Monday, November 23, 2009

Lovely Music of the Judeo-Spanish Diaspora

Originally posted on March 5, 2008

Tzadik Records operates out of downtown NYC. It is perhaps one of America’s most unpredictable labels. Expect anything and you’ll be likely to get it. Formed by jazz-improv-composer John Zorn, the label is devoted to, but not limited to, radically conceived new Jewish music, rearrangements of traditional song, reconceptions of the Jewish diaspora conceptualized in the broadest sense, and fusions of traditional and non-traditional musics.

La Mar Enfortuna’s second album Convivencia pits the lovely vocals of Jennifer Charles with the arranging talents of Oren Bloedow from the downtown band Elysian Fields.

The program is an uncanny mix of reworked traditional music of the Judeo-Spanish Diaspora. It is completely eclectic in a semetic way. Haunting ouds mix with guitars mix with synths and /or anything that seems right for the musical moment. Ms. Charles has a wonderfully sultry voice and the disk comes off with a program worthy of a sleeper of the year award.

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