Misty In Roots à Massy

Le reggae roots n’est pas l’apanage des jamaïquains, même si la concurrence est rude !!!

La tribu rasta londonienne de Misty in Roots nous le prouve depuis prés de 30 ans. Fers de lance de la scène roots britannique avec Steel Pulse et Aswad, le groupe s’est formé en 1974. En pleine révolution punk, ils vont prendre part activement au mouvement Rock Against Racism qui mélangera pour la première fois en Angleterre musiciens noirs et blancs sur scène.

Apôtres d’une musique consciente, stigmatisant les problèmes sociaux de l’Angleterre tatchérienne (émeutes raciales de Brixton, désindustrialisation, chômage, etc.), ils vont enchainer albums (toujours indépendants), tournées et voyages en Afrique. Quelques uns de leurs chefs d’œuvres datent de cette période du début des années 80, lorsque leur reggae roots puissant, rehaussé de vibrations textuelles sans compromission les placent définitivement au centre de l’échiquier reggae international. Leur dernier album est sorti en 2002 chez Real World (le label de Peter Gabriel) et leurs prestations scéniques sont toujours autant des épopées mystiques et politiques, des hymnes au reggae conscient et engagé.

En première partie, le combo yvelinois de Danakil nous livrera sa version du roots & conscious reggae.

Interview de TONY LEVIN

TIRER LEVIN TANT QU’IL EST BON

Qui est exactement TONY LEVIN, bassiste indécrottable de PETER GABRIEL ( on dit : cheville ouvrière), membre à temps partiel de KING CRIMSON, patron de son propre groupe (qui vient de sortir son deuxième cd : RESONATOR), et sideman sur au moins 54,49 % des albums parus depuis 1970 ? Nous ne lui avons pas posé la question. Il est de bonne humeur, mais méticuleusement diplomate....Interviou de TONY LEVIN

Le retour du zoulou blanc

photo: Claude Gassian

Johnny Clegg: "La musique est mon lien essentiel au monde."

L'attachant Johnny Clegg arrive à Ottawa avec six musiciens pour hâter la fin de l'hiver. Joint par téléphone à Johannesburg (Afrique du Sud), où il réside, Jonathan "Johnny" Clegg est d'une bonne humeur contagieuse, malgré le marathon téléphonique auquel il se livre.

Le capital de sympathie dont il bénéficie ici ferait rougir de jalousie la diamantaire sud-africaine De Beers. Les réactions entendues à droite et à gauche à l'annonce de sa venue sont très favorables, même s'il ne tourne pas fréquemment à la radio. Bien qu'il ait franchi la cinquantaine depuis peu, Johnny Clegg est reconnu pour offrir des performances qualifiées pour le moins d'énergiques, dans lesquelles la danse a toujours eu une place de choix. Il met d'ailleurs la touche finale à un documentaire sur son parcours, intitulé The Last Dance of a White Zulu, prévu pour le mois de mai prochain, via son site Web.

Comme s'il n'y avait pas déjà assez de sa chaude musique pour justifier l'intérêt qu'on lui porte, Clegg a déjà été statufié par le chanteur Renaud sur son album Putain de camion en 1998. La chanson Jonathan, en forme de panégyrique, avait fini de l'installer au panthéon des héros africains, à cause de sa lutte contre l'apartheid. "Je me suis toujours défini plus comme un activiste culturel que politique, mais il faut savoir qu'à cette époque, ce qui était culturel était aussi politique, et chanter en anglais et en zoulou dans une même chanson vous assurait de ne pas passer à la radio."

"J'ai rencontré Renaud pour la première fois en 1986, alors qu'il était venu en Afrique du Sud
pour une émission intitulée Les Enfants du rock, et nous avons gardé contact depuis." C'est d'ailleurs le chanteur français qui agit à titre de producteur exécutif pour One Life, son nouvel et 18e album en près de 30 ans de carrière, album qui a pu bénéficier de l'expertise des ingénieurs des studios Real World de Peter Gabriel. Sur le plan musical, on y retrouve encore ce mélange de rock et de musique africaine qui le caractérise si bien, mais aussi enrichi de sonorités latines ou reggae.

On évoque avec lui diverses anecdotes, comme la fois où l'on a tenté de lui voler sa voiture alors qu'il était dedans -avec sa mère de surcroît! - et il éclate de rire. "C'est l'Afrique, Monsieur!" lance-t-il spontanément. "L'Afrique, oui, c'est la guerre et le sida, mais c'est aussi un continent qui change rapidement." À preuve, l'exemple qu'il nous donne de la compagnie African Sky, dans laquelle il a investi il y a quelques années, et qui travaille à récupérer les composantes des cellulaires et ordinateurs pour en recycler les métaux.

