Music of the Ba-Benzelé Pygmies has famously influenced many musicians, who have sampled some of the riffs. Ethnomusicologist Steven Feld unraveled the story of Herbie Hancock copying a musical phrase of the Ba-Benzelé in the opening of “Watermelon Man,” which Madonna later sampled, crediting Hancock—not the Ba-Benzelé—in the liner notes! The album also inspired New Jersey native Louis Sarno, who had virtually no background in ethnomusicology or sound recording, to travel to the Ituri Forest and live with the Bayaka people (also referred to as the Aka or Ba-Benzelé) and record their music and sounds.4 Sarno's adventures are portrayed in films like Oka! (2011) and Song from the Forest (2013). Alan Lomax suggested that the leaping intervals of pygmy music were characteristic of hunter-gatherer societies. I believe the Ba-Benzelé weave a spell which any non-hunter-gatherer could fall under. The communal, cross-generational sense of the music permeates the voices of men, women, and children in ensemble. The hindewhu whistle—playing the riff co-opted by Hancock—begins one of the tracks, followed by voices and clapping, each in a seemingly different yet oddly compatible rhythm. The apparent casual ambience of the gathering is belied by the complexity of the rhythms. There is a blend of both vigilance and relaxation here, with nary a hint of performance and the egoism that so often accompanies it. - Jim Metzner for Smithsonian Folkways
"This is the bands 4th studio release. Prior to recording, the group had their manager and promoter Bill Thompson purchase a large 20-room, three-story, home at 2400 Fulton Street directly across from Golden Gate Park in San Francisco where the members would live communally. Costing $73,000,[8] the home, known as _The Airplane House_ or simply _The Mansion_ included a refurbished basement with a built-in recording studio. The band became a tight grouping and much of their composing began at their new headquarters. -wiki."
"Morgan Sexton was born January 28, 1911, in Linefork, Kentucky, to Shaderick (Shade) and Harriet Cornett Sexton. He stands out among traditional Appalachian musicians; the circumstances of his life allowed his music to develop in near isolation. As a young boy, he said, _my cousin, Press Whitaker, and me got some old lard buckets and cut the bottoms out and fixed us some banjos. They sounded awful, but we played them like they were real banjos._ In 1928, when Mr. Sexton was 17 years old, he was able to order his first _real_ banjo, from Sears & Roebuck. It cost him ten dollars and eighty-six cents. He said, _I walked four miles out to Ulvah to pick it up... and I played it all the way back home..._ - wiki & Youtube. "
His 9th studio album. This was the first Bishop album to feature a full band of supporting musicians. The record is a tribute to late Egyptian guitarist Omar Khorshid as well as to Middle Eastern music.- wiki
I learned of her from Patti Smith who made a passing reference in one of her SubStack postings. Greco (1927-2020) came to be one of the stars of the bohemian “in” crowd of post-war France. She embodied the disenchantment and poverty of the French intellectuals following World War II. Greco dressed all in black and let her long, black hair hang free. A famous description of Greco is that her voice “encompasses millions of poems”. She was an inspiration to many of the writers and artists working in Saint-Germain-des-Pres, such as Jean-Paul Sartre and Boris Vian. in the 1950s. She fell in love with and almost married musician Miles Davis when he visited Paris in 1949. ome of these artists would write songs for her to sing. -- discogs.com
"Charles Mingus - bass Eric Dolphy - sax, bass clarinet and flute Clifford Jordan, tenor sax Jaki Byard - piano Dannie Richmond - drums Johnny Coles - trumpet. From AllMusic.com: Taken from their somewhat tumultuous but very musical tour of Europe, most of these rather lengthy workouts actually just feature a quintet because Coles took sick (he is only heard on _So Long Eric,_ which here is mistitled _Goodbye Pork Pie Hat_), but the playing is at such a high level that the trumpeter is not really missed. _Meditations on Integration_ (an utterly fascinating performance) and _Parkeriana_ (a tribute to Charlie Parker that features some stride piano from Byard and what may very well have been Dolphy's greatest alto solo) that make this gem truly essential in all jazz collections. "
"Roger Bunn was hardly ever a household name in music, even at the peak of his career during the last three years of the 1960s. He somehow managed to play with lots of important people and bands, and at major gigs -- and intersected with the early career of David Bowie, as well as playing a role in the founding of such outfits as Roxy Music -- but he only ever got known especially well among musicians, rather than to the public - Bruce Eder for AllMusic.com (see link for full bio)"
"John Berryman in a pub in Sandymount in Dublin in 1967, reading Dream Song 29. Berryman was interviewed by Al Alvarez for a BBC arts programme and was extravagantly drunk during filming, as the attentive viewer may notice." Youtube (link to watch)
"Eno took what he learned from making this album and put it to use in his collaboration with David Byrne, My Life in the Bush of Ghosts. Hassell apparently considered that album too _commercial_, and castigated Eno in Andy Warhol's Interview magazine for his methods and _lack of musical pedigree_. Eventually, they were reconciled."
"aka Donovan Philips Leitch (b 1946) became a friend of pop and folk musicians including Joan Baez, Brian Jones, and the Beatles. He taught John Lennon a finger-picking guitar style in 1968 that Lennon employed in _Dear Prudence_, _Julia_, _Happiness Is a Warm Gun_, and other songs This track features the sitar, which was played by American folk-rock singer Shawn Phillips...Donovan dedicated the tune to Bert Jansch.- wiki"
"Sylvia Marlowe (1908-1981) was born in New York City, began to study the piano at the age of nine and at eighteen was offered both a scholarship to the Juilliard School and the Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris. Choosing the latter, she worked for four years with Nadia Boulanger. She taught at the Mannes School of Music...Kenneth Cooper was her student. In 1957 she founded the Harpsichord Music Society, Inc. to promote new works for the harpsichord and award scholarships for the advanced study of the harpsichord and its literature.- misc"
"Touring solo artist for US Department of State, Cultural Envoy to New Zealand, Middle and East Far East; Sound Designer/Composer/Performer for Constellation Theatre; Multi-Media project... (click link for more)
"B 1940, Sister of Dee Dee Warwick, cousin of Whitney Houston, niece of Cissy Houston. Changed her artist name from _Warrick_ to _Warwick_ because her name was misspelled on the labels of her hit record _Don't Make Me Over_. Warwick ranks among the 40 biggest hit makers between 1955 and 1999 - Discogs.com"
"Jonna's comment re: her YouTube video: Today in the forest I recorded some spontaneous _kulning_, the ancient northern herding call. One of the things I love about kulning is the very special _in between_ sounds. Not sad, not happy. Just something in between. Something very emotional that calls to our soul. Fragile, and very strong at the same time. "
