DaftNotStupid

The Talent

2011-10-10T23:56:00.000+01:00

When I first started getting serious about making videos and did some research on techniques, I kept on hearing the term 'the talent' - not as an attribute, as in 'so an so' has talent, but as a proper noun, as in 'place the talent there', or 'make sure the talent ...'. At the time it seemed a bit strange to refer to the subject of the film in that way, almost as if no one else had any talent.

In my proper job - marketing manager for a major computer company - I work with many very talented people every day, and I'd be disingenuous if I tried to claim that I didn't have a little myself, but ...

... over the past few days I've been editing some of the footage I took in this year in Essaouira in order to build some DVDs of the preparation and performances of a couple of the groups, and suddenly it made sense - these people aren't the same as most of you and me. There's something about them that forces you to watch and listen to the same bits of their music over and over till you capture it just right, so that you can portray them in the best light. I stand there while they perform and record them putting their soul into it for our sakes, but I'm like a financial derivative, they are the prime assets.

I got to thinking - would people pay to watch me work? Would I entrance then as I put the finishing touches to a marketing plan, of submitted a request to update a web page? I guess you all know the answer.

Anyone who buys books, CDs, movies, or goes to concerts knows this to be true - we couldn't write those books, sing and play on those CDs, act in those movies, or whatever. It's only when you get close to musicians and actors, as I've been privileged to recently, that the truth hits home - talent is not just a subjective characteristic, like beauty in the eye of the beholder, it's something innate. It's what makes them different. It's why we pay good money to be in their presence - whether physically or virtually.

I could go on, but 'nuff said.

Great glass by Ton Verdegaal in Amsterdam

2011-10-02T01:33:00.000+01:00

On my last visit to Amsterdam, Maggie bought me a wonderful piece of glass as a birthday present. It was made by Ton Verdegaal, who has a small shop cum studio at Berenstraat 41.

I stumbled on his shop by chance, only to realize that I had bought another piece of his the year before. I'll post a photo of that later.

You can see more of Ton's work on his web site http://glassierkunst.nl/
, but if you plan to visit Amsterdam, take the time to drop in, and see it for real.

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2011 - June 23-26

2011-07-05T01:29:00.022+01:00

Updated 24th July 2011
Updated 5th July 2011

REVIEW
We've been home now for about a week and Maggie and I are really missing being there. We had a wonderful time, met lots of old and made lots of new friends, and, of course, heard some great music from some oustanding performers. I recorded about 12 hours of video, about 6 hours of audio, and took about 1500 photographs - of which disappointingly few are any good. Armed with my press accreditation, I was able to spend time at the Hassan Boussou - Jacques Schwarz-Bart residence in the three days leadng up to their performances. You can read more about that, and see the videos I took here. I'll add all of the videos I post to this Essaouira 2011 playlist, so check back every now and again in case I've added any new ones.

As Maggie has written on her blog - link - it wasn't quite the same out the big Bab Marrakech square, which this year becane an increasingly busy car park!

I loved Brother Jacques' project - Jazz Racines Haiti, both on their own and when they played with Hassan Boussou. Trilok Girtu's drumming and tabla playing - sometimes simultaneously - was a wonder to behold, complemented by Carlo Cantini's mournful violin (see the playlist for a great example).

Between Worlds were pretty good on their own, but when they played with Maalem Hamid El Kasri up on the new Bab Marrakech Bastion, the music entered a different realm. I managed to sneak a short video of them playing part of the old Nusrat Fateh Aki Khan favourite - Mustt Mustt - that I have now posted - you'll find it in the playlist. Humayun Khan's voice and harmonium playing were outstanding.

This set reminded me of the Ali brothers - Mehr Ali and Sher Ali - who played Bab Marrakech in 2006 - before I started to record music in Essaouira - now they wer really something. We often play thir CD - Qawwali, The Essence of Desire - 4 long tracks, each about 15 minutes - music to take you to another place. After a sound-check, one afternoon, I saw them walking with their musicians - a line of princes, the crowd parting before them. "Where's my camera, where's my video" I thought - well, it's in my head - we all carry one around with us all of the time, and it's moments like that that live with us forever - camera or no.While not a replacement for Place Bab Marrakech, the Bastion is a great venue. seating about 600 on rugs and bolsters, on a slight rise going up from the low stage, all under the open skies with a view over the town to the sea beyond.

Darga were an eye-opener and a very refreshing one a that. while Ribab Fusion, who led out at the closing concert are the band to watch.

The finale of the festival featured four (4) maalems playing together, but what I'd billed as the Battle of the Maalems tuned out to be more of a friendly chat. Each maalem played a solo session while the others stood around, tapping their guimbris, wanting to join in - but that wasn't the plan. The they went round one more time. Only for the ninth and final number did they all play together, but by that time, quite frankly I'd lost it, and can't quite recall much at all and missed part of the recording. All in all though, a good festival with some great highlights.

I lost three pieces of equipment - one on them quite expensive - but was reunited with them all by the end, so "Thanks guys".

Countdown to Essaouira 2011
The 14th Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival will be held this year from Thursday June 23 to Sunday June 26. There are no more details yet on the festival web site, but the dates are now public along with is new banner, so I guess it's safe for you to book your flights and accomodation. I've already booked our usual room in Essaouira.

Maggie and I are applying for accreditation again this year - I let you know how we get on with that.

Update 15th May 2011

At last, they've posted the program for 2011 at http://www.festival-gnaoua.net/festival_essaouira/pages/index.php

Here're the highlights. I've indicated the countries in brackets, if not indicated, they are from Morocco. I've also added links to the web sites for some of the artists.
Maalem Hassan Boussou
Maalem Mohamed Kouyou
Trilok Girtu (india)
Maalem Abdenbi El Gadari
Jazz Racines (Haiti) with Jacques Schwarz-Bart
Maalem Omar Hyatt
La Halla KingZoo
Baba Sissoko and Mali Tamani Revolution (Mali)
Maalem Hamid El Kasri
Maalem Mustapha Bakbou
Tigran Hamasyan (Armenia)
Maalem Abdelkebir Merchane
K'naan (USA)
Salif Keita (Mali)
Maalem Mahmoud Guinea
Between Worlds (Afghanistan/Iran) - featuring Humayun Khan and Shahin Shahida
Ribab Fusion
Gnaoua All Stars - Maalems Hassan Boussou, Mahmoud Guinea, Abdelkebir Merchane, Mohamed Kouyou
You can also download a 56 page Press Dossier as a pdf file . There's a version in French and another in Arabic. Whereas the program on the web site is built using Flash, so you can't copy the text or print it out, the pdf version can be copied and printed. Updated 29/05/11 There's also a version available in English now.

According to the program, there will only be two (2) sets at Bab Marrakech on Friday and Saturday - one at 8pm and one at midnight. Last year, there were 4 on the Friday and 5 on the Saturday - starting each night at 7:30 pm,

The program also talks about a new stage at the Bastion Bab Marrakech not the Bab Marrakech square, and they show a picture of the bastion. The text says that the bastion houses / shelters (abrite) the concerts. At first, I could'nt believe that they planned to hold the concerts inside the bastion - it just isn't big enough for the large crowds that normally go there. Then I saw that you have to pay for the Bab Marrakech stage. Only Place Moulay Hassan and Scene Meditel (on the beach) are free! Can this really be true? I hope not.

Another sign of down-sizing is the absense of the Pepsi stage. I never went there myself, but they seemed to use it for electro-fusion aimed at younger people.

Essaouira 2011 - Maalem Hassan Boussou playing with Jacques Schwarz-Bart's Jazz-Racines Haiti

2011-06-25T04:14:00.003+01:00

Just experienced what must be the highlight of the Essaouira 2011 festival - Maalem Hassan Boussou playing with Jacques Schwarz-Bart's Jazz-Racines Haiti. Powerful music - haunting at times - with virtuoso performances by Brother Jacques on tenor sax, Etienne Charles on trumpet and Milan Milanovi on piano, driven along by Ari Hoenig's fearsome drumming and Reginald Washington's bass. Add to the mix the Oh yes, and Hassan Boussou, of course, who drummed and strummed and blew and sung the whole set together. Truly a night to remember. Thanks guys.

Look out for some videos of this set and the Residence that preceded it on YouTube.com/DaftNotStupid.

Update 29/06/2011

I've just got back home from the Essaouira 2011 festival and I've posted a short - 3 minute - extract from the final number of the Maalem Hassan Boussou with Jacques Schwarz Bart's Jazz Racines Haiti set as well as the whole of the second to last number. You'll notice some fur from my dead cat - hope it doesn't spoil the effect too much. The video is available in 720p HD on YouTube and the audio for the longer piece comes from my digital recorder which I'll use whenever possible since the quality is better.

Update 03/06/2011

Kouzin http://youtu.be/BkRN1USSYPw

Hamdouchia extract http://youtu.be/EMdE0Q2bR30

Foufou Djenba 2nd last number http://youtu.be/AlmK24pykF0

Welcome to Dorothy - our new Northern Correspondent

2011-06-12T11:47:00.000+01:00

I'd like to welcome Dorothy who has joined the DaftNotStupid team as our new Northern Correspondent and who will, I'm sure, provide a different perspective on things. Like Maggie and myself, she has a long-time love of African music and has visited Morocco and Tunisia on many occasions. She will be joining us this year for her first ever Essaouira festival, so look out for posts under her by-line.

Bomb at The Argana, Djema El Fna, Marrakech, June 28 2011

2011-04-29T00:56:00.001+01:00

We see, hear, and read news about terrorist attrocities around the world nearly every day and they always seem so far away from most of our normal reality that we tend to let them wash over us, sad that it is to say that. Yesterday's bomb at Bomb at The Argana restaurant in Marrakech changed all that for me.

I'm not usually given to writing about topical or political subjects, but this is personal. I first visited the pink city in 1972 and have been back many times since then. Buses may no longer arrive there and the cars are kept away at night, the once-rough ground may be paved over, and there's more light around the food hawkers tables, but Djema El Fna is still the heart and the pulse of the city, always bustling, exciting, alive. The gnaouistas (you can't call them gnaoui) still play their parodies of the true form, the young boys beat their drums and dance, the water-sellers quench travellers' thirsts, snakes are charmed, and young children sit in a circle listening to an old man telling wonderful stories of times past. That is the true Marrakech and it always has been thus, long before the hippies and then the tourists came. Incidents like today's won't stop the Marrakchis and we mustn't let it stop us tourists and travellers from visiting this beautiful city.

All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.

The Third Man theme

2011-04-25T23:45:00.002+01:00

Inspired by an idea from Marvin Naylor, here's a playlist of the The Third Man theme. Enjoy!

Posting HD videos on YouTube

2011-04-21T00:58:00.001+01:00

When I first started posting videos on YouTube in 2007, they were audio only - I mastered them using Windows Movie Maker as wmv files with a short text header and trailer and typically they were around 10MB. That year, I also uploaded the wav files (about 30MB each) to Fileden and created playlists which could be played from my blog. The audio quality was usually pretty good - I used a little Zoom H4 digital recorder with an AT shotgun mike - and almost all of the bandwidth was tajken up with the audio.

In 2008, I got my video camera, and started to record the visuals as well as the audio, but, I still mastered them as wmv and tried to maintain a similar, small file size. While the audio in those files wasn't bad, the video quality wasn't that good. Typically YouTube wasn't able to deliver more than 240p.

In 2009, as network upload bandwidth became better and YouTube relaxed their file size limits, I started to render my videos as mp4 files, now using Sony Vegas Movie Studio, and I tried to keep the files at around 100MB. YouTube was now able to deliver these at up to 480p, which I considered a pretty good improvement.

Last year, YT upped its limits to 2GB and I moved to a BE broadband connection which had up to 2Mb of upstream bandwidth, so I started to increase the size of the mp4 files to about 800MB for a 10 minute video. Now YouTube could play these in HD at 1080p, but I found that my download speed was no longer good enough, and the videos would stop and start. so I usually played them at 720p or even 480p on a bad day. I also found that I couldn't play them locally any more. VLC would play the first couple of minutes OK, but then would stop showing any video and just play audio. Two steps forward and one step back.

Recently, I discovered that I hadn't done anything with my 2010 recording of Maalem Mahmoud Guinea and Daby Toure, so I edited and mastered one of the numbers, and rendered it in Mpeg 2, producing m2t files, at around 1.2GB per 10 minutes of video. Not only would these play well locally with VLC and QuickTime, but YouTube could deliver them pretty reliably in HD at 720p.

Update: 15 Oct 2011

I've been getting quite a few Google searches ending up on this page, so I thought that I'd add a few details about the setting I use:

Software: Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD 10
Encoding: MainConcept MPEG2
Vegas template: HDV 720-25p - I film in the UK so always work in PAL at 25fps
Audio: 384 Kbps, 48,000 Hz, 16 Bit, Stereo, MPEG
Video: 25 fps, 1280x720 Progressive, YUV, 18.3 Mbps
Pixel Aspect Ratio: 1.000
Aspect ratio: 16:9

I know I could probably reduce the bit rate, but this works, so I'm loathe to change it.

