CITYFOLK MONTHLY - April 2008

The story of world music, by definition, is a tale of fusion—the fusion of cultures, traditions and music styles. The best results of this kind of cultural blending are fresh, exciting, respectful of tradition and truly something new. The worst feel like an awkward forced marriage driven more by marketing concerns than musical ones. Some seemingly unlikely combinations of musical forms have caught the public fancy in past years, but the recent emergence of the more-or-less traditional music of Eastern Europe as an East Coast dance club sensation is surely one of the most unlikely.

New York City is the U.S. center of this music we might call “Balkan Beat,” as played by such bands as Slavic Soul Party, Balkan Beat Box, Gogol Bordello and Firewater. If “Balkan Beat” doesn’t suit, Slavic Soul Party calls its take on the music “BalkanSoulGypsyFunk,” if that helps. Not many bands appeal equally to young hipsters and elderly immigrants, but these bands are pulling it off with a mix of fun, music and good times that brings audiences together. (Balkan Beat Box here from a 2005 concert in New York. Photo by Miao Wang.)

The core of this new world music hybrid is the traditional music of the part of the world bordered by the Baltic Sea to the north, the Mediterranean, Aegean and Black Seas to the south, Turkey and the former Soviet Union to the east and Western Europe to the west. It’s a large swath of territory that includes such European countries as Macedonia, Estonia, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Kosovo, Serbia, Montenegro and a few others.

This music differs from country to country, region to region, and between ethnic groups, but virtually all of it has been heavily influenced by the music of the Ottoman Empire, which at its 16th-century peak consisted of modern-day Turkey and major parts of southern Europe, northern Africa and the Middle East.

Many of the neo-Baltic bands in the U.S. are horn-driven—trumpets, trombones, tubas and saxophones—and many of them share common roots in the music of 19th-century Turkish military bands. Another influence is the brass-band festivals that were common way back when in the small towns of what is often called “the country formerly known as Yugoslavia”: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Kosovo.

A shared characteristic among these bands is the presence of highly skilled jazz musicians, especially horn players, in most of the New York bands. The members of Slavic Soul Party are typical in this regard, having performed and recorded with the Mingus Big Band, Lionel Hampton, Lee Konitz, Anthony Braxton, Steve Swallow and John Hollenbeck, among other respected jazz artists.

The final thing the New York bands have in common—besides a wacky, surreal sense of humor and an appreciation for art’s outer fringes—is that many of the musicians are active participants in the downtown punk klezmer scene, a busy little hive of activity containing such bands as Golem, Frank London’s Klezmer Brass All Stars, Metropolitan Klezmer, Isle of Klezbos, Aaron Alexander’s Midrash Mish Mosh and What I Like About Jew.

To the traditional elements at the base of their music, the Baltic Beat bands add ideas and sounds from just about everywhere: electronica, jazz, klezmer, gypsy, Middle Eastern, punk, funk, Jamaican dub, dancehall and ska, New Orleans “second line” brass band music, hip-hop, rock, “noise music,” modern classical, folk, flamenco, rap, small band circus music and probably 19 other musical genres that any given listener will hear in any given song. The key point is that it’s dance music and it’s fun.

National Public Radio has been a big booster of this nascent cross-cultural movement, giving major exposure to Slavic Soul Party, Balkan Beat Box, Gogol Bordello and other bands on such NPR programs as All Things Considered (which liked Slavic Soul Party’s “madcap rhythms, hyperactive horns, sense of the absurd, and hint of abstract jazz”), World Café and Fresh Air.

Slavic Soul Party! (pictured here), a nine-member band appearing July 3rd & 4th at the Cityfolk Festival, mixes accordion, old world brass band, New Orleans funk, virtuoso jazz chops, klezmer rhythms, a keen sense of the absurd, a dash of anarchy and an appreciation of New York City’s immigrant soul into “the most danceable Balkan-flavored pop this side of the Adriatic” (Global Rhythm). Founded by drummer and vibraphonist Matt Moran, and stocked with some of New York’s finest jazz players, the band has showcased its “fiery Gypsy brass, soulful Balkan anthems and hip-grinding American funk” (New York Times) on four albums to date: In Makedonija, Bigger, Teknochek Collision and Remixed.