Mais si les affaires vont bien, quelle est la raison qui le pousse à continuer à tourner? "Vous savez, la musique est mon lien essentiel au monde."

Le 21 février à 20h Au Théâtre Centrepointe d'Ottawa

Erich Langlois

Paula Cole finds her voice again

Paula Cole went from backing up Peter Gabriel to overnight sensation with “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone” and “I Don’t Want to Wait” from “Dawson’s Creek”

Then in 2000 she just went away. She dropped out of the business and only now is starting to try again. She’s scheduled to perform Friday at her alma mater, Berklee College of Music in Boston. A new album, “Courage” is due in June.

Q. So. Where have you been?

A. I moved to L.A. in 2000 and lived there until February of 2005, when I moved back to New York City. They were my quiet years, my domestic years. Sky (Cole’s daughter) was born in 2001, and I found a house with a big yard. We had dogs and cats and a settled-down life.

You abandoned your career. Why, and why then?

It had been building for a while. Some of the things that I’d wished for were happening, and that was such a blessing, and yet there was so much more to life. I really wanted a child. I’d been out in the world too long. It was like being in the sun, it blanches your skin. I just needed to stop, to punctuate it with a big period.

What brought you back?

(Producer and manager) Bobby Colomby, who I first met in 1994, got word from my former manager that I needed a friend. So he e-mailed me and asked how I was. I said, “I’m fine. I’m a mom. I don’t think I’m going to be in the music business. I don’t know what’s happening.” I had done him a favor in 1997, singing on an album by an unknown artist he was working with, and he wanted to repay the favor. He believed in me, profoundly, and I learned to trust him. He brought fun to music and life again. I feel incredibly blessed to be taken under his wing.

Is the music, and the process of making music, different this time around?

Writing before was a hermetic process. I was a kind of Type A, controlling person, and that comes from a lot of fear. Writing my songs by myself in a silent room felt safe. Now I’m writing with other people. I have to show up and come up with ideas and be detached enough to be criticized. It’s healthy. And it makes the work better to not be so precious about it.

This is your first headlining concert in seven years. Are you nervous?

Sure, I have some anxiety about it. But I know that once I’m a couple songs deep into the show it’ll be like riding a bike. It has to be. God, it better be.

Joan Anderman, Boston Globe

Why Birds Sing At Real World

Why Birds Sing takes its inspiration from a book of the same name by David Rothenberg - the American musician and philosopher, who puts forward the theory that birds not only sing for courtship and territorial reasons, but also for pleasure. This Endemol documentary, transmitting sometime in March 2007 on BBC4, follows David around - equipped with clarinet and flute - meeting scientists, ornithologists, poets, eccentrics and of course, musicians, including Laurie Anderson, Beth Orton, Jarvis Cocker and Juana Molina. This extraordinary journey climaxed with a recording session in the Big Room at Real World Studios with producer/composers Simon Emmerson and Richard Evans, Kate St John and the Guillemots all collaborating with the real bird samples to create an undeniably funky dance groove. (2006-12-30)

Jarvis, Guillemots, Peter Gabriel in BBC Bird Doc

We may know why the caged bird sings, but what about its undomesticated sibling, chirping its little heart out on the power line outside your window? Author/naturalist/esteemed jazz clarinetist David Rothenberg set out to discover just what inspires these feathered friends to burst into song in his 2005 book Why Birds Sing, concluding humankind's avian neighbors sing not just for practical purposes (mating, communication, etc.), but for one of the same reasons we do: pleasure.

Um, like, that's cute and all, but what's a book? We want Rothenberg's ideas distilled into a riveting, uncomplicated television documentary! With music! And famous people! And thanks to the BBC, that's just what we'll get. According to The Guardian, BBC Four will soon premiere Why Birds Sing, an 80-minute documentary inspired by Rothenberg's ideas and packed with guest spots from Jarvis Cocker, Beth Orton, Laurie Anderson, and Peter Gabriel.

