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Bassekou Kouyate and his band Ngoni Ba burst upon the African and world music scene a few years ago, winning top world music awards and winning the hearts and minds of African music fans everywhere.  It is pure Malian groove, no gimmicks.  It doesn’t need any .(well, there is a wah-wah pedal and some guest musicians).    Following up on his popular two first …

I love jazz music for its creativity, its virtuosity, and what Whitney Balliet–jazz poet for The New Yorker,  once called “the sound of surprise”.  Jazz musicians have both brain hemispheres going simultaneously:  all that training on the left side, all the improvising creativity on the right.
There is a Dutch pianist named Reinbert de Leeuw who recorded Erik Satie’s famous piano pieces at about one-half …

I did my first radio show on KCRW in April, 1977.  Does that make me a jurassic deejay?  Probably.  But being the longest-serving KCRW staff member, I’ve been able to watch KCRW grow from a small station in a cramped middle-school classroom with a tiny stoned-out and lackadaisical staff to an NPR powerhouse and tastemaker, with some of the most creative people I’ve ever …

The other night found me working once again on the lovely Minuet from Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin.   This is a neo-classical work by the great French composer.  There is a beautiful melody part that I’ve been learning, always trying to make it a little better.  Meanwhile, outside 20 squad cars, a mobile van, two helicopters and the LAPD SWAT team were mobilizing.  There …

The number of free summer music concerts around LA are pretty overwhelming.  You could catch great music all summer without spending a penny!  Here are some upcoming shows that caught my attention:
1)  Grand Performance California Plaza (next to MOCA)  Friday, July 20:  Tribute to Gil Scott-Heron 8 p.m.;   Sat July 21st:  Vamos Al Mambo:  Tribute to Cachao;  Sat, July 28th:  Breakestra & Bibi …

I was fortunate enough to go to opening night of the new production, here in LA next to the Santa Monica Pier where it has been staged for many years.  The theme is the life of insects, the smallest and most plentiful members of the animal kingdom.  After about a half hour, I started to say to myself, “this music is very tropical, either …

Milestone Films, a great film distribution company and purveyer  such fascinating films as The Exiles and Killer of Sheep, has just released Lionel Rogosin’s secretly filmed Come Back Africa, a narrative about the harsh reality of life under apartheid in late 1950s South Africa.    Cruelty and injustice are the themes of much of the film, but there are great moments of musical joy, …

The other day I was auditioning newly-arrived cd’s in my car and in the cd changer was a new 2-cd compilation of pre-revolutionary Iranian music called, as you may have guessed,  Rangarang:  Pre-Revolutionary Iranian Pop (Vampi Soul).   Rangarang (trans: colors or rainbow) was the name of a popular TV show in Iran at the time, a TV station still available online.  The first cut …

I’m a water person and have always had a relationship with the sea.  I swam competitively,  was on a surf team, and rode the scary waves Banzai Pipeline while still in high school.  I love being in water.
Usually when you think of music that goes with this love of the water you think of either the Southern California experience or Hawaii:  The Beach Boys, …

There was an article about Bacardi Rum in yesterday’s LA Times Food Section that caught my eye.  I’m not a mixologist but I appreciate good rum.  In Cuba they put it in regular glasses and you drink it straight at room temperature.  Which doesn’t rule out going to La Bogedita del Medio to get a strong, fragrant mojito that will kick your ass. But …