world music

One Rhythm, One Planet: Music from the Banned Countries

February 9th, 2017 I have always believed that music brings people together and bridges cultural divides. Music can connect us like no other arts, with its universal language of rhythm and melody. Maybe even more importantly, music—especially world music, helps

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Qawwali Music: The Mystical, Peaceful Side of Islam

September 30th, 2016 I first heard the Sufi devotional music called qawwali around 1982 on a WOMAD (World of Music and Dance) album. WOMAD was Peter Gabriel’s world music label and brainchild. This was right about the time when a bunch of

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Tinariwen, The Harpoonist and the Axe Murderer

November 13th, 2014 Tinariwen’s Emmaar (2014) Tinariwen, The Harpoonist and the Axe Murderer sounds like a gruesome scene from the Kel Tamashek uprising of 1963 in northern Mali that saw the death of messianic Tinarwen frontman Ibrahim Ag Alhabib’s parents

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World Music Teaches You Everything

April 3rd, 2014 Music tells the stories of our world I majored in Humanities as an undergraduate because it was broad-based and I could take many courses, from California Geography to Entomology to history, philosophy, languages and literature. Later, I

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