NYC Radio Live!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Dave Eggar is a cello virtuoso and one of our most frequent guests at WKCR –  I am posting this short podcast up now because he’ll be performing live today 6-9pm on May 2, 2012! A prodigy, he first played with Metropolitan Opera at the age of 7.  He is not limited by genres, his latest album, Kingston Morning features legend of bluegrass Ralph Stanley, and reggae legends Sly and Robbie and Luciano.  He’s performed and recorded across the spectrum from Beyonce to Bon Jovi to Lucinda Williams to Michael Brecker.  This sweet version of “Bird Cage” capped off an  extended jam at WKCR.

This group features Tom Perozzi on Bass and Chuck Palmer on drums.

Here’s video of another performance of Dave and the Quartet on our show.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

On Feb 5, 2012, Kaleidhaphonic treated the WKCR FM-NY listening audience to a live performance.  It was a magical evening.  Kaleidhaphonic is

Kevin Nathaniel Hylton – Mbira, Rattles, Shakere
Tripp Dudley – Tabla
Salieu Suso – Kora
John Ragusa – Flutes, Conch Shell

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

I’m back from the Sahara, and, as promised, have a ton of recordings to share with you.  This special show was originally broadcast on WKCR on 89.9 FM-NY and features rough mixes of studio recordings with up and coming guitarist and pop star Oumar Konate, Griot Royalty Noura Mint Seymali from Mauritania recording exclusively for us in her flat in Timbuktu, artists from Niger informally jamming in their tents and the Festival Au Desert and much, much more. We’ll hear this Takamba band in the photo above- they use a car battery and a PA and the flute ends up sounding just like Jimi Hendrix…

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

NYC Radio live will be heading to Timbuktu with the incredible singer Kiran Ahluwalia! Here we will hear an excerpt from a radio broadcast when we first met, and hear some of the tracks from her new album Aam Zameen: Common Ground.  Future podcasts will feature musicians from the Festival in the Desert in Mali and other recordings I’ll make, Inshallah, during my travels through Mali.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Abdoulaye Diabate

Abdoulaye Diabate from Mali has been called the greatest griot singer living in the United States.

We recorded this duo track in my studio this year and I thought that rather than selling it, I’d like to share it as a holiday gift to show appreciation to current and future friends who have been enjoying this podcast, Acoustic Mandala Project, or life in general.   On this track, Abdoulaye plays rhythm guitar, bass, djembe and sings, I play some rhythm guitar and all the lead guitars.   This is part of a bigger project called Abdoulaye Diabate’s African Ladyland.

I hope you enjoy it and that you have a a wonderful New Year.

Here’s a bio of Abdoulaye from Wikipedia:

Abdoulaye Diabaté was raised in the Mande tradition to a djali family (traditional musicians and story tellers). His brother Kasse Mady has achieved worldwide fame and his sister Mama Diabate is a great star in Guinea. At age 18, having developed into a formidable singer and guitarist he left his village.^[1] He joined Tenetemba Jazz in Bemako, the capital of Mali.^[1] In 1975, he moved to Abidjan in Ivory Coast where he formed his own band called Super Mande. Super Mande became one of the foremost ensembles in the capital performing all over the country. At times, some now most famous West African stars such as Salif Keita, Mory Kante and Ousmane Kouyate joined the group for performances. The career of Super Mande culminated with the release of their album “Wahabiadashi” which was eventually banned from airplay because the title track criticized hypocritical Marabouts (religious leaders). In the early nineties, Diabate was recruited as a star singer in the world renowned “Ballet Koteba” led by Souleymane Koli to replace Sekou Camara “Cobra” after his death; and also as rhythm-guitarist with the “Go de Koteba” the world famous women group. He toured the world with these ensemble for several years. In 1996, he relocated in New York City. He has since taken part in many cultural events as leader of the re-formed Super Mande group and with many collaborations with artists such as jazzman Don Byron, Peter Apfelbaum, Sean Noonan, and the groups Source and Fula Flute Ensemble.^[3]

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Hawaiian Guitar Virtuoso Jeff Peterson

Jahkey B., a musician and producer, has dedicated over a decade of his life to recording the music of Shamans of the Amazon.  He came to WKCR recently with many of these recordings, some which have never been officially released.  We’ll hear music from Don Solon Tello, Don Guillermo Ojanama and Jose Campos (aka Don Evangelino Murayay) curanderos of a lineage of traditional healing that spans hundreds of years. You can learn more about Jahkey and the albums at http://mamancuna.com/sounds/

Later in part 2 of this podcast – we’ll be joined by 2 musicians who perform live on the same show, Grammy Award winner Jeff Peterson of Hawaii and violinist Frederika Krier.  Jeff and Jahkey will talk about the relationship between the roots music of Hawaii and the Amazonian sounds – there’s quite a connection.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Don Evangelino Murayay

Jahkey B., a musician and producer, has dedicated over a decade of his life to recording the music of Shamans of the Amazon.  He came to WKCR recently with many of these recordings, some which have never been officially released.  We’ll hear music from Don Solon Tello, Don Guillermo Ojanama and Jose Campos (aka Don Evangelino Murayay) curanderos of a lineage of traditional healing that spans hundreds of years. You can learn more about Jahkey and the albums at http://mamancuna.com/sounds/

Later in part 2 of this podcast – we’ll be joined by 2 musicians who perform live on the same show, Grammy Award winner Jeff Peterson of Hawaii and violinist Frederika Krier.  Jeff and Jahkey will talk about the relationship between the roots music of Hawaii and the Amazonian sounds – there’s quite a connection.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Cosmas Magaya

Cosmas Magya is a master of the Mbira ( a type of thumb piano) from the Shona tribe in Zimbabwe.  Here he performs and explains the way the instrument is used in ceremonies to contact ancestors.  We’ll also hear a track he recorded with another powerful Mbira player and vocalist Beauler Dyoko.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Oran Etkin is a Grammy Nominated clarinetist and saxophone player, who has been making waves with his band Kelenia which combines his love of jazz and the music of West Africa.  Featured in this live performance is Lionel Loueke of Benin, West Africa, one of the most exciting jazz musicians today.  He’s been playing with Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter and coming out with amazing albums for Blue Note.

