World music, compiled by Stan Rijven. Today’s theme: Spring- Nature & Sounds Right
A new spring, a new sound
Birds take centre stage in this programme as advocates of Sounds Right, a British movement that sees nature as a legal entity: “A new initiative will see nature recgonised as an official artist on major streaming platforms, including Spotify and Apple Music”. In London, for example, the Earth Unwrapped series was recently launched to draw attention to this cause through music. “The greatest musician of all time has never been credited for her work. Via the Sounds Right initiative, at least 50% of recording royalties from tracks by global artists that feature NATURE will be donated to biodiversity conservation and restoration projects along with 63% of recording royalties from ambient NATURE tracks” according to their website https://www.soundsright.earth
Cuckoo, wren & robin
Asides Brian Eno, folk artist/ eco-activist Sam Lee is the figurehead. Not only does he ing along with nightingales during his birding excursions, he also mixes bird sounds into his songs like Bushes & Briars & Birds demonstrates. Lee is extensively features in this month’s Songlines magazine https://www.songlines.co.uk De Norwegian joik singer Mari Boine calls attention to the endangered nature of her Sami people. In Gula Gula she sings: “Hear the voices of the foremothers. They ask you why the earth becomes polluted, poisoned and exhausted. They remind you where you come from. That the earth is our mother. If we take her life we die with her”. Following this, The Brothers Gillespie sing of the inexhaustible nature of Northumberland in razor-sharp duets. Followed by British folk songs about the cuckoo (Pentangle), the wren (Steeleye Span) and the robin (Emma Christian).
Osprey
Harpist Catrin Finch & kora player Seckou Keita pay tribute to the osprey on their album Soar, which annually flies from West Africa to Wales to breed. Migration, both psychically and emotionally, is the theme of this album on which Welsh harp and West-African kora fuse.
Tropical birds
Congolese singer Lokua Kanza draws inspiration from pygmy songs that traditionally accompany the search for food. Kanza brings to life a buzzing tropical forest with enchanting vocals; alternated with the original chants of the Baka people from Cameroon.
Blackbird & skylark
Would The Beatles and Pink Floyd still pay off the rights for sampling a blackbird (Blackbird) and skylark (Grantchester Meadows) even after so many years?
In Irish ballads the blackbird not only referenced to love, but it also had a political charge.
“The Wee Weaver, in the north of Ireland is in fact one of the large family of Blackbird tunes, descended from the old Jacobite song air The Royal Blackbird in which the Catholic James II, defeated at the battle of the Boyne and taking refuge in France, was personified as a blackbird flown far from its home and its absence lamented”.
Nightingale
Birds come to life even without song or sample. For instance, Mozart composed Ein musikalischer Spass (KV 522) as a tribute to the starling he kept in a cage. And maestro Tata Mirando imitates on violin just how rich the warble of the nightingale can be.
Bird journal
Bird photographer Adri de Groot weekly sends out his magnificent pictures free of charge, as a journal of his photo safari’s through the green heart of Holland. Subscribe here: list@mailing.vogeldagboek.nl
Playlist
- Sam Lee/ Bushes & Briars & Birds – UK
CD: Bushes & Briars & Birds (Cooking Vinyl, 2024)
- Mari Boine/ Gula Gula – Norway
CD: Gula Gula (Idut/ Ariola, 1989)
- The Brothers Gillespie/ Northumberland II – UK
CD: Hirondelle (Hirondelle, 2024)
- Ygdrassil/ One morning in the Springtime – NL
CD: Nice Days under Darkest Skies (Pink Records, 2001)
- Pentangle/ The Cuckoo – UK
LP: Basket of Light (Transatlantic Records, 1969)
- Steeleye Span/ The King – UK
CD: Please to See the King (Big Tree Records, 1971)
- Emma Christian/ Little Red Bird – Wales
CD: Celtic Voices, Women of Song (Narada Media, 1995)
- Catrin Finch & Seckou Keita/ Teranga-Bah – Senegal/Wales
CD: Soar/ Floating (Bendigedig, 2018)
- Lokua Kanza/ Boto – Congo
CD: Lokua Kanza (Night & Day, 1993)
- Baka Pygmies/ Yelli 1 – Cameroon
CD: Heart of the Forest, the Music of the Baka Forest People of South East Cameroon (Hannibal, 1993)
- Lokua Kanza/ Ye Wo – Congo
CD: Lokua Kanza (Night & Day, 1993)
- Pink Floyd/ Grantchester Meadows – UK
CD: Ummagumma (Harvest, 1969)
- Beatles/ Black Bird – UK
CD: The White Album (Apple, 1968)
- Dolores Keane & John Faulkner/ The Wee Weaver – Ireland
CD: Celtic Graces: a Best of Ireland (Hemisphere, 1994)
- Tata Mirando/ Le Rossignol – Norway
LP: A Gipsy Played (Fontana, 1963)
Compilation & presentation: Stan Rijven. Technician: Dirk Winkel
