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viewing 1 To 15 of 15 items
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BUDA 860412CD
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$15.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 2/6/2026
"This is Ethiopia in the mid-1950s and early 1960s, on the eve of the blossoming, or rather the explosion, of Swinging Addis. Rock'n'roll, rhythm and blues, soul and twist had not yet burst onto the scene, and the atmosphere was still steeped in the post-war big band era, with Glenn Miller's 'In the Mood' enduring as a global anthem on a par with the Latin wave which was also popular at the time. But post-war joie de vivre was already there, with peace restored after the terrible Italian-Fascist invasion of 1935-1941. The redeployment of modern music was an integral part of the reconstruction. It was the young generation, parents of baby-boomers, who had the first taste of this resurrection before the baby-boomers themselves took over, definitively electrifying the soundtrack of the end of the imperial reign. It was stateless persons of Armenian origin, Kevork Nalbandian and, above all, his nephew Nersès, who contributed to revolutionizing modern Ethiopian music. The great historical godfather of this music, it must be strongly emphasized, was an Armenian emigrant who had become deeply Ethiopianised. A riot of brass instruments, well-integrated discipline, relentless innovation and revolutionary teaching methods took care of the rest, starting in 1955. These outsiders, who composed two Ethiopian national anthems and a continental anthem (no less than the anthem of the OAU, the Organization of African Unity), were also and above all the true origin of what would become the Swinging Addis of the 1960s. Nersès was granted Ethiopian nationality in 1957 for services rendered to Ethiopian music. With the essential contribution of Russ Gershon and the Bostonians of the Either/Orchestra, this recording represents the crucial modernist link that until now had been missing in the Ethiopiques."
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BUDA 860411CD
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$15.00
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 2/6/2026
"Muluken Mèllèssè leaves posterity with a clear idea of the level of sophistication and mastery that modern Ethiopian music had reached before it was crushed under the military-Stalinist boot of the Derg. Betraying the singer's extreme youth (he was not yet 18 at the time), his angelic voice fooled more than one listener into thinking they were hearing a female singer. It was Muluken who inaugurated the Ethiopiques series more than twenty years ago with Hédètch alu, the B-side of his first single. He was not yet 22 when he released his last vinyl record on Kaifa Records (KF 39LP) in 1976, one of the last released in Ethiopia before the cassette became the dominant medium for music distribution. Ethiopia, 1976. For a year now, cassettes have been inexorably crushing the vinyl record market. Muluken Mellesse's 33 rpm album Muluqän Mälläsä, produced that year by Ali Abdella Kaifa on his Kaifa Records label, is historic in more ways than one. It is one of the last vinyl records released in Ethiopia, but more than that it is the absolute masterpiece of Ethiopian Groove -- and its swansong. It leaves posterity with a clear idea of the level of sophistication and mastery that modern Ethiopian music had reached before it was crushed under the military-Stalinist boot of the Derg -- the word that stands for the bloody revolution that had been underway since 1974."
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BUDA 860404CD
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"Sory Kandia Kouyaté (1933-1977) was 'The Voice' of independent Guinea. It is to this baobab of Guinean song that one of his sons, Kaabi Kouyaté dedicates this tribute. The most fascinating thing about this album is Kaabi's voice, whose timbre, modulations and inflections, and the felicity of his DNA, echo so hauntingly those of Guinea's most famous griot."
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BUDA 82252CD
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Originally released in 2003. "The great Italian musicologist Enrico Castelli has devoted this recording to the Konso, living at the border of Ethiopia with Sudan. This panorama presents pieces linked to daily agricultural tasks, sacred and ritual songs, as well as recreational songs. The rich instrumentarium includes flutes, lyre to accompany songs, bell for epics, horn trumpet, xylophone and drum."
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BUDA 829792CD
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Originally released in 1999. "For many years everything the world knew about Mahmoud Ahmed was limited to the cult album Erè Mèla Mèla, recorded in 1975 but released for the first time in Europe in 1986. Mahmoud's first LP, Almas ('Almaz men eda nèw'), recorded two years before Erè Mèla Mèla, now bears new witness to the talent of one of the greatest Ethiopian artists of the past 35 years."
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BUDA 822222CD
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Originally released in 2002. "Emptiness, melancholy, nostalgia; doom and gloom, morbid musings; heartache or homesickness: such is the stock in trade of the misery and mournful memories expressed by the song Tezeta -- Ethiopia's majestic hymn to the blues. Etymologically, the word itself means memory, nostalgia, and several Ethiopian authors have used Tezeta as the title for their memoirs."
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BUDA 829642CD
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Originally released in 1998. "In the Ethiopian musical world, Mulatu Astatqé is a totally unique personality, a legend unto himself. For 30 years, he has been an inescapable presence. His true singularity resides in his efforts in instrumental music in a country where musical culture and tradition are strangers to it. Jim Jarmush included some of these hypnotic instrumentals to great use in the soundtrack of Broken Flowers."
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BUDA 860400CD
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"Dar es Salaam, still the 'haven of peace' alluded to in its name, in the 1960s and 1970s, moreover have seen the influx of a number of bands from neighboring Congo-Zaire. Typically contracted by some of the upmarket clubs and hotels for a limited time: some of the individual musicians and bands stayed on, among those the musicians of the future Orchestre Maquis and Orchestre Safari Sound."
