Just before we left for Cuba to record for this podcast, Brooklyn Raga Massive's Raga Cubana feat. Roman Diaz, had an intimate concert to get ready for our sold out concert a month later at the Rubin Museum of Art. Here we are trying new things and feeling the hometown energy and love from the Raga Massive Jam Session at the Art Cafe With Román Díaz (conductor, batá: iyá ) Giancarlo Luigi (shekere) Clemente la Tierra (batá: okónkolo) Melvis Santa (vocals) Folasona Olorunsola (batá: itótele) Ehre...
Jan 05, 2017•1 hr 30 min
After three weeks of recording music in Cuba, we return with this special epsiode featuring a live performance from Groupo Folklorico 19 de Septiembre of Santiago de Cuba. Guided by their lead Bata' drummer, Roberto Maikel Fuentes, we'll learn about 3 rhythms: Guanguanco', Tumba Francesa and Columbia.
Jan 05, 2017•39 min
The seventh set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Neel Murgai (sitar), Sameer Gupta (tabla). Neel and Sameer will be performing at the Raga Massive Concert and Jam Session at the Art Cafe (885 Pacific Street, Brooklyn) this Wednesday, Jan 4th 8pm. Neel is a multi-instrumental performer, composer and teacher in New York City. He graduated with an MFA in interdisciplinary arts from Goddard College. His life long journey into the depth and beauty of sitar and Indian ...
Jan 02, 2017•47 min
This is last minute post while I am in Cuba collecting great recordings for the all you listeners of the podcast! A great performance from Dee Harris at Ragas live guitar..more to come.
Dec 16, 2016•47 min
The ninth set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Roopa Mahadevan (vocal) Anjna Swaminathan (violin), Bala Skandan (mridangam), Kabilan Jeginathan (kanjira). Roopa Mahadevan is a versatile vocalist rooted in the South Indian (Carnatic) classical tradition. Born and raised in San Jose, California, Roopa underwent her major formative training in Carnatic vocal music in under Asha Ramesh, disciple of the late Sangeetha Kalanidhi D.K. Jayaraman and Sri Nanganallur Raman...
Dec 05, 2016•44 min
We hang out with Olivier Conan, the band leader of Chicha Libre, and the owner of Brooklyn's most beloved listening room, Barbes. We'll hear some of the smoking tracks from his group and his Barbes Records label and get his take on what's happening in the world. Barbes will be hosting a free and open event this Sunday about the general state of the union entitled What Now? Post Election Gathering at Barbès from 5pm-7pm November 20th 2016. Our next upcoming podcast will be Innov Gnawa's explosive...
Nov 20, 2016•38 min
As NYC and the world woke up to the results of an election, we gathered, as always, on Wednesday night, our inclusive, diverse music scene taking on a new meaning. Tomchess and his quartet rose to the occasion and captured the moment with stunning soulful maquam based compositions informed by the free jazz improvisations of of Ornette Coleman and John Coltrane. Hear the beauty and the promise from this set at the Art Cafe. Tomchess - Oud, Ney Morsing, Composer Zachary Swanson - Upright Bass Abra...
Nov 15, 2016•1 hr 2 min
The fourth set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Dan Weiss (Drumset) and Michael Gam (bass). Weiss has been studying tabla and Indian classical music with his Guru (teacher) Samir Chatterjee since 1998. With his Tintal Drum set Solo, Dan takes the concept of a traditional Indian tabla solo and migrates it to a conventional drum set. When listening to Tintal Drum set Solo, the trick is to reverse more conventional roles. Whereas, in a typical Western context, one w...
Nov 06, 2016•44 min
This was an amazing experience. We got to hang in the studio with two legends of Afro-Cuban Jazz: Bobby Carcassés and Arturo O'Farrill! After the two recorded an improvised set we got to sit down and talk music. We also get to hear some music from Bobby's record celebrating his 50 years of creating music in Havana and NYC: 50 TH Aniversario, De La Habana A Nueva York. ARTURO O’FARRILL, pianist, composer, educator, and founder and Artistic Director of the nonprofit Afro Latin Jazz Alliance, was b...
Oct 25, 2016•47 min
This was an amazing experience! We sit down with one of the great families of rhythm for a live performance and interview. TH Vikku Vanyakram and family will be back in NYC, starting Oct. 24th teaching an incredible workshop on rhythm. Recorded at the East Indian Music Academy, this is a legendary lineup: TH Vikku Vanyakram, Uma Shankar -ghatam Selva Ganesh, Swaminathan - khanjira, konnakol. A. Ganesan - morsing Avirodh Sharma, tabla Special thanks to Avorodh Sharma for expertly mixing and hosti...
Oct 18, 2016•55 min
This was a real incredible experience. We got sit down and hang with Vieux Farka Toure, talk to him and record a little acoustic music...AND record his entire live set at Le Poisson Rouge in Manhattan with his smoking band! Many thanks to World Music Institute and Le Poisson Rouge for making this happen. This podcast will air on WKCR 89.9 FM-NY at 11pm Sunday Oct 2nd and stream and www.wkcr.org. Often referred to as “The Hendrix of the Sahara”, Vieux Farka Touré was born in Niafunké, Mali in 198...
Oct 02, 2016•1 hr 49 min
Vocalists Sattar Khan Langa, Manjoor Khan Manganiyar join us at WKCR for a live in-studio set. The music from this region is recognized around the world for its virtuosity and beauty. The chance to see and hear real live Rajasthani folk music is really rare and these guys really blew us away.
Oct 02, 2016•31 min
The eighth set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Vivek Pandya (tabla), Kalpit Pandya (harmonium). This 11 year old tabla prodigy is a disciple of Pt Anindo Chatterjee, and he was 1st place winner of the Swaradhara competition held on 23rd Feb 2013. As you can hear and se from his performance, he has a bright, musical future ahead of him. Ragas Live Festival 2016 is produced with the support of The Rubin Museum of Art. This music was expertly mixed by Sameer Gupta....
Sep 21, 2016•45 min
Their first time playing together, Max ZT (Hammered Dulcimer) Karsh Kale (tabla) and Kane Mathis (kora) played an amazing set from 3am-4am on the Ragas Live Festival 2015.
Aug 28, 2016•40 min
Ba-Ere Yotere a master of the African Gyil performs live with great percussionists Valerie Naranjo (also on Gyil) and Barry Olsen. We hung out at Valeries house and recorded a few songs as well as talking to Ba-Ere about his early days with a man I searched for but never found, the great Kakraba Lobi.
Aug 21, 2016•38 min
The thrid set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Arun Ramamurthy (violin), Sameer Gupta (tabla), Perry Wortman (bass). The Arun Ramamurthy Trio (ART) performs Jazz Carnatica. Rooted in the style of the virtuoso violinist Dr. Mysore Manjunath, Arun brings a fresh approach to the age-old South Indian classical repertoire. The trio’s collaborative sound is driven by the propulsive rhythm section of drummer Sameer Gupta & and bassist Perry Wortman. The Carnatic can...
Aug 15, 2016•50 min
In a stunning display of North and West African fusion, El Foukr R'Assembly, a group traveling all the way from Algeria performs live on WKCR. The musicians from Algeria, Burkina Faso and Ghana come together for two explosive sets of music A taxi-driver & a farmer, a graphic designer, a sound engineer and an art-major student, Oualid Khelifi as the producer and filmmaker had met them lin 2014 at various parts of Algeria before suggesting a long term project around docfilm and experimental Af...
Aug 07, 2016•1 hr 22 min
The second set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Akshara (lit. imperishable, immutable, inalterable) is comprised of: Bala Skandan (mridangam), Arun Ramamurthy (violin), Trina Basu (violin), Jay Gandhi (bansuri), Kabilan Jeginathan (kanjira), Max ZT (dulcimer), Shivalik Ghoshal (tabla). Akshara is an exciting dynamic percussion group rooted in Indian classical musical traditions. Comprised of virtuosic performers in Carnatic and Hindustani classical genres, Akshar...
Aug 04, 2016•49 min
The blazing first set of the historic, Ragas Live Festival 2016, live at Pioneer Works. Comprising of members of Brooklyn Raga Massive - Neel Murgai (sitar), Sameer Gupta (tabla), Arun Ramamurthy (violin), Eric Fraser (bansuri), Trina Basu (violin), Michael Gam (bass), Samarth Nagarkar (vocal) - the Ravi Shankar Tribute ensemble inaugurates the Brooklyn Ragas live festival by playing several of Pt. Ravi Shankar's compositions. Ragas Live Festival 2016 is produced with the support of The Rubin Mu...
Jul 30, 2016•45 min
As we recover from our legendary 24 hour Ragas Live Festival this weekend, we share two great past episodes with talents that will be performing very soon. We'll hear some of Awa Sangho and the BRM's All Stars blistering set as the group is set to return to the Rubin Museum of Art on August 12th. Hear her full set Pioneer Works here. And we'll revisit our chat with Lech Wierzynski of the California Honeydrops who play the knitting factory tonight. More to come!
