Edition #19: "Iberian Roots" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

On this virtual tour guided by our world-music specialist Lorenzo Mans, we make stops for Flamenco in Andalusia, Gypsy Rumba in Barcelona and Perpignan, Fado in Portugal, drawing Celtic roots from Galicia and the unique Euskedi culture of the Basque country. Some of this music delves into the Muslim and Sephardic distant past, or borrows from former colonies. Proving that this is not a new trend, he includes "I'll Go to Santiago," a song written in the Cuban "Son" style by Federico Garcia Lorca, when he visited the island in the 1920s.

Playlist

 1) Radio Tarifa= Black Hooves
 2) Radio Tarifa= Pincushion Tango
 3) Perlita De Huelva= My Pretty Baby Daughter
 4) Peret= Wait A Minute
 5) Dolores Vargas= Achilipu
 6) Ojos De Brujo= Maria's Tango
 7) Ojos De Brujo= Cheaters Are Losers
 8) Amalia Rodrigues= The Black Ship
 9) Katia Guerreiro= Vermillion Rose
 10) Kepa Junkera= The Road to Berhueta
 11) Peio Serbielle= New Girlfriend
 12) Uxia= Sailor's Wife Lament
 13) Uxia= Your Mama's A Witch
 14) Barrio Chino= Saudade
 15) Tekameli= Que Son Son
 16) Lola Flores= Let the Tiger Eat Me
 17) Ana Belen= I'll Go to Santiago
 18) Radio Tarifa= Osu
 19) Praying Voices
 

Edition #18: Afro-French - listen | listen with RealPlayer

World music guide Lorenzo Mans is the only passport you need for this musical tour of former French colonies around the world. First stop, the Antilles islands like Martinique, where the beguine began. and on to Haiti, where we sample the troubadour tradition, their version of merengue and the modern beat called compass - all sung in Creole. A transatlantic jump brings us to Mali, where local blues musicians sprinkle their lyrics with French phrases and Monsieur Salif Keita performs a cover version of a classic chanson in his distinctive African accent, leading to Afro-Parisian rappers from the projects who take pride in their urban slang.

Playlist

 1) Kali= Perfume of the Islands
 2) Ti Coca= Haiti Cherie
 3) Nemours Jean Baptiste= She took my money
 4) Manno Charlemagne= Haiti's not a forest
 5) Beethova Obas= Lina
 6) Kali= Children of the Good Lord
 7) Chris Combette= La Nati
 8) Nemours Jean Baptiste= Pimp # 3
 9) Boubacar Traore= Kari Kari Madison
 10) Amadou & Mariam= mon amour ma cherie
 11) Salif Keita= I'm here to tell you
 12) Emeline Michel= Moso Mama
 13) Taxi Creole= Mandolin
 14) Fabulous Troubadours= L'Accent
 15) Jephte Guillaume= Where are the people?
 

Edition #17: Secular Prayers - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Starting with a seamless blend of klezmer and Muslim vocals, Lorenzo Mans has the former front man of the Specials pay homage to Ravel, Bizet and company, while an Israeli scholar recreates the sound of Muslim Spain. Folk music from medieval Armenia follows, accompanied by the Master Singer of Iran. Not to be outdone, a young Mongolian diva enters the fray, along with avant musicians from New York who jam in Istanbul. An electric blues from a nomad tribe in the Sahara then finds its way into Sufi trip-hop and...did you think anyone could stop there?

Playlist

 1) Orient House Ensemble= Dal'ouna on the Return
 2) Terry Hall= The Hour of Two Lights
 3) Sameer Makhoul= al-Andalusi verses
 4) Shoghaken Ensemble= Dance of Tamir Agha
 5) Hoseyn Qavami= Esfahani verses
 6) Khongorzul= The River Herlen
 7) Wax Poetic= Oriental Wind
 8) Tinariwen= Chet Boghassa
 9) Mercan Dede= the name Shah
 10) Cheb Mami= Delali Mantzaoutchi
 11) Shakila= Kokab
 12) dj Cheb i Sabbah= Kese Kese
 

Edition #16: Psycho-Babble Club Mix - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Spinning for a motley crew at the Tower of Babel, world music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans has the Boys in the Hood learn "Nuyorican," while a tribal chant gets a techno splice job, Jamaican Dancehall MCs dub Serge Gainsbourg, a French Disco Diva goes to Ibiza for a total makeover, and Dominicans add sex chat to Reggae and call it "Reggaeton." (We just call it fabulous.)

