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Search Result for Label STERNS AFRICA
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2CD
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STCD 1118-9CD
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On any given day or night in recent years, you could turn on a radio or TV in Senegal and hear at least one of the songs on this new compilation. The artists are generally not the international stars that Americans tend to associate with Senegalese music, but they all have their home-country fans and their own styles. There's more to contemporary Senegalese music than the Afro-salsa of Orchestra Baobab and the drum-driven mbalax made famous by Youssou N'Dour, not to mention the Senegalese take on hip-hop. Many of today's pop artists tap into various roots in the fertile soil of Senegalese culture; others stand apart and draw what they like from near and far. Les Frères Guissé have championed a lean, acoustic sound for two decades and are now more popular than ever in Senegal. The indomitable Ablaye Ndiaye Thiossane had his first radio hit in 1966 and is currently enjoying an extraordinary comeback with his classic sound. A new generation of artists also rides the airwaves, such as Queen Biz, with her wry commentary on personal and social mores, and Wally B. Seck, one of the most charming young romantic singers on the scene. Working with media partners ZIK FM and SEN TV, Senegalese record producer Ibrahima Sylla compiled the tracks on these two CDs.
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STCD 1114CD
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Abdou Diop was born and raised in Kolda, a small town in the Casamance region of southern Senegal, but since the mid-1990s, the singer and songwriter has been based in the cosmopolitan Senegalese capital, Dakar, where he is treasured as a champion of Pulaar and Manding musical and cultural traditions. On this, his second album, Abdou Diop and his musicians blend acoustic and electric guitars with traditional instruments such as the hoddu (an ancestor of the banjo), the wooden Pulaar flute, tama drums and calabashes for songs about love of the land, violence in the city, and the clash of traditional and modern ways of life.
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STCD 3063CD
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In the era of vinyl records, the format of most African pop music was not the album but the single. As Doug Paterson, the compiler of this album, explains: "In Kenya in 1980, the average music fan might not have found it too difficult to come up with 10 shillings for a single, but it would have been much harder to find the 55 shillings necessary for an album." This album, then, is a celebration of singles. It is a selection of tracks from the late 1970s, most of which have never appeared in albums and none on CD before now. It tells the story of one of the most successful East African bands of the time, Orchestra Super Mazembe, a sprawling, prolific, dynamic unit that recorded hit after hit and is still remembered today with pleasure and affection. In 1975, some five years after leaving its origins in Zaire, Super Mazembe (whose name means "giant earth-movers") finally arrived in Nairobi, Kenya. Its early years in Nairobi were lean, but in 1977 the band scored a huge hit with the single "Kassongo," and from that point on its fortunes lay in East Africa. It was an incredibly productive group: by 1984 it had released 42 singles under the Editions Mazembe imprint alone, and it toured relentlessly. Honed to perfection on the road, in the studio the songs were recorded in one session each. The structure of every song had to fit the limits of a 45 rpm single. At around the five-minute mark, there was a repeat or chorus or instrumental; this would be the fade-out of side A and the fade-in for side B, which then usually featured a fabulous guitar breakdown before building up again for the end. Our tracks have been painstakingly mastered and reunified as originally recorded.
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STERNS 3062EP
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Special limited edition 10" vinyl of Moreno And L'Orch First Moja-One in conjunction with the Stern's reissue of Sister Pili + 2 (STCD 3062CD).
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STCD 1117CD
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Sékouba Diabaté is the son of Mande griots on both his mother's side and his father's. He was born and raised in the center of what was once the ancient Mande Empire, near the present-day border between Guinea and Mali, and in that region he was known for his strong, soaring voice by the time he was 16 years old. It wasn't long before his reputation reached the Guinean capital, Conakry, and in 1983 he moved to the coastal city to join Guinea's pre-eminent modern band, Bembeya Jazz National. Most of the others in the band were in their 40s, so they dubbed him Bambino -- the Italian for "baby." Why Italian? He's not sure, but Bambino has been his professional name ever since. Today Bambino is in his 40s himself and has been Guinea's biggest star for three decades. He has released five solo albums of contemporary African pop and made many guest appearances with Africando, the multinational salsa band. But he's never stopped being a griot, and his new album brings him and his fans back to the style that made him famous in his youth. The songs are all Bambino originals composed in traditional Mande forms and modes but with decidedly current themes, ranging from the perils of modern love to the heinous practice of female circumcision. Similarly, traditional Mande instruments -- kora, ngoni and balafon -- are deftly augmented by acoustic guitars and bass. Above all, though, is the griot's voice. By turns melancholy, tender, playful and impassioned, Bambino's voice -- one of the best in the world -- never fails to touch hearts and minds.