Jul 27, 2016•1 hr 8 min
Wow! A chance to talk with a legend of African Music, King Sunny Ade! For me this is a dream come true, there are few musicians as influential as King Sunny Ade who brought the Juju music of Nigeria to the world. Here we speak with him in depth about his life and the roots of his music. King Sunny Ade came on the scene in 1966 and made his first big record in 1967. He became an international star across Africa during the mid-1980s, touring and gaining a significant audience in the United States ...
Jul 08, 2016•37 min
Eric Krasno is the amazing guitarist/producer with artists ranging from Soulive and Lettuce (both of which he co-founded)to Norah Jones, 50 Cent, Aaron Neville, Phil Lesh, Derek Trucks, and, well, the list keeps going! To celebrate the upcoming release of his new album, Blood From A Stone, we got to hang with Eric at his home studio, hear him play some guitar and share what he's learned so far in an incredibly prolific career. The new album comes out July 8th.
Jun 23, 2016•54 min
In part 1 of this podcast we spend time at home with Jay Gandhi (bansuri) and Abhik Mukherjee (sitar) as they prepare for the a special evening of Monsoon Ragas at the Rubin Museum on June 15. The two perform live and share insights and legends about the malhar group of ragas, those that praise the monsoon rains. This episode was broadcast on WKCR 89.9 FM-NY on Sunday June 5th. In part two we hope to share their performance with the virtuoso tabla player Suryaksha Deshpande as the trio perform a...
Jun 06, 2016•17 min
Last month, maestro Román Díaz brought a world class group of Afro-Cuban musicians to perform with the Brooklyn Raga Massive All-Stars during the artist collective's epic residency at Pioneer Works. We'll share the recording of that innovative concert, where, for the first time, sarod, bansuri and Carnatic violin dialogue with Afro-Cuban vocals and the sacred Batá drums. This concert will air on WKCR 89.9 FM 7-9pm Sunday May 22nd. Raga Cubana is: Román Díaz ( conductor, Batá: Iyá ) Giancarlo Lui...
May 22, 2016•1 hr 19 min
I've never heard a radio show go off the rails like this one! Counterculture hero, ethnobotanist and "psychonaut" Dennis McKenna, in a freewheeling conversation with ethnomusicologist Alexandre Tannous and comedian Greg Barris. This was broadcast in NYC on the radio in 2013, when McKenna had just published his memoir The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss about his wild experiences with his legendary brother Terence McKenna, who has been called the Timothy Leary of the 90's." The conversation ho...
May 16, 2016•1 hr 3 min
Debo band explores the rich and varied traditions of Ethiopian music with a dose of funk, punk and soul. With a large instrumental ensemble and a charismatic singer Bruck Tesfaye it all adds up to an undeniable party band. We got to hang with the leader of this amazing group, Danny Mekonnen and here excerpts of their upcoming album Ere Gobez (FPE Records; May 20, 2016). They'll be playing in NYC with Antibalas May 18th at the Brooklyn Bowl. Debo Band is Bruck Tesfaye vocals Danny Mekonnen saxoph...
May 04, 2016•39 min
A legendary percussionist, Román Díaz is a pillar of the New York City Afro-Cuban folkloric tradition and one of the music's great innovators. He is considered an Olú Aña or “keeper of the sacred drum” Before his Raga Cubana concert with the Brooklyn Raga Massive (we hope to share that soon!) he gave this workshop where he spoke of the legends, history and musical foundations of Afro-Cuban Music.
Apr 24, 2016•52 min
As a lifelong fan of Shakti, hanging with V. Selvaganesh was a dream come true. Here the master percussionist V. Selvaganesh talks about his music and shares his experience with John McLaughlin's Remember Shakti and other great collaborations. He breaks down the South Indian rhythmic system and we hear selections from his album Souhka. Our friend Arun Ramamuthy joins the discussion. Born in Chennai to Grammy-winning musician Vikku Vinayakram, a former member of the original Shakti, he is the gra...
Apr 06, 2016•1 hr 4 min
Whoa! This one went viral. Here is the full hour podcast interview and below is a half hour of video interview with George Porter. As the bass player of the Meters, George Porter, Jr. defined one of the most influential styles of popular music. It's now called "Funk." Beyond that he's on a million records including all the killer material coming out of the Sea-Saint studio in New Orleans with cats like Allen Toussaint, Earl King, Lee Dorsey, Johnny Adams, Irma Thomas, The Lastie Brothers and lat...
Mar 29, 2016•1 hr 8 min
New music! A burnin' set of classical raga from last week's Brooklyn Raga Massive's Raga Roots Night, as broadcast on WKCR 89.9 FM-NY and performed at Pioneer Works. Anirban Dasgupta – sarod Suryaksha Deshpande – tabla Present Raag Kafi Kanada
Mar 11, 2016•59 min
