Colombiafrica Downloads

Colombiafrica - is that a new country?"This story began 500 years ago," writes Lucas Silva in the liner notes of a new album by a unique intercontinental project dubbed Colombiafrica -- the Mystic Orchestra. Produced by the Paris-based Silva (pictured), the album, titled 'Voodoo Love Inna... Learn More »

Colombiafrica - is that a new country?

"This story began 500 years ago," writes Lucas Silva in the liner notes of a new album by a unique intercontinental project dubbed Colombiafrica -- the Mystic Orchestra. Produced by the Paris-based Silva (pictured), the album, titled 'Voodoo Love Inna Champeta-Land,' brings together progressive Afro-Colombian musicians with various actual African soukous, Afrobeat and highlife musicians for a project that kind of completes the musical circumnavigation ... and starts the trip all over again with fresh sails.

"It's a new musical genre, a new musical language," says Silva in an interview. As such, he's taken the nickname "Champeta-Man Original" in reference to his spins on champeta criolla, the '60s and '70s precursors in which Colombians of African heritage started blending the local cumbia, bullerengue and other rhythms with African styles.

New? Well, yes and no. As Silva said, the tale goes back centuries, sharing history with North American blues and jazz, as well as Afro-Caribbean styles from Haitian voodoo to salsa. Colombia is a distinct situation, straddling the oceanic divide with coasts both on the southwestern end of the Caribbean and on the Pacific, facing away from Africa. In the modern era -- all we really have documented through recordings, of course -- the situations specific to Colombia have resulted in some fascinating side trips of that global journey.

"It all started in Africa, but it took different forms in the Americas," Silva says. "Black people also creolized the European music."

Some fascinating examples of that are found in another new album, 'Colombia! The Golden Age of Discos Fuentes, the Powerhouse of Colombian Music 1960-76.' Compiled by English DJ Miles Cleret and released by his adventurous Soundway label, the set brings together some wild takes on cumbia, gaita, fandango and, indeed, champeta styles, all filtered through the modernizing culture of inland capital Bogota under the auspices of Discos Fuentes, which remains a considerable presence: In the churning 'Cumbia en Do Menor,' by Lito Barrientos y Su Orquesta, for one prime example, sizzling horn arrangements back battles between near-psychedelic '60s garage-rock organ and almost klezmer-sounding clarinet. Latin music scholar Roberto Ernesto Gyemant, who wrote the liner notes, says that after digging through hundreds of "dusty records" and interviewing musicians throughout Latin America, he and Cleret were amazed at how much the music went beyond even their expert knowledge, with "folk" music that sounded anything but and cutting-edge blends that both borrowed from and pointed directions for salsa throughout the Western hemisphere.

"Some of the oldest tracks, and the most folkloric-based, sound the most like electronic music," he says. "If you listen to 'Fandango en Percussion,' by Pedro Laza y Sus Pelayeros, you can't believe it was done by musicians and not on someone's computer."

And if that's not enough, Discos Fuentes earned a reputation for serious eye candy on some blatantly sexy (OK, also sexist) cover art, much of it reproduced in the booklet.

Meanwhile up in Cartagena, African records started making their way to Colombia in the '60s, finding very receptive ears in such locales as San Basilo de Palenque, which Silva notes was the "first free village in America" after slaves rebelled against the Spaniards in the 17th century. Now, let's not forget that much modern African music was itself inspired by the Afro-Caribbean music of the first half of the 20th century -- beguines and the like fueling dance bands throughout the mother continent. So the music coming back from Africa dovetailed neatly into what was happening in Colombia when Viviano Torres, descended from runaway slaves, started to record the African-derived music being played by musicians in Cartagena in the '80s.

Torres became the center of Silva's plans when he conceived of this project a few years ago, taking Congolese musician Bopol Mansiamina and Cameroon drummer Guy Bilong to Cartagena to collaborate with Torres, Justo Valdez, Luis Towers and other locals. Later sessions in Bogota and finally Paris added various musicians from the Congo (singers Dally Kimoko, Nyaboma and Syran Mbenza, and guitarist Rigo Star), Guinea (Sekou Diabate) and other countries.

"This," Silva says, "is a new musical son of Africa in Afro-Colombia."

Or is it the other way around?
« Hide Description