I'd welcome your comments on what works for you.

What's interesting is that I've been using the same camera all for all of this - a Panasonic GS-400, which creates a 12GB avi file for each hour of tape. The high quality is inherent in the original, but it's taken me three years to discover the optimum way of delivering the quality on YouTube. I re-rendered and re-posted one of the numbers by the Korean drummers, Samulnori Molgae, but honestly, life is too short to re-render everything that I've recorded and posted over the past three years. Looking back at some of my old stuff, I cringe a little, but people still watch and listen to them. My most popular video - Maalem Hamid El Kasri - is only available in 240p but has had over 40,000 plays and still gets around 50 plays a day, so I figure I shouldn't worry too much.

Essaouira 2010 - Daby Toure and Maalem Mahmoud Guinea

2011-04-07T23:59:00.001+01:00

Here's the music from the set that Daby Toure played with Maalem Mahmoud Guinea the Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2010 at Place Bab Marrakech, Friday 25th June 2010. I recorded it last year, but forgot to master it.

Watching and listening to the whole set again (and again and again) over the past few days has reminded me just how wonderful these musicians are. Daby Toure led the vocals on their opening number, but there comes a point where Mahmoud just turns the song into a completely different one, one of his Gnaoua standards. You can see the look of surprise and sheer joy on Daby Toure's face as he realizes what's just happened. I've mastered them all now, so here is the YouTube playlist:

Daby and Mahmoud, if you're listening, I hope you like it. The music was great. Thanks!

Noir: SIT at GO GALLERY, Amsterdam

2011-03-19T19:21:00.003Z

I was privileged to be given a sneak-preview of noir, SIT's new exhibition that opens today, March 19 at GO GALLERY, Prinsengracht 64, Amsterdam, and runs until the end of April.

noir #6

25/10/2011 Update: I've just received a copy of noir #6 and it looks fabulous. It's printed an really heavy art paper and the ink is soooo black. It's quite big - about 3'x2' - so will need a good space to hang it. I'll get it framed and then post a photo of how it looks in situ. Some prints are still available at http://www.rooftopamsterdam.nl/, but you need to hurry since some are sold out already.

Unsurprisingly, the work is largely black - and if not as dark as unwired - still pretty uncompromising. noir appears to be about fashion, and the wrath wrought by man on the rest of animalkind in its perfection. The paintings feature beautifuly painted women, animals, and articles of fashion, which, in isolation look totally natural, but the resulting composition is anything but.

If you're coming to Amsterdam, take some time out and walk down the Prinsengracht to the GO GALLERY, but if you can't make it, visit SIT's new noir site. Prices range from about €1500 to €3500, though for those of us with smaller budgets will be able to buy a copy of the wonderfully photographed and produced show guide book, which will be available at €35 from GO GALLERY in the near future.

Many thanks to SIT, and to Faroud and Oskar for letting me take some photographs and publish them here. I hope that you think that they do the work justice. I couldn't get the white balance correct, so I developed the raw images in monochrome

For more about SIT on this blog, read this. See more of SIT's work at http://sitnie.com/.

Moon Calendar 2011 at Go Gallery, Amsterdam

2011-03-10T23:56:00.003Z

I subscribe to the Go Gallery's newsletter, and today I received a notification that there will be abother SIT (Freaking Sitnie) exhibition there. "Wow!" I thought. "Maggie and I are going to Amsterdam next week. What perfect timing!" Unfortunately not, however, since we leave on Saturday moring (March 19) and that's when they have the opening. Maybe, if I go there on Friday, they'll give me a sneak preview. I don't think I'll take Maggie, though. SIT is always a bit dark, and this exhibition promises to live up to his reputation, and given that it is called 'noir', you should expect it to me even more so than usual.

I still wish I'd bought one of his pieces from his 2009 (?) Unwired exhibition - the one with the pandas. (Strange thing, I just looked at my blog stats, and someone Gooogled 'unwired' earlier today, from Mexico, of all places. )

Anyway, while browsing round the Go Gallery web-site, I was reminded that they sell Moon Calendars, so, in what's become something of a tradition, here's the icon or the 2011 edition. You can buy one for as little as €11.00 from Go Gallery at http://www.gogallery.nl/page.php?lang=nl&category=nieuws&id=3, or contact
GO Gallery

Prinsengracht 64
1015 DX Amsterdam

Tel. 020-4229580
E-mail: office@gogallery.nl
Fax 020-4229581

Chez Ben Mostafa, Essaouira

2010-10-25T18:27:00.000+01:00

I've just found an email address written on a scrap of paper and realized that it belongs to one of the waiters at Chez Ben Mostafa in Essaouira. I took a few photos there just before I left back in June, and though I added them to me Flickr account, I hadn't added them to my blog, nor had I sent them in an email.

If you've ever been to Essauouira, you've probably walked past Chez Ben Mostafa, though you may not have stopped there for a drink or a bit to eat. Everyone has their own favourite spot, and that is our's (my wife Maggie and me, that is.) I suppose that's a good job, really - otherwise it would be even harder to get a seat there, than it usually is! Great coffee (cafe casse for me, nous-nous for Maggie) and good food too - breakfast, lunch, and dinner too.

Anyway, here are photos of some of the team. If you've been there, I'm sure you'll recognize them.

iPhone near-disaster

2010-09-23T00:22:00.001+01:00

I was on the balcony of a little hotel in northern Italy a couple of weeks ago when the chair I was sitting on collapsed beneath me. About 10 minutes later, while I was recovering - I landed right on my coccyx, so the pain was pretty bad - there was a knock on the door, and one of the hotel staff appeared at the door holding my new iPhone 4 which I'd been using at the time.

She'd seen it drop through the kitchen window and went down to the street to see what it was. Switching it on, she saw that the login-in panel was in English, so since we were the only English people staying there, she figured it was mine and brought it up to me. I was still pretty shocked from the fall, so I hadn't even realized that it was missing.

It was totally unscathed - not a scratch, not a dent, screen still intact. I figure that it must have fallen in a horizontal position, and that maybe its fall was broken by first landing on the roof of one of the cars that you can see in the photo

This film below is a simulation, shot using my wife's little Lumix, though the still photo was taken using the iPhone from the balcony. And "No", my wife didn't drop the iPhone again, just to see whether it could survive twice - for the simulation we used a cigarette packet stuffed with a Zippo. As the saying goes, "I may be daft, but I'm not stupid."

Madness at Glastonbury Abbey Extravaganza 2010

2010-08-23T18:13:00.000+01:00

A couple of weeks ago a bunch of family and friends went to see Madness play the Glastonbury Abbey Extravaganza. They were really good. I've never been what you could call a fan, but I've liked their music and their whole performance style since their early days. I took my video camera and recorded about half of their set and posted a couple of videos on YouTube. I had them set to Private until today, when I received the OK from the band's own YT channel - MadTubeTV. Thanks CB. (Note to WS - See, I do learn.)

I plan to add a couple more, but for now there's Wings of a Dove and It must be Love on this playlist.

Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel kicked off the evening, and while I didn't manage to record them at all, they were a superb accompaniment to our big picnic. Thanks guys.

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2010 - Report, Videos, Photographs

2010-07-02T16:30:00.018+01:00

I've just come back from the Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2010 where Maggie and I had a really great time, listened to lots of good music and made lots of new friends.This year, we were given press accreditation, with what I came to realise were precious Camera badges, that allowed us privileged access right in front of the stages. I shot loads of what I hope will turn out to be great video, though your opinion on that is more important than mine. I lost control of the sound quality some of the time, in the heat of getting better pictures, but I think I've found a way around that, if we get to go again and get the badges again. But enough of that.

The festival opened as usual with a parade of Gnaoui, but this year that was supplemented by a number of troops of Fantasia riders on horseback, led by their Masters, all carrying ancient-looking rifles. 75 horsemen in a circle, hoeses all calm and controlled but frisky with it. Troops approach one another and pull back. The lead Master starts to speak - addressing all of the troops. Then Bang! All 75 rifles fire at one. Wow - took me by surprise.

First up in Place Moulay Hassan after the open speeches were the two Maalem brothers Kouyou - Mohamed and Said, joined after a few gnaoua numbers by the Sukishvili Georgian National Ballet, who were not at all what I had expected. My only past experince of Georgian National Ballet had been tall and statuesqe women in long white gowns who appeared to float across the stage. Take a look at the video when I post it and you'll see how wrong I was.

Videos

Here's a YouTube playlist that I'm starting to build. There'll be more music appearing in the coming days, weeks, and (knowing me) months:

This post is work in progress - be sure to check back soon for some new material.

I've managed to crack the problem of posting videos on YouTube in HD this year. I'm using the same camera as before (Panasonic GS400) which records in pretty good quality though not native HD. The secret appears to be to render the clips with a large frame size (1440x1080) and using an AVCHD codec, though this does generate very large files, about 1.0 GB for a 10 minute clip. The resulting quality on YouTube is however really good, and I might re-render and re-post some of my previous years' movies if I ever get the time.

Interview with Hassan Boussou

This year, I was given the opportunity to request interviews with some of the performers. I asked to speak with Maalem Hassan Boussou, since I really love his music, and was lucky to be able to talk with him for 10 minutes or so at the Sofitel Hotel one afternoon. To be honest, at first I found the experience a little overwhelming, but once we got started, it seemd to work quite well. I recorded the interview, which I've added to my YouTube playlist, but I've also included it separately below.

I asked about the importance of fusion to his music and learned that what is most important is the traditional Gnaoua, but that he has mainly started to play fusion since he started living in France where he meets and works with a wider variety of musicians. He would like to see Gnaoua become more recognised internationally and considers it part of his responsibility to help to achieve that. When he plays, he considers the audience to be very important, "a plant must have water if it is to grow" was how he explained that to me. I asked a rather complicated question about the frequent and complex time changes and what I called the 'musical punctuation' that seems to divide up some of his longer pieces, and he explained that such changes of tempo were key to the Boussou school of Gnaoua, developed by his late father, the great Maalem H'mida Boussou. The interview video runs to a little over 10 minutes, and if you speak French you'll get a lot more out of it than if you just speak English. Many thanks to Ibtissam Alaoui, from the festival press office, for translating my questions and Hassan's replies from and to English.

Photographs

Here's a slideshow of some of the photographs that I took that I have loaded up to Flickr. I took these with my camcorder, which lets me take still photos while I'm recording a video.

Vince Millett

Vince Millet added a comment with links to some great photographs that he took. Just follow the links to these six Flikr slides-shows to get a great sense of the everyday excitement of the Essaouira festival. Thanks for these, Vince.
Opening Parade: http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624411100934/

Maâlem Mustapha Bakbou: http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624284357785/

Dhafer Youssef: http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624283906685/

Maâlem Saïd Ouressan:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624407655628/

Speed Caravan:http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624407510136/

Around the festival: http://www.flickr.com/photos/brokendrumphotography/sets/72157624286342899/

Audio

I was able to record a couple of Audio-only sessions from our balcony at Bab Marrakech while I was over at Moulay Hassan with the video camera. Here's the first of them, featuring Maalem Aziz Bakbou with some member of the Armenian Navy Band (among others):

This isn't working, and I'm not sure why. I'll try to sort it out.

MaggieKnutson.com

My wife Maggie has also wrtten extensively about the festival, and you can read what she says and see her own photographs on her blog here http://maggieknutson.blogspot.com/2010/07/wonder-and-beauty-of-gnaoua-and-world.html.

Essaouira Gnaoua festival Facebook groups

2010-05-11T00:51:00.002+01:00

I've been one of the admins for the i just can't wait for the next gnaoua's festival in Essaouira !! Facebook group for a couple of years and I always knew there was at least one other, but today I was looking around and I found a whole bunch more. I couldn't find a way to create a Facebook supergroup (let me know if you know how), so I decided to list and link to them all here, on my blog. Post comments if you knolw of others, and I'll add them to the post.

Some of these groups have over 400 members and have good posts, photos, and videos, so, if you are in facebook, take a look and join some of them.

A long week-end in Amsterdam, March 2010

2010-03-24T19:18:00.023Z

Last Friday, Maggie and I flew to Amsterdam for the week-end. We got a 7am flight from Southampton airport, less than 10 miles away, getting to Amsterdam's central station by 10am local time - not bad considering UK is an hour ahead.

Once again we stayed at the same little hotel on the Prinzengracht, this time in a room facing onto the canal. The only down side was that it was on the 4th floor, and if you've ever been in a narrow 17th century dutch town house, you'll know exactly how challenging that can be. I'm 6'7'' and on one of the flights I had to limbo backwards to get down the stairs.

Amsterdam is a great place for shopping. If you like hats, the English Hatter is a great place to go. I thought I'd lost my black Kangol 504 so bought another one, along with a black cotton/linen mix in a similar style, though when I got home I found my old one in the loft.

