69.00 PLN

CD:

Nr kat.: TM024
Label  : TRADITION and MODERN

"LET’S PLAY" — the title of Tri-Continental’s third album for TRADITION & MODERNE is a simple expression but it carries a fair amount of determination. The team of Madagascar Slim, Bill Bourne and Lester Quitzau is back with a new studio recording at long last. It’s an album that has been highly anticipated after the exciting success of their wonderful debut album and the live double that followed in the fall of 2001. "LET’S PLAY" was recorded in the summer of 2002 in Bremen/Germany. Due to the fact that the group is so well-received in continental Europe, one is tempted to modify the wordplay to "Four-Continental", but in strictly musical terms, these guys still deal in a combination of sounds coming from Africa, North American and the Celtic aspects of the folk tradition. There has never been a dogmatic approach when it comes to mixing the different musical strands of the Tri-Continental sound. Musical boundaries are still fluent and everybody influences each other in more than one way or direction. The personnel: Madagaskar Slim: Ben Randriamananjara was born in 1956 and hails from Madagascar. He seems to be walking a borderline between various musical worlds. There’s the highly complex acoustic music of his home country that has been made popular by players like the great D’Gary, and there’s the electric blues world with influences ranging from Albert King and Freddie King to Jimi Hendrix. Malegassy roots music meets modern blues. It’s always an exciting fusion Slim comes up with and he’s already won a Canadian JUNO award for his solo album "Omnisource". Bill Bourne: the guy with the top hat was born in 1954 and is a part of the Canadian and Celtic folk and singer/songwriter tradition. Bourne has released a number of great solo recordings, too, and his most recent solo effort "Sally’s Dream" from 1999 has been decorated with a JUNO as well. Not only is he a striking singer and excellent guitar-player in his own right, he’s also a charismatic stage presence. Bourne is a roots music artist through and through and his personal style combines folk, country and bluegrass with a lot of exotic stuff thrown in for good measure. He never resorts to straight traditionalism. Lester Quitzau: the Canadian bluesman from Edmonton (born in 1964) is one of the most sensitive and intense slide players around and his solo work has been subject of the JUNO academy’s attention as well. His blues combines many different aspects, as he’s been studying countryblues masters like Son House as well as the aesthetics of jazz modernists like Bill Frisell. Quitzau has one foot in Mississippi Fred McDowell’s camp and the other is firmly situated in Jimi Hendrix territory. This versatility not only makes him one of the most open-minded blues stylists, he’s also showing the way into a very interesting future for the blues. The line-up for "LET’S PLAY" has been embellished by the inclusion of a very special guest: Indian percussionist Ramesh Shotham. This Cologne resident provides his special brand of vocal and manual percussion and adds to the group’s groove in a significant kind of way. He’s also a great rhythmic colorist and has been a very in demand player with artists like Karnataka College of Percussion, Dissidenten, Embryo, Carla Bley, or Rabi Abou-Khalil Ramesh Shotham is a solo artist in his own right as well.