Playlist

 1)   Los Chicharrones: Bugaloo
 2)   Salif Keita: Musulu Remix
 3)   Lisa Danger: Lola Rasta Quay
 4)   Baby Rasta & El Gringo: Change Your Lyric
 5)   Frederic Galliano: Affo ReMix
 6)   Barrington Levy: Here I Come
 7)   Mylene Farmer: Opti Mystique Me
 8)   Tim Love Lee: Again Son Harder
 9)   Sister Brady: Javanaise Remake
 10) Mala Fe & Glory: Doggie Style
 11) Mauro Picotto: Like This Like That
 12) Modem Quartet: Fantasia For Clarinet
 13) Mylene Farmer: Dis Enchante
 

Edition #15: Bi-Polar Metronome - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Lorenzo Mans moves beyond ethnic lineage with: Bhangra DJs who sample from secular and sacred sources...a kick-ass African salsa band...East Indians from the West Indies...Balkan Brass with Jamaican Dubstyle...a Sufi lament that becomes a catchy hook...symphonic Algerian Rai...the Pre-Colombian roots of Latin Pop...Punk-Ska from a Basque provocateur.

Playlist

 1) Karnataka College: Vocal Exercise
 2) Ustad Sultan Khan: Jaadu Magic Mix
 3) Africando: Son Fo
 4) Ustad Sultan Khan: Majhi Reh ReMix
 5) Africando: Quel Scandal
 6) Ustad Sultan Khan: Maula Bhangra Mix
 7) Bobo Bhagwa Dean: Irene Win the Lottery
 8) Bigga Bush: Turkish Roots
 9) Mercan Dede: Shiki Shiki Baba
 10) Ram Ragie Prabhu: Wedding Plan
 11) Fela Ababsa: A Night in Algiers
 12) Gaby Kerpel: Desire & Guilt
 13) Fermin Muguruza: Hurricane Puzka
 14) Toto La Momposina: Faroto Injun
 

Edition #14: Slow Core - listen | listen with RealPlayer

World-music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans explains this ingenious compilation thus: It's about a minimalist composer who stops being compulsive, an aging punk rocker who visits his dying mother, a garage band without a drummer. It's about stretching an awkward moment, describing it from every possible angle until the pain subsides, or standing still like the humming bird, so you can taste the nectar.

Edition #13: Throat Singers from Tuva - listen | listen with RealPlayer

As world music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans recalls, the tiny Republic of Tuva, in the Russian Federation, was one of the first to gain independence from the former Soviet Union, but it has been known for its wild horses and the peculiar vocal style known as throat-singing for eons. Tuva musicians have emigrated to the most unexpected places (Milan, Wyoming, Munich, etc.) where they have absorbed all kinds of musical influences: Native American chants, punk rock, avant electronica, etc. Sample them, unforgettably, here.

Edition #12: World Dub - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Alternating Bally Sagoo's version of Jamaican dub with club mixes that sample vintage Bollywood hits, Lorenzo Mans moves on to Frederic Galliano's Parisian dance floor mixes, featuring traditional singers from Mali. The session ends with less typical examples of the influence of Dub on the so-called developing world.

Edition #11: "The Last of the Garifuna" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

World-music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans relates that, in the early 18th century, a slave ship crashed in what is now Belize, on the North coast of South America. All the prisoners escaped and were welcomed by the native Arawak people. Out of this meeting of unexpected bedfellows, the language and culture known as Garifuna was born. This session features the few old men who might be the only traditional Garifuna musicians left.