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STCD 1112CD
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Taking his musical training from a Mandé griot upbringing, Dawda Jobarteh creates an intense contemporary vision of an ancient tradition. With the support of long-term friends and band members, Preben Carlsen on guitar, Nana Osibio on bass and Salieu Dibba on percussion and including some deeply personal statements, Dawda weaves his distinctive kora-playing through modern musical landscapes. Jobarteh's musical heritage carries considerable weight. His grandfather was Alhaji Bai Konte, the first kora player to take the instrument to the U.S.; Dawda's father is kora player Amadou Bansang Jobarteh and his uncles Malamini Jobarteh and Dembo Konte together 26 years ago recorded the seminal kora album Jaliya for Sterns Music.
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STCD 3062CD
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Moreno Batamba is fondly remembered and sadly missed in Kenya, but like many of the most popular musicians in East Africa, he was actually from Congo-Zaire. He left home when he was 16 and began his career in Uganda. With the Congolese band Bana Ngenge he moved from Kampala, Uganda, to Nairobi, Kenya, in 1974. Four years later, Moreno was in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, singing with the renowned Orchestra Safari Sound. Back in Nairobi, in 1983, Moreno recorded with the great Orchestra Virunga, his husky bass-baritone contrasting affectingly with Samba Mapangala's airy tenor. That same year he and his own Orchestra First Moja-One made their LP Sister Pili, two nine-minute songs on each side. It was Moreno's biggest success to date and was followed by a good run for a few years. A trip back home to Zaire interrupted his career for a while, but his 1993 album returned him to the Kenyan pop charts and headline engagements. Then, suddenly, he was gone -- dead after a brief illness at the age of 38. This CD, the first of Moreno's music to be released outside Africa, includes Orchestra First Moja-One's Sister Pili album in its entirety, supplemented by two extremely rare 1977 recordings of Moreno with Bana Ngenge. These six tracks make it perfectly clear why Congolese musicians were so popular in East Africa in the '70s, '80s, and '90s, and why it's high time Moreno and his bands were heard around the world.
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2CD BOX
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STCD 3025-26CD
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2007 release. This set in The Syliphone Years series, Authenticité, is the survey of various artists that revived international interest in the golden age of modern Guinean music when it was first released in 2007. In addition to landmark recordings by Bembeya Jazz National, Keletigui et ses Tambourinis, and Balla et ses Balladins, this set features such historic entities as Orchestre de Beyla, Tropical Djoli, Horoya Band, Super Boiro and Camayenne Sofa, whose sounds run the gamut from traditional African forms to Afro-Latin dance music and on to psychedelic rock and funky Afrobeat. The 44-page booklet includes fascinating notes along with period photos and reproductions of album covers.
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2CD BOX
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STCD 3046-47CD
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2009 release. When the first volume of Francophonic was released in 2008, Mojo described it as "a treasure chest from the Congo" and concluded "It doesn't get much better ... until Volume 2." Well, here's Volume 2.
"Thunderbolts and fireworks, start to finish." --Pitchfork
"Extraordinary depth, drive, musicality and emotional power." --fRoots
Over two hours of music, plus a 48-page booklet.
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2CD BOX
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STCD 3041-42CD
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2008 release. In the last half-century, Franco (1938-1989) and his music can legitimately claim to have been the most popular in all of Africa south of the Sahara. Yet today that status and relevance is in danger of being written out of history; a travesty that these volumes, with their rare photos and insightful notes, set out to redress. Beginning with a take from his very first session, the carefully selected 28 tracks on the 2CDs of volume I tell the story of Franco's transformation from a street-wise 15 year-old into a successful guitarist, band-leader, singer, composer and social commentator. When this album was released in 2008, it won the fRoots World Music Critics' Award both for Best Compilation and for Best Package. Rock critic Robert Christgau, speaking on National Public Radio's All Things Considered, named it the best album of the year in any musical genre, never mind that the contents had been recorded in Kinshasa, Congo, three, four and five decades earlier. The accolades kept coming. Both Mojo and Blender awarded the album 5 stars, Inside Music graded it A+ and Pitchfork gave it an 8.8 ("an essential release, whether you know Franco's music or not, or even whether you know African music or not"). The New York Times reported that "Thorough liner notes help Western listeners understand the implications of Franco's lyrics, while the grooves communicate immediately." The Washington Post clarified that point: "Two and half hours of irrepressible grooves." Boxed set containing 2 CDs and a 48-page book.
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