Ivo Papasov - WOMEX 22 Artist Award

First published in the WOMEX – World Music Expo 2022 delegate guide.



A large man grasps a fragile-looking stick of a clarinet and raises it to his mouth: a rapid-fire of wild runs, tricky turnarounds, leaps, squeaks and lightning-fast trills bursts forth. Ivo Papasov has been at the top of his field for the best part of 50 years – it’s just that people haven’t always realised it.

Hailing from the Turkish-speaking Roma population of Bulgaria’s Thrace region, Papasov plays Bulgarian wedding music, which he has evolved into a unique personal style with international influence from Turkish, Greek, Balkan and Roma music, as well as from jazz and off-kilter rock. His extreme virtuosity and expert command of his instrument quickly secured Papasov and his Trakija Band as the most-wanted wedding entertainers in 1970s Bulgaria. By taking an unorthodox approach to the tradition, he revolutionised it.

It wasn’t always easy: he faced persecution during the Communist crack-down on Turkish culture (even landing him a short spell in jail), and after the regime fell, wedding audiences abandoned his style for Westernised pop. A disillusioned Papasov even stopped playing altogether for a while. But genius is hard to dampen, and a resurgence in the last 20 years has seen Papasov and his band once again touring internationally, releasing critically-acclaimed albums and gathering awards as they explode their way through mind-bending time signatures at breakneck speed. It’s a wonder his clarinet doesn’t burst into flames.

It is for his resilience in remaining the epitome of his style through thick and thin; for his dedication to the advancement of Thracian and Turkish-Roma music in Bulgaria; and for his sheer, passion-filled mastery of the clarinet, that Ivo Papasov is the recipient of the WOMEX 22 Artist Award.

Essential 10: Live Albums

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 167, May 2021.

Nikhil Banerjee
Afternoon Ragas (Raga Records, 1992)
This performance by sitar great Nikhil Banerjee, recorded in a museum in Rotterdam in 1970, is simply supreme. The 10-minute alap on Raga Bhimpalasri that opens the album is surely one of the most transcendent ever put to record. Accompanied by Kanai Dutta on tabla, Banerjee guides us through the serenity and the fireworks of ragas Bhimpilasri and Multani. Forget Rotterdam, this album can take you somewhere else entirely.

Bisserov Sisters
Music from the Pirin Mountains (PAN Records, 1990)
Recorded in concert at the Paradiso in Amsterdam, the Bisserov Sisters (together with their instrumentalists the Trio Karadzovska) give a whirlwind tour of the many folk styles of the south-western Bulgarian mountain village of Pirin, from the iconic vocal polyphony to all-instrumental dances and lots more in between. Beautifully performed, the resulting 26-track album is interesting and intriguing in equal measure.

Fatoumata Diawara & Roberto Fonseca
At Home: Live in Marciac (Jazz Village, 2015)
Of many attempted African-Latin collaborations, this is among the best. Between Diawara’s breathtaking voice and Fonseca’s nimble Cuban jazz piano, the connection feels completely natural, unforced and personal. Powerful and driving or subtle and sweet, the two masters match each other every step of the way. This recording from the Jazz in Marciac festival remains their only full-length release together.

Oum Kalthoum
Al Atlal (Sono Cairo, 1966)
Oum Kalthoum is one of the world’s bona fide megastars, revered not only in her native Egypt but across the Arab world and far beyond. She was known for her extended live performances, and Al Atlal (The Ruin) consists of a single 48-minute song of melancholy, despair and utter beauty. It is widely considered to be Kalthoum’s greatest achievement, maybe even the greatest Arabic song ever sung.

Ozomatli
Live at the Fillmore (Concord Records, 2005)
How much dancing is your body ready for? Mariachi, cumbia, salsa, norteño, hip-hop, funk, rock, samba and influences from every continent: it’s all here in one band. Ozomatli are one of the greatest of all party bands, known for their on-stage and in-crowd antics as well as their social consciousness. This sweat-soaked CD+DVD set gives a clue as to the dangerously high levels of ecstatic energy they bring.

Radio Tarifa
Fiebre (World Circuit, 2003)
The Iberian Peninsula and North Africa are only 13km apart, but Radio Tarifa’s music makes them feel even closer. Here, Spanish flamenco and Moroccan chaabi become one and the same. This retrospective-in-concert of the group’s first ten years results in a smoldering album that occasionally bursts out into full flamenco flame without ever leaving the souk.

Rachid Taha, Khaled, Faudel
1, 2, 3 Soleils (Barclay France, 1998)
This one-off supergroup show at Paris’ Bercy Stadium by the three biggest voices in rai – the king Khaled, the prince Faudel and the rebel Taha – was always going to be an extravaganza. With a 40-piece orchestra on top of the usual rai ensemble, this 2CD album is cheesy Algerian pop at its best. No wonder they sold out a stadium.

Lobi Traoré
Bamako Nights: Live at Bar Bozo 1995 (Glitterbeat, 2013)
There’s worse places to be than in a small, crowded bar in perhaps the world’s most musical city. Bamako Nights presents one of guitarist Lobi Traoré’s regular all-nighters in the Malian capital’s grungiest bar. Traoré’s electric Bamana blues is sometimes brooding, sometimes roaring, always grooving. And when he goes full-on Hendrix, it seems like Bar Bozo would be the best place on Earth.

Various Artists
Le Festival au Désert (Independent Records, 2003)
The Festival in the Desert is one of those legendary events spoken about in hushed, reverential tones: a stage set up in the village of Essakane in the Sahara desert where local Tuareg musicians rubbed shoulders with Malian giants and international stars, surrounded by camel races and fire dancers. It would sound like fantasy if we didn’t have recorded evidence that it happened.

Various Artists
Music and Rhythm: WOMAD 1982-2007 (WOMAD, 2007)
WOMAD is the standard bearer for world music festivals across the globe, and this 25th anniversary souvenir set tells its story with three CDs and a book. It features rare and wonderful live recordings from throughout the festival’s history, including the very first piece performed at the inaugural event in 1982 – ‘Raindrops Pattering on Banana Leaves’ by the Tianjin Music and Dance Ensemble.

Ortanitza - Folktron

First published in Songlines Magazine issue 115, March 2016.

Ortanitza
Folktron
Fusion Embassy (49 mins)

In the second full-length album from Bulgarian folk distorters Oratnitza, the quartet continues their quest to meld their traditional music with international rhythms and global bass, through completely acoustic means. The sound is quite old-school in many ways – harking back to the golden era of world fusion, introducing elements from drum’n’bass, electronica and dub. But they’re not afraid to let the folk styles take over.

Oddly, considering that the group define themselves as ‘ethnobass’, bass sounds are disappointingly absent. The low-end is provided by a keyed didgeridoo, which sounds great but doesn’t drop to the bowel-worrying levels that some of the pieces call for. Likewise, some sections feel like they could do with deeper rhythms than the single-drum percussion can really deliver.

There are places where the fusion really shines, though: the dark harmonies between Bulgarian singing and didgeridoo, such as in the tracks ‘Yaninka’ and ‘Beginning’, are wonderful; and guest solos of kaba bagpipes and galdulka fiddle help place the album’s musical provenance.

Alone in the otherwise all-acoustic set, the last track is a remix from drum’n’bass duo High Roll, fully bringing on the electronics and drum machines. It’s an interesting look at the other side of the fusion coin to end the album.