Obituary: Bruno Nettl (1930-2020)

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 156, April 2020.

Teacher, mentor, writer and pre-eminent ethnomusicologist

From fleeing the holocaust from Czechoslovakia to the US as a child, to being a founding member of the Society of Ethnomusicology, to being one of that field’s most well-respected figures, Bruno Nettl’s life and work is nothing short of remarkable.

In terms of musical study, Nettl wrote on subjects as diverse as the indigenous traditions of North America and the classical music of Iran, but he is perhaps best known for his studies of the field of ethnomusicology itself. No budding ethnomusicologist can avoid his book The Study of Ethnomusicology, a work he first published in 1983 and updated continuously throughout his life, which lays out the essential thought processes and discussions that scholars should undertake before, during and after their research.

Writing at length about the intricacies and philosophies behind study itself is one of those things that can quickly get very dense and very dry, but Nettl’s particular talent was presenting his thoughts in an in-depth and authoritative way while remaining easily accessible and even down-right entertaining. I don’t think I’ve read another ethnomusicologist who is as comfortable making puns and dad-level jokes as Nettl.

Across any field, and certainly within ethnomusicology, it would be hard to come across a person whose work has consistently defined and redefined the meanings of the discipline throughout such a long career as Bruno Nettl. He will be missed, but his work and words will echo on. A memorial concert will be held for Nettl on May 10 at the University of Illinois in Urbana.


Photo: Bruno Nettl, by L. Brian Stauffer.

Super Parquet - Super Parquet

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 156, April 2020.

Super Parquet
Super Parquet
Route 164/Pagans (46 mins)

Super Parquet were first profiled in Songlines two years ago (in #134); now they’re finally here with a debut album to follow their 2015 EP. They’re part of the new school of French folk that are taking things into exciting – and sometimes strange, barely-recognisable – places. Their roots are in the old music of Auvergne but, in Super Parquet’s hands, it becomes an entirely different monster. The acoustic instruments are there – cabrette (bagpipe), banjo, the boîte à bourdon (a self-invented drone-only hurdy-gurdy) – and there are samples from folk song recordings, but all of it is refracted within dark, dirty electronica.

EDM and trip-hop are taken to surreal edges with never-ending loops, unrelenting dissonances and inexorable drones, all with a whole load of acidic noise. Each part shifts and evolves gradually, creating Steve Reich phasing that plays tricks on the mind’s ear. Everyone seems to play in their own time signature, weaving together sonic tapestry while the irresistible drone carries on and on. All the while, no track drifts so far off-piste as to negate the folk at its very core.

It’s overwhelming. It’s claustrophobic. It does weird things to your brain and I love it. This long-awaited debut is not an easy listen, but it’s an incredible experience.

Various Artists - Léve Léve: São Tomé & Príncipe Sounds 70s-80s

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 156, April 2020.

Various Artists
Léve Léve: São Tomé & Príncipe Sounds 70s-80s
Bongo Joe (78 mins)

São Tomé and Príncipe isn’t exactly known as a musical powerhouse nation – Songlines has only reviewed one other São Toméan album in the past 20 years – which makes this particular rare groove compilation such an unexpected delight.

The country (the second smallest in Africa) is made up of a series of islands in the Gulf of Guinea. It’s perfectly placed to absorb all the sounds from both West and Central Africa, and the music on this album shows a lovely combination of Cuban-influenced Congolese guitar music and Ghanaian highlife with its own unique twist arising from its past as a Portuguese colony.

When I listened to this album, I was in the middle of a deep midwinter gloom, but by the end of the first track – ‘Mino Bô Bé Quacueda’ by Africa Negra – I was already walking with a bounce in my step. It’s brilliant music for feeling cheery, all sunshine guitars and major third vocal harmonies with just occasional dips into cheesiness.

Featuring nine artists across 16 tracks, Léve Léve presents the glorious and little-known sound of the equatorial Atlantic islands. The front cover is also intriguingly marked ‘Vol. 1,’ so here’s hoping we get to hear more São Toméan music very soon…

Mazaher - Mazaher

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 156, April 2020.

