An Evening of Ragas, Barbican, London, 4 June 2008
[by Ken Hunt, London] The literature in the Barbican’s foyer called it “An evening of Ragas with legendary sitar player Ravi Shankar and his daughter Anoushka.” But it was far more than that. It also said, “Ravi Shankar – Farewell to Europe tour.” The sadness lay in the leave-taking. It meant that a good number of people attending in the audience were there to be able to say – at some stage later – that they had seen him in concert. It happens. It happened with Frank Sinatra and it happens with Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones.
16. 6. 2008 | read more...
[by Ken Hunt, London] Well before the first of Jazzwise‘s sequence of Indo-Jazz-related pieces began running, before the first interview was done, the idea of delivering more than column inches formed part of the discussions. And it happened, thanks also to the concert promoters, Serious. “Dedicated to the new directions in Indo-jazz ,” as Jazzwise‘s editor Jon Newey put it from the stage, it happened over two house-full nights, on 29 and 30 May 2008 in the cavern-like rather than cavernous basement of a pizza chain’s Soho jazz den. 
[by Ken Hunt, London] Goldfrapp’s fourth album Seventh Tree (2008) was reviewed in several places in the British press along the lines of it being “psychedelic folk”. Reviews came with a sprinkling of words such as “pastoral approach” and, oh the joys of semi-accurate quotations, “middle of the public bridleway”. It was the dangled carrot of talk about psychedelic folk that attracted me. Sort of. Not because I am an acolyte of psychedelia’s darker folk arts. I had a decade when editors told me how important every twee and fey, post-Wicker Man manifestation of “psychedelic folk” was. It drove me up the wall and “psychedelic folk” still turns me itchy-twitchy. 
[by Ken Hunt, London] You’d be hard-pressed to find a finer and more authoritative curator for a programme of folk music than Shirley Collins. After all, she is one of the singers who poured ideas into Britain’s second Folk Revival. Under the banner Folk Roots New Routes (a title lifted from her and Davy Graham’s 1964 duo album), she curated the five-day season of folk-themed concerts at London’s Southbank. 
[by Ken Hunt, London] In 1969 the Toronto-born Canadian folksinger and guitarist Bonnie Dobson arrived in England and never really left. She settled in London, raised a family and eventually largely dropped out of making music. Part of the first wave of Canadian folksingers that made their names down south, she had established her name in the United States and once in England chose to disappear off the radar after 1989. More or less. Because every so often – well once in 2007 and 2008 – she has put her head above the parapet. When she sings you go, even if it is a dimly lit, out of the way place above a pub in Chalk Farm.
[by Ken Hunt, London] Hungary is one of Europe’s most productive hothouses for truly revelatory female singers. Once upon a time in Western Europe Márta Sebestyén was all we knew of Hungarian singers. She was our Hungarian sun and moon, earth and horizon. Mind you, starting at the top was not necessarily a bad thing. But it was only getting the chance to see her fly vocally in concert that it truly hit home how world-class a singer she was. In my experience, it is in the live situation that Hungarian music truly reveals its depth and its heights. That applies to most music with a living, beating heart. Despite the generational gap and the apparent differences in their music and approaches, Sebestyén Márta and Szalóki Ági are names fit to speak in the same breath.
[by Ken Hunt, London] London’s embassies regularly host exhibitions, talks, artist showcases and recitals. Generally speaking, these events are free. The Czech Embassy situated on the leafier fringe of London’s Notting Hill district is no exception. Its showcase featuring the classical violin maestro Pavel Šporcl stands out in my memory.
[by Ken Hunt, London] To my mind, Martin Simpson’s Prodigal Son was more than one of the finest releases of 2007 – it was the finest album of his recording career, trumping even The Bramble Briar (2001), also made for Topic. And he made his first album, Golden Vanity for Trailer back in 1976, so the lad’s been around for some while. Explaining why Simpson has remained such a signal feature in my soundscape would degenerate into a wallow of words. 
[by Ken Hunt, London] Transformative is probably the most appropriate word to describe the influential Northern Indian rhythmist, composer and teacher, Alla Rakha Qureshi, and how his music affected people. Ustad in the concert’s title is the Muslim counterpart of Hinduism’s more familiar word guru. Certainly, Alla Rakha educated many, many people. The default-standard tale is that the West turned on to Indian music through the sitar. There is no denying the inherent truth, if hackneyed, of that proposition. But it was never the whole story, never the truth, the whole truth. For many people, the neon, flashing sign over the entrance to appreciating Hindustani music didn’t come with Ravi Shankar or Ali Akbar Khan, the Beatles, the Byrds and their kind. It came, heresy of Hindustani heresies, through clicking with taal (rhythm cycle). In other words, for many people, rhythm came before raga.