trek much like this one. I mean, if it were a potpourri of blues stylings, it would be a blues program.  Likewise, a jazz potpourri would be a jazz program. But when the reach extends from Gha...

Bienvenidos to another week of Al compás del mundo. Welcome to my world. Being that RadioactivaTX, out of Tequisquiapan, Queretaro, in the heart of old Mexico, is a streaming station, I’m not sure if I’m the only inhabitant of that world, or not. If there’s a way of measuring audience size and feedback for such programming, I’m not aware of it. Doesn’t matter. If the station allows me, I’ll continue throwing together yet another hour’s worth of eclectic global sounds until they wrest the musical inspiration from my cold, dead brain.  This week’s program arrives on the island of sunny, green Puerto Rico. A bountiful land of abundance (except when there’s not) and fair governance (except when there’s not)... Al compás del mundo 205, 10-30-25 – Puerto Rico Listo 01 Isabel Dávila y German Rosario - Mujer dominante 02 Andres Jiménez - El Pobre Sigue Sufriendo 03 Grupo Mapeye - La Cultura y La Tradición 04 Ecos de Borinquen  - El alma de Puerto Rico 05 Taoné - Verde luz 06 El Trio J...

  So, back from vacation with the task at hand. What can I say about a RadioactivaTX streaming radio program of old-timey blues and gospel? I’ve been here before. Turns out many of the songs chosen for this playlist showed up on Al compás del mundo previously and memory failed me (I try to not duplicate titles, but after almost four years of programming there’s room for that.) It was back in January, 2022 when I culled a whole raft of music from a single album: “Voices of Mississippi.” And it all still sounds good. This time I added and peppered a blues list with gospel music of the time – all of which was recorded and edited by ‘blues hunter’ Bill Ferris during tours of the deep South in the 1960s. It’s too bad that cut #8 remains anonymous, as I’d like to hear more from someone who dreams so big – “I had a dream, dream I had last night.  I went to the U.N. and set the whole nation right.” Brings to mind lyrics by Uruguayan singer Daniel Viglietti from “Cantaliso en un bar”. ...

  Al compás del mundo   195, 8-28-25, original songs and their covers   01 Richard Berry - Louie Louie (USA) 02 The Kingsmen - Louie Louie (USA) 03 Bo Diddley - Who Do You Love (USA) 04 Elise LeGrow - Who Do You Love (Canada) 05 Dolly Parton - Jolene (USA) 06 The White Stripes - Jolene (USA) 07 Bob Dylan - All Along the Watchtower (USA) 08 The Jimi Hendrix Experience - All Along the Watchtower (USA) 09 Alemayehu Eschete - Ayalqem tedengo (Ethiopia) 10 Mungo Jerry - In the Summertime (England) 11 Little Willie John - Fever (USA) 12 Elvis Presley - Fever (USA) 13 Solomon Linda - Mbube (South Africa) 14 The Tokens - The Lion Sleeps Tonight (Wimoweh) (USA) 15 Billy Roberts - Hey Joe (USA) 16 Wilson Pickett - Hey Joe (USA) 17 Ray Charles - Hit the Road Jack (USA) 18 Becca Krueger - Hit the Road Jack (USA) 19 Beethoven Symphony 9 (Choral) - Ode an die Freude (Germany) 20 Rube Waddell - Ode An die Freude (USA)   Throughout t...

  Al compás del mundo   #193, 8-14-25 - Tuff Vibes, vol. 1 - reggae   01 Sons of Light - Land of Love 02 Devon Russell - Jah Hold the Key 03 Judah Eskander - Jah Light 04 Barrington Levy - Look Youthman 05 Al Campbell - Fight I Down 06 Barry Brown - Warmonger 07 Don Carlos - Plantation 08 Anthony Johnson - Hey Mr. Rich Man 09 Eddie Constantine - Tenement Yard 10 Burning Spear - Jah Jah No Dead 11 Desi Roots - Weed Fields 12 Johnny Clarke - Blood Dunza 13 Earl Cunningham - Jail House 14 Lacksley Castell - Guiding Light 15 Cornell Campbell - Hard Time 16 Noel Ellis - Memories 17 Prince Jammy - Throne of Blood   Here’s another contribution to the Al compás del mundo radio program from flesh and blood prodigy, Ras Haas. A long-time collector of Jamaican vinyl, Ras has claimed that honorific title due to an abiding interest and participation (as a consumer) in the island’s musical scene. For me it’s an entire playlist where almo...