The Cheetah Television-produced film was created in part at Gabriel's Real World Studios and concludes with an all-encompassing musical collaboration featuring Gabriel, Guillemots, Afro-Celt Sound System founder Simon Emmerson, composer Richard Evans, and Van Morrison bandmate Kate St John using "real bird samples to create an undeniably funky dance groove." We are not making that quote up: it's on Real World Studios' website

Rock duo are set to get the bird

Jarvis Cocker and Peter Gabriel are spreading their wings to help make a BBC documentary on birdsong. The rock stars will perform on Why Birds Sing, an 80-minute film based on musician and philosopher David Rothenberg’s book. Also taking part in the BBC4 production are Beth Orton, Laurie Anderson and the aptly named Guillemots.

It will culminate in a unique musical composition combining human music and birdsong featuring Gabriel, the Guillemots and musician Simon Emmerson and the vocal talents of a stonechat, butcher bird, hoopoe, woodpecker and an eider duck. Sara Ramsden of makers Cheetah Television said: “Only on BBC4 can you see a man in his underpants pretending to be a song thrush while revealing the latest neuroscientific discovery of what’s really going on in a bird’s brain.”

Paula Cole returns after seven-year absence

Cole play: Local pop star returns after seven-year absence

When Rockport native Paula Cole stopped performing in 2000 she was a pop star with a major label contract. At first she needed to take a break from the hectic career that followed her winning Grammy’s Best New Artist award in 1997. But the birth of her asthmatic daughter, Sky, required healing of another kind.

Now the Berklee College of Music graduate -- who will give her first performance in seven years on Friday at Berklee Performance Center -- is starting all over again."I stopped touring because I’d been running on a giant hamster wheel since flying to Germany in 1993 to sing with Peter Gabriel" Cole, 38, said from her home in Manhattan. "That was before my first disc, ’Harbinger,’ even came out."From there it just didn’t stop. The residual atrophy on my personal life took its toll, and my enthusiasm felt increasingly inauthentic. I stand by the three discs I made, though. I’m very proud of those."

Newly married and free of the pressures of touring, Cole attempted a follow-up to her 1999 CD, "Amen." When her record label, Warner Bros., reacted to the results with indifference, she shelved the project. They, in turn, dropped her. As it turned out, Cole was freed up just in time for the birth of her daughter Sky, now 5. The child’s severe asthma required a vigilant regimen of medication and emergency room visits. "Sky struggled for years," Cole said, "and I stopped writing all together. I needed that time just to be a mom. The fact that I was able to do so -- that my previous success kept us afloat -- is a blessing."

Now in the throes of a divorce that she declines to discuss, Cole sees her music as a source of energy. "I’ve missed performing and I’m coming back with a renewed sense of gratitude," she said. "I need to use my voice. It’s a responsibility and it’s healing. I thought about pursuing something else; I even looked into the business major curriculum at UCLA. But it’s obvious to me that music is what I’m meant for."

Once Cole decided to return to music, she first signed with Columbia, but, she said, "I got lost in the ongoing label mergers." Now she has a deal with the revived Decca label and is preparing for the release of a new CD, tentatively titled "Courage," which she describes as more diverse and gentler than previous efforts. It comes out in June. In July, Cole will kick off her national Lessons in Life tour. But first comes this weekend’s homecoming performance.

"Nowadays I look at the business side of this with a healthy Buddhist sense of detachment," Cole said, with a laugh. "Having survived my midlife crisis, I can now recommend it to everyone as an excellent tool to help you get around all of life’s BS. "For me it’s a spiritual full circle. I feel the need to come back to my community for strength and, of course, to say thank you."

By Christopher John Treacy/ Music
Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Jarvis Cocker to star in bird documentary

He will help investigate why birds sing. Jarvis Cocker is set to feature in a new BBC documentary which will investigate why birds sing. 'Why Birds Sing' is based on the book of the same name by musician and philosopher David Rothenberg, who argues that birds sing for sheer joy of it. As well as Cocker, the film will feature Peter Gabriel, Beth Orton and Laurie Anderson. The show will culminate in a "unique musical composition combining human music with birdsong".

This will feature Gabriel, Guillemots and founder of the Afro-Celt Sound System, Simon Emmerson. The 80-minute show will premiere on BBC4, though a transmission date has yet to be announced, reports The Guardian. Meanwhile Jarvis Cocker will play a Shockwaves NME Awards Show on Saturday (February 17) at London's Astoria.

57

Today in history - Feb. 13 Singer Peter Gabriel is 57

More than your garden variety of festival

WOMAD stage will host more than 300 artists from 20 countries, including, from top right, Bollywood's Asha Bosle, the most recorded artist in history; Mesoamerican singer Lila Downs; and Portuguese fado singer Mariza.

WOMADelaide has grown to maturity under founder Rob Brookman's care.

