Reviews
Japanese Celebration Melodies
Junnosuke Uehara, Washu Yoneya & Kisaburo Umeya
Matsuri bayashi, the celebratory festival music of Japanese prefectures, provides the core for this album, albeit reimagined for a contemporary...
Reviewed in issue December/2023
Hani Polyphonic Singing in Yunnan China
Southwest China’s Yunnan province is home to the majority of the Hani people. Think of the terraced rice fields of...
Reviewed in issue December/2023
Ögbelerim – Music for My Ancestors
Batsükh Dorj comes from a continuous but little known and recorded tradition of Tuvan music in the far north west...
Reviewed in issue December/2023
The Holy Mother – Madhuvanti Pal Plays the Rudra Veena
This album is a treat. It isn’t often you get the chance to hear new recordings of the rudra veena,...
Reviewed in issue December/2023
Variations for Piano and Sitar
Andrew Goldberg & Ricky Romain
Sitarist Ricky Romain has long been a stalwart of the South Asian music scene in the UK, working with musicians...
Reviewed in issue December/2023
Tokyo Riddim 1976-1985
While reggae music has long had a reverent fanbase in Japan, the country’s musicians have generally shied away from attempting...
Reviewed in issue November/2023
Approach to Anima
Basically a trio, the self-proclaimed ‘ragtag collective’ of maya ongaku is based in the Ace General Store on their local...
Reviewed in issue November/2023
Live at Café Oto
OKI is the tonkori-wielding bard famed for bringing the endangered music of the Ainu people of Hokkaido, one of Japan’s...
Reviewed in issue November/2023
Upopo Sanke
This posthumous release was recorded in 2003, on a farm in the Tokachi district of Hokkaido, the northernmost island of...
Reviewed in issue November/2023
The Water Garden
Okinawa-born Kojun Kokuba’s The Water Garden was first released in 1993, and proved immensely popular, hence this vinyl reissue, complete...
Reviewed in issue November/2023
