If you just want a preview or a trailer of the show, then here it is.
The Netflix film Roma highlights music from 1970s Mexico. I’ll play a couple of songs from that. The music has that 70s vibe of fuzzy guitar and almost disco-types of sounds.
And for other quick notes, we’ll also have a smattering of Grammy-nominated musicians. These will be mostly the “losers,” which doesn’t mean any of the selections are not worth the listening. And lastly, we’ll check out Steel Pan music from an all-student band call The Rhythm Project All Stars.
Now, to dive-into the main feature.
Film music--you know, I have my favorites and they usually are part of a Wes Anderson or Quentin Tarantino film. However, for tonight’s task, we’ll going to hear these two tracks from the recent Netflix film Roma, which is up for Best Picture this year. I think I should add that to my queue. The music revolves around 1970s Mexico rock. From that soundtrack, we’ll hear “Ciudad Perdida” by La Revolución de Emiliano Zapata followed by “Te He Prometido” by Leo Dan.
Added to this first part of the movie, we’ll head to outer edges of Bongolia--a mythical and mystical place, to hear the song “Silbando” by Los Riberenos.
Before heading into the Grammy-nominated portion of the flick, we’ll take a brief commercial break—but a good one—to highlight an event you can go check out next week. It’s the VA Arts Festival happening in Norfolk on February 22. Part of the event will feature an all-student band called The Rhythm Project All Stars. They play steel pan drums and they can range in age from elementary to high school students. The group, led by David Longfellow, plays many types of Caribbean songs and they even do covers. We’ll checkout the song “Dynamite.”
Continuing in the Caribbean music vein, we’ll also hear a fun cover of Bob Marley’s “Three Little Birds,” done by Keith Frank.
So, I’m not sure if you watched the Grammys or not--I didn’t. The “Walking Dead” was on, so...ya. But I actually don’t watch the Grammy’s any longer. any more. However, I do try to keep track of any World Music nominations or wins.
We’ll kick off the set with off with Malian guitarist Bombino, who was up for Best World Music Album. He lost out to Soweto Gospel Choir--which I need to get some of their music. Off he’s great CD Deran, we’ll hear the song “Tenesse.”
And we’ll also hear Orquesta Akokan with “Carbata Barata.” They were up for Best Tropical Latin Album. And we’ll check out the New Orleans musician Sean Ardoin with his cover of the song “Abracadabra” (originally done by Steve Miller). He was nominated for Best American Roots performance.
The Grammy show within a show will keep going with David Byrne with “It’s Not Dark Up There,” from his nominated album American Utopia. That was up for Best Alternative Album. He lost out to Beck, so that’s ok. Plus, we’ll hear from The Lost Songs Of World War II -- Yiddish Glory, with a song called “A Walk in the Forest. That was also up for Best World Music Album.
For the second hour, we’ll dip into the Reggae nominations to hear some great musicians. But before that begins, we’ll start with a new song from reggae musician Beres Hammond. His new CD is called Never Ending. I’ll play the first cut called “I’m Alive.”
For the Grammy-nominated Reggae musicians, including Black Uhuru, Ziggy Marley and the band Protoje.
For the second half of the this film, we’ll move from Grammy to songs of peace. In this set we’ll hear the latest from Michael Franti and Spearhead with “The Flower.” He just released a new “Stay Human” album and self-directed documentary. Go checkout the video for this. And we’ll check out Gaby Moreno and Van Dyke Parks covering the David Rudder song “The Immigrants.” Rudder, a Trinidadian Calypso recording artist, wrote the song in response to an attack on Haitian immigrant Abner Louima by New York police officers. Moreno and Parks re-did as a way to raise awareness for benefit the Central American Resource Center of California.
In some to “new to me” tracks, we’ll check out an artist by the name of Petite Celine. She grew up in France and may sing in multiple languages in the same song, or incorporate steel pan and even tuba. We’ll hear “Qui Sommes Nous” or Who are we?
And in the “man, I just love this song,” I’ll play the song “ Karma the Knife,” by local musician Angelica Garcia. Go check out the video if you can—it’s awesome.
Let’s switch to some powerful female musicians now. The Argentinian musician Juana Molina will play “Sin Done.” I’ll follow her with the German multi-instrumentalist Leni Stern with a song about a crocodile.
Then taking us out of this week’s show is the song “Ripple” by Playing for Change. Besides the normal 20-plus musicians from around the world that are features on PFC songs, that one also featured David Crosby, Jimmy Buffett and David Hidalgo from Los Lobos.
The World Music Show airs Saturday nights from 8-10pm on WCVE Music. 93.1 or 107.3FM. You can stream the show via this website, where you can also check out live-streaming track listings to every show. Follow me on Twitter @wcveworldmusic and on Facebook at The World Music Show on WCVE.