Adelaide's beloved WOMAD festival is losing creative director and founder Rob Brookman, whose vision 16 years ago brought the world music festival to Australia and planted it under Botanic Park's canopy of trees...

Mélancolie musicale de l'Arménie

Le musicien arménien Gaguik Mouradian en concert au Théâtre des Abbesses (Paris-18e), le 10 février 2007.

Samedi 10 février, l'Arménie s'exprimait au Théâtre des Abbesses, à Paris. Après quelques pièces en solo interprétées par le joueur de kamantché (vielle à pique) Gaguik Mouradian, formidable ciseleur de cordes, la sonorité douce et plaintive du doudouk de Lévon Minassian, hautbois à neuf trous taillé dans l'abricotier, tisse le fil conducteur du répertoire.

Lévon Minassian a grandi à Marseille, mais il porte la terre de ses aïeux en lui et dans cet instrument dont il joue depuis l'âge de 16 ans. Lauréat du "Trophée des maîtres", réunion des grands interprètes, révélatrice de nouveaux talents du doudouk ayant lieu tous les dix ans à Gumri, deuxième ville de l'Arménie, il a enregistré deux albums (label Long Distance), en collaboration avec Peter Gabriel, Aznavour, Sting, I Muvrini, participé à plusieurs musiques de films avec le compositeur Armand Amar.

Autour de lui, deux autres joueurs dedoudouk, venus d'Arménie, Amen Ghazarian et Arthur Ghasabian, chargé de faire le bourdon (note tenue, le dam) sous la mélodie. A deux (dans la tradition, le soliste est accompagné du bourdon) ou à trois, les musiciens déroulent de lentes musiques tristes, poignantes et infiniment sensuelles.

Rejoints sur certaines pièces par deux talents sûrs du chant arménien, Roselyne Minassian et le puissant Hamlet Gevorgian, connu comme le plus renommé spécialiste du chant traditionnel à Erevan, les doudoukistes dictent la loi de la mélancolie austère et belle imprégnant la musique de l'Arménie, des mélodies qui semblent porter en elles la mémoire, l'histoire douloureuse du pays.

The BBC Folk Awards, The Brewery, London

Folkies aren't supposed to want to be famous; they're supposed to want to be contiguous with their tradition. This does not appear to be an issue for Seth Lakeman (inset), the young Dartmoor multi-instrumentalist and beacon of spanking new folk celebrity. He won two gongs at the BBC Folk Awards last week and treated the assembly to a demonstration of authentic star quality.

He radiates wide-eyed camera-ready energy and he does it without inhibition. But whereas Lakeman just goes out there and gets on with it, everyone else in folk is a bit anxious about the celeb thing, not least the BBC. The problem, of course, is that to serve folk's cause you need to get "profile". To get profile you need to get people's attention. And to get people's attention these days requires celebrity, or so they say. What then ensues is the marketing grail: momentum. So while the Folk Awards have got bigger and bigger over the half-decade or so since their inception, year-on-year biggerness has become an absolute requirement.

Danny Thompson and Peter Gabriel (not a mirror image!)

This year the ante was upped afresh. The stage was dressed with Hollywood twinkles, Eliza Carthy dressed herself as the inside of a pomegranate and Lembit Opik MP made a speech in which he declared a passionate interest in Romanian musicianship.

That was the only real stomach-churner, though, because the Beeb just about got it right, by inviting celebrity gong-presenters possessed of real status but, Opik aside, reasonably contained vanity. Nick Park, Andrew Motion, Sir David Attenborough, Rosanne Cash, Peter Gabriel and Jennifer Saunders were gracious, un-narcissistic and in some ways relevant to the recipients of their prizes. Vin Garbutt and Archie Fisher were less sexy but more relevant.



In real folk terms, though, sexy is hard to define. Some might suggest that the definition of 21st-century folk sexiness might be the unlooked-for onstage reunion of the first great crossover artists of British folk. No, not the Seekers. Pentangle. And so it came to pass. A shudder of anticipation passed round the Brewery as the original five-pointed stars of folk-rock-jazz-blues fusion took the stage for the first time in 30 years and then completely cocked up their first number, "Bruton Town". They followed it, almost flawlessly, with that hoary old cliché of Sixties pan-cultural fusion, "Light Flight", and everyone felt a lot better. You even began to get a sense of what it was that made them into celebrities all those years ago - slippery, shiny, elusive music that defies easy definition. Music which is remarkable for being neither wholly one thing nor another.

