world music
Some uncomfortable truths about World Music
In his masterly, wide-ranging survey, Joe Boyd acknowledges that many artists’ expectations are unrealistic – and that their music is often greeted with contempt by home audiences
Triumphant: Big Thief, at Green Man, reviewed
One of the first things I learned after seeing Big Thief triumph at Green Man is that some long-time fans…
Expectations were met and then exceeded: Arooj Aftab, at Celtic Connections, reviewed
We gathered on a freezing Sunday night, inside a barrel-vaulted church designed in the 1890s by Charles Rennie Mackintosh, to…
Read The Spectator article that gave birth to musical minimalism 50 years ago
The Spectator is responsible for many coinages. One of the most significant came in 1968, when an article by our…
Paul Simon says farewell with a daring and inventive show that left some restless
Early in 1987, a middle-aged woman approached me on the record counter of the Slough branch of Boots. ‘What do…
The polyphonous Babel of global music
‘Following custom, when the Siamese conquered the Khmer they carried off much of the population, including most of their musicians,…
The band that nearly saved the Cuban revolution
By chance, my first night in Havana in 1987 was the night the clubs went dark to mark the death…