Since it was Maggie's birthday, I got her a pretty little brooch from Laloli, and as I'd bought a number of things there over the past few years, Sandra (one of the three sisters who make all of the jewelery) gave Maggie a pair of silver and pearl ear-rings as a present. Thank you, Sandra, Monique and Marianne.

Go Gallery

In 2008, I went to the Go Gallery to buy a Moon Calendar and discovered Sit's Unwired exhibition which was running at the time, but on my last two trips I just couldn't find it. I must have walked up and down the odd side of the Prinzengracht four times but just couldn't see it. This year, while paying for the Duvel I'd just drunk, I asked the owner of the little bar on the even side of the canal (No. 44, I think) if she knew the Go Gallery, and she said "Oh yes, it's just a few doors down". You know, I'd been convinced that it was on the other side, but there it was, at Prinzengracht 64!.

This time, the gallery was running the first solo exhibition by Michiel van der Born, a young Dutch typographer. The exhibition is called "26 Characters", and features 26 acrylic paintings of all of the letters of the alphabet. Here's the composite view used to promote the show. I currently use this in tesselated form as my lap-tops background.

I didn't buy one of those, but I did buy "typotalk" (4/15), another piece of his work on show there:

I do love typography and can't wait to get it framed and hung. Here's my YouTube playlist of some good typography videos that I've collected.

Speaking of Moon Calendars, I bought the new one and the owner gave me the one from 2009 that I missed getting last year. Thanks so much.

De Bierkoning

My usual mode of transport in Amsterdam is walking and believe me, I did a lot of it in those three days! It's strange you know, but for such a small and compact city, most of the places I wanted to be were a surprising distance from each other. One day, while walking between two such places, I spotted De Bierkoning, possibly the best beer shop in the world, and certainly the best I've ever been in. Confused by the enormous choice of what seemed like 1,000 different bottles, I plumped for a single bottle of green label (or kleine) Duvel. At 7.5%, it's about 1% weaker than the regular. Cold-filtered and sold in 25cl bottles, it's perfect for drinking ice cold and straight from the bottle.

Yellow and Red meet

That's the title of the piece of glass by Ton Verdegaal that I bought at the Tatiana De La Fuente Art Gallery at Prinzengracht 308a. I'll try to take a good photo of it and post it here. It looks beautiful in our dining room, front-lit, casting a yellow shadow on the wall behind. You can see some wondeful examples of his work, though not my piece, on his web site.

Maggie and I saw it on Saturday while we were walking somewhere and I didn't manage to get back there until late on Sunday afternoon when the gallery had already closed. Not only did the owner open the shop and show me the work while her guest was left waiting, but she personally delivered the piece to my hotel, securely wrapped for air travel and complete with it's certificate of authenticity. Thank you, Sara, for such wonderful service.

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2010 - June 24-27

2010-02-13T16:19:00.008Z

UPDATE 4 July 2010

Now that the festival has been and gone, if you want to read my festival report, listen to some of the music, watch some videos, or see some of the photos that I took, just follow this link http://daftnotstupid.blogspot.com/2010/07/essaouira-gnaoua-and-world-music.html

UPDATE 10 May 2010

At last, the official dates are now up on the festival web-site, so you don't just need to take my word for it. Here's the image that is currently posted there:

The dates are as I previously posted - Thursday to Sunday, June 24-27, 2010.

I've been in touch with the Festival organisers and am pleased to announce that the 13th Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival will be held Thursday to Sunday, June 24-27, 2010.

The official festival website at http://www.festival-gnaoua.net is still showing the 2009 dates, and almost none of the links there work, but I'm sure that they will sort that out before too long. The line-up and the updated website are usually posted until late-May/early-June, but they usually update the banner image with the dates round about now. If any of you need to books flights or hotels, and want to confirm the dates, I suggest you call A3 Communications (contact details on the festival web page).

If you can't wait until June and need to hear some gnaoua music right now, you'll find plenty on the playlists here or over on my YouTube channel.

Essaouira 2009 playlist with music and video

2009-07-01T01:22:00.003+01:00

I am slowly building a playlist on YouTube with music that I recorded at last week's Essaouira 2009 Gnaoua and World Music festival. There are only a few numbers there so far, but don't worry, there will be more to come.

So far I have three numbers from Hassan Boussou and Sewarye's great closing set in Place Moulay Hassan. It was really great. You should have been there, if if you couldn't make it, or if you did and you want to hear it again, just press the button on the playlist below.

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2009 - Lineup

2009-06-08T23:22:00.004+01:00

News - 8th June 2009

At last, the festival home page now has a link to download the program, so we now know some of the artists who will be playing. Here's a link to the program - look for Télécharger le Programme 2009 just below the flash panel on the homepage. I've been looking at the festival site for weeks, and the menu options once yo enter the site are still only showing the arttsts and program from 2008 (the 11th festival), so be careful that you don't get confused.

For more details about the festival, as and when they post them, visit the official site. There is also a Facebook group for the event, where you can talk with some of the 187 (last count) people who have confirmed they will be attending.

Here's the list:

Residents groups
- The prestigious orchestra of the WDR (thoough it might actually be the WDR Big Band)& the king of raï, Cheb Khaled and Maâlem Hamid El Kasri, with the participation of festival artistic director, Karim Ziad and the celebrated percussionist, Rhani Krija.
- Maâlem Abdeslam Alikane's group, with the musicians of the group Jouala and the kora player, Albaye Cissoko.
- Maâlem Mohamed Kouyou his musicians, with the celebrated New Orleans group, Donald Harrison & Congo Nation.
- Maâlem Abdenbi El Gadari, Unes & Hak’x.

Fusion concerts
- Maâlem Mahmoud Guinea, Afoxe Loni et Stephane Belmondo
- Maâlem Mustapha Bakbou and Sixun
- Maâlem Abderrahim Benthami, the trio Amrat Hussain and Foulane
- Maâlem Mahmoud Guinea, Martin Vassilev, Stephane Belmondo and the Brazilian group Afoxe Loni
- Maâlem Kbiber, Meddy Gerville, Laatabi Diouani and Rachid El Guerrab

Invited groups
- Babani Kone
- Blue Mogador
- Rais Brahim
- Arrested Development
- Mazagan
- Sewarye & Maâlem Hassan Boussou

Acoustic concerts
- Fusion between Agadir Gnaoua and Congo Nation
- Fusion between Maâlem Omar Hayat, Meddy Gerville, Laatabi Diouani and Lindigo
- Fusion between Maâlem Abdenbi El Gadari, Ablaye Cissoko and Foulane
- Sidi Ali Lasmar Stambali
- Maâlem Abdelkebir Merchane
- Trio Amrat Hussain

Looks like we've got a great festival ahead of us. I hope to meet lots of you there. John

New DaftNotStupid logo?

2009-04-05T23:25:00.005+01:00

Which one do you like as the new DaftNotStupid logo? Feel free to comment. Stamps bought at De Posthumuswinkel, Amsterdam. Printing all mine.

A
B
C
D
E
F

Save Barton Farm - protest march - Winchester

2009-03-15T22:00:00.005Z

A short video documenting the march held in Winchester to protest against the proposed building of 2000 houses on farmland on the edge of Winchester. It's a long story, best understood by going to www.savebartonfarm.org.

The proposal needs to be understood in the context that the land was formerly owned by Winchester College, who sold it for development to Cala Homes, so that the College could continue to 'educate' the sons of the wealthy upper class (OK - there might also be a few girls, and a few scholarships, and the kids of a few working class people) - but largely its a class thing. They don't mind sending there kids to Winchester, but they usually don't live here themselves so they don't car if they f%&ck it up for us residents.

Thanks to Rob Berry (who just happened to be busking on the High Street as the march went past) for supplying the musical background to the second half of the film. Films work so much better with music, and, as many of my regular viewers know, it's what mainly motivates me. It's really appropriate that the lyrics he's singing is "You've got to help me - I can't do this all by myself". I'm sure that's just how Gavin Blackman (the chairman of the Save Barton Farm Group) feels sometimes.

Thanks also to the lovely lady from the CPRE whose name I forget to get. Passion will out!

earport Amsterdam, 2009

2009-02-05T18:56:00.020Z

I'd planned a short week-end in Amsterdam, and on the Thursday evening googled for some live music while I was in town. I stumbled upon earport, billed as a post fusion symphony , created by Paul Oomen. Fusion it was, but not like I'm used to in Essaouira. This was altogether more refined, more planned, but just as joyous and just as fulfilling. I recorded the whole evening - some four hours or so of music - from the balcony of the Conservatorium van Amsterdam. My thanks to Maartje from earport, for making it all happen.

I don't have time to list all of the musicians now, but I will be posting lots of the music, and will have a mp3 player available here pretty soon.

Here's a piece written and played by Jan Wouter Oostenrijk with his Maghreb Jazz formation. It's called Feel cha' aby (Track 2),named after the Moroccan chaaby rhythm, according to JWO.

I'm in the process of building an mp3 player, but it will take a little while to get everything posted.

Artist details
Track 1a - Diego Nicolas group

www.marcosbaggiani.blogspot.com
www.celanobaggianigroup.com
www.themeetingpoint-impro.com
Fra Fra Sound on MySpace

In England, one tends to think of the recorder as a child's instrument, so, be prepared to be disabused of any such preconceptions, when you listen to Raphaela Danksagmuller playing with Jalliya Ensemble and them with Nello Mirando and co. Not on the palylist yet, but will be there soon. In the meantime, take a listen to her on her MySpace profile

Eboman - the human mixer / splicer - maybe not how he would describe himself. I'll be adding one of his pieces to the mp3 player, but you really need to watch him in action to get the whole picture. So, take a look at some of his videos on his MySpace profile: Eboman at MySpace

Who would have thought it. DaftNotStupid is an old romantic. Something about the group that closed earport on Saturday afternoon really got to me. If you've listened to any music that I've recorded and talked about, you wouldn't have thought that this was my style at all. Anyway, take a listen to the final track on the mp3 player and see what you think. Amsterdamse Zeedijkkoor - the Amsterdam Zeedijk Choir - put on a great show - visually and aurally.

I've been going to Amsterdam, off and on, for nearly 40 years now, since my early days as a Dam-slaper, so maybe I'm starting to think like a native. Zeedijk is just around the corner (or across the gracht) from the Dam, so maybe that's got something to do with it. Whatever, take a listen and enjoy. Learn more about this well-hatted choral group on their web-site.

More info at earportamsterdam.nl, myspace.com/earportamsterdam, myspace.com/janwouteroostenrijk

All music copyright of earport and / or its owners.

Musicians and composers will be credited. Write to john@daftnotstupid.com

Essaouira 2009

2009-01-23T23:22:00.009Z

I've just seen that they have posted the dates for this year's Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival - 2009

George Brooks Summit with Zakir Hussain at SJ Jazz Festival 2008

2008-10-14T00:23:00.003+01:00

Here's more from the SJ Jazz Fest

Essaouira 2008 - Interim report

2008-07-25T01:03:00.003+01:00

So, its now about a month since we arrived in Essaouira. That long, slow drive down the sea front. Cecking it at the hotel and seeing old friends again. Our first nous-nous and caffee cassee Chez Ben Mustafa, God rest his soul. The excitement and anticipation is tangible. Looking back, was it all worth it? Yes, for sure. I don't think it was a great festival but it was a very good one. Great moments spring to mind: Omar Hayat with his flag holders and the great wailing woman, Hamid El Kasri, Ky-Mani Marler, Samulnori Molgae and their great drummers, but no Band of Gnawa, no Ray Lema, no Mehr Ali and Sher Ali, no Youssou N'Dour. Well, you can't have everything, and it was pretty good.

I took about 20 hours of video and quite a bit of audio and II captured all and have processed some of it and posted it to Youtube. It's given me the chance to listen again to all of the msuic, some of it many times as I get it ready for posting. I worked out that I probably listen to a given piece 8 or 10 times before it gets onto my channel.

My wife Maggie has written a great description of the festival, and much more, over on her blog, so why not take a look?

Group Bana de Marrakech at Essaouira 2008

2008-07-20T12:14:00.003+01:00

I know little about Group Bana de Marrakech other than what I've read in the Essaouira festival guide which says (as translated by Google Translate):

The Group Bana is a native of Marrakech and plays in the style of "taktaka" Marrakesh, which is part of authentic arts of the city ochre as the "Dakka Marrakchiya." The group Bana has participated in several regional and national events and poetry evenings.

I saw them play on the Friday afternoon in the little Place Al Khayma and recorded all that I saw and heard. Theirs' is a completely different style to gnaoua - very interactive, both between each other and with the audience, who they carry along - singing and dancing - with long, complicated songs with rhythms that change all the time and which seem to tell well-known stories that everyone knows the words to - except me, of course. Anyway, as a musical and visual experience, it was stunning.

The stage at Al Khayma is only feet away from the audience which really helps the interactivity between the group and the crowd, and there was quite a crowd, filling the square pretty much, as you can see on my videos. I've seen a vidao of them playing at the new stage at Bab Doukkala, and they looked more formal, and more distant, there. I think maybe their taktaka works better in a smaller, more intimate venue.