By Nick Coleman

Peter Gabriel Growing Up Live on Artsworld Sky TV

Peter Gabriel performs a live concert from the Fila Forum, Milan, featuring a range of his songs, including old favourites such as Sledgehammer, Red Rain and Solsbury Hill.

Broadcast times :
Sun 11 Feb 2007 9pm - 10pm
Wed 14 Feb 2007 0:40am - 1:40am
Thu 15 Feb 2007 9pm - 10pm
Fri 16 Feb 2007 4pm - 5pm

Featured artists :
The Blind Boys of Alabama (vocals)
Richard Evans (guitar)
Melanie Gabriel (vocals)
Peter Gabriel (vocals)
Tony Levin (bass)
Ged Lynch (drums)
Sevara Nazarkhan (vocals)
David Rhodes (guitar)
Charles Zawose (vocals)
Dr. Hukwe Zawose (vocals)
Rachel Z (keyboards)

Filmed live at the Fila Forum in Milan, in May 2003, Peter Gabriel masterminds this fascinating concert. Featuring visually stunning theatrics set against classic Gabriel hits and songs from his album, Up, Gabriel performs a selection of favourite songs including Sledgehammer, Red Rain, Solsbury Hill and Secret World in a musical tour-de-force that has made Gabriel one of the all-time great performers of the last four decades.

Whole Music Experience: New Music Blog

General NewsSeattle, Washington--Patricia Herlevi, founder of Cranky Crow Whole Music launched a new blog, Whole Music Experience. The blog has been created for musicians, sound healers, labels, promoters and those who organize communal music events such as festivals to contribute short articles about their work and or healing music.

While Herlevi contributes most of the reviews and articles to CCWM, she encourages invited authors to contribute to the community-building blog. She prefers to take a few steps back and moderate the contributions of other writers, musicians, etc. She also encourages musicians who have already been featured in her reviews and articles to contribute to the blog and to express their own ideas about their respective music.

Herlevi envisions a diverse group of authors to come together and share their innovative and intriguing projects. These projects can include, but are not limited to WOMAD, world and jazz music festivals, The Eden Project, youth and music projects, healing arts, or non-profits started by musicians to make a difference in the world.

Interested parties can visit the blog at http://www.wholemusicexp.blogspot.com or contact Patricia Herlevi through World Music Central

Eclectic music inspires choreography

VU ensemble creates dance story to Peter Gabriel's songs

Setting Peter Gabriel's eclectic songs as a theme for a dance performance has benefited both the performers of the Valparaiso University Dance Ensemble and its staff.

"We're expanding their music repertoire, which is kind of fun as a teacher," said Ann Kessler, ensemble co-choreographer and an associate professor of theatre at VU.

"Sometimes you can't ever teach a kid something new, because they know everything, so it's nice every once in a while to be able to do something like this, and it's also something where you're not repeating yourself."

Scheduled to perform today through Sunday at the University Theatre at the VU Center for the Arts, Kessler came up with the idea of setting the Gabriel's multigenred music to original choreography with Kathleen Dominiak, an adjunct assistant professor of theater and co-choreographer.

Both instructors, Kessler said, have been longtime fans of Gabriel's music, which has melded pop and rock with world music and rhythms over three decades. Along with Michigan City VU graduate student Derek Bolka, the choreographers have created a nine-song, 40-minute piece.

"His music is so interesting and his lyrics are so interesting," Kessler said.

"But sometimes they're not easy lyrics. There's images of religion and images of love lost and love gained. Sometimes (the music) is very, very happy, but the words are very insecure -- this is kind of a way of handing down a tradition and keeping his music alive."

Combining long-loved classic rock staples such as "Solisbury Hill" and "In Your Eyes" with deep cuts such as "Here Comes The Flood" and "Excellent Birds (This is the Picture)," the trio have created a running story about two people who must deal with the world around them after being pulled into a painting for the 35-member ensemble's performance. The trio have also included a pair of instrumental pieces penned by Gabriel for the soundtrack to the 1985 film "Birdy."

Kessler said many of her dancers, at first, could not see how the songs were going to connect to tell the story.

"It was hard for them to see how this all made sense," she said. "But in December, before we all left for (holiday) break, we ran all the pieces in order for the first time, and they started to see how all these (songs) connected."

BY TIM SHELLBERG
Times Correspondent

ifyougo

Valparaiso University Dance Ensemble

When: 8 tonight, 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. Sunday

Where: University Theatre at the VU Center for the Arts, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso

Cost: $15 adults, $10 senior citizens and students

FYI: (219) 464-5162 or www.valpo.edu