Mazaher
Mazaher
Abaju! (72 mins)

Zar is a ceremony found in various forms across north-east Africa and beyond that involves communicating and pacifying spirits for mental and physical healing and purification – accompanied, naturally, by music.

Mazaher present the music of zar as it exists in Egypt: a female-dominated rite with hypnotic vocals joined by percussion and drums and underpinned by the low-pitched tamboura lyre, which sounds very reminiscent of the Gnawa guimbri from Morocco. In fact, there are many similarities between the rituals and music of the zar and Gnawa – it can be heard most evidently on the track ‘Amna’.

This album aims to capture the feeling of the ceremony as closely as possible, but nothing can truly replicate it without the sights and smells and 3D loudness, not to mention the changes your body and mind go through across the six or seven hours of the full ritual. Mazaher is an interesting and well-presented introduction to the Egyptian zar from some of its few remaining practitioners. It remains several steps too removed from the real thing to convey the real impact of the ritual, but the music within remains an enjoyable – if perhaps not transcendental – listening experience.

The Sorcerers - In Search of the Lost City of the Monkey God

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 156, April 2020.

The Sorcerers
In Search of the Lost City of the Monkey God
ATA Records (42 mins)

The Sorcerers’ second album presents itself as the ‘soundtrack to the motion picture,’ but don’t be hopping on IMDB just yet – In Search of the Lost City of the Monkey God isn’t a real film that exists on our plane of existence. Rather, it lives in the musicians’ minds as the inspiration for this groove-filled concept album.

As with any film soundtrack worth its weight, the music here is built up of motifs that reoccur and evolve throughout. The main influence is clearly the Latin-edged Ethio-jazz of Mulatu Astatke, evident in the pentatonic melodies and shape of the compositions; the prominent bass clarinet is very Wayne Shorter-esque at times too. Add in the atmospheric, sonic world-building inspired by the distinctive library music sound of the 1960s, and it all has the evocative, cinematic style of classic action-adventure movie soundtracks. A mix of moods means that the album is as well-suited in its bombastic funk sequences (perfect for a car chase) as its tense, brooding passages (what’s looming in the dark?).

Although the concept of a soundtrack to an imaginary film is a bit naff, the album itself immerses the listener in a swamp of jazz, funk and African influences – and it really is quite fun.

Latvijas Radio Bigbends - Spikeri Concert Hall, Riga, Latvia

First published on jazzwise.com



Latvijas Radio Bigbends
Spikeri Concert Hall, Riga, Latvia
30th January 2020

Next to the Daugava river in Riga, an old warehouse has been transformed into one of the city’s most innovative new music spaces. And for two nights, the Spikeri Concert Hall was transformed again, into a giant live-room recording studio for a session from the Latvijas Radio Bigbends (Latvian Radio Big Band).

It was an intimate performance in many ways. Not only was the audience small – the 100 tickets for each show were in such demand that they were allocated by lottery – but the band themselves played entirely without amplification. Listening to the instruments without the adulteration of a sound system was a really liberating experience, and one that brought the audience much closer to the music in an emotional sense. In such close quarters, the feel of the massed horns takes on a physical quality as well as a musical one, although with the occasional downside of the soloists becoming drowned in sound during some of the more hectic moments.

The Big Band was as tight as you’d expect from a state-funded ensemble – not that that makes it any less impressive. The band’s line-up represents a distillation of the country’s varied jazz scene, with the sax section especially acting as a who’s-who of Latvia’s premier players. There were also special guests in the form of Gints Pabērzs on soprano sax, Lithuanian trombonist Jievaras Jasinskis, and Atis Andersons, whose Hammond playing was a delight throughout, his solos adding a classic bluesy hue to proceedings.

