Nov 19/07
Champeta Mondays
Did I tell you that I’m learning Spanish? A second visit to South America this summer confirmed my desire to one day live in Buenos Aires, or possibly Santiago.. or, hey, Colombia. Why not. Anyway, in honour of my (painfully slow, despite the French) adoption of a new language, let’s play some Colombian criolla music.. champeta, to be exact.
Benn loxo has a surprising number of listeners in Barranquilla, Colombia. Ok, not so many; there are three, as far as I know. But that’s more than I’d expect.
Benn loxo’s Barranquillan readers has sent me lots of music over the last year, mostly champeta, with a splash of cumbia here and there. Before you read any further you should check-out the wonderfully translated Wikipedia article on champeta. It’s clear to me now that the word champeta “makes reference to the knife, used in the work, in the kitchen and as defense and offensive weapon of this culture of he himself name.”
The African origins of champeta are immediately clear. Much of it sounds like a very slightly South Americanized soukous. It has a very different sound from the majority of South American styles, including the music by Belizean-African musicians that you might have heard here before.
The first couple tracks today come off a World Network release by Colombiafrica – The Mystic Orchestra, called Voodoo Love Inna Champeta Land. It’s a collaboration between Colombian champeta musicians and several well-known West African musicians, including members of Kékélé and Bembeya Jazz, Diblo Dibala, Rigo Star and others. Wow, that first song.
The second couple are reader contributed champeta tracks straight from the source. Unfortunately I don’t know who they’re by. Please let me know in the comments. Thanks, Fabian and Farid, for hooking us up with the artist names.
Respect to all the champeta fans out there who tune in to Benn loxo, and thanks for the promos and musical discoveries.
Colombiafrica / The Mystic Orchestra – Sambangole / Tres Golpes Na’ Mas
Colombiafrica / The Mystic Orchestra – Mini Kusuto
Dogard Disc – Quedo En Las Tablas
Charles King – Echale Tierra
Hi alls..
The interpreter Quedó en las Tablas is Dogardiscs, this song speaks of a person who had it all before and now lost, and ths friends left him alone
Best Regard’s…
Farid Martinez Acosta
Barranquilla Colombia
Greetings
Matt & Farid,
Matt,
The song Echale Tierra, is interpreted by the artist, Charles King.
The instrumentation to this melody, was influenced by a track from the Album “Carambola” El Conjunto Africa Negra of Sao Tome Principe”
http://img504.imageshack.us/img504/2617/p10101048hy.jpg
Thanks for all the great music, that samples in your blog!!
Fabian–
I just got this cd last week and liked it. I also read that Palenque records is coming out with a new release. does anyone know anything about it?
Actually you posted “Quedo en las Tablas” last year: http://bennloxo.com/archives/2006/10/06/listener-all-stars/ listed as artist “Dogar Dis” which seems to get some google hits as opposed to “dogardiscs” which google finds only at bennloxo.com (not that I have any actual non-intuitive facts about the artist’s name).
I guess more than anything that just goes to show how long I’ve been reading the site (which by the way is wonderful).
Nick, I’m flattered! Thanks for pointing that out. I got confirmation that it is in fact Dogardiscs..
I just realized too that the Dogardiscs track is based on a sample from Orchestra Super Mazembe’s Shauri Yako..
the sambangole singer is really bad, sad because the music is great !!
ooh.. I disagree! That singer on Sambangole is killer!
[...] islands are nowhere near Africa, but hey, neither are Belize or Colombia. Plus they do share something in common with many African islands: good music, turbulent politics, [...]
“It’s a collaboration between Colombian champeta musicians and several well-known West African musicians, including members of Kékélé and Bembeya Jazz, Diblo Dibala, Rigo Star and others….” — Hey, I LOVE to see ANYTHING about Champeta, may its fame grow and grow! HOWEVER: Kékélé, Diblo, and Rigo Star are Congolese, not West African. Americans have a tendency to refer to most anything African as “West African”, probably because western Africa was the source of most of the African slaves brought to North America. West Africa is indeed the musical sourceland of the Blues, Jazz, R&B, and the American gospel sound, and West Africa has also had significant influence on Congolese music, just as the music of Congo has had impact across West Africa. But West Africa is not the source of Champeta, Cumbia, Mambo, Salsa, or other “Latin” forms: Those musics trace back to Angola, which includes the countries today named Congo (and which is 100% in Central and Southern Africa, not West at all). This is why Champeta sounds so much like Soukous (it basically IS soukous!), and why Congolese musicians in the 1940s were so enamored of the Cuban music that reached them on 78rpm records at that time: The Congolese musicians recognized their own sound ‘bouncing back’ from America Latina. Bla bla bla…to make a long story short, it’s time for us all to use greater care when we are making reference to the African roots of both North American and South American music. It’s time for us all to know which music comes from which area in Africa, and to make those references with greater accuracy.