LOVING NON NATIVE MUSICAL TRADITIONS: was 'gypsy caravan film'

["RICK WALKER" <looppool@cruzio.com>]

Mark Sottilaro <sine@zerocrossing.net> wrote:

"This is way OT, but what's up with that?  Sure,
 music made by  Europeans may speak to some part of my Euro-mutt
 brain............... (sic).......... but what does it mean when
 this Euro-mutt hears  Indian classical music for the first time and
 falls instantly in  love?"


Wow,  I've alwasy wondered about this thought, too,  Mark.
I was essentially a white kid who grew up in a lilly white
upper middle class suburb in San Jose, California.

When no one in my junior high school was listening to anything
besides the Beatles and Beach Boys,   I was completely in
love with Smokey Robinson and James Brown.   Why is that?

When I went to a college dance as a single, horny college student
to try and meet girls,   I was suddenly completely besotten with
this band from Ghana, Hedzoleh Soundz who played a college dance
using only 6/8 time signatures.

My whole life changed that evening and all I knew was that I had to know
everything I could possibly know about this amazing exotic music that
was completely foreign to me.

The next 25 years of my professional life were determined within
four minutes of hearing the song,  "Languta" by Hedzoleh 
Soundz............literally!

I can't say that I necessarily believe in past lives but I can say that 
something
very, very deep inside of me was touched when I heard that music (or the
music of Babatunde Olatunji,   Ali Farke Toure,  Debhashish Battycharya,
 Hiryasu Takashi, Bob Brozman or Martin Simpson).

Whatever it was,  it was some kind of magic,  I can assure you.

The same kind of magic that occured when I started hanging out with live 
looping
artists some 8 years ago.

It's great to realize that magic exists and can touch someone if they are 
receptive to it.

thanks for your thought provoking question, Mark.

let's hear it for being receptive to that kind of magic, musically!

yours,  Rick