Though there are generally several musicians on stage during a performance, Balkan Beat Box is essentially a duo of Tamir Muskat (left) and Ori Kaplan, both of whom were born in Israel. Kaplan was a klezmer clarinetist and Muskat a drummer in a punk band when they met in Brooklyn, and they joined forces to create a new kind of “world music” that more accurately reflected their world than the traditional styles they had learned and played in their younger days. Entertainment Weekly has described the duo’s sound as “Eastern Bloc-inspired techno grooves fueled by a big dose of punk ’tude. It’s one of those rare [bands] that bubbe and the grandkids can all groove to.” Balkan Beat Box has recorded a pair of critically acclaimed albums, Balkan Beat Box and Nu Med.

Self-declared gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello (pictured here), led by Ukraine-born and Lower East Side-based singer Eugene Hutz, has been called “the best live band in New York” by The New York Times. The Mothers of Invention of world music, Gogol Bordello present a full-blown Zappa-esque musical spectacle not unlike the circus coming to town or maybe a Fellini film run in reverse. The band’s discography includes four singles, an EP called East Infection, and four albums: Voi-La Intruder, Multi Kontra Culti vs. Irony, Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike and Super Taranta! Hutz and his bandmates have also appeared in two films, Everything Is Illuminated and Filth and Wisdom, directed by Madonna.

There’s a fair amount of personnel overlap in the New York-based bands, with some musicians—such as Slavic Soul Party founder Matt Moran, for example—playing in as many as a dozen different ensembles. Balkan Beat Box and Gogol Bordello have worked together on the album Gogol Bordello vs. Tamir Muskat under the moniker J.U.F., for Jewish-Ukrainian Freundschaft (a shout-out of sorts to the German electropunk band, Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft).

This is immigrant music in the great American tradition, and it’s no accident that these bands live in New York City, the historic port of entry for so many people entering this country. The three bands Slavic Soul Party, Balkan Beat Box and Gogol Bordello contain members born in Israel, Ukraine, Russia, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Japan and Mexico, and each one brings something different to the mix. Slavic Soul Party says that its sound is “new music out of the unplanned results of immigration, proximity and globalization,” and that’s an insightful summary.

Back in the days when it was fashionable to speak of the United States as a cultural “melting pot,” it was axiomatic that every immigrant group added its own special ingredients and spices to the simmering and ever-changing stew that was American culture. It was understood that every addition changed the stew in both subtle and profound ways, producing something entirely new and unprecedented—something that uniquely reflected the American character.

At a time when immigration is a hot-button political issue for some, it’s well worth remembering that this is a country of immigrants, built by immigrants and shaped by immigrants. American music should reflect that fact, and the Balkan Beat music of Slavic Soul Party and its like-minded compatriots does just that, in a new and fun way. This is melting pot music of the first order.

Country star Marty Stuart just might be the youngest and hippest “elder statesman” you’ll ever encounter. At the age of 50, Stuart is already the go-to guy in Nashville for articulate, informed commentary on anything related to the history of country music. He’s an unofficial ambassador for “real” country music and the country music industry and owns the largest private collection of country music artifacts and memorabilia in the U.S.

Stuart is a writer, photographer, film scorer and more. He’s a four-time Grammy winner. He’s even been the subject of his own Marvel comic book, Marty Party in Space. Stuart is country music’s Renaissance man—and for my money, its sharpest intellect—as well as its finest purveyor of that good old hillbilly rock.

Marty Stuart started his professional career as a musician very young and he started pretty much at the top. Born in 1958 in Philadelphia, Mississippi, Stuart formed his first band at age 10. After a summer apprenticeship playing with the Sullivan Family Gospel Singers (”We played Pentecostal churches, camp meetings, bluegrass festivals and George Wallace campaign rallies all throughout the South”), Stuart joined Lester Flatt’s band, the Nashville Grass, in 1972, moving to Nashville and living with Lester and Gladys Flatt. Stuart played mandolin with the Nashville Grass until Flatt died in 1979. (Stuart and Flatt are pictured here.)