  192, 8-07-25 – worldly potpourri   01 Juluka - Ibhola Lethu (Sovany) (South Africa) 02 Hany Mehanna - Dala (Egypt) 03 Aung Win Group - Mother River (Myanmar) 04 Insan Olmaya Geldim - Kirpiğine Kaşına (Turkey) 05 Luis Enrique Casal - El Arbolito (Panama) 06 Lola Flores - La Faraona (Spain) 07 Dengue Fever - Seeing Hands (Thailand and USA) 08 K.R. Nagati - De l'Orient à l'Orion (Tunisia) 09 Kalyi Jag - La Romnjasa (Roma, Hungarye) 10 Jaime Pineda - Cuando el viejo se enamora (Colombia) 11 Liam O' Maonlai - Amhrán na hEascainne (Ireland) 12 Yayah Ratnasari & Bhinneka Group - Bau Tapi Ngeunah (Indonesia) 13 Mulangeni Sounds - Kwathu ku Mulangeni (Malawi) 14 Red Baraat - Sialkot-Zindabad (India and USA)   This week’s program, it’s a worldly potpourri. Or maybe, a weirdly potpourri in its logic or lack thereof. It’s a big ol’ grab bag of stuff. Culled from a file of worthy Al compás del mundo fodder that resides on the fringes where poten...

  Historically, the tango (and its close cousin, the milonga) has been considered an example of world cultural property, i.e. something to be nurtured by the likes of UNESCO. It was born in the 1880s in back streets of Buenos Aires, Argentina and across the river in Montevideo, Uruguay. Considered a lewd, low-class form of entertainment, particularly due to its intimate couples dance moves, it, of course, became the favorite of the masses. Many a music producer has learned that lesson: don’t tell the masses what they should listen and dance to. By the early 20 th  century France seemed to have a soft spot for the tango, as well as Hungary, Britain, Germany, and other European centers. Record production, cabaret shows and radio broadcasts from the 1920s onward served to introduce this seductive sound to an ever-wider audience. Why did the tango captivate the public far and wide? One could ask the same about reggae music, Cuban rhythms, rock and roll, and other musical trends em...

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...

  These are mostly old songs, as the notion of riding a train is largely an old experience. Who rides trains (or used to)? Hobos, guys on the lam, the lovelorn, wanderers, and fellow travellers. Today’s playlist consists of mostly bluegrass and blues, but rockabilly and rock ‘n roll join in. Even gospel takes its turn ferrying the faithful up to the pearly gates. Trains are linked to a wide range of situations and feelings. They can serve as a means of escape, freedom and joy, abandonment and sadness.  Doc Watson went so far as to wish mayhem on the train that took his girl…“I wish to the Lord, that train would wreck, kill the engineer and break the fireman’s neck.” But trains are like that, adept at taking men’s (and some women’s) babies away. They can also bring them home. Most any instrument can imitate a train sound, the harmonica, fiddle, guitar...and the human voice including a muted hand-trumpet by the Golden Gate Quartet, otherwise performing acapella. Train songs can ...

  This week’s playlist went right over my head. Or maybe, under the radar…I’m not sure. I do know what I don’t know, however that plays out, and I didn’t know the performers or music in this week’s Al compás del mundo radio program. It’s the brainstorm of guest programmer, Ras Haas, a card-carrying member of the familial tribe, though admittedly, of a different generation. This should be apparent as you’ve not heard any of this genre previously on the show. And what genre is it? Not sure. These songs came out of the 1980s and, I’m told, they’re post-disco and an incipient lead-in to rap…or at least it served as fertile ground for a wealth of sampling taken by that next musical movement up.  When Ras passed the finished product on to me, I admittedly had some reservations, disco being a hateful creature in my geezer mind – and it sounded close to disco. But a few listenings have cleared some space and I sense a trend emerging. Funk is foremost and that’s nothing new for most an...

  Shown here: Howlin Wolf --  First thing, got to get this off my chest: I’m glad I don’t have the blues. I’m so glad. I’m   so glad. I’m glad, I’m glad, I’m glad. When an elderly Muddy Waters exhorted a mostly White college student audience in Madison, Wisconsin (circa 1975) “Can you feel it?”, everyone cried out “yes!”. Maybe they did. Who am I to judge?   But why did the African American listening public back off from the blues while White American youth embraced it at that time? Because the blues were old-fashioned for the former, and top-of-the-charts in the hands of young British and (later) American bands for the latter. Of course, that’s a whole lesson in American sociology and a historic musical diversion that has been explored in previous iterations of Al compas del mundo, i.e. programa #140, “British blues”. But today were dealing with today and everything is in retrospect. So these guys, the likes of Honey Boy Edwards, Ed Bell, Robert Johnson, etc., are...