Oran Etkin and Lionel Loueke at WKCR

There is video from this session at WKCR

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Famoro Dioubate is a master of the balafon from Guniea, West Africa.  He performs live on the radio with Yacouba Cissoko on kora, Raul Rothblatt on cello and Sean Dixon on drums.  We also hear him with his full ensemble Kakande.  Famoro is djele, or griot, and his family have been an unbroken chain of musician/historians for almost 800 years.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

A live set from the David Rogers and Kairos, an all-star band featuring Kenny Wessel, guitar; Sylvain Leroux, flutes, Matt Pavolka, Bass and Rob Garcia on Drums recorded a couple months ago at WKCR.   Also a live recording from the Bernard Woma Ensemble on Jumbie Records.  David Rogers is an artist who lived and studied in West Africa for many years and his music is deeply informed by those grooves and his jazz roots.   Bernard Woma is a master of the gyil, the wooden xylophone of northern Ghana.  He is the master drummer of the Ghana Dance Ensemble, Ghana’s National Dance Company and keeps a busy schedule on 3 continents.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Thomas Mapfumo - Photo by George Estreich

Thomas Mapfumo, of Zimbabwe, is a revolutionary musician in every sense of the word.  Musically, his band was one of the first to experiment with combining the mbira (thumb piano) and electric guitars and he was the first to put his own lyrics to traditional Shona melodies.  Politically,  these songs became the anthems of the freedom fighters during White minority rule.

When the revolution succeeded and Rhodesia became Zimbabwe, he continued to be a gadfly.  He questioned the integrity of Robert Mugabe and the current government.  He now lives in exile and while immensely popular his music is banned in the country where he is most beloved.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

A couple recordings I made with a mini-disc recorder in Independent Samoa in 2002 0r 2003.  Every Samoan can sing, if you started to sing a song on a public bus everyone would join you.  The houses have thatched roofs and walls of woven leaves that are folded up during the daytime so the breeze sweeps through.   Here are some pics: the father and son are from the Falonga Bay village in Upolo, where I recorded the outstanding youth chours.

Falonga Bay, Upolo, Samoa

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Kojiro Umezaki at WKCR

Kojiro Umezaki – Shakuhachi-

Live Performance and Interview

This podcast features live performances and interview with Kojiro Umezaki, who plays the Japanese Zen instrument, the shakuhachi, a bamboo flute.  While Kojiro performs the instrument traditionally, he is also experimenting with some new directions in music. Kojiro designs computer programs so that during performances the programs will generate sounds that react to his flute playing in the moment.  We’ll hear live performances with and without this technology and learn a lot about the history of this amazing instrument.

Kojiro Umezaki performs regularly with the Grammy-nominated Silk Road Ensemble and has recorded on the Sony BMG, World Village, and Smithsonian Folkways labels.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

This podcast is a beautiful live performance by Srinivas Reddy and Sameer Gupta when they came to the studio to celebrate the release of their album Hemant and Jog in December of ’08.

Sameer, who is great tabla player and jazz drummer, has recently released an amazing album on Motema called Namaskar. The lineup includes jazz musicians like pianist Mark Cary, who co-produced the album, and maestros of Indian Raga such as Pt. Anindo Chatterjee and Pt. Ramesh Mishra.

Srini has been busy since then as well. He just published a book called The Giver of the Worn Garland: Krishnadevaraya’s Amuktamalyada The work is a literary translation of a famous Telugu epic that poetically describes the devotional love of the ninth century South Indian mystic Antal.

These are some heavy cats!

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

Wasifuddin Dagar comes from the most famous lineage of singers of an ancient style of Indian raga called Druhpad. He is part of an unbroken chain of generations of musicians in his family that has lasted over 400 years. He started his training with his father at 5 years old.
In this musical interview, he both speaks of the philosophy behind this ancient style and sings to exemplify the elements behind this deep, emotional and spiritual style.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed

McCoy Tyner and the Mandingo Ambassadors. McCoy Tyner is true jazz royalty. He’s recorded over 50 albums as a leader and, with John Coltrane, Jimmy Garrison, and Elvin Jones, created the sound which critics refer to as John Coltrane’s “Classic Quartet.” This group’s transcendent sound completely changed the course of music. Sitting down with him for a discussion was one of the great honors of my life.

John Coltrane and McCoyTyner

The Mandingo Abassadors are a classic band, half from West-Africa and half from Brooklyn. Their leader Mamady Kouyate, from Guinea is best known as the guitarist in the classic Bembeya Jazz National.

They were happy enough with the sound I got in the studio that they released the recordings from that session as a album:

Ismael Kouyate – vocals; Mamady Kourouma – guitar; Oran Etkin – tenor sax & clarinets; Sylvain Leroux – flute, tambin and alto sax; Andy Algire – drums; Nick Cudahy – bass and Mamady Kouyate – guitar.