After a short time touring with Doc and Merle Watson, playing acoustic guitar, and Vassar Clements, playing electric guitar in the band Hillbilly Jazz, Stuart joined Johnny Cash’s band, where he spent several years playing guitar and mandolin and producing some of Cash’s best albums.

Stuart made his solo recording debut in 1978 with Marty, With a Little Help from My Friends, an album that seems little-remembered today. The album that most people consider Stuart’s solo debut is Busy Bee Café, released on Sugar Hill in 1982. Stuart began moving closer to his signature sound of honky-tonk meets bluegrass on his first two major label albums, Marty Stuart and Let There Be Country, but it was his first MCA album, Hillbilly Rock (1989), that was his commercial and artistic breakthrough.

Stuart was one of the leaders of the New Traditionalist movement of the 1980s and 1990s, with six top-10 hits, one platinum and five gold albums to his credit. The hits included “Hillbilly Rock,” “Tempted,” “Little Things,” “Now That’s Country,” “This One’s Gonna Hurt You” and “The Whiskey Ain’t Workin’” (with Travis Tritt). Stuart became a member of the Grand Ole Opry in 1992.

My favorite Marty Stuart album is The Pilgrim, an ambitious song cycle that called to mind Willie Nelson’s landmark 1975 album, Red Headed Stranger. Released in 1999, The Pilgrim tells a similar tale of a tragic love triangle and the quest for redemption through 13 of Stuart’s best songs (and an instrumental duet with Earl Scruggs). It’s an almost operatic album, and if the idea of Johnny Cash reciting part of Tennyson’s “Sir Galahad” seems a bit over-the-top, well, that only adds to its operatic aspirations. It’s one of the great modern country albums.

Patsy Cline’s cowboy boots, Hank Williams’ hand-written lyrics to “Your Cheatin’ Heart,” Lester Flatt’s guitar and Jimmie Rodgers’ railroad lantern are just a few of the more than 20,000 items in Marty Stuart’s collection of country music iconography (“memorabilia” just doesn’t do justice to much of the collection). “Sparkle & Twang: Marty Stuart’s American Musical Odyssey,” an exhibit assembled from Stuart’s collection, was on extended display at the Tennessee State Museum and pieces from the Stuart collection have been displayed at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Louvre in Paris.

“I’ve always been historically minded,” says Stuart. “Even as a kid when I’d watch performers on television I paid attention to their instruments, suits, boots and hats. Those things seemed important to me. When I first arrived in Nashville in 1972, it was a sight to behold when the stars gathered. It truly was Hillbilly Hollywood. Rhinestone suits, Cadillacs, fancy guitars, pompadours and beehive hairdos gave those hard hitting country songs even deeper impact. It also gave country music a cool, glitzy, one-of-a-kind image. The image matched the music and its makers, giving country music a pedigree in roots authenticity second to none.

“From the first time I played with Lester Flatt, I sensed an extreme amount of history around me. I’ve always been a collector at heart. When it really exploded for me was in the early 1980s. I was in London touring with Johnny Cash. Isaac Tigrett had just started the Hard Rock Café. He took me to see his restaurant—all these treasures from the Beatles, the Stones, the Who, Buddy Holly. I thought it was so cool that someone was archiving all this.

“The first thing I acquired was guitars and costumes. Nobody in Nashville was really paying attention to the old Nudie suits [the ornate rhinestone-encrusted stage outfits that defined country music in the 1950s]; people basically were ashamed of that image, and they were being sold and pawned. Then I went after the guitars, which accounted for so much of what made country music cool. All the glamour was being thrown away; most of the old guitars were being bought up by the Japanese collectors.” Two iconic guitars that escaped that fate and ended up with Stuart instead are Clarence White’s old Fender Telecaster (pictured here) and Pops Staples’ Fender Jazzmaster, given to Stuart last year by Yvonne and Mavis Staples.