Anyway, enough talk, here's some music. It links to my Group Bana de Marrakech playlist on YoutTube.

Van churns out another one!

2008-07-19T00:41:00.004+01:00

KISS, or Keep It Simple, Stupid, is long-standing tenet in the IT business that I've been involved in for the past 40 years or so. As the title of Van the Man's latest album implies, I'm not sure who's the stupid one - us - for buying it, or him. He says that he's returning to his roots though to me it sounds like he's saving himself the bother of working for a living and is just repeating what he's done before. That said, on stage last year, his performance was great.

I wondered what was going on earlier this year when he and/or his record company pulled all of his classic videos from YouTube. Now I understand. He didn't want us to remember how great he was.

Sorry Van. You need to go back to the drawing board, and reinvent yourself. This just dosn't cut the mustard.

Music in Essaouira

2008-07-13T10:21:00.005+01:00

If you think that the only music in Essaouira is at the festival, you would be very wrong. As you walk along its streets, you'll find yourself moving between islands of music: shops and stalls selling CDs - mainly gnaoua, but also sub-Saharan music from Mali and Senegal, shops selling souvenirs who play music to attract customers, and of course the cafes at Place Moulay Hassan, where sometimes the music is so loud that you can't hear the live music being played on the stage just around the corner!

Then, of course, there are the shops selling instruments: some more workshop that shop, where a lone craftsman makes instruments of wood and leather using hand-tools and skills that must have been passed down over the centuries.

Essaid Rhatrhat is one such who not only makes guimbris and djembes, but also plays them and sings as well, as you can see in this 10 minute clip that I recorded in June. I'd spotted his shop on the Derb Ibn Toumert, a little street that links the top end Place Moulay Hassan leading to Place Al Khaima. Younger musicians gather at his shop, to talk and get advice, a new string, or to try out a djembe. They address Essaid as 'maalem' (master), though he's wouldn't call himself that. Still its a term of respect that I think is well deserved.

Just a few minute's walk away, where Derb Yousef Ben Tachfine joins the Mellah Qdim (aka Avenue Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdallah), you'll find Bob Music, a veritable treasure chest of musical instruments, old and new, from Morocco, other parts of Africa, and from Europe and the Americas. The shop is run by Abderrahim and his assistant Hamid, who you can see in this clip, playing an impromptu set on djembes.

Regular visitors to DaftNotStupid may recognise the music playing on Abderrahim's complex set of interconnected CD players and amplifiers at the beginning of the clip. A free CD to the first person to identify the number (add comment here please, but send you name and address by email to mailto:john@daftnotstupid.com

Getting back to the theme of this meme (I know, I usually call them posts, but I liked the rhyme), you need to ask yourself the question "Why is there so much music in Essaouira?" Is it because of the festival, or is the festival here because of the music? I think the latter. Essaouira is one of the homes of Gnaoua music - it's in the soul and the blood of its inhabitants. If the festival stopped, the music wouldn't. People like Essaid would continue to ply their craft, making their own instruments and playing them for their own satisfaction and that of their friends and families.

While I'm on this subject,I've just counted up the gnaoua groups who played at the festival this year. Of the 28 maalems listed in the program, 13 come from Essaouira, 6 from Marrakech, and the remainder from the other gnaoua centres - Rabat (4), Casablanca (2), Meknes (1), Tangier (1), and Safi (1). While this certainly is partly due to local availability and a desire on the part of the organizers to promote native Souiri talent, it's probably also largely due to the fact that so many of the the Essaouira gnaouis are so darned good. Well, that my opinion. It just helps to show that music runs in the blood down there.

Essaouira 2008 الصويرة playlist

2008-07-06T14:37:00.003+01:00

This is a playlist of the music that I recorded at the Essaouira 2008 Gnaoua and World Music Festival which I've posted on YouTube. Enjoy.

Click the little rectangular icon at the bottom, or move your mouse over the bottom of the fram, to see the clip titles.

Essaouira 2008 Gnaoua and World Music Festival - First Impressions

2008-07-02T01:36:00.014+01:00

Maalem Omar Hyatt

I've just come back from another great Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival and will be writing a lot about it and posting some pretty good audio, and new this year - video, of all of the sessions that I saw and heard. Hightlights for me were Maalem Omar Hyatt, Groupe Bassekou Kouyaté, Orchestre National de Barbes, the heavyweight drummers form Korea - Samulnori Molgae, Ky-Mani Marley and Maâlem Hamid El Kasri.

I recorded over twenty (20) hours of video and another 10 hours or so of audio. It's taken me three or four hours to create a 7 minute video clip that I am currently uploading to YouTube, so you can see that I've got my work cut out for the coming months.

Here's the start of a long number that I need to break to pieces because it's so long. It features Maalem Omar Hayat with Franck Vaillant (Drums), Jon Balcke Norway (Piano / keyboards), Mohamed Derouich (Guitar) France / Morocco, Ibrahim Maalouf (Trumpet / Lebanon).

This clip shows the great drummers from Samulnori Molgae:

After the Hamid El Kasri set, Maggie said that Ky-Mani Marley would have to be pretty good to beat it. Well, here's the evidence. Ky-Mani comes out fighting - and folks, there's more to come. Here's his opening number:

The closing set of the festival was back to Sunday, once again, after last year when it closed on Saturday. There were a couple of changes though: the two sets started a little later and were held at Moulay Hassan, not Bab Marrakech. Here's a couple of numbers by Orchestre National de Barbes who finished it all off very nicely, thank you!

Franck Vailant playing with Omar Hayat

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival - 2008 line-up

2008-06-26T15:56:00.002+01:00

Festival dates: Thursday June 26 to Sunday June 29

Updated: At last, the line-up has been posted for the 2008 Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival, and now (20 June) there is a detailed program that's nicely colour-coded to show musical genre, along with the lists of the artists and biographies. Also (18 June), some of the artist listings show the venue, day and time, so you can now plan your festival.

Note that you need to access the site using the French entry point if you want to see the musicians - the English side of the site is still pretty sparsely populated. I've added hyperlinks to the section headings below, so you can easily read more details about the artists. Links to the original French are shown in italics, English translations (courtesy of Google Translate) are shown in normal type.

I've added some links for some of the artists to their web-sites or Myspace profiles, so that you listen to their music, before the event, to help you to determine which sets you should attend.

Artistes World / International musicians

Franck Vaillant (Drums)
Jaleel Shaw (AltoSax) USA
Mohamed Derouich (Guitar) France / Morocco
Stéphane Edouard (Percussion) - India
Hassan Idbadssaïd (Vocals / banjo / guitar / Rebab / violin)
Abdenour Djemaï (Multi instrumentalist strings) France and Algeria
Andy Narell (Steel drums) NY
Jon Balcke Norway (Piano / keyboards)
Ibrahim Maalouf (Trumpet / Lebanon)
Fermin Juarez and Nelson Javier Silva (Argentina)

Groupes Etrangers / Foreign groups

Eric Légnini Trio - Belgium
Le Trio Joubran , Samir Joubran, Wissam Joubran, Adnan Joubran, Yousef Hbeisch
3 MA
Justin Adams - UK with Juldeh Camara - The Gambia
Groupe Bassekou Kouyaté
Toumani Diabaté - Mali (Kora)
Diwane El Kasbah - Algeria
Wayne Shorter quartet - USA
Ky-Mani Marley - Jamaica
Orchestre National de Barbes - Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia
Samulnori Molgae - Korea

Groupes Marocains / Moroccan groups
Groupe Darhem
Groupe Berbère Raiss Said OUTAJJAJT et Raissa JAMILA TAMINTAGHT
Groupe Paco Ghiwane
Groupe Wachmin’hit
Hmadcha
Ganga (Smimou)
Haddarates
Issaoua de Meknès
Groupe bana de Marrakech
Kif Samba

Groupes Gnaoua / Gnaoua groups
Maâlem Hamid El Kasri
Maâlem Mustapha Bakbou
Maâlem Mohamed Kouyou
Maâlem Abderrahim Benthami
Maâlem Omar Hayat
Maâlem Abdelkébir Merchane
Maâlem Mahmoud Guinea
Maâlem Abdellah Guinéa
Maâlem Abdenbi El Gadari
Maâlem Allal Soudani
Maâlem Abdeslam Alikane, Tyour Gnaoua
Maâlem Mahjoub Laghnaoui
Maâlem Abdelwahad Stitou
Maâlem Abdeslam Belghiti
Maâlem Saïd Boulhimas
Maâlem Mustapha Gholf
Maâlem Mustapha Hagbel
Maâlem Adil Amimi
Maâlem Najib Gbani
Maâlem Rachid Fadli Ladhass
Maâlem Abdelkader Amlil
Maâlem Saïd El Bourqui
Groupe Baâlil
Maâlem Ahmed Bakbou
Maâlem Chérif Regragui
Maâlem Lahcen Demnati

There will be a number of changes this year with a new performance area (scene): Bab Doukala for the traditional Gnaoua - which will undoubtedly be where Joseph Sebag will spend most of his time.

There was also talk on the festival site about a new venue - Bab Sba, which looked like it would replace Bab Marrakech, but now it looks like that's not going to happen. To read my wife's view on that proposed change of venue, link to Maggie Knutson: Gnaoua and World Music Festival, Essaouira, Morocco June 26-29, 2008

Hold Fire at The Railway Inn, Winchester

2008-06-14T12:02:00.007+01:00

I went along to the Railway Inn in Winchester last night to record Hold Fire, a band from Brighton who've been playing togather since 2002. They played a short but powerful 30 minute set and really got the beach party rocking. Super job, guys.

Let's start with their second number:

Here's the finale:

You can find more music by Hold Fire on YouTube and MySpace

Ryan O'Reilly at the Discovery Centre, Winchester

2008-05-25T22:54:00.003+01:00

I used to go to school in Newcastle and seemed to spend the best part of five years waiting for a bus at one end or the other of the Westgate Road. We used to tell a joke - "Why are Newcastle buses like bananas? Because they are yellow and come in bunches." I know, its not that funny. What is funny, though, is that I go for months without recording anything, and then I get three gems in one day.

Ryan O'Reilly's business card says he is a singer/songwriter/musician, and if his short session before Polly and the Billets Doux at the Discovery Centre, Winchester last night is anything to go by, he's very good at all three. Here's a couple of his songs, sung with a smokey voice and a lyrics that hint at a life full of experience.

Elisabeth:

I know I'm not good enough:

If you like these songs, go check out more of his work on his web site or on Myspace or just buy some of his tracks on iTunes.

Rowlie at the Discovery Centre, Winchester

2008-05-25T19:06:00.009+01:00

As I mentioned in my earlier post today, Rowlie opened the evening last night for Polly and the Billets Doux, at the Discovery Centre, Winchester. Rowlie is a print maker at the Winchester College of Fine Art, and, if his printing is as good as his singing and guitar playing, he's going to have a very successful career ahead of him. Shades of Syd Barrett, with similar lightness of touch and quirky lyrics.

Well, since I wrote the previous paragraph on on Sunday, I've seen some of Rowlie's work and I'm really impressed. This piece illillustration.com combines a great piece of fantastical artwork with an imaginative use of a virtual magnifying glass. I'll leave the reader to discover how to navigate the site, but take your time - it'll be worth it. I'd love to see the 1600x1400 dip pen and ink original. You'll find more of Rowlie's work on his web site.

The Queen and I:

Intaglio:

Polly and the Billets Doux at The Discovery Centre, Winchester

2008-05-25T14:15:00.009+01:00

If you were in Winchester last night, you couldn't have had a better time than I had, listening to Polly and the Billets Doux playing live at The Discovery Centre - Winchester's new, intimate performance venue. After un-billed performances by the multi-talented Rowlie and Ryan O'Reily (surely a star in the making), Polly and her band came on to a rousing welcome and certainly didn't disappoint.

Here are a few samples.

When I get low I get high:

The old blues standard House of the Rising Sun, rendered in a way that makes it sound new, all over again:

The set closed with this - look out for Polly playing the lead guitar!

You can buy PBD's new EP CD at any good record shops or, I'm told, from iTunes, or visit the band web site . Their MySpace profile lists their upcoming gigs, including the GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL on 27 Jun 2008 at 13:00 .

A few months ago, I mentioned that I was thinking of getting a video camera. Well, as you can see, I got one and it's really great. Not too heavy but super quality, though you lose a lot when you compress the movie file for use on YouTube. I'll post some more videos and some music mp3s from the show, so keep a look out.

nps output webradio

2008-04-18T16:35:00.008+01:00

Someone I met in Amsterdam yesterday told me about an internet radio station that played jazz and world music, so, this morning, when I got home, I decided to take a look at npsoutput.com . What I found is a never-ending stream of great, non-stop, music - world, jazz, blues and grooving music too, spread across three different channels. Indeed, three never-ending streams.

