Jul 19, 2008

ASIAN JOURNAL -VASCONCELOS,GORN,RICHMOND,ROY- (world of music, 1988)

border crossings made of notes


MIKE RICHMOND (acoustic, electric basses) & BADAL ROY (tabla, indian percussion) are from India, STEVE GORN (bansuri bamboo flute, sopr. sax) is an american expert in indian bansuri bamboo flute performing, NANA VASCONCELOS (berimbau, talking drum, vocal percussion, shakers ) is the famous brazilian percussionist, ISMET SIRAL (sopr. sax) & MURAT VERDI(percusssion) are turkish.... They all carry strong, different traditions, and although they keep the individuality of their ethnic backgrounds, they don`t blend cultures but they meet in the common ground of jazz. Having worked extensively with each other before the recording sessions they fuse "naturally", as if the border-crossing roads are made of notes.

According to the album sleeve informations: "Mangooli" refers to a trad. west african tale about a young boy. "Prayer for Piece" conjures up the image of RICHMOND`s father as he prayed in temple with his congregation. "Sadhu" melody dues inspiration to a song a holy wandering man (a sadhu) used to sing passing from GORN`s neighborhood in Calcutta, asking for some food, perhaps a little rice." Asian Journal", the title track, is inspired by the image of a caravan of travellers heading from Turkey to India...and this, in some way sums up the music experience of the whole album.

"ASIAN JOURNAL" recorded in NY & NJ in 1981, released in 1988 from Music of the World ltd.


LISTEN HERE CD version with extra tracks (56mb)

1 comment:

vaubu said...

Wow, neat line-up. This blog just gives and gives and gives!