Edition #10: "A Gathering of the Tribes" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Here WPS1 world music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans stretches the meaning of fusion to include felicitous collaborations between musicians from different traditions: a Flamenco singer with a Cuban jazz pianist; a Malian pop singer with a French country band; a Tunisian oud player who has discovered Electronica; nomads from Southern Sahara who channel the Grateful Dead.

Edition #9: The Louisiana Purchase - listen | listen with RealPlayer

The contents of this program reminds WPS1 world-music guide Lorenzo Mans of the time when the U.S. bought Louisiana from Napoleon at 4 cents an acre and an American general was heard to remark to Thomas Jefferson, "You have bought it for a song." Little did anyone foresee the musical treasure trove we would get for that song. The birthplace of jazz continues to be fertile soil for new musical genres that sometimes defy definition.

Edition #8: "Vintage Samba / Vintage Cumbia" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Samba, the first major musical export of Brazil, is now regarded as an outdated cliche by most Brazilians, but WPS1 world-music connoisseur Lorenzo Mans demonstrates that in the hands of first-rate artists, this rhythm remains as infectious as ever. Included in this session is a rural version of Cumbia known as Vallenato, performed here in all its unpolished glory by unheard-of musicians, who take us back to a happier time in Colombia, before it became the frontline for the War on Drugs.

Playlist

 Vintage Samba: 

 1) Paulinho de Viola = "I'm in Trouble" 
 2) Beth Carvalho = "The Lonely Dance" 
 3) Martinho da Vila = "Heart of a Scoundrel" 
 4) Joanna = "Looking Slick" 
 5) Joao Bosco = "Bullet with Bullet" 
 6) Silvia Torres = "Catch the Spirit" 
 7) Nazare Pereira = "Moonlight" 
 8) Jorge Ben = "The Widow's Boyfriend" 
 9) Rosa Passos = "Showers of March" 
 10) Geraldo Azevedo = "Berekeke" 


 Vintage Cumbia:

 11) Conjunto Tipico Vallenato = "Cumbia from San Pues"
 12) Los Galleros = "Song for Soledad"
 13) Andres Landero = "Indian Cumbia"
 14) Los Corraleros de Majagual = "Peasant Cumbia"
 15) Alberto Pacheco = "Cumbia from the Swamp"
 16) Corraleja 71 = "Her Red Skirt"
 17) Los Hispanos = "Atlantico"
 18) Tamara = "Maria, the Red Hot Mamma"
 19) Armando Hernandez = "La Zenaida"
 20) Pedro Lanza & Los Pelayeros = "Cumbia from the Deep Country"
 21) Los Gavilanes de la Costa = "The Sea Hawks"
 

Edition #7: "Iceberg Theory" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Lorenzo Mans chooses music from cold climates to warm a lost heart. The title comes from Ernest Hemingway: "I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There are seven-eighths of it underwater for every part that shows."

Edition #6: "The Former Anatolia" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

With this new compilation, Lorenzo Mans takes an imaginary trip to places formerly in turmoil but now enjoying relative peace. Places like Turkey, where an independent label can record local musicians and get them airplay. Or Uzbekistan, where a secular Muslim singer can have a long career and pass it to his daughter. Or Macedonia, where a corpulent diva can sing risque songs in cabarets. Or like Romania, where a multi-generational Gypsy caravan can defiantly call itself, "A Bunch of Crooks."

Playlist

 1) Istambul Street Musicians
 2) Continued
 3) Birol Topaloglu (Istambul) - "Europa"
 4) Bengi Trio (Ist.) - "Kasik Havasi"
 5) Selim Sesler (Ist.) - "Ali Pasa"
 6) Barbaros Erkose (Ist.) - "Kanat Kari"
 7) Ulas Ozdemir (Ist.) - "Oldum"
 8) Chengiz Ozkan (Ist.) - "Ferahi"
 9) Alim Qasimov (Uzbekistan) - "Bagishlami"
 10) Esma Redzepova (Macedonia) - "Abre Ramce"
 11) Taraf de Haidouks (N.W. of Bucharest) - "The Bear Trainer's Circle Dance"
 12) Taraf de Haidouks - "Tell Me, Old Man"
 13) T.de H. - "Dumbala Dumba"
 14) T. de H. - "Ballad of the Dictator"
 15) T. de H. - Love in Clejani"
 16) T. de H. - "Rustem"
 17) Spanish Gypsies Clapping 