Go to the webradio page select the channel (Kies je station) and click the Shoutcast icon and open the playlist file to add the channels to your iTunes. The tracks being played have their titles shown, real-time. There's also a Media player link, if you prefer that. See the playlist on the right nav-bar for access and a display of what's playing now.

I've been listening to it all day now - you should do the same. It's playing an old Miles Davis / Gill Evans track now - sublime.

Laloli Jewellery Design, Amsterdam

2008-04-18T14:59:00.007+01:00

I first found Laloli, at Grimburgwal 13, in Amsterdam, last year, when I was looking for something nice for my wife. I bought her a beautiful little enamel brouch, a tiger or a monkey. Anyway, she loved it and then she lost it, so, I was under orders to get her a replacement when I was there yesterday. All they had left was a turtle covered in hearts.

Monique, if you read this, she loves this one too.
Marianne, you'll have to let me know what other animals you make, since you've got a fan, over here.

I also bought a tulip brouch, like the one in the image (Copyright Laloli), but taller and thinner. They lots of other stuff too, including some wonderful gold earings. Maybe, next time.

Do you want to buy a joke?

2008-04-18T14:18:00.002+01:00

"Do you want to buy a joke?" That's what I heard this guy say, yesterday in Amsterdam. Really. I was sitting on a bench, in the sun, looking at the canal, eating my chips - the best chips. No, I mean the best. He'd ridden up on a bike and was talking to the couple on the bench right behind me. Intrigued, I turned around and asked him what a joke costs. Good jokes were 2 euro and great jokes were 5. I asked for a good joke, but only had a five, so decided to go for the great joke. To be honest, the joke was good, but the telling was really great. It was the Panda joke - eats, shoots and leaves, respun.

So, when later in the day, I saw the pandas at the Go Gallery, I wondered, "what's with all of the pandas, all of a sudden." I'm not one for signs, so I figure it was just a coincidence, but it makes you think.

Sit at the Go Gallery, Amsterdam

2008-04-18T13:28:00.011+01:00

Yesterday I was in Amsterdam for the day and decided to go the Go Gallery and pick up a copy on this year's Moon Calendar. So far, I've had to make do with seeing it tesselated as as the background on my laptop and I was looking forward to seeing it up close where you can see a lot more detail.

How lucky I was to stumble upon Sit's Unwired exhibition, now in its third week at the Go Gallery and running until 12th May. In his latest work, Sit, better known as Freakin Sitnie delivers a haunting prediction of a very bleak future. We all see examples of some of what Sit portrays here, everyday, but we still ignore the warning signs. Visit the Unwired website (select paintings) for a flash screenshow of details from the work. Let's all hope that his visions - if these are what they are - don't become much more real than they are today. I will not be able to forget the pandas. Speaking of pandas, see ...

Go Gallery describes Sit in these terms:

SIT (Amsterdam, 1976)
Sit,vroeger beter bekend als Freakin Sitnie, maakte jaren geleden furore inde Amsterdamse straatkunstscene met zijn geheel eigen stijl van scherpeen eigenzinnige schilderijen. Geïnspireerd door illustere comicillustratoren als Simon Bisley, Sam Keith, Todd Mcfarlane en JamieHewlett, perfectioneerde hij zijn stijl. In rap tempo werd hij zeersuccesvol. Zijn werk was overal te zien, tijdens evenementen en inclubs, van Amsterdam tot Kuala Lumpur. Vanaf 29 maart t/m 12 mei in GO Gallery.

Or, when translated by Google, with a little editing by me:

Sit, formerly known as Freakin Sitnie years ago created a furore in the Amsterdam street-art scene with his own style of scherpeen(?) idiosyncratic paintings. Inspired by illustrious comic-illustrators such as Simon Bisley, Sam Keith, Todd Mcfarlane, and Jamie Hewlett, he perfected his style. He rapidly became successful and his work has been widely seen, at events and in clubs, from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. From March 29 to May 12 in GO Gallery.

More details of how Sit approached this work can be found on blakkbyrd.

All images Copyright Sit, linked to on the Go Gallery website, or taken from a review on A Blue Chicken .

My charicature

2008-04-14T21:46:00.004+01:00

I was in Las Vegas last week and had my charicature drawn by a Canadian artist called Sam Gorrie which bears quite a striking resemblence to what I look like. Here's a photo that I took of it. Sam took all of 10 minutes to draw this!! Cool, or what?

Joseph Sebag talking about Gnaoua

2008-03-31T22:02:00.001+01:00

As my wife has described (at some length) we attended a Lila at the home of Maalem Mahmoud Guinea on Christmas evening, 2007. Here is a short podcast of Joseph Sebag, talking about Gnaoau music, that I recorded just before the music started.

As you can tell, Joseph, an Essaouira-born Moroccan, not only understands, but really loves, Gnaoua. If you want to learn more, you should pop into the Galeria Aida, his great little shop selling books and some wonderful ethnic jewellery on Rue de la Skala (just off the Place Moulay Hassan).

Here are three of the tracks that I recorded that night:

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2008 June 26-29

2008-02-04T22:51:00.013Z

Update: Line-up posted - see my post dated May 31

For the past few years, the Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music festival ended on Sunday with a big concert in the afternoon at Place Bab Marrakech. Last year, 2007, was different - things started a little earlier in the week and the whole thing ended on Saturday night. Not sure I liked it this way. Sunday just seemed a little flat this year. I had heard that they were tryng to restore the town to some sort of normality a little sooner, or maybe it was just because 2007 was the 10th anniversary.

Anyway, according to the festival website, the 2008 festival will run from Thursday June 26 to Sunday June 29, so, if you haven't done so yet, start to make your plans, book your flights and hotels.

While I'm talking, its worth visting the festival site, just to hear the great Maalem Hamid El Kasri singing that old gnaoua favourite - Chalaba.

If you'd like a taste of Gnaoua and world music, why not listen to some of my recordings from the 2007 Essaouira festival.

Should you be planning to visit Essaouira for the festival this year, be sure to take a walk up the Avenue Sidi Mohamed Ben Abdallah and stop in at Bob Music, at 3, Derb Youssef Ben Tachafine. Abderrahim OUBELLA, who runs the shop, has just about every Morrocan and sub-saharan musical instrument and he knows how to play them all. Tell him John Gnaoua sent you.

Line-up

No official lineup has been posted yet - last year these didn't appear until late April/May - but I think we can rest assured that the festival team will put on a great show for us all. In the meantime, I will keep this post updated with names of artists expected to attend, based on other sources of information.

Juldeh Camara - One of my Myspace Friends - includes Essaouira 2008 in his list of gigs for this year. Take a listen to some of his music on his MySpace profile. Juldeh sings and plays the riti (nyanyeru), a traditional one-stringed fiddle originating from the nomadic Fulani cultures of the Sahel. I'm looking forward to hear how this sounds when fused with some gnaoua.

A rumour is spreading on Facebook that Stephen Marley, one of Bob Marley's sons, will appear. Let's hope that there is some truth in this, but as yet, there's no evidence. Update June 1:Funny thing about rumours is that there's often some truth in them. Fact is Ky-Mani Marley, not Stephen, will be playing Essaouira this year.

Van Morrison with John Lee Hooker - GLORIA, etc etc

2008-02-01T22:45:00.000Z

YouTube may have removed most of Van's music, but you can still find him elsewhere. Not all the classics that we used to be able to listen to, but some pretty good stuff , all the same.

I had posted links to them here, but even that apparently isn't allowed, so, following a request from that nice Web Sheriff, I am removing them. They are still out there, somewhere, as deft googling on your part will show. Sorry folks, but I need to bow out of this.

I'll leave the list of song titles I'd found, unless that's breakingthe rules, too.

GLORIA with John Lee Hooker

Baby Please Don't Go with John Lee Hooker

Brown eyed girl

Till I Gain Control Again - an interesting title given the current situation!

Them with Van Morrison - Mistic eyes and Gloria - old but veeerry good - look at those hep cats in the audience!

Georgia - Montreux Jazz Festival 2004

Have I Told You Lately (with Lavern Brown)

The Band & Van Morrison - Caravan - The Last Waltz

Days Like This - with Brian Kennedy

Van Morrison videos purged from Youtube

2008-01-26T15:23:00.003Z

As of yesterday, Youtube has not only removed all of my Van Morrison recordings from the 2007 Glastonbury Extravaganza but has also removed many videos posted by other Van the Man fans and has even suspended a couple of accounts of active Van fans. The net result of this is that ALL 35+ videos on my Van Morrison playlist have been deleted. Tragic. (1/9/2010 However, the playtlist still exists as a reminder to us all of what used to be available on YouTube - read it and weep)

New update 1/9/2010 You used to be able to read more of this story at The Bo Bice Underground but that site has also recently closed down, so I've removed the hyperlink.

Searching on this Van Morrison videos removed from Youtube with Google I came upon this, dated 12/13/2007 - Led Zeppelin Concert Clips Removed From YouTube and g4tv.com so we Van fans are not the only ones losing precious and unique musical events.

A new posting on Tim Anderson’s ITWriting blog indibts Websheriff as the party behind, at least, the (was temporary, now apparently permanent) removal of Michael Hayward's unofficial Van Morrison web site. The vanmorrison.net domain name is now up for sale and the site just a front, so I've removed that hyperlink too (1/9/2010).

The question is, are these isolated incidents or part of a concerted effort to rid the world of unlicenced music? Is Polydor just enforcing it legal rights? Or, did Van just have a bad day recently and decided to take it out on his loyal fans - present and future? Did WebSheriff just jump on the bandwagon once they saw the Youtube activity the previous week? Is this the first example of web ambulance chasing, I wonder?

New update 23/1/2008
Arctic Monkeys tribute site has also been served email writs by Web Sherry requiring that they remove

"unreleased ARCTIC MONKEYS tracks from your site immediately"

otherwise

"a DMCA notification shall be forwarded to you and legal action by our clients' lawyers and the BPI / RIAA shall follow"

They go on to say

"On behalf of the artist's label, we do appreciate that you are a fan of / are promoting the Arctic Monkeys but, by the same token, you must also appreciate that, by posting a pirate copy of the album or tracks from the album pre-release (or linking to a pirate copies), you are potentially causing considerable damage and we are sure that you would not want to be held to be personally liable for all of the lost sales that could ensue"

Does that mean that if we can show that we have been responsible for increased sales, due to our promotional activities, we could maybe demand a share of the profits from the record companies?

New update 26/1/2008 I see from an old story (Nov 2007) on Vintage Vinyl News that Van Morrison, along with Exile Productions and Polydor/Universal, have announced a reissue program that will see all of the artist's albums reissued with bonus tracks. Could this perhaps explain the recent purges, or am I just being overly suspicious?

New update 31/1/2008
My wife, Maggie, has just posted an open letter to Van Morrison on her own blog - powerful stuff.

Xmas Day 2007 Lila with Maalem Mahmoud Guinea

2008-01-03T19:00:00.005Z

This Xmas (2007), the DaftNotStupid team decided to forsake the craziness of Xmas in England and took their daughter, Lou, to Morocco to indulge in their own Moroccan style of craziness and, without a doubt, the highlight of the eight day holiday in Marrakech and Essaouira was the Xmas Night Lila in the home of the Master Gnaoua Musican Maalem Mahmoud Guinea in Essaouira.

Maalem Mahmoud Guinea

Here's the playlist for the Lila, starting with the first piece - about 20 minutes long. Listen out for the sounds of the carpet-dancing about 15 mins in. I can still see them - just five feet in front of us.