  Al compás del mundo programa #186, 6-26-25 – potpourri Run list 01 Johnny Clegg & Juluka - Mantombana (South Africa) 02 Ejigayehu 'Gigi' Shibabaw - Moniw natana (Ethiopia) 02 Medjo Nsom Jacob et son Ensemble - Elie o yange ma (Cameroons) 04 Boubacar Traoré - Sa Golo (Mali) 05 Janvier Denagan - Guigo (Benin) 06 Gilberto Gil, Jorge Ben Jor, e Sérgio Mendes – Emoriô (Brazil) 07 Crazy Ken Band - Singapura (Japan) 08 Minyo Coderanny - Donpan-bushi (Japan) 09 La Misa Negra - Dueña de Mi (USA) 10 Banda 2 de Febrero de Cerete - El estanquillo (Colombia) 11 Bugle, Buju Banton and Damian Jr. 'Gong' Marley - Thank You, Lord (Jamaica) 12 Camarón de la Isla - La Leyenda Del Tiempo (Spain) 13 Legiana Collective - Lu Rusciu de lu Mare (Italy) 14 Kadinelia - Ta palea mou vasana (Greece) Ahhh! Summer is here and it’s time for the sweet smell of potpourri. Shades of Africa burst forth like fragrant blossoms, immediately bringing an energy to the subject at hand. The uncharacteristi...

What is an orishá, you might ask? In the context of Brazilian religious practice which, like most everything else in Brazil, involves music, it is a divine spirit sent by the Creator to assist us mere humans in living an upright existence. Belief in the pantheon of orishás was carried from the Yoruba culture and other West African groups mostly during the 19th century slave trade and is concentrated primarily in several areas of Latin America. Devotion to the spirits is observed still by their descendants and practiced as Haitian Vodou, Afro-Caribbean Santería, and in Brazil, Candomblé. Music heard in honor of Brazil’s orishás – as offered in today’s program – can be syncretic, percussive group chants in a style known as batucada, or sweetly gentle overtures that earn pop favor amongst a largely Catholic nation despite apparent apostasy. Choosing several notable tunes, I must point out Baden Powell e Vinicius de Moraes’ Cante de Xangó, recorded in 1966 and a classic of bohemian musical...

The countries represented in this playlist have a fraught history of ever-changing political boundaries and warring factions, not unlike most regions of the world. What has remained as a constant is the beauty and strength of their musical expressions.  See more below >>> Al compás del mundo #184, 6-12-25 – Albania and the Balkans 01 Kocani Orkestar - Papigo (Macedonia) 02 Vellezerit Aliu - Keq Kur Tkam (Albania) 03 King Ferus Mustafov - Staro Cunovo Oro Velesko Oro (Macedonia) 04 Shaqir Cervadiku - Albumi Im (Albania) 05 Eli Fara - Cupeze Beqare (Albania) 06 Angele Dimovski Kavalsko - Oro (Macedonia) 07 Fatime Sokoli - Ka lidh besen Shqiptaria (Albania) 08 Dunja Knebl - Klincec Moj Zalosten (Croatia) 09 Bekhit Fahim - Gusta mi magla padnala (Kosovo) 10 Ivana and Isadora Cantrach - Жали Заре (Macedonia) 11 King Ferus Mustafov - Turska Igra (Macedonia) 12 Ethno Group Trag - Врбице, врбо зелена (Serbia) 13 Belo Platno - Udade se Zivka Sirinicka (Kosovo) 14 Kosturchanki - Sob...

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...

Hey Joe Henderson! What we got here: Moving through the cycle, starting with early, hot jazz from Illinois Jacquet; a brisk blues from the Duke and his orchestra (Paul Gonsalves’ tenor sax goes all tough and bluesy); to the chillest Miles Davis trumpet and funereal accompaniment from the soundtrack ‘Elevator to the Gallows’: he meets the occasion. What you hear next is a lengthy cut by Keith Jarrett, hypnotic in its repeated bass line and vivacious clean living on the keyboard. A couple of tempo changes serve to highlight a sax entry and the rhythm section once more – all in all, 12 minutes well spent. And then there’s even more... not that the other major talents in this week’s playlist don’t merit their own brief but succinct (?) evaluation from yours truly.  Alas, it’s just that I’m suddenly thinking that an attempt to define a jazz tune and translate its meaning into words. It's a Sisyphean task! When at the SF Museum of Modern Art, I read the descriptive cards alongside works ...