On her recent release, “Wu Man And Friends” the Chinese pipa (lute) virtuoso Wu Man teams up with musicians representing East African, Slavic, and Appalachian traditions. At first glance the combinations of the instruments from such disparate corners of the earth seems forced, however the musical scales of the Ugandan endongo and those of the pipa aren’t so dissimilar; the Ukrainian bandura is also a lute held upright like a pipa, held from behind and played with fingers of both hands; and some Appalachian folk tunes, when played on banjo, seem eerily close to certain Chinese folk melodies. On this edition of New Sounds hear some suggestive conversations between instruments and traditions from Wu Man’s record, with songs about rain in Chinese with accompaniment on Ugandan harp (adungu), a dance from the Appalachian mountains with mouth bow and pipa, and not to be outdone, there’s a pipa/bandura combination hinting at flamenco experimentation.

PROGRAM #2512, Crossing Cultures And Centuries (First aired on Thurs., 2/16/06)

ARTIST(S)	RECORDING	CUT(S)	SOURCE
Wu Man	And Friends	Nandere [2:00] Old Joe Clark [2:30] Bat-Out-Of-Hell Kozachok [3:00]	Traditional Crossroads #4329** www.traditionalcrossroads.com*
Yo Yo Ma & Silk Road Ensemble	Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon	Battle Remembered [4:00]	Sony Classical #93962** www.sonyclassical.com*
Hossein Alizadeh & Djivan Gasparyan	Endless Vision	Mama [6:00]	World Village #468047 ** www.worldvillagemusic.com*
Rolf Lislevand	Nuove Musiche	Passacaglia celtica [2:00] Passacaglia spontanea [4:00] Passacaglia andaluz II [2:30]	ECM Records, due out on 3/7/06 www.ecmrecords.com
Yo Yo Ma & Silk Road Ensemble	Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon	Chi Passa Per’sta Strada [4:00]	See above
Blue Mule	Enter the Mule	Norwegian Wood [4:00]	Flatfive Press #1134 www.flat5.com*