For reasons known only to the young, Lou decided to stay in her hotel room to watch a Harry Potter film (in German) on TV, drinking copious cups of hot chocolate and so she missed this experience BUT she has heard about it endlessly since then!
I (Maggie) am a Christian and I had prayed beforehand for Jesus to prepare the way for us on this holiday and I believe that that is just what he did because not only were we able to contact Mahmood once we were in Essaouira on the off chance that we could meet him, having been bowled over by his performance at the June 2007 Festival of Gnaoua and World Music in Essaouira, playing firstly with his own group and then with Chiek Tidiane Seik, and he not only visited us at our hotel, Dar Loussia (one of the pretty restored courtyard hotels which Morocco has become famous for) but also invited us to a private Lila in his own home the next evening, which was Xmas Night.
We behaved like excited children all that day, so honoured to have met him AND to be invited to his own home, and pinching ourselves (metaphorically) to assertain that it was not all a dream.
The session had been arranged by Joseph Sebag, a Moroccan Gnaoua devotee who owns the Galeria Aida a great little shop selling books and some wonderful ethnic jewellery on Rue de la Skala (just off the Place Moulay Hassan) so that the Japanese photo-journalist Ishida Masataka could record a Lila in session and other guests, including us, had been invited to be part of the audience.
We had no idea what to expect and were already exhausted by our walk along the beach from the small village of Diabet several kilometres from Essaouira, where we had a Xmas lunch of omelettes, fish tagine and fresh bread at the tiny Jimmy Hendrix cafe, once frequented by Hendrix nearly half a decade ago.
But, refreshed by a hamman (lsimilar to a Turkish bath) and a cooked chicken from a street vendor, we set off about 8.30 pm with our guide, Hussein, who is a young apprentice musician being trained by Mahmoud. He is very charming, very handsome in a Rudolph Nureyof kind of way and, as we later discovered, already a gifted musican.
Our common language was French and as we walked across the large square outside the city walls, Bab Marrakech, and into the suburbs beyond, I was secretly delighted that I was able to dig up so much GCE 'O' level French that I thought had been lost for ever.
Mahmoud's house is a modest riad and we entered via a small blue door, squeezed past a scooter in the entrance lobby, took off our shoes and entered the downstairs room, which was clearly a room for entertaining with rugs and long, cushioned couches which faced a cushioned performance area . In front of us was a table with a tray containing jug of water and two glasses, which was, I felt, such a lovely gesture of hospitality.
Mahmoud greeted us warmly, as is his custom, and then pottered upstairs. The sky was clearly visible above us and a long red robe hung over the first floor inner wall, presumably a performance costume. A cowboy film was playing in one of the upstairs rooms, later to be replaced by the tinny ring tones on his young daughter's gadget, which struck me as so incongruous given her father's talent. But there again, that's the young for you.
She and her older brother went outside to play football and pretty soon there was a disagreement and she arrived back home in tears and rushed upstairs, where Mahmoud comforted her and soon she was back downstairs, all smiles and playing her ring tones. She is a very pretty young girl, of Junior School age, with her long black hair gathered into bunches and wearing slacks and a long-sleeved t-shirt with 'girl' embrodiered on it. She had kissed us on both cheeks as a greeting and I was very touched by the gesture.
Then an older brother dashed in, wearing a number 10 football shirt with what I think was the name of a Brazilian footballer player on the back, tall and slender and like his siblings extremely handsome and courteous, with a generously endearing smile.
Gradually, members of Mahmoud's makeshift band arrived - not his regular group but friends who were Gnaoua musicans - and his two young sons, obviously being trained by their father, also formed part of the group. There were about seven playing altogether.
The rest of the audience also arrived: Joseph, Hilal ( a Moroccan designer), a very attractive Moroccan lady and her Italian husband and several of their friends and relatives, plus Ishida and his wife.
We sat on the couches facing Mahmoud and his group whilst they changed into their bright yellow performance robes and prepared themselves for the session. Conversation between performers and audience flowed freely, in Arabic, French and English.
And then the performance started.
I had never heard of Gnaoua music until about ten years ago when a couple of young Gnaoua musicans were playing at our hotel, the Riad Mogadon (woops! Freudian slip - I mean Mogador!), just outside the town of Essaouria, during a previous Xmas holiday . 'You must listen to this!' my husband said and so I did and I liked it but at the time I was desperate to have supper and so we moved on.
Even when we returned to Essaouira the next June for the Gnaoua and World Music Festival, sponsored by the King, Mohammed VI, I still didn't 'get' the Gnaoua music. Eventually, we returned every June for the Festival and although I fell in love with much of the World Music, particularly the fusion music and artists like Youssou N'Dour (from Senegal) and Thalweg (from France) and the Ali brothers and their group from Parkistan, I still found the Gnaoua Music too basic and too repetitive and too noisy.
And then, during the 2007 festival, we were having supper outside, on the balcony, of the Restaurant Bab Lachour and The Band of Gnawa (based in France) were practicing their set and they suddenly and unexpectedly launched into a performance, starting with, of all things, Come Together by the Beatles, with the large audience in the square singing along, and then they drifted into Gnaoua music and I finally 'got' it! Explosive ... exciting ... amazing ... joyful ... life enhancing ... and I was up on my feet and dancing and all the cares in the world just melted away. Then the band drifted back into Come Together and they did this drifting in and out of modern music and Gnaoua music (led by Maleem Said Boulhimas) with songs such as Who Knows by Hendrix and Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin and The Gallow's Pole by ?.
So, when I later listened to Mahmoud's session in the Place Bab Marrakech, I was able to enjoy tradional Gnaoua for the very first time.
Gnaoua music precedes the birth of Islam and is specific to Morocco, having been brought there by migrants and slaves from other parts of Africa by Gnaouai (the artisitic people from a variety of tribes) and has survived down the centuries despite being frowned upon by previous authorities because it was considered un-Islamic. But that has all changed, particularly with the approval of King Mohammmed VI and it is is growing in popularity, not just in Morocco, but throughout the world in both its tradional form and fused with other musical genres (rock, pop, jaz, hip hop etc.) In fact, Mahmoud has a photograph on his wall of the King presenting him with an award last year in recognition of his contribution to the cultural life of Morocco.
What we were listening to on Xmas Night was a Lila (trance session) and the music was very primitive and very rythmic. Mahmoud was playing his guembri, which is an instrument with three strings played like a guitar AND a drum; the rest of the group were playing castanets (aka Garagab, qarqaba, qaraqib, karkabas, karakob - the spelling variations appear to be endless), which are like brass castanets and, and singing and chanting in praise of Allah.
They also call upon spirits of the earth and heavens, so Joseph informed us, and I said that I wasn't too happy about that because I'm a Christian and believe it is a perilous thing to do. And so we started a dicussion about religion during one of the intervals and Joseph revealed that he was Jewish and Halil that he was a Hindu and Joseph said that Mahmoud and his group were all Mulims. We also had a mix of atheists and agnostics and it was really striking that we were all united by the music, which re-enforced my view that music can cut through all kinds of differences and bring us together in not just a shared experience but also in a realisation of a shared humanity.
So much music that I hear in Morocco, including Gnaoua, seems to strike at something deep within, strong emotions of joy and sadness, hope and despair, exhilaration and exploitation that we all share irrespective of gender, age, religion, culture, or nationality. And I felt it particularly this Xmas Night. So, I silently prayed for a blessing on all of us and relaxed into the music.
The muscians were totally focused on their performance and, as they sat on the cushions with their backs aginst the tiled wall and their legs either crossed or outstretched, it was clear that they had a passion for the music and a passion for Allah. In particular, it was fascinating to watch Mahmoud's hands, as small and smooth as a teenagers, working his guembri seemingly effortlessly, and leading the music and the singing. He had the appearance of a man totally at ease and totally in the 'moment' and his two young sons looked like natural successors, in the way that Mahmoud learnt from his father, and his father from his father. A wonderful skill being handed down from generation to generation.
Purists of Gnaoua music get a bit sniffy about the developing role of dancing in Gnaoua music but personally, I love it. The Gnaoua dancing now plays an important role in performances on stage and to see the musicans perform the highly difficult moves (and I can assure you that they are VERY difficult because I've tried them myself) as well as playing their krota, dressed in the brightly coloured robes, with tassles swinging from their hats, is a magnificent sight to behold. Sometimes they dance individually and sometimes as a group, particularly at the climax of a session, when they advance towards the audience. And you think 'I certainly wouldn't want to mess with these guys' because the effect is of concentrated force and power.
Just how skilled these guys are was brought home to me in June while watching a Gnaoua group perform with The Asian Dub Foundation' (from Birmingham and absolute dynamite on the stage) and the Gnaoua dancers did their own version of hip hop and you just couldn't better that dancing. Their versatilty with this fusion music is awesome and highlights the fact that they are NOT support acts but world class performers and more than able to respond to different musical genres.
The title Maalem, by the way, means master and a master Gnaoua musician must be expert in ALL the disciplines: every instrument played, the singing and the dancing.
In Mahmoud's house there wasn't much space for dancing but several of the musicans did dance for a while and I was especially impressed with Mahmoud's oldest son. He had a certain fluidity which promises much for the future. And the younger son, too, obviously loves the whole musical experience. I was also taken with the intensity of joy that was plain to see on Hussein's face.
One of the group performed a trance dance which continued for ten or more minutes. He had a piece of material over his head (the Gnaouans use 7 different coloured clothes, each one representing the 7 stages of the trance session), and burning incense was heavy in the air and he did eventually drop to the floor like a dead weight and lay there for several minutes until he jerked himself awake. Possible some 'trances' are faked for effect but this looked genuine enough. ( Obviously, lots of silent praying from me during this time! I certainly believe in evil spirits and when spirits are being 'summonsed' you just don't know what you're going to get.)
Altogether, the session lasted several hours with breaks for refreshments.
Every so often, Mahmoud's wife (apparently the 'great woman' behind 'the great man') would call one of the children to fetch down some dish or other and they would scurry upstairs, having put their slippers on, and then dash back down, slipping their slippers off before walking on the rugs covering the floor.
I had actually been aware of delicious cooking smells for some time but had not realised that it was for us, so I was surprised and delighted when we were presented with a splendid lamb couscous, which arrived on a large metal platter: a mound of couscous with cooked lamb covered with caramalised onions and thick strips of cooked carrots and courgettes. We were each handed a spoon and thus we ate, sharing the same plate and it was such a liberating experience, again linking us together. (I had really only eaten VERY LITTLE chicken beforehand!) And then we had mint tea, which I don't usually like but this time found it to be perfect after the couscous. The plates and spoons and glasses were whisked away and the performance resumed.
Later on, the group stopped for their lamb couscous and they sat in a circle to eat and Joseph was invited to join them, which, apparently, is considered a great honour.
And with each break, the barrier between audience and performers was put aside and we discussed how the session was going and about the music generally. I also had a chance to discuss Hilal's costume work since I enjoy sewing and embrodiery myself. He was sitting next to me and showed me the many layers of his Indian-style tunic. It was made in a very soft cream linen/silk material with finer layers of Egyptian cotton underneath. He had made the trousers too and all was finished off with hand-embrodiered edgings. (When we return in June for the festival I MUST get in touch with him and ask him to create some exotic trousers for me.)
The music was very loud it has to be said and would have echoed around the neighbourhood, escaping from the open roof, and round about midnight, there was a knock on the door. I wondered if perhaps it was angry neighbours who had been trying to sleep (although on reflection I realise that that would have been absurb) but Hilal declared loudly: "Papa Klaus!" and everyone burst out laughing. In fact, it was a young Morocco man, as handsome as you can get, with long dreadlocks and delicate features and hands with his European-looking girl-friend. They stayed for a while and then disappeared outside. It was that kind of informality.
By the early hours of Boxing Day morning, Mahmoud and his friends finished their marathon session and we all applauded loudly and compliments were delivered to all the players. It had become chilly by then and I had already put my coat on but given that this was December, I think that was pretty good going since we had been sitting under the stars for a long time. We promised to bring Mahmoud a recording of the session (we had been recording, with his permission, throughout) in June and Ishida, who had been taking photographs using a very impressive looking camera, made arrangements with Joseph for a preview of his material. There was much shaking of hands and then we all burst out into the midnight-blue Moroccan sky on what was now Boxing Day, exhausted but exhilarated. (How Mahmoud and his friends felt physically and emotionally after their efforts I hardly dare imagine. They probably need chiropractotors like The Rolling Stones so physical is their performance.)
And Joseph asked me to bring some copies of 'Saucy Shorts for Chefs' and 'Sexy Shorts for the Beach' (paper-back short story collections (I have a short story published in both of them)) to sell in his bookshop when we return for the 2008 Gnaoua and World Music Festival in June (inshallah!).
We, the audience, all shook hands and staggered back to our respective 'homes.'
John and I (TheDaftNotStupid team) repaired to the roof terrace of our hotel with a bottle of brandy and pastries and cigarettes and sat silently looking at the Atlantic Sea and the large semi-circular sweep of the beach stretching towards the desert in the south and the white roof tops in the walled city of Essaouira, with the two resident sea-gulls perched on the wall hoping for some tip-bits, which, of course, they got.
And the next day, a dejected Lou informed us that she had twisted an ankle when she missed a step near her room and so it was business as usual...except that Xmas Night Lila experience is something I will never forget. Although I had taken paper and pen, I had not made any notes at all, but my memory of that night will never desert me. And I have a whole new list of names to add to my daily prayer list.
Maggie Knutson: teacher, writer, journalist and novice photographer. Also member of TheDaftNotStipid team.
P.S. THIS IS MY VERY FIRST BLOG!!! and it has definitely been work in process so it has grown, spelling mistakes corrected and so on during the week but this is probably the final version and, bearing in mind that French is probably the most commonly shared language of those of us who love the music, I shall endeavor to post a French version of this page - just don't hold your breathe, though, because it might take a long time.

Christmas 2007 in Essaouira

2007-12-28T18:45:00.000Z

Hello to all the new friends I met in Marakech and Essaouira. Just a few words now to say that we all got safely home today and that we had a really great time.

Here's a photo of me taken at the Jimi Handrix (sic) restaurant in Diabet on Christmas day. I spent a fun few weeks living in Diabet back in 1972 and often go back there to see how the place has changed since then.

In 2006, I think it was, we first saw the early works for the new golf course being built there. The work had progressed in June and the layout of the greens and fairways are now well advanced. Once they sow the grass its going to take a lot of water to keep the grass alive and growing. More on the subject of water in Essaouira later.