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BUDA 860384CD
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"For several years, Nègarit has established itself as the leading orchestra of the Ethiopian instrumental scene, choosing to perform regularly at the Fendika [ፈንድቃ Fèndeqa - exultation, exuberance], underground and popular lair, hyperactive and mutating melting pot, rather than in the conventional clubs of the nice neighborhoods - which today tend to transform into shishabét (shisha bars)... As opposed to Ethiopian pop songs, which always favor the lyrics over and above vocal or instrumental innovation, Ethiopian jazz has for the last 20 years or so received greater interest from a growing and noticeably youthful audience. These younger generations find in instrumental music, spiced up with improvisation, a pleasing compromise between openings onto other worlds and boring Ethiopian pop. The near or total absence of lyrics helps to erase linguistic differences or taboos. Pan-Ethiopian tastes and audiences, a far cry from the ethnic hierarchies of yore, whereas inter-ethnic violence is very much on the rise. It is no small paradox that the peaceable gentleman Teferi Assefa chose Nègarit as the emblem for his group. The traditional insignia of royalty and symbol of power, nègarit is the name of the drum which once called for general mobilization. It is brave souls such as Teferi Assefa and his Nègarit Band who are carrying high, today, multicultural, pan-Ethiopian claims and belonging. Pay close attention to each of the individual talents in this combo. Other experimenters are getting involved in this stirring clear-out, such as Endris Hassen, Haddis 'Haddinqo' Alemayehu, Sammy Yirga, etc. It has been half a century since the release of the album Yekatit - Ethio Jazz (Amha Records 1974, ethiopiques 4, 1998). The Nègarit band is hanging in there, and in its turn forging a delicate path in these times of global epidemic and unacknowledged civil war." --Francis Falceto (Ethiopiques Series Producer)
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BUDA 860388CD
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"Batsükh Dorj was born in 1990 in Tsengel, the last village in western Mongolia. This remarkable musician is a master of the various overtone styles typical of the Tuvas. Rare and complete artist, because, luthier, he brings a major contribution to the tradition. He sings to us about his nomadic culture through mountains and travels, notably imitating the rhythms of horses and the flow of water."
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BUDA 860144CD
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Originally released in 2007. "Alèmayèhu Eshèté is no less than one of the great voices of the heyday of modern Ethiopian music -- the swinging '60s which, in Ethiopia, went on until the fall of the Emperor Haile Sellassie I in 1974. On a par with Tlahoun Gèssèssè, Bzunèsh Bèqèlè, or Mahmoud Ahmed, Alèmayèhu is a star at the top of the constellation that once lit up the wild nights in the capital city Addis Ababa."
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BUDA 860122CD
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Originally released in 2006. "An outstanding pianist and a remarkable composer, Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou, now a Christian nun in a Jerusalem monastery, recorded her own piano solo works, seeped in Ethiopian culture. Their rich, personal poetry brings to mind Carlos d'Alessio's India Song. A rare curiosity indeed, with beautiful melodies and a charming interpretation."
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BUDA 860373CD
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"Shadi Fathi, a setar soloist trained by the great master Dariush Talaï, and Bijan Chemirani, a virtuoso of the zarb, the daf and other percussion instruments, conceived the idea of combining bowed and plucked string instruments as well as percussion and wind instruments. Shadi recites poetries by Khayyam, Mowlana Rûmi and contemporary Persian authors."
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BUDA 860354CD
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"Taarab is a music genre popular in Tanzania and Kenya. It is influenced by the musical traditions of the African Great Lakes, North Africa, the Middle East, and the Indian subcontinent. In the early 1970s a new taarab emerged in the East African coastal cities of Mombasa and Tanga: In Mombasa, Matano Juma's Morning Star replaced strings with distorted organ sounds, amplified violin or clarinet; Zuhura Swaleh promoted an electrified tashkota as a major new sound in her band, digging deep in coastal ngoma rhythms and dances. Crossing the border from Kenya to Tanzania, in Tanga, Black Star Musical Club's electric guitars and dance music rhythms paved the way for a broader audience reception of taarab away from the coastal Swahili towns. Mombasa was at the forefront of taarab production from the 1960s to the 1990s, thanks in no small measure to the enterprising Mzuri record label. They would not just record and promote Mombasa based artists, but also invite groups from Tanzania like Black Star or Dar es Salaam's Egyptian Music Club. In the course of the 1970s records were displaced by the cassette and the initiative moved to Mbwana Radio Service in Mombasa's Old Town, soon the new center of taarab production and distribution. Taarab rose to new heights in the 1980s with the voices and hits by Malika and Golden Star's Mwanahela. With the economic and political crisis in Kenya in the early 1990s and the concurrent rise of Dar es Salaam as the new center of music production in East Africa, Mombasa began to fade from its position as the prime taarab center. The early 1990s saw the rise of so-called modern taarab, a new style based on drum machine rhythm, powerful sound systems, and a novel fashion of inciting and insulting lyrics. Nevertheless, the musical innovations of Matano, Zuhura and Black Star opened up new vistas early on; and Malika's and Golden Star's lyrics paved the way for what was to come in the 1990s. In recognition of this, taarabfrom the Mombasa -- Tanga era is now affectionately known as 'First Modern'."
"I've already been knocked out flat by the year's sure-to-be best reissue." --Peter Margasak
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BUDA 860323CD
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"Malagasy Guitar Masters is the meeting of three musicians from Madagascar. Three generations rub shoulders there: Teta, 'guitarist with the fingers of fairy', undisputed grand master of the tsapiky. Chrysanto Zama, young prodigy guitarist, combines virtuosity, originality and richness of the compositions. Joel Rabesolo, perfectly masters all the styles of the Malagasy guitar."
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