#4228: "Supergroups" of All Kinds
Hear new music by supergroups, including all-star lineups from the African-American tradition in Our Native Daughters, African acoustic music trio 3MA, and music from the British Isles.
There’s music from the collaborative record by the banjo-wielding supergroup, Our Native Daughters, who are Rhiannon Giddens, Amythyst Kiah, Allison Russell and Leyla McCalla. These African-American historians and musicians tell the stories of the dark American institution of slavery and its legacy. In fact, Birds of Chicago singer-songwriter Allison Russell found out that her family line can be traced back to an enslaved person named Quasheba. Hear Russell’s tribute to her ancestor, “Quasheba, Quasheba” featuring Russell and Giddens on banjos, along with Leyla McCalla’s cello and producer Dirk Powell’s electric guitar.
Then, listen to The Furrow Collective, an all-star quartet out of Scotland, whose four distinctive singers and instrumentalists - singer-songwriter Emily Portman, Lucy Farrell and Rachel Newton, and singer/guitarist Alasdair Roberts – might encompass the darker, weirder side of the British folk tradition. Hear tunes from their 2018 record, Fathoms, with musical saw, banjo, harp, fiddle and guitar along with eerie vocal and instrumental effects. Then, hear music by supergroup of great women musicians calling themselves Les Amazones d’Afrique, featuring the Malian griot Kandia Kouyaté, Beninese singer/musician Angelique Kidjo, and Malian singer Mamani Keita, among other great vocalists and musicians from Gabon, Mali, and Nigeria who are part of the collective. For this song, “Anisokoma” hear traded vocal lines by Rokia Koné and Kandia Kouyaté.
Listen to music from the trio 3MA, who are Malian kora master Ballaké Sissoko, the Moroccan oud maestro Driss El Maloumi and the Malagasy valiha wizard, Rajery. [A valiha is a tube-zither, while the oud is found in Arabic classical music, and the kora is 21-stringed lute-harp of griots in Mali.] Hear the African virtuosi in the title track, “Anfaz” from their second record, Anarouz. Also, listen to music from The Hands Free, a new music super-quartet featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and violinist/vocalist Caroline Shaw (Roomful of Teeth, ACME), bassist Eleonore Oppenheim (Glasser, Victoire), multi-instrumentalist and composer/arranger Nathan Koci, and composer and banjo player/guitarist James Moore.
Plus, more music by the Irish and Irish-American supergroup The Gloaming, and a work by virtuoso kemancheh player and composer Kayhan Kalhor for the stellar musical collective, Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road Ensemble.
Program #4228 "Supergroups" (First aired 4/18/2019)
ARTIST: Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble
WORK: Kayhan Kalhor: Mountains are Far Away [1:00]
RECORDING: Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon
SOURCE: Sony #93962
INFO: sonyclassical.com
ARTIST: The Furrow Collective
WORK: The Cruel Grave [3:16]
RECORDING: Fathoms
SOURCE: Hudson Records
INFO:hudsonrecords.co.uk
ARTIST: The Gloaming
WORK: The Pilgrim’s Song [6:54]
RECORDING: The Gloaming 2
SOURCE: HWY-052
INFO: store.brassland.org
ARTIST: The Furrow Collective
WORK: Down by the Greenwoodside [3:53]
RECORDING: Fathoms
SOURCE: Hudson Records
INFO:hudsonrecords.co.uk
ARTIST: The Hands Free
WORK: Needle & Thread [6:41]
RECORDING: The Hands Free
SOURCE: New Amsterdam Records
INFO: thehandsfree.bandcamp.com
ARTIST: Our Native Daughters
WORK: Quasheba, Quasheba [4:43]
RECORDING: Songs of Our Native Daughters
SOURCE: Smithsonian Folkways SFW40232
INFO: folkways.si.edu
ARTIST: Les Amazones d’Afrique
WORK: Anisokoma [5:27]
RECORDING: Republique Amazone
SOURCE: Real World Records CDRW217
INFO: realworldrecords.com
ARTIST: 3MA
WORK: Anfaz [5:40]
RECORDING: Anarouz
SOURCE: Six Degrees Records
INFO: sixdegreesrecords.com
ARTIST: Yo Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble
WORK: Kayhan Kalhor: Mountains are Far Away [6:09]
RECORDING: Silk Road Journeys: Beyond the Horizon
SOURCE: Sony #93962
INFO: sonyclassical.com