A new road is being put in to speed access to the golf course which will undoubtedly be brightly lit at night, bringing light polution to the southern horizon when seen from Essaouira. Today, this view is of a dark hillside running down to the sea. You know where Diabet is but you can't quite see it.

On Christmas Day, my wife, my daughter and I took a taxi to Diabet where we had a simple lunch - omelettes for my wife and myself, fish tagine for Lou. Then we walked back along the beach - a distance of about two miles. A lovely walk, seeing Essaouira getting ever bigger. The wind blowing as usual. I always bring my long, blue Tuareg scarf when I come to Morocco and it comes into its own in Essaouira

That night, we had been fortunate in being invited to a Lila given by Maalem Mahmoud Guinea, in his own house in Essaouira, just outside the medina. I was able to record the entire Lila and will post some of the music and some photos and a podcast given by a local expert in a separate posting.

We sat drinking coffee, most days, at Chez Ben Mustaffa, near Place Moulay Hassan, cafe casse (must learn how to type acute accents) for me, nous-nous for Maggie and Lou. Cafe Casse means broken coffee, or latte machiato (Italian and Starbuckspeak) - more coffee than milk. Nous is half in arabic, so nous-nous is half coffee and half milk. Add kebir if you want a large drink - nous-nous kebir, men fadlek.

I was sitting there one evening and thought I recognised the music that was playing. Then I realized that it was the Hassan Boussou concert that I had recorded in June. They were playing one of the CDs I'd given to Hicham the day before. It was wonderful hearing this long, soulful, 20 minute piece just 50 yards away from where the music had been performed six months earlier. Then, the music fom the CD vendors near to the cafe had totally drwoned out the music from the stage just beyond. This was the first time that people in this area had heard that music. I felt quite proud to have brought something back to Essaouira.

I took about 30 CDs with me and I gave them all away but could have given away many more. I'd build a 3 CD set of Chiek Tidiane Seck and Maalem Mahmoud Guinea, first playing individually and then together. This set really shows the value of fusion between musical styles. I also took some three volume sets of Best of Essaouira 2007 plus a bunch of Best of DaftNotStupid Volume 1. All have nice printed labels in the blog colours.

Problems with the mp3 players

2007-12-11T23:07:00.001Z

Since all of my recordings are posted with relatively high quality - 96Kbps or more - you might sometimes experience problems when you play them if you don't have a reasonably high-speed internet connection. There's a simple way around this - it just requires a little patience. Just pause the player for 30 seconds or so to allow more of the mp3/wav file to download - note that this still happens even when you've paused the player. Then press play again and it should now be OK. Give it a try and let me know if this helps.

Villa des Orangers musicians

2007-12-11T00:03:00.001Z

I know it's not gnaoua but it is beautiful. These two guys play every night in the courtyard at the Villa des Orangers in Marrakech - our favourite hotel - an oasis of peace in this noisy and bustling city. While much has changed in Marrakech since I first was there over thirty years ago, it's magic never ceases to surprise me.

Asian Dub Foundation rehearsal at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-12-10T23:57:00.001Z

Asian Dub Foundation rehearsal recorded live by DaftNotStupid at Essaouira the afternoon of their gig. I missed the gig itself, since I'd gone over to the Place Moulay Hassan for the Maalem Abdeslam Alikane concert. Maggie stayed behind though and said that ADF were really great, though she didn't like the overtly political nature of their lyrics. I still think I got the best of the deal, though.

Fnaire at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة - Matkich Bladi

2007-12-10T23:46:00.001Z

Recorded live by DaftNotStupid at Essaouira 2007. Matkich Bladi means 'hands off my land'.

John and Maggie - Podcast at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-12-10T23:40:00.001Z

John and Maggie chat after the Maalem Mahmoud Guinea and Chiek Tidiane Seck sets at Essaouira 2007.

Podcast after the Tagada set at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-12-10T23:33:00.001Z

John rambles on after the Tagada set at Essaouira 2007

Groupe berbere El Baz at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة - T3a

2007-12-10T23:30:00.001Z

Recorded live by DaftNotStupid at Essaouira 2007

Lénine at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-12-10T23:27:00.001Z

Recorded live by DaftNotStupid at Essaouira 2007

My Web Card

2007-11-12T23:46:00.000Z

Moon Calendar 2008

2007-10-31T23:35:00.000Z

If you liked Moon Calendar 2007, you're going to love this - Moon Calendar 2008. If you're stuck for ideas for c.......s presents, you need look no further.

As before, it's available from Go-art in Amsterdam.

My new playlist

2007-10-24T00:48:00.000+01:00

My new playlist built using JW's Mediaplayer. I host my own swf files and playlist on Fileden. Next I'll look at linking in an RSS feed given very dynamic playlists.

Maalem Hassan Boussou at Essaouira 2007

2007-10-21T16:24:00.008+01:00

Playlist Alert! I'm sorry to say that this playlist not been working properly recently. All now appears OK, but please post a comment if you have any problems. Both tracks now play fine. Sometimes, Fileden (where I keep my files) is weird.

I recorded just the two numbers of the Maalem Hassan Boussou set at the Essaouira 2007 festival just before the Baaba Maal set from the balcony of the Bab Lachour restuarant. Listen to the break in pace about 10:30 mins into the last number. Haunting. This set was a tribute to Hassan's father - Maalem H'mida Boussou, who died in February 2007 - and Hassan was accompanied by members of his father's band. Great music.

V3 playlist - 64Kbps

These mp3 files are encoded at 64 Kbps and so should play well on most networks.

V2 playlist - 192Kbps

These mp3 files are encoded at 192 so play well on high-bandwidth networks.

Lolou at The Tower, Winchester

2007-10-13T00:02:00.000+01:00

Lolou, a seven-piece band from Senegal played a wonderful set at the Tower Arts Centre, Winchester last night (as I write this, just after midnight). Lolou features a really great djembe player - Mamadou Sarr . That's a name to listen out for in the future.

Here's a playlist for the entire concert. Ten numbers and an incredible 1 hour 49 minutes (yes, 109 minutes) of great music. What a performance!

Mamadou, Kevin: If you read this - Great Set! I hope you like the recordings. The .wav files sound much better than these .mp3s, so get in touch if you'd like me to burn you a CD. (PS - Glad to hear that you liked the CDs).

I recorded the whole set as native .wav at 44.1 so they should sound pretty good. On the player above they are compressed at 96kbps (medium quality) to avoid drop-out when playing at busy times or on slow links.

For those of you with fast links, try this verison:

LOLOU: General Info
MySpace URL: http://www.myspace.com/loloumusic

Band Members
Badou Ndiaye: Drums
Birame Seck : Lead Vocal
Mamadou Toure :Lead Vocal
Elhadji Seye : Bass
Jules Sow: Lead guitar
Kevin "Senegal": Keyboards
Mamadou Sarr : percussion [Djembe,Congas ]

UK Bookings through CTM.

Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2007 playlist

2007-10-11T23:55:00.000+01:00

Here, all in one place, is the music I recorded in June at Essaouira.

BigBagStudios - Zig Zag - The series

2007-10-11T22:59:00.001+01:00

For more from the guys over at BigBagStudios, visit their YouTube channel. You'll probably want to subscribe since they are pretty prolific.

The Cloud Appreciation Society

2007-10-09T23:49:00.000+01:00

I took this book called The Cloudspotter's Guide away with me on holiday to Italy last month and read it in a few days while sitting on the beach under a largely cloudless sky. Question to self - Is that Irony? Anyway, its a great read and better (in my opinion) than another book on clouds that I read a couple of years ago.

The Cloudspotter's Guide is written by a guy called Gavin Pretor-Pinney, who, believe it or not, is also the founder of the The Cloud Appreciation Society. If you like clouds, want to look at great photos or learn how they work, that's the place to go.

Here's a cloud that I photgraphed from my window a week or so back. Stratocumulus, I think.

Branching out into video

2007-10-09T23:12:00.000+01:00

As you probably know if you've listened to any of the music I recorded this year, it's all audio-only. While the sound quality is usually pretty good - except for some unavoidable wind noise in Essaouira - the full-length videos that I post on YouTube never seem to get the number of plays that even short clips of the same piece get when accompanied by a video track. Maybe that's something to do with the media; people expect video on YouTube and are put-off if they don't get it.

Its not only that, though. The Essaouira festival is not just about music its also about dance and that over-worked word performance. I've been there five times not just because the music is great (which, of course, it is) but because the performance drags me back. And when I get home, I not only want to listen to the music again - which my recordings have allowed me to do - but I also want see again what I saw then. Yes, I know its not the same as being there - but it certainly helps.

That's why, I'm now seriously planning to move to video, and not only regular video but HD. That's High Definition to the uninitiated - i.e people like me, until a week ago.

Where to start is the problem. Audio quality and the ability to plug in external microphones is obviously a real necessity. So is low light sensitivity - especially for night-time concerts, Lilas and general street-shooting. Size and weight are also important - I don't really want to hold a 5lb camcorder for hours on end. And anyway - how can I film and dance at the same time? Do I need two cameras - a bigger, more functional one for me and and smaller, lighter one for Maggie? Do I really need HD or should I wait till that settles down a bit? Am I destined for the movie business or should I limit myself to audio? Do I really need interchangeable lenses? How important is SMPTE at this entry level? When will YouTube move to HD? Ever or never? Is size important?

As you can see, this post is all about questions, not answers. I'm doing my research and will make a decision soon. Maybe buy something for Maggie and see how I get one.

More later on this, but if any passing reader can answer any of these questions, please do.

Next year - VideoTime!

Layla's Classic Rock Faves: Jimi Hendrix

2007-10-04T00:44:00.000+01:00

Layla's Classic Rock Faves: Jimi Hendrix

Cinema and Movies.: Gnawa music in Essaouira,the soul music town in Morocco

2007-10-03T00:16:00.000+01:00

There're some good photographs of the concert space at Bab Marrakeck during its initial set-up over on this blog posting Cinema and Movies.: Gnawa music in Essaouira,the soul music town in Morocco

My Youssou N'Dour playlist

2007-09-24T00:19:00.000+01:00

My Van Morrison playlist

2007-09-22T16:05:00.001+01:00

January 12th 2008 News Update
Van Morrison videos purged from Youtube. Youtube has not only removed all of my recordings of Van Morrison from the 2007 Glastonbury Extravaganza but has also removed many videos posted by other Van the Man fans and has even suspended a couple of accounts of active Van fans.

I first started to listen to Van Morrison in 1971, and though I had heard him sing in Them a few years earlier, I did not at the time know he had been their singer. Astral Weeks was my introduction to him as a singer and poet and it is still my favourite album of his. I lived in Leeds at the time and big Dave upstairs had this LP and used to play it for me. I recorded it on an old Aika reel-to-reel recorded I used to have and I played it for years after that.

I lost touch with Van - and much music - for a few years and it was only after I moved up to Sunderland some years later that I caught up with him again, This time the record was Veedon Fleece - my mate Fred introduced me to it. I wondered what happened to Fred?

No Guru, No Method, No Teacher is I think my second favourite, and then probably Moondance. You'll find songs from all of these and more on my playlist below.

Moon Calendar 2007

2007-08-25T18:36:00.000+01:00

I saw this Moon Calendar in an Amsterdam shop recently and thought you all may like it.

Click on the calendar or here to buy a full-size print from Go-art in Amsterdam.

The calendar shows the phase of the moon for every night of the year-and the day of the week for every day. You can use it anywhere in the world: a full moon is still a full moon wherever you are on the Earth. If you want to know the exact time of full moon, remember to make an allowance for the time zone you are in-all the times on this calendar are GMT. So in Britain in summertime, for instance, add one hour to the printed time to get the clock time of an event.

SpeakMoroccan.com

2007-08-25T13:07:00.000+01:00

On my last trip to Essaouira I started speaking a little Arabic using a Teach Yourself CD that I had previously downloaded to my iPod. I managed to learn a few words and conntructions, mainly around greetings and simple requests, but I found that even being able to say a few words in Arabic was a great help and the Moroccan people really appreciated the effort. The Arabic dialect used on the CD was that used in Egypt and the Gulf states, so, I was not always understood. It came therefore as a great find when I discovered SpeakMoroccan.com which has a web-site decicated to speaking the Moroccan dialect or Darija as they call it.

SpeakMoroccan.com has rich vocabulary section with an easily understandable transliteration system and they also show the Arabic spelling too. It has many situational lessons which are oriented around learning by reading since there are no sound clips. These would, I think, be a great addition to the site and I'll try to find out if they have plans to change that.

If you plan to visit Morocco - maybe for next year's Essaouira festival - pay a visit to SpeakMoroccan.com and try to pick up a few words of Darija - it'll be well worth it.

RADIOGAS

2007-08-25T00:19:00.000+01:00

For music, just music, great music, no chat, no adverts, just music - listen to RADIOGAS.

