Reviews
Tamburising: Lost Music of the Balkans
The tamburica, which comes in various shapes and sizes that may resemble a guitar, a long-necked mandolin, or a bass...
Reviewed by Kim Burton in issue: Aug/Sep/2011
Songs from the Pearl of Khorasan
The story of Afghan rubab master Nasim Khushnawaz is as fascinating as it is fraught with unimaginable adversity. Born in...
Reviewed by Charlie Cawood in issue: November/2022
Dancing on the Heads of Snakes
Orontes began as a Syrian-Spanish project in the city of Homs, but ceased to function when the catastrophic civil war...
Reviewed by Jo Setters in issue: Jan/Feb/2020
The Rough Guide to Blues Divas
The stereotypical image of the early blues pioneers as black itinerant males playing bottleneck guitar on the plantations of the...
Reviewed by Nigel Luilliamson in issue: April/2020
Iration Steppas: Dubs from the Foundation
Founded in the early 1990s in Leeds, Iration Steppas is the creative brainchild of Mark Iration and one of the...
Reviewed by Andrew Taylor-Dawson in issue: August/2025
Postcards
‘Like David Grisman's Dawg’ music, but with pierogies,’ is how Eric Stein, leader of Beyond The Pale once jokingly described...
Reviewed by Li Robbins in issue: Apr/May/2010
Cats, Dogs and Ghosts
Kottarashky is Nikola Gruev, a young Bulgarian composer and producer whose 2009 debut album Opa Hey! demonstrated a fluid,...
Reviewed by Garth Cartwright in issue: Jan/Feb/2017
Tibet: Ritual Traditions of the Bonpos
Bon is considered as the collection of pre-Buddhist beliefs of the Tibetans. The Bonpos trace the source of their teachings...
Reviewed by Michael Ormiston in issue: November/2019
The Rough Guide to Ragtime Blues
World Music Network seem to issue their Rough Guides to The Blues at an almost monthly rate – which suggests...
Reviewed by Garth Cartwright in issue: October/2017
The Rough Guide To Acoustic Africa
Those who read the recent debate in Songlines about global hip-hop and share a fear that the ubiquity of rap...
Reviewed by Nigel Williamson in issue: June/2013