The programme of the evening was a set composed by the Big Band’s musical director, tenor saxophonist Kārlis Vanags, entitled Identitātes (Identities). The most striking element was Vanags’ use of contrast. While there were nods to big band’s swing origins, it was the unexpected juxtapositions that pricked the ears the most. In some places, shrill horn blasts pepper sumptuous sustained piano glissandi; in others, wordless vocals seamlessly blend into full-spread trumpet chords. In ‘Jaunā Dzīvība’ (New Life), quiet clouds of layered polyrhythmic sound provided an impressionist backdrop to Rihards Goba’s Santana-like guitar solo. And then, out of nowhere, we’re treated to a simple, elegant solo piano piece in the shape of ‘Iekšējā Balss’ (Inner Voice). The concert ended on one of those big, bold pieces that’s just perfect for a 70s cop movie, complete with wah guitar and a grooving organ trio section to top it off. With the repertoire constantly chopping and changing and catching the listener off-guard, Vanags’ compositional through-line meant that the concert had a conceptual unity that elevated it from a fun big band gig to an accomplished artistic showcase.

The performance was arranged as a live recording to become the ensemble’s forthcoming album, to be released on up-and-coming Latvian jazz label Jersika Records. It was live in every sense, too: the whole concert was mixed onto two-track tape as it was performed for a fully analogue experience; with no editing possible after the fact, there’s no hiding place. And they rose to the occasion. It was a night mercifully free of tedious retakes. Having performed (and recorded) the same concert two nights in a row, there was no need to hang on the audience’s patience by playing the same pieces over and over.

Along with the intimate venue, it all created a relaxed and friendly atmosphere for all involved – perfect for a live recording – and together with the top-notch performances and forward-thinking composition and concept, this was a very special show. Keep your eyes out for the album’s release in the late spring.


Photo: Kārlis Vanags conducts the Latvijas Radio Bigbends, by Kaspars Balamovskis.

Hossein Alizadeh

First published in Tonality Magazine no. 4, 2020.



Few musicians of contemporary Iran are as respected as Hossein Alizadeh. He is the leading master of Persian lutes including the tar (the hourglass-shaped lute) and the setar (a long-necked lute with variants across Central Asia and the Middle East), as well as the shurangiz, a hybrid instrument of his own devising.

Born in Tehran in 1950 to mixed Persian-Azeri parentage, Alizadeh quickly became immersed in the tradition of musiqi-e assil – the classical music of Iran that can be traced back many centuries. He became a professional musician aged just 15, and quickly became noted for his powerful yet delicate performance style and his mastery of improvisation within the classical radif structures. Among his achievements in traditional music are his recordings of the entire canonical cycle of radif based on the interpretations of Mirzah Abdullah.

Aside from strict interpretations of classical and traditional music, Alizadeh has been at the forefront of innovative music in Iran, and has expanded the possibilities of what is thinkable within the realms of Persian music. He has been particularly celebrated as a composer, having written many pieces even outside of his own instruments of choice including, famously, a concerto for ney (end-blown reed flute) and string orchestra entitled NayNava from 1983. In addition to many film scores including those for Gabbeh and Turtles Can Fly, he has also expanded into rarely-walked avenues such as in his creation of the Hamavayan Ensemble, a forward-thinking group bringing new directions to Iranian choral singing.

Part of Alizadeh’s importance to Persian music lies in his dedication to the transmission of the musical culture, which he pursues in various ways. As an educator, he has taught regularly at the Tehran Conservatory of Music, as well as at the University of Tehran and the California Institute of the Arts; his pupils have themselves gone on to be respected and boundary-pushing musicians.

Internationally, he spreads the word through his performances. Alizadeh has played concerts all around the world, both solo and as part of many ensembles with other legends of Persian music, such as Aref Ensemble with Mohammad Reza Lotfi and Perviz Meshkatian, and Masters of Persian Music with Mohammad Reza Shajarian and Kayhan Kalhor. Some of his most exciting collaborations have seen him exploring his music’s wider connections. Made together with renowned Armenian duduk player Djivan Gasparyan, the celebrated album Endless Vision earned Alizadeh one of his three Grammy nominations; it was the first time the Persian and Armenian cultures had met in a formal musical space. He has also performed with Dutch baroque-jazz specialists the Rembrandt Frerichs Trio, a collaboration that has resulted in an album to be released later in 2020.

Hossein Alizadeh is without a doubt one of the most important figures in the field of music in Iran and beyond – as an educator, as a composer, as an exponent of old traditions and new talent and, foremost, as a true master in his performance of Persian classical music.


Photo: Hossein Alizadeh (right) plays the tar alongside Madjid Khaladj on tombak.