Click for RADIOGAS on media player
Click for RADIOGAS on iTunes (you'll need to Open or Save and then Open the file
Or, visit radiogas.it

Jbara at Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival 2000

2007-08-23T23:04:00.000+01:00

Mohamed Jbara has been compared to Carlos Santana and Jimi Hendrix. I'll leave that to you, but take a listen to a truly great Moroccan guitarist. Jbara is one of the pioneers of Moroccan Rock Fusion as this first song here from the Essaouira World Music festival 2000 shows. Listen and enjoy.

Click for more of the same at Jbara's YouTube channel.

Corinne Bailey Rae at the Glastonbury Extravaganza 2007

2007-08-18T11:04:00.000+01:00

Instead of converting the music I've recorded to video format and posting it to YouTube, here I've just converted it to mp3 format and hosted it on FileDen. I think that the player is more consumable, even though the visibility may not be as goo as on YouTube. I tried adding the player to my channel over there but that didn't work.

Van Morrison set at the Glastonbury Extravanganza 2007

2007-08-17T18:16:00.000+01:00

January 12th 2008 News Update
Van Morrison videos purged from Youtube. Youtube has not only removed all of my recordings of Van Morrison at the 2007 Glastonbury Extravaganza - hence this post is now entirely devoid of music - but has also removed many videos posted by other Van the Man fans and has even suspended a couple of accounts of active Van fans.

OK, I'm back now, so I'll update this new blog entry as I post each Van Morrison number from the Glastonbury Extravanganza 2007 to my YouTube channel

For a full and detailed review of the Van Morrison set, please see Patrick Maginty's excelent review which has been reposted on the Van Morrison News blog . I'd also like to thank Patrick for putting names to some of the tracks that I couldn't identify.

St James Infirmary

Stop drinking Lyrics

Beauty of the days gone by

Precious time

Tupelo honey

Why must I always explain

Brown eyed girl

Gloria

Some of the photo's that I've incorporated into the videos are by Stewie, other from various web sites.

Van Morrison and Corinne Bailey Rae at the Glastonbury Extravanganza 2007

2007-08-11T23:47:00.000+01:00

January 12th 2008 News Update
Van Morrison videos purged from Youtube

Just in - new live music by Van Morrison and Corinne Bailey Rae recorded at the Glastonbury Extravanganza 2007 - YESTERDAY - 10th August 2007.

I'll be posting more from the wonderful concert held in the old abbey grounds sometime next week, but, for now, hear's a taster of what's to follow.

Let's kick off with Bailey Rae singing her masterpiece Just like an angel.

The see and hear more from the girl with this divine voice, visit her site on MySpace.

From the sublime to the not ridiculous but just wonderful. Van the Man with his old favourite G_L_O_R_I_A . Sorry about the loss of control at the end of the piece. Quite out of character, I can assure you.

Not Bono but Akram

2007-08-04T16:14:00.000+01:00

I'd like to apologise for a big mistake in the credits when I originally posted clips of Band of Gnawa. I had mistakenly shown them featuring Bono, due to a misunderstanding when Akram Sedkaoui was introduced (in French) as "the man with the Golden Voice, according to Bono from U2". I was at a distance from the stage and my eyesight isn't as good as it was, an I just heard the word "Bono" and jumped to the wrong conclusion. Sorry for the mistake. In this case its more of StupidNotDaft - maybe I should rename the channel.

Anyway, here's a clip that sort of explains my state of mind at the time:

Links to blogs

2007-08-04T07:36:00.002+01:00

http://floridarobot.blogspot.com/

http://thegioiwebsite.blogspot.com/

http://robinhoodofindiemusic.blogspot.com/

Dedication and thanks

2007-08-02T07:03:00.000+01:00

One thing that you can't help noticing about Morocco is the friendliness of its people and their joy of life. So, it was with much sadness, on my last visit there, that I learned of the death, in the past year, of Mostafa Ben Manna. Mostafa, who died at a tragically early age, will be sorely missed by his family and his many friends around the world, and I'd like to dedicate this blog to him. His memory and name live on, however, as does his cafe - Chez Ben Mostafa - now run by his nephew, Hicham, who carries on the tradition of welcoming all who pass his way.

Thanks also to Kamal and Mamadou who love the music of Essaouira almost as much as I do, but who have the pleasure of living there all year round, not just a week or so at a time.

Labass, guys. See you soon, insha'Allah, maybe in December.

Finally, I'd like to thank His Majesty, King Mohmmed VI, the patron of the Essaouira festival. Each year, he shares this wonderful music with his people and so, via this blog and my YouTube channel, I share that gift with you, the wider internet audience.

John (aka DaftNotStupid)

SoundRoots World Music & Global Culture: Monday's mp3: The Paripatetic Ray Lema

2007-07-31T22:44:00.000+01:00

SoundRoots World Music & Global Culture: Monday's mp3: The Paripatetic Ray Lema

Techno at Essaouira!!!

2007-07-29T23:09:00.000+01:00

I've just heard some great techno that was recorded at Essaouira this year. Take a listen at http://www.popround.com/2007/07/02/essaouira-gnaoua-festival-the-recordings/

Hoba Hoba Spirit Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-29T16:25:00.000+01:00

Live audio-only recording at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007 of Hoba Hoba Spirit

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Friday 22nd June 20:00

Bienvenue a Casa (7:03)

If you want to see how much Hoba Hoba Spirit were able to pump up the audience, take a look a this clip, and, if you look very carefully, you might just see Maggie and I in the background:

More about the band at http://www.hobahobaspirit.com/

Gangbe Brass Band at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-29T16:16:00.000+01:00

Listen to this the rich sound from this wonderful brass band from Benin - the Gangbe Brass Band.

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Saturday 23rd June 20:00

Track 1 (5:22):

Track 2 (3:46):

Find out more about the Gangbe Brass Band, their available CDs and planned 2007 appearances at http://www.gangbebrassband.com/ . If you get a chance to hear them, its worth going out of your way. They played for over an hours and gave 100% the whole time. Hurrah!

While looking around, I found this link to an mp3 on the Genting Jazz Festival web site of the band playing.

Baaba Maal at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-29T16:00:00.000+01:00

Live recording at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007 of Baaba Maal playing at the Place Moulay Hassan .

Location and timing: Place Moulay Hassan Thursday 21st June 21:00

Track 1 - Mbolo (9:38)

This set immediately preceded the Band of Gnawa set, and, like that, was recorded from the Restaurant Bab Lachour. If you've ever ben to Essaouira, you'll know that it gets pretty windy there, so, you won't be surprised that the music fades a little.

Tidiane Seck at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007

2007-07-29T15:53:00.000+01:00

Live audio-only recording at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007 of Cheik Tidiane Seck (Keyboards Mali) with Will Calhoun(USA Drums).

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Friday 22nd June 22:00

Tagada set at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-29T15:25:00.002+01:00

Live recording (audio only) of Tagada at Essaouira 2007

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Saturday 23rd June 20:00

Track 1 (9:42):

Podcast

Listen to old DaftNotStupid himself ramble on after the Tagada set.

Maalem Mahmoud Guinea with Cheick Tidiane Seck set

2007-07-29T15:12:00.000+01:00

Live audio-only recording at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة World Music Festival of Cheik Tidiane Seck (Keyboards Mali) featuring Will Calhoun (USA Drums) along with Maalem Mahmoud Guinea (Guimbri and vocals Essaouira)

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Friday 22nd June 00:00 midnight

Podcast

John and Maggie chat about the Maalem Mahmoud Guinea with Cheick Tidiane Seck set that's just finished.

Essaouira 2007 poster

2007-07-29T14:11:00.000+01:00

Maalem Mustapha Bakbou at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-28T19:02:00.000+01:00

Live recording at Essaouira World Music Festival 2007 of Maalem Mustapha Bakbou with Moktar Samba ( Drums Senegal), Louis Bertignac (Guitar France), Jean-Philippe Rykiel (Piano France).

Location and timing: Bab Marrakech Saturday23rd June 22:00

Track 1 (9:58)

Track 2 (9:52):

Track 3 (9:53):

Track 4 (9:11):

Believe it or not, I left this session at Bab Marrakech (Saturday night 23rd June) before it ended, to see Maalem Abdeslam Alikane with Tyour Gnaoua and Ray Lema over at Moulay Hassan. See my blog entry for more about that. However, I have four pieces from this set, all about 10 minutes long and featuring Louis Bertignac's haunting guitar.

Band of Gnawa with Louis Bertignac at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-28T12:22:00.000+01:00

Another posting about the 10th Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival in June 2007.

One of the other Musical Creations this year was put together by Loy Erlich who has been one of the Essaouira Artistic Directors since 2000. Loy Elich (keyboards bass France) joined the Band of Gnawa with Louis Bertignac (guitar France), Jean-Philippe Rykiel (guitar France), Akram Sedkaoui (vocals Tunisia), Cyril Atef (drums percussion) and Maalem Said Boulhimas (gimbri Morroco) along with four other Gnaoua musicians (choers percussion).

The band started with Maalem Said Boulhimas and his Gnaoua musicians - I've just found about 20 minutes of him leading the whole group which I'd forgotten that I'd recorded - I'll post this to YouTube as soon as I can and then embed it here. The band then switches to more of a rock session, with the old Beatles number Come Together moving on through Hendrix's Who Knows to end on Gallow's Pole, they enchanted the crowd with rich rock fused with Gnaoua. Maggie and I agree that this was the session of the festival. Thanks guys!

Location and timing: Place Moulay Hassan Thursday 21st June 23:00

This is the first of the two Maalem Said Boulhimas pieces (6:57):

.., and this is the second (9:44)

Here's Part 1 (9:22) of Come Together:

And here's part 2 (5:13, not 9:57 as shown. Sorry about the dead space at the end):

Since I mentioned it, and Hendrix was probably my favourite musician when I first went to Essaouira in 1972, here's "Who Knows" (9:57):

The old Led Zeppelin number Immigrant Song. Listen for the break to Gnaoua around the 3 minute mark.

Finally, here's Gallow's Pole (5:59):

I recorded this set from the balcony of the Restaurant Bab Lachour, clamping the mike to the balustrade. It's a great place to see the concerts in Place Moulay Hassan and one of the few places in the medina to serve alchohol. You need to buy a ticket on the nights of the festival but that includes food which is always good there - the lamb chops and little baby soles are especially good.

Thanks to e - C h i l l . . aka.. SuperUnknown.. for the great photographs.

Maalem Abdeslam Alikane and Ray Lema at Essaouira 2007 الصويرة

2007-07-16T01:26:00.000+01:00

This is my first posting about the recent Essaouira Gnaoua and World Music Festival.

Maalem Abdeslam Alikane (Guembri Morocco) played with Tyour Gnaoua and Ray Lema (Guitar, Keyboards Congo), Adellah El Miry (Violin Morocco), Soriba Kouyate (Kora Senegal) and Mokthar Samba (Drums Morocco-Senegal), Camilo Nu (Guitar Mexico) at the Essaouira 2007 Gnaoua and World Music Festival in June 2007. Part of the through track 9, they were joined by Jean-Philippe Rykiel (Keyboards France who had been playing in the Mustapha Bakbou concert over at Bab Marrakech - listen out for his distictive guitar of the mp3 player of this concert in the right hand side-bar of this blog.

Thanks to Camilo Nu for advising me (via my YouTube channel) of the corrected line-up for the concert. I had previously being showing Cyril Atef on drums and Jean-Philippe on guitar and hadn't acknowledged Camilo at all. Sorry for the mistake - I'd been using the line-up shown in the festival guide, and, I guess that they are subject to last-minute changes.

Location and Timing: Place Moulay Hassan Saturday 23rd June 23:00

This is Part 1 (3:24) of the 8th number that they played:

and this is part 2 (8:13) of the same number:

In answer to nirvomind I recorded this piece (http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=V4Dg1fRLowM) at around 23:00 on Saturday night (23rd June) at the Moulay Hassan. Maalem Adbelkebir Merchance played at 20:30 on the Friday night in the Moulay Hassan at which time I was recording Hoba Hoba Spirit at Bab Marrakech.

It may interest Blogger readers and listeners on my YouTube channel (http://uk.youtube.com/DaftNotStupid) to know that Maalem Abdeslam Alikane is one of the founders of the Essaouira festival and that this session was one of three Musical Creations sponsored by the festival this year. Alikane chose this occasion to reunite musicians he has played with before and who have a strong affinity for Gnaoua music. I believe that this session was one of the high points of the festival, though my wife still thinks I'm stupid for missing out at the Asian Dub Foundation who played at Bab Marrakech at the same time. "Daft not stupid" I said. Anyway, I did record a short rehearsal of theirs which is also available on my channel.

Unusually, I made this recording in the audience, close to the stage. I like the richness of sound I get there and being deep within an Essaouira audience is a wonderful social as well as musical experience.

For the technically minded, I clamped the microphone to the scaffolding of the official TV platform, so I was not only optimally placed but was able to dance without holding the microphone for 2 hours.

Anyway, thanks for listening. I'll be posting more great music from the Essaouira 2007 festival, so why not subscribe so you'll hear straight away.

Cheers,
John