As of 2005, with the launch of Superlatone Records, Stuart could add “record company executive” to his resume. Souls' Chapel , Stuart’s first gospel album, was the first release on his new label and the album was hailed as one of the strongest of his career. USA Today called it “the bluesiest gospel album you may ever hear, a righteous collection of testifying six-string twang and quartet vocals.” The label’s second release was Badlands: Ballads of the Lakota, a collection of 13 Stuart originals and an obscure Johnny Cash song, all of which address the historic and contemporary lives of Indians on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. (Stuart and country star Connie Smith were married on the reservation in 1997.)

Stuart returned to his bluegrass roots with his next album, Live at the Ryman, on which Stuart’s band the Fabulous Superlatives—Kenny Vaughan (guitar), Harry Stinson (drums) and Brian Glenn (bass)—is augmented by award-winning bluegrass fiddler Stuart Duncan (of the Nashville Bluegrass Band), banjo picker Charlie Cushman and special guest star, legendary dobro player Josh Graves.

Compadres, an anthology of duets, is Stuart’s most recent release on Superlatone. Released in 2007, the album collects in one place Stuart’s duets from various tribute albums, guest shots, film soundtracks and out-of-print older albums. The cuts range from throughout Stuart’s career and include him singing (or just picking in a couple of cases) with Lester Flatt, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, the Staple Singers, Earl Scruggs, Steve Earle, Loretta Lynn, B.B. King, Del McCoury, Connie Smith and others.

Stuart has been a familiar figure on television for almost 20 years. He’s appeared and performed in such acclaimed PBS productions as Carter Family: Will the Circle Be Unbroken, American Roots Music, The Ryman: Mother Church of Country Music and The Appalachians. For a while in the 1990s, Stuart was nearly ubiquitous on The Nashville Network between his music videos, performances on programs including New Country, American Music Shop and Nashville Now and five Marty Party programs.

In addition to the activities already mentioned, Stuart is also a record producer (Johnny Cash, Porter Wagoner, Pam Tillis, Kathy Mattea, Connie Smith, Jerry & Tammy Sullivan); a photographer, with two published books of his photos, Pilgrims: Sinners, Saints and Prophets and Country Music: The Masters, as well as a cool photo gallery on his website; a radio host with a weekly XM Radio show, "Marty Stuart’s American Odyssey", launched in 2007; and a writer whose work has appeared in the Oxford American, Journal of Country Music, and several other music publications.

A few years ago, Stuart took some time off from touring and recording to take stock of himself. He went back home to Mississippi and recharged his creative batteries. Since his return to action, he’s been firing on all cylinders, to use an expression from the days when cars had cylinders and lots of them. Considering how much Marty Stuart has accomplished in his first 50 years on this planet, it will be most interesting to watch his second act take place.

“I’ve followed the sound of music all around the world and it led me right back where I started from…home in Mississippi,” says Stuart. “From the perspective of the Delta land it’s not just about country music, the blues, gospel, or rock & roll. It’s about all of it. Mississippi is the home of roots music and its royalty. It’s a place where words and music drip from the trees. It feels good to create in an atmosphere where all things are possible.”

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MATERIAL CULTURE--RIPS, CLIPS AND CREASES: Paperfolding traditions

The art of folding paper is nearly as old as paper itself. The specifics are difficult to trace, since paper doesn’t hold up through the centuries as well as more common artifacts made of marble, pottery or even wood. Both paper and paper folding seem to have started in China. In the 6th century, paper made its way to Japan and the tradition of origami got its start. A couple of centuries later, the Moors brought paperfolding to Europe when they invaded Spain. The Spanish took the art of paperfolding to South America, and eventually it followed trade routes up to the United States.

At first, paperfolding was available only to the rich, because paper was very expensive. The first Japanese uses were formal and ritual in nature: for example, Shinto nobles decorated sake bottles with butterflies (like the one pictured above) to celebrate weddings and used other folds to wrap gifts and tokens of good fortune. The folds used were simple to symbolize purity and sincerity.

