 Various Artists If Moby has spoiled Alan Lomax for you, here's an alternate pioneering ethnomusicologist to embrace. It's important that your field recording fandom not be too obvious. Better yet, make room for both. No need for rivalry … you have to appreciate anyone who devoted his life to documenting the pure human music of our world. This CD is one from a series of recordings drawing from Hugh Tracey's exhaustive library of African field recordings dating mainly from the 50s and 60s. Tracey recorded indigenous music primarily in the central and southern African subcontinent, devoting his life to it and ultimately producing over 200 albums in a series called Sound of Africa (published through the International Library of African Music, which he founded). The sheer commitment demonstrated by this gargantuan project is itself worthy of admiration, but the music he collected is rather amazing, and in many cases, has since been lost to time and change. SWP's reissues do not attempt to bring the full Tracey library to CD (thank God, because that damn Alan Lomax collection has put me into ample debt as it is), but rather, they offer highlights, the best stuff by which to start exploring. I've only heard this one disc, it's clear that this is a significant corner of the "world music" genre … worthy of standing beside the Lomax CDs and The Nonesuch Explorer Series. At the Court of the Mwami presents 25 tracks recorded in Rwanda in 1952, when the country was under Belgian control but still ruled by the Tutsi Banyiginya dynasty. Nine years later it would become the Republic of Rwanda, which put an end to that 500-year dynasty and shook up the political structure: the Mwami people, who are documented on this disc, fled the country and took their royal drums with 'em. Yeah, yeah, so it's "historically important" because it preserves a music that essentially vanished shortly after this was recorded. More important, though, is the fact that the music simply kicks ass. It is almost entirely drumming, with some tracks also featuring vocals and additional instruments like a musical bow. These are songs of praise and love, royal rhythms and tribal rhythms. Visit SWP's webiste to discover Hugh Tracey and his slammin' legacy of true world music. Um, wait, I suppose "slammin'" is stretching a bit, but how else can I make this stuff hip to American teens, who, as I understand it, still love 1988 Prince?
Review by Jesus H. Pryce |