Edition #5: M.T. Vera - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Lorenzo Mans compiles rare recordings by Maria Teresa Vera, who held the title of Troubadour Laureate of Cuba for most of her life (1895-1965). The illegitimate, bi-racial daughter of a slave, raised by a wealthy, white, progressive family, she was already famous in her teens as a singer, songwriter, and guitar virtuoso. As a band-leader in the 1920's, she was the driving force behind the fusion of European and African roots that created Cuban pop music. 

Edition #4: Travels of Marco Polo - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Lorenzo Mans chooses music from all the places he imagines Marco Polo would have stopped for a beer. Inspired by Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities. Really.

Edition #3: Dos Equis - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Lorenzo Mans put this compilation together for a theater piece that he calls "a Bladerunner vision of a video arcade somewhere in Latin America, populated by cyber-punks, and played before and after the show and during its intermission." He chose what he calls 'hybrid' instrumentals that sample Latin American rhythms, but included cuts that sampled from other ethnic sources as well. "In my own experience, " he says, "this type of music dates back to the late 50s, when Prez Prado from Cuba and Esquivel from Mexico came to the US and went wild with the new possibilities of high-fidelity and studio wizardry." Tracks include music by GoTan Project, Cachaito, Radio Zumbido, Esquivel, Tipsy and Dus Oud.

Edition #2: "100% Arabica" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Mixmaster Lorenzo Mans makes pure RAI. This music (pronounced "rye") was born when the secular musicians of Algeria were exposed to American rock-and-roll through bootleg cassettes. By the time Rai became the prevailing pop music of the Arab world, the political edge had softened and -- much to the dismay of fundamentalists -- was replaced by a flagrant hedonism. When Rai was adopted by the disaffected Arab youth in the housing projects on the north side of Paris, the lyrics became more confrontational and the musical influences grew to include hip-hop, reggae and salsa. Most important, it rediscovered traditional drumming from North Africa.

Edition #1: "Sultry Winter Sunday" - listen | listen with RealPlayer

Suddenly, in the dead of winter, the temperature rose in New York and the love of Lorenzo Mans's life invited him over for dinner. Not wishing to go empty-handed, he put together a session of suitably sultry sounds to bring along, pulling tracks from every category of music on his shelves, almost without thinking. "My lover did not appreciate it," he reports, but he made copies for other friends -- us -- who did and we can tell you: it works, whatever the mood, and wherever you are in the world.

Playlist

 1) James Bond Theme, Surf Chandlers (Japan)
 2) Humanity: Gerald (UK) & Louise Rhodes (U.S.)
 3) No Good at Love, June Tabor (UK)
 4) Veronica, Virginia Rodrigues (Brazil)
 5) Stormy Night, Virginia Rodrigues 
 6) Magic Chant #4, Federico Mompou (Catalonia)
 7) Solitude, Dr. John (U.S.)
 8) That Feel, Tom Waits (U.S.)
 9)   Ai Du, Ali Farka Touré (Mali) & Ry Cooder (U.S.)
 10) Rafiki, Zap Mama (Belgium)
 11) No More Affairs, Tindersticks (UK)
 12) Ocean, Sheila Chandra (UK)
 13) O Saathi Re, DJ Bally Sagoo (UK)
 14) Bend Your Mind, Elysian Fields (NYC)
 15) I Wanna Be Sedated, Carol Lipnik (NYC)
 16) Wishing All These Things Were New, Merle Haggard (USA)
 17) Parisian from Uptown, Cheb Mamí (Algeria)
 18) Jamming in a Faux Style, Rhythm & Fire (Cuba)