As paper became more affordable, origami became more recreational in nature. Ever-conscious of waste, people would fold even small scraps of paper, such as tea bag wrappers. The many different kinds of Japanese paperfolding originally had many different names. It wasn’t until the late 1800s that they all were commonly referred to as ‘origami,’ a compound word created from "oru" (fold) and "kami" (paper). This photo shows modern 'tea bag' folding, which is commonly done with small squares of patterned paper rather than tea bag wrappers.

Origami techniques and patterns were handed down through oral tradition for generations. The first known book about origami, How to Fold 1000 Cranes, was finally published in 1797. Legend has it that folding 1000 cranes will bring peace, long life or the granting of a wish. Over the last few decades, the set of symbols and terms used to describe the needed folds have been standardized, allowing all designs to be more accessible.

The Chinese primarily folded inanimate objects such as pagodas and boats. The Japanese preferred animals such as the crane or frog. The Moorish religion prevented them from creating animals, so they created geometric forms. Sadly, little is known of the origin and evolution of Moorish folding. The history of Asian folding is murky too; it’s only been since the 1940s that the differences between Chinese and Japanese traditions have become clearer. American paperfolding primarily takes the form of paper airplanes.

Paperfolding – all of which is now referred to as origami, regardless of whether the style is rooted in Japanese tradition – continues to evolve as a pastime and art form. Some artists use new technology in the form of thinner, stronger papers or foils. (These dancers were folded by Neil Elias using a sheet of paper laminated foil). Others break away from the standard origami practice of using a square piece of paper and use rectangles or extremely large sheets to make more complex shapes. New techniques are being tried, such as ‘wet-folding’, in which the paper is dampened during the folding so that the final design is sturdier. Computer modeling is now used to help figure out which folds are needed to create intricate designs.

In the mid-1990s a group of Chinese refugees was detained in the US, and began making elaborate designs to be sold at fundraisers. This form of modular paperfolding – in which multiple pieces of paper are used to create structures more complex or decorative than is possible with a single sheet – is now known as ‘Golden Venture’ folding, after the name of the ship the refugees arrived on. This folding is usually done with magazine covers or Chinese paper money, and no fasteners are used to hold the structure together. This swan was made by L Surber.

Yasue Sakaoka, a Columbus-based origami artist who was one of last year's Ohio Heritage Fellows, is scheduled to be a part of Rips, Clips and Creases. Sakaoka learned origami as a child from her mother, but her interest was intensified after a trip to Japan in 1978. She began creating new work and experimenting with the art form. Sakaoka has been designated a Master Artist since 1990 in the Ohio Arts Council’s Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program, through which she has trained seven artists in the traditional techniques of origami.

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CULTURE BUILDS COMMUNITY: An Interview with Maribel Ruiz, Founder and Director of Sol Azteca

Through the Culture Builds Community partnership program with East End Community Services Corporation, Cityfolk has been providing Twin Towers/East Dayton community members with extraordinary opportunities to share with and learn from some of the world’s most highly acclaimed folk artists. In addition to bringing in outside resources, Cityfolk has also helped to support and cultivate the community’s own local artists and cultural assets.

One of East Dayton’s true cultural gems is Sol Azteca, the community’s Mexican folkloric dance troupe. Sol Azteca grew out of East End’s Milagro de Mujer program, which focused on empowering Latina women to make improvements in health and wellbeing for themselves and their families. During one of the Milagro de Mujer workshops, the women were asked to list their personal goals and dreams, and begin to develop steps toward achieving them. Maribel Ruiz, a participant in the program, talked about her dream of building a Mexican dance troupe in the community.

Now nearly 4 years old, Sol Azteca has performed at and helped to organize nearly all of the CBC community events. Kelsa Rieger, CBC Coordinator, interviewed Maribel Ruiz to learn more about what motivates this true community cultural ambassador.

Kelsa: Where did your dream of forming a Mexican folkloric dance troupe originate?

