Post by Fuggle on Sept 14, 2006 22:24:21 GMT -5
Musical nomad moving toward the traditional
Middle Eastern singer going 'ethnic and pure' and acoustic
By JON M. GILBERTSON
Special to the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Sept. 13, 2006
Middle Eastern singer Natacha Atlas has worked with contemporaries as varied as film composer David Arnold (whose work with Atlas includes the scores for the James Bond movie "Die Another Day"), experimentalist Jah Wobble (bassist for Public Image Limited, John Lydon's post-Sex Pistols project), and folk duo Indigo Girls.
So she gets along well with other musicians, obviously. Yet she still isn't quite sure why, in 2001, Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland and then United Nations high commissioner for human rights, appointed her a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Conference Against Racism.
"I don't know, because I'm the most undiplomatic person you could meet," said Atlas, who will be performing on Sunday at the two-day, free-to-the-public Global Union World Music Festival at the Humboldt Park Band Shell. "But Robinson felt with my background and my experience, I would be a good spokesman for a bunch of programs and interviews to do with intercultural relations. So I accompanied her and met a lot of intelligent people."
Although Atlas might deny her ability to be tactful, she cannot deny Robinson's other claims. Born and raised in a Moroccan suburb of Brussels, her lineage is Moroccan, Egyptian and Palestinian; besides Belgium, she has lived in Egypt, Greece and England. (Her speaking voice bears out the final destination on that list.)
For the last decade and a half, she has found common cause with other artistic and geographical nomads. Her involvement with Transglobal Underground - a London assemblage that wove traditional "tribal" musical forms into hip-hop, funk and electronica - has been a guiding light for all her subsequent projects, including her latest.
"I've put together this acoustic ensemble, which is more kind of ethnic and pure, kind of serious and a bit more intellectual," Atlas said. "It's more of a sit-down, genteel thing."
For those world-music fans more familiar with Atlas' diverse, boundary-erasing music, her current group makes a surprising shift toward traditionalism. The group includes strings, bass, piano, guitar and Arabic instruments, but it excludes the machine beats and her serious ability as a belly dancer. And while what she's doing is old-fashioned, the ensemble and manner are still new to her.
"I'm still developing this," she said. "We just had a Scandinavian tour. We've done it in London as well. It's gone down very, very well, but I didn't expect for the Americans to want that. It's just not my regular setup."
But American promoters, given a choice between Atlas' electric group and her acoustic one, chose the latter. It definitely marks a change from her latest solo album, "Mish Maoul," which came out this spring. Like much of her previous work, it brings all of her potential contradictions - traditionalism and modernism, Middle Eastern heritage and Western address, human body and computer rhythm - into an ultimately harmonious whirl.
"Mish Maoul" also brought her back to her roots: She once again joined forces with Transglobal Underground/Temple of Sound member Nick Page (a.k.a. Count Dubulah), who produced her first solo album, 1995's "Diaspora."
"He's fairly flexible and open-minded, and he's good at trying to get me to be a bit more forward-thinking," Atlas said. "I like to go quite 'Arabic pop' sometimes, and he likes to stay with the current thing that's happening musically, and he has to drag me there kicking and screaming sometimes."
For Atlas, it made perfect sense to release "Mish Maoul" and then, in the same year, to tour with a more conventional ensemble: it's a kind of diplomacy.
"I get to do the stuff now that the purists like," she said. "So therefore, I cover both bases."
Middle Eastern singer going 'ethnic and pure' and acoustic
By JON M. GILBERTSON
Special to the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Sept. 13, 2006
Middle Eastern singer Natacha Atlas has worked with contemporaries as varied as film composer David Arnold (whose work with Atlas includes the scores for the James Bond movie "Die Another Day"), experimentalist Jah Wobble (bassist for Public Image Limited, John Lydon's post-Sex Pistols project), and folk duo Indigo Girls.
So she gets along well with other musicians, obviously. Yet she still isn't quite sure why, in 2001, Mary Robinson, the former president of Ireland and then United Nations high commissioner for human rights, appointed her a goodwill ambassador for the United Nations Conference Against Racism.
"I don't know, because I'm the most undiplomatic person you could meet," said Atlas, who will be performing on Sunday at the two-day, free-to-the-public Global Union World Music Festival at the Humboldt Park Band Shell. "But Robinson felt with my background and my experience, I would be a good spokesman for a bunch of programs and interviews to do with intercultural relations. So I accompanied her and met a lot of intelligent people."
Although Atlas might deny her ability to be tactful, she cannot deny Robinson's other claims. Born and raised in a Moroccan suburb of Brussels, her lineage is Moroccan, Egyptian and Palestinian; besides Belgium, she has lived in Egypt, Greece and England. (Her speaking voice bears out the final destination on that list.)
For the last decade and a half, she has found common cause with other artistic and geographical nomads. Her involvement with Transglobal Underground - a London assemblage that wove traditional "tribal" musical forms into hip-hop, funk and electronica - has been a guiding light for all her subsequent projects, including her latest.
"I've put together this acoustic ensemble, which is more kind of ethnic and pure, kind of serious and a bit more intellectual," Atlas said. "It's more of a sit-down, genteel thing."
For those world-music fans more familiar with Atlas' diverse, boundary-erasing music, her current group makes a surprising shift toward traditionalism. The group includes strings, bass, piano, guitar and Arabic instruments, but it excludes the machine beats and her serious ability as a belly dancer. And while what she's doing is old-fashioned, the ensemble and manner are still new to her.
"I'm still developing this," she said. "We just had a Scandinavian tour. We've done it in London as well. It's gone down very, very well, but I didn't expect for the Americans to want that. It's just not my regular setup."
But American promoters, given a choice between Atlas' electric group and her acoustic one, chose the latter. It definitely marks a change from her latest solo album, "Mish Maoul," which came out this spring. Like much of her previous work, it brings all of her potential contradictions - traditionalism and modernism, Middle Eastern heritage and Western address, human body and computer rhythm - into an ultimately harmonious whirl.
"Mish Maoul" also brought her back to her roots: She once again joined forces with Transglobal Underground/Temple of Sound member Nick Page (a.k.a. Count Dubulah), who produced her first solo album, 1995's "Diaspora."
"He's fairly flexible and open-minded, and he's good at trying to get me to be a bit more forward-thinking," Atlas said. "I like to go quite 'Arabic pop' sometimes, and he likes to stay with the current thing that's happening musically, and he has to drag me there kicking and screaming sometimes."
For Atlas, it made perfect sense to release "Mish Maoul" and then, in the same year, to tour with a more conventional ensemble: it's a kind of diplomacy.
"I get to do the stuff now that the purists like," she said. "So therefore, I cover both bases."