December 2011 and with the Arab Spring still in motion across the Middle-East and North Africa, we headed to Egypt to perform at the Disco Cairo 2011 event at Scharazad in the West El Balad area of the capital. Only just this year, the country has been through the Egyptian revolution but is still in it’s transitionary period and while we were there, there were still mass demonstrations in the streets and particularly in the famous Tahrir Square.
We just got back from playing at Electroblog, a fantastic little festival in Trieste in Northern Italy, where the organisers arranged for us to record an artist friend of theirs called Lorenzo Mos. Mos, as he’s simply known, is very much part of the local music scene there and also performs under the name Circo Bazooko.
Day one in Israel and we found ourselves on a rooftop in 40 degrees heat and no shade! We were in Tel Aviv playing at the opening of the Icon Film Festival, who’s organisers had arranged this great fooftop location over-looking old Jaffa and the port to record a group of very talented musicians. Perfect place to also get a tan, or rather severe sun-burn…
Over the last year, Orchestra of Samples has introduced us to some amazing musicians playing really unusual instruments, but the Boudègue from Southern France, made from an entire goat that’s essentially skinned and turned into a huge bagpipe, has to be the oddest one yet!
While in Brasilia we met up with artist, poet and all round wonder woman Marina Mara who organised a recording session with her Amazon goddess friend Andréa dos Santos (above).
During our time in Brazil for the amazing Celebrar Brasilia event we were playing at, we hooked up for a recording session with the incredible “eco-band” Patubatê (pronounced Patoo-bat-ay). For over 12 years now, the guys have been transforming and recycling all manner of old junk and scrap metal into musical instruments, from kitchen pots and pans to car exhaust pipes and truck suspension springs, all in a kind of re-cycling Stomp Brazilian style!
Behind the intriguing name My Real Name is Starship is the young and talented Daniel Marques from South London. We discovered him playing an open-mic night at the Star & Garter…
In June 2011 we travelled to post-revolution Tunisia to play at electronic culture festival FEST, being held at the Acropolium de Carthage – the incredible gothic cathedral in the ancient part of the capital city Tunis. Involving themselves in the…
We’re back in Brazil for the second time this year! Our first night in the country and only a few hours after landing we headed out to Casa São Jorge (‘House of St George’) one of the most popular Samba bars in the nearby city of Campinas, where sweaty dancers were tearing up the dancefloor and the band were giving it large.
In July we were in Paulinia, in Brazil – often jokingly referred to as “Paulywood” as it’s a real hub for film studios and the Brazilian movie industry. We were in Brazil performing at the city’s Fest2011 event and while there, the festival organisers…
Drums drums drums! In Madrid, we hooked up with Daniel Salorio and Guillermo Fernandez-Cid who are both obsessive collectors of drums. Livika, their band, are a group of musicians who believe in bringing cultures and…
Ole! Just knew at some point we had to feel the heat and record some fiery flamenco. Fast toe-tapping and stamping of Cuban heels, incredibly rhythmic finger clicking and – yes – castanets! So we headed to Madrid and the rehearsal studios of La Corrala de la Danza to record a session with one of Spain’s leading flamencos dancers, Luis Ortega with his two colleagues Fernando Alfaro
It’s well into New Year and we’re in the very very very cold city of Bucharest to play a gig (it’s -13 degrees here!). We’ve only just started recording samples for the project, so it was fantastic when…
Abdoul Mbaye (on the left) comes from a ‘griot’ family – essientially storytellers in western Africa who perpetuate the traditions & history of a family or village in song. The keeper of ‘history’s living…
In Dakar, during a night time power cut, we met up in total darkness with musician Pap Guissé who that night invited us to visit the idyllic and peaceful village of Ndem where he’s from (about 4 or 5 hours drive from Dakar) to record…
While in Dakar, we hooked up for an afternoon of filming with the I-Science crew at the very happening arts centre and work space Les Petites Pierres, a great place where music meets arts meets fashion. Founders Senegalese…
While in Dakar in Senegal, we went to a concert of world music star Baaba Maal and were utterly captivated by his tama drum player Massamba Diop. So after the concert we spoke with him to see if he was up for being recorded and to be…
Still in Mexico and we did an interview for Indie Rocks Magazine with editor Luis Alberto González who kindly took the time to introduce us to Leika Mochán, Dora Juárez and Sandra Cuevas aka Muna Zul. The acapella trio simply blew us away with their beautiful harmony singing, making the hairs on the back of our neck stand up! Queens of improvisation, they mix genres from folk, jazz and bossa nova to local styles like susurros, cacareos, aullidos and chasquidos.
While in Mexico to perform at the huge Sonorama Festival in the incredible Azteca Stadium, we were introduced to Humberto Alvarez, formally from the well known Mexican band Sangre Asteka. These days Humberto is an expert in pre-Hispanic music, which we recorded him playing – from Aztec whistles and drums to playing a virtually Neolithic ‘stone xylophone’, which he feels would have been one of the first instruments humans likely invented
We’ve begun work on our new project Orchestra of Samples! For our first official recordings, we headed off to France and beautiful Brittany for a short residency at the venue L’Echonova in the town of Vannes to record local band Lyse and other musicians playing celtic instruments.
Prior to creating this project but in many ways helping plant the seed for the whole idea of Orchestra of Samples, we had many hours of footage and field recordings we’d filmed in the small Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan in 2007, when we’d been invited as part of an artists expedition by London’s October Gallery aiming to record and preserve aspects of the country’s ancient ritual dance culture.