Doña Maribel: When I was 16 years old, I joined a dance group in the small Mexican village where I lived. That year, our group got the opportunity to participate in a regional dance competition. We arrived at the competition with our simple skirts, and saw that we were surrounded by dancers in very grand costumes. We were intimidated and did not think we would compare to these other dancers. To our surprise we won third place in the entire competition. We came back to our town energized and motivated to work even harder. We perfected our routines and began creating elaborate and brilliant costumes. The experience really made me passionate about dancing.

I have had the dream to recreate a dance troupe here in Dayton for many years. My main motivation is to demonstrate for the people a bit of our Mexican heritage. I wanted to do it through the medium of dance, because dance is what I know.

Kelsa: What has the experience of dancing with Sol Azteca given the young members of the group?

Doña Maribel: More than anything, it’s given them the chance to participate in something positive. And from this, my hope is that they have learned something about their culture…something that they will pass down from generation to generation. In Mexico, dance is the thing that makes you feel alive. It’s our expression of life and happiness.

Kelsa: What do you think Sol Azteca has given to the wider community?

Doña Maribel: In our performances, we take people to Mexico. When they see our costumes, they can imagine what life is like there. It makes the people want to visit Mexico. It also shows the community that we are not bad people…that we are fun people who enjoy ourselves through dance.

Kelsa: What do you think about the Culture Builds Community program?

Doña Maribel: It has provided opportunities to show our culture and the cultures of other countries. It’s helped us learn about each others’ roots, customs and traditions.

This summer, Culture Builds Community will provide Sol Azteca the opportunity to learn several new folkloric dances in an intensive residency program with Sones de Mexico, Chicago’s premiere, Grammy-nominated, Mexican folk ensemble. Sol Azteca will perform some of these dances during Sones de Mexico’s Main Stage set at the Cityfolk Festival on Friday, July 4, 2008.

TEACHERS CORNER: Hawaiian Music at Smithsonian Global Sound

Hawaiian steel guitar player Bobby Ingano is familiar to many who attended the 2006 Cityfolk Festival. He will make his third festival appearance this summer with the Hawaiian Hotshots. The Hotshots are an all-star group of Hawaiian steel guitarists that includes Jeff Au Hoy and Derrick Mau, joined for this appearance by local hula dancer Leilani Duteil. Learn more about Hawaiian music and dance traditions, sample music, stream video, and find lesson plans from the Smithsonian Global Sound website.

The Global Sound Feature presents Na Leo Hawai’i or Musics from Hawai’i with a succinct introduction to the cultures and musical traditions of the islands including: Mele, Himeni, slack-key guitar, and falsetto singing as well as the influences of immigrants from Puerto Rico, Portugal, China, Okinawa, Korea, Japan, and the Philippines. Himeni, for those who wondered, is

Links carry the visitor to sample recordings. A short streaming video introduces the Halau ‘O Kekuhi hula ensemble. You can also tune in to the featured radio program, Musics of Hawai’I Radio and listen to complete tracks of music. A third link brings up an earlier Smithsonian feature for teachers and students the Lu’au: a Hawaiian feast that includes music, dancing, recipes, and suggested readings.

The New York Times described Global Sound as “the ethnographic alternative to iTunes.” With 35,000 tracks of world music, Global Sound is a gateway to both recordings and educational resources from the United States and the world. Search by countries, cultural groups, genres, instruments, and artists. The Global Sound Live link brings up video performances and interviews with performers. While you can purchase tracks or albums through Smithsonian Global Sounds, there are plenty of resources available for free.

Global Sound offers a summer World Music workshop for teachers with the Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts, July 9-12, 2008.

PROFILE BEHIND THE SCENES: World Music Project Brings Yellow Springs To Its Feet

In a pilot project designed to take world music concerts and workshops into the village of Yellow Springs, the music of Brazil and Cuba was featured in two concert/residency programs in February and April. Students in the orchestra program at McKinney Middle School, Yellow Springs High School jazz band members and Spanish language students from both schools participated in workshops with both Jane Bunnett's Spirits of Havana and Rob Curto's Sanfona Project.

February 21st, three events included two intimate workshops introducing students to the components of Afro-Cuban music, plus an assembly program with Bunnett's group culminating in a Cuban dance party on the floor of the gym at Yellow Springs High School (pictured above).

As a prelude to the program with Bunnett's band, a showing at the Little Art Theatre of the documentary film on Bunnett's late 1990s trip to Cuba, Cuban Odyssey kicked off the project on February 13. A well attended opening reception at South Hall on the Antioch College campus featured Dennie Eagleson's "Cuba Revisited" exhibition on February 20th. The month-long exhibition highlighted not only the Antioch professor's own distinctive documentation of the island but the work of a number of other important Cuban photographers. The reception also welcomed saxophonist Jane Bunnett and trumpeter Larry Cramer who co-lead the band, and members of Spirits of Havana. The concert on the 22nd, which arrived at Antioch's Kelly Hall the same night as a ferocious ice storm, was well attended.

While Bunnett's music focused on the intersection where Cuban music and American jazz meet, accordionist Rob Curto's Sanfona Project introduced students and concert goers to the dance music of Northeast Brazil called forro, which has been transplanted to enthusiastic audiences in New York City and throughout North America. Curto and his bandmates, which included drummer Scott Kettner, Brazilian singer Liliana Araujo and bassist Mike Lavalle, demonstrated the various components of forro, including having students participate in the rhythms and dance steps associated with the music and interpreting the Portugese lyrics of songs from their repertoire. Workshops and a culminating concert at Kelly Hall took place on April 11.

Cityfolk will continue to look at the potential for other world music programs ideally suited to present as part of this effort and for funding to continue the project. Special thanks to the Morgan Family Foundation for the grant which created the initiative. Additional support was provided from the Greene County Convention and Visitors Bureau, Antioch College, WYSO 91.3 FM. Special additional thanks to the Yellow Springs News for their preview coverage of events connected to both portions of the program and to Jenny Cowperthwaite and the Little Art Theatre.

Tim O'Brien didn't take much time making a name for himself after he arrived in Boulder, Colorado in the early seventies. He had just written his mother, telling her, "I'm heading west. I know 200 songs now, and I figure if I keep learning more I should be all right." How right he was. It was just a few short years later that his band, Hot Rize, began to earn their reputation as perhaps the greatest of the new wave of bluegrass bands that dominated the 80s. During his tenure with Hot Rize, O'Brien honed his skills as a singer (winning several International Bluegrass Music Association singer of the year awards in the process) and quickly gained a reputation as a gifted songwriter and a jaw-dropping multi-instrumentalist.

After leaving Hot Rize in the early nineties, Tim O'Brien racked up one great album after another, even leaving time to author a few Billboard rated singles for country artists like Kathy Mattea, and cementing his place in the highest ranks of traditional musicians. But his latest CD, Chameleon, takes his artistry to a new level and serves as a perfect showcase for his abilities as a singer, a songwriter, and an instrumentalist with whom very few can compare.

Consisting of a wonderful mix of new songs across a spectrum of styles and genres, each is a solo effort. No overdubbing, just O'Brien's soulful voice over his virtuosic but tasteful accompaniment. He sounds at home on every instrument he plays (fiddle, banjo, guitar, mandolin, and bouzouki) and displays the technique and subtle restraint that sets him apart as a singer and an instrumentalist.

From the country-blues inspired "Where's Love Come From" to "Red Dog In the Morning" which sounds straight from a 'holler in O'Brien's native West Virginia, to the heartbreaking ballad "The Only Way To Never Hurt", O'Brien's performances capture the essence of each of the traditional forms the songs represent with rare finesse.

Every track on Chameleon reveals another element of Tim O'Brien's incredible artistry, and the album brings together songwriting, singing and instrumental skills of the very top rank. Run, don't walk to your local record store for this one. A recording like this one doesn't come along every day. You won't be disappointed.

In this special edition of Have You Heard, we're turning our attention from radio stories and interviews to the vast world of blogging. These days there are blogs for just about every subject you can think of -- including traditional and world music. Here are a few we've found:

If you find a story that you'd like to share with other Cityfolk ENews readers, please send us the link and we'll put it the hopper for possible inclusion.

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