globalFEST 2012: A World Of Amazing Discoveries

Ryan Muir for NPR

The Silk Road Ensemble (left), Yemen Blues (top right), M.A.K.U. Soundsystem.

Twelve bands, 17 opposite countries, 3 stages, one demoniac night: That’s a guarantee of globalFEST, a yearly showcase for general musicians who come from around a universe to New York’s Webster Hall. There, they deliver themselves to American bar bookers, festival programmers, rope managers and, of course, song fans. If we gait yourself well, there’s only adequate time during a evening’s 6 hours to get a good ambience of any rope — and this year’s extraordinary array of talent was uninformed and surprising, from a funked-out unusual grooves of Ethiopia (by approach of Boston’s Debo Band) to a Silk Road’s joyously feeling cross-cultural collaboration, to a windy and vivid sounds of Wang Li, a solo Chinese jaw harp player.

For this week’s book of All Songs Considered, NPR Music’s Anastasia Tsioulcas, NPR writer and Afropop.org comparison editor Banning Eyre, and Rob Weisberg of WNYC (who also hosts WFMU‘s Transpacific Sound Paradise) join Bob Boilen to revisit some of a highlights and favorite discoveries from this year’s globalFEST.

Posted by EthioSun on January 11, 2012. Filed under Entertainment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry