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Gandjal Kessoum - Hamad Kalkaba and The Golden Sounds

1975

A buried treasure from one of Cameroon’s true geniuses

Ramallah Underground - Aswatt il Zaman (Sounds of the Past)

رام الله أندرجرند - أصوات الزمن

Breathtaking instrumental single largely because it samples “Wahdon” by Fairouz almost in its entirety.

Julius Eastman - Femenine - first-ever release of this minimalist opus, recorded in 1974

Recorded live on Wednesday, November 6, 1974 at Composers Forum in Albany, The Arts Center on the Campus of the Academy of the Holy Names, Albany, New York. Like Bandcamp themselves, we will be donating 100% of our share of every sale on Friday, June 19th (from midnight to midnight Pacific Time) to the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, America’s premier legal organisation fighting for racial justice. The label will also donate its entire share of each pre-order made before this date, as well as that of all orders made during the rest of June.

This is the première release of Julius Eastman’s Femenine, for chamber ensemble. It is also the work’s only known recording, documenting a 1974 performance by the S.E.M. Ensemble (with the composer on piano) which has lain unheard for decades.

The music of Julius Eastman (1940-90) is enjoying an on-going period of rediscovery. Known best in the past for his work with figures like Peter Maxwell Davies, Arthur Russell and Meredith Monk, today his own formidable compositions draw increasing admiration.

Joyous, insistent, and immersive, Femenine bathes the listener in surges of tonal colour from intertwining winds, piano, violin, pitched percussion, synthesizer and – uniquely – the composer’s own invention of mechanised sleigh bells, which provide the 72-minute piece with its characteristic pulse.

Illuminating sleeve notes are provided by composer and author Mary Jane Leach, who is co-editor of Gay Guerrilla, the recently released collection of essays on Eastman’s life and music.

From Eastman’s pre-performance notes at the premiere, January 1980:

“Now the reason I use Gay Guerrilla — G U E R R I L L A, that one — is because these names — let me put a little subsystem here — these names: either I glorify them or they glorify me. And in the case of guerrilla: that glorifies gay — that is to say, there aren’t many gay guerrillas. I don’t feel that ‘gaydom’ has — does have — that strength, so therefore, I use that word in the hopes that they will. You see, I feel that — at this point, I don’t feel that gay guerrillas can really match with ‘Afghani’ guerrillas or ‘PLO’ guerrillas, but let us hope in the future that they might, you see. That’s why I use that word guerrilla: it means a guerrilla is someone who is, in any case, sacrificing his life for a point of view. And, you know, if there is a cause — and if it is a great cause — those who belong to that cause will sacrifice their blood, because, without blood, there is no cause. So, therefore, that is the reason that I use gay guerrilla, in hopes that I might be one, if called upon to be one.”

“a reminder to those who think they can destroy liberators by acts of treachery, malice, and murder. . . . Like all organizations, especially governments and religious organizations, they oppress in order to perpetuate themselves. Their methods of oppression are legion. But when they find that their more subtle methods are failing, they resort to murder. Even now in my own country, my own people, my own time, gross oppression and murder still continue.”

— EASTMAN'S INTRODUCTION TO JOAN D'ARC

[yt: Prelude]

this entire album was astonishing. unfortunately only the first track is freely available online

Antón Tomás. Antonio Bengala. Francisco Miguel. Cristóbal Catoya. Agustín Longalo. Lucas Cate.

[interview from 2015, Electronic Intifada]

Mo'min Swaitat teams up with some of his favourite artists and labels to present his collection of vintage cassettes from Palestine and beyond, including jazz, funk and Bedouin field recordings. From The Host: For our end of the year NTS monthly show I will be playing vinyls, cassettes and CDs, that I have been given as gifts in my tour this year, as a thank you to everyone invited the Palestinian sound archive / Majazz project to their cities. Find the full tracklist and related episodes on NTS.

Tracklist under the cut: