African Jazz

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Matthew
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African Jazz

#1 Post by Matthew » Fri Aug 29, 2003 8:38 am

I've developed a theory of why Afro-pop sounds (to me, anyway) so cool, and why it might be fun for swing dancers.

African slaves carried their local rhythms and styles to the Americas, where the music intermingled with the local music. Now, with the help of technology, the new musical styles that developed are being transported back to Africa, where the musicians are finding many similarities - primarily rhythmic ones - to their own music. Naturally, the African musicians are using these similarities to create new sounds.

This theory has led me to look for African jazz that I could play for swing dancers. I've found a little, mostly from western (Ghana, The Gambia, Mali, Cape Verde, etc.) and eastern (Kenya and Tanzania, especially) Africa. Benga music sounds very promising. I haven't found exactly what I want, though.

Has anybody here heard any African jazz that they think could be played for swing dancers? Thanks for any help.

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dana
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#2 Post by dana » Fri Aug 29, 2003 9:02 am

Well, it's not just "now" that western music is travelling back to Africa. I have a really interesting cd called "Township Jazz & Jive" that's a compilation of Sowetan and South African music from the 40s and 50s. American records would get imported to SA and the local bands would try to emulate what they'd heard. See, they had some of the same instruments (bass, guitar, clarinet instead of sax), so they can get pretty close. I'll try to type up the liner notes to that cd for you.

http://members.lycos.nl/Rembrandt/SAMus ... NJive.html

That cd also features, on the inside liner notes, pics of a couple quite obviously doing a swingout.

d.

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Matthew
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#3 Post by Matthew » Fri Aug 29, 2003 9:47 am

Seriously cool CD! I had a similar one on my wishlist, but this one sounds more interesting. Many thanks!

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mark0tz
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#4 Post by mark0tz » Fri Aug 29, 2003 10:22 am

Ya some good listening indeed. Thanks for sharing... that oaned.
Mike Marcotte

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Matthew
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#5 Post by Matthew » Tue Dec 30, 2003 1:00 am

Township Jazz 'N Jive came in the mail today, and I like it a lot. It sounds very playful and positive. I may speed it up a little bit when I play it, as many of the tracks are a touch slow for my taste. I'll have to experiment with it.

If you don't have this CD, it's definitely something to check out.

Thanks for the suggestion.

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Yakov
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#6 Post by Yakov » Tue Dec 30, 2003 11:23 am

you can listen to samples by clicking that link, then "alapage," then checking all the boxes and clicking the french listen link thing

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#7 Post by mousethief » Tue Dec 30, 2003 11:24 am

Matthew wrote:Township Jazz 'N Jive came in the mail today, and I like it a lot. It sounds very playful and positive. I may speed it up a little bit when I play it, as many of the tracks are a touch slow for my taste. I'll have to experiment with it.

If you don't have this CD, it's definitely something to check out.

Thanks for the suggestion.
Great, great, GREAT CD.

Kalman

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dana
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#8 Post by dana » Tue Dec 30, 2003 3:39 pm

Mwahahaha! Slowly I make everyone I know love that cd - I got it for my dad for Christmas, too.

It was one of those serendipity buys. I was looking for The Indestructible Beat of Soweto, which influenced Paul Simon's Graceland, when I wandered into this microscopic used cd store in Victoria BC. They not only had IBoS (out of print, absolutely mint condition, $10CDN), but they had some other african jazz in the window. I picked up that TJ&J album for 8 bucks or something and I don't think it's been out of heavy rotation since then. I think every time I went into that little store they had something mindbending for me to buy - it's probably a good thing they closed down or I'd be flat broke. And that was BEFORE my swing obsession, too.

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CafeSavoy
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#9 Post by CafeSavoy » Tue Dec 30, 2003 9:41 pm

There are a couple of swing songs on Mandela, Son of Africa, Father of a Nation: The Essential Music of South Africa. I especially like Sip n' Fly by The African Jazz Pioneers.

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SpuzBal
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#10 Post by SpuzBal » Thu Jan 01, 2004 10:00 pm

Whoa! That's awesome. I think I'll have to buy that...
"In my opinion, out of the ten great guitarists in the world, Django is five of them!" - Rex Stewart

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SpuzBal
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#11 Post by SpuzBal » Sun Apr 24, 2005 12:08 am

One year and four months later, I finally did. Haha.
"In my opinion, out of the ten great guitarists in the world, Django is five of them!" - Rex Stewart

Pocail
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#12 Post by Pocail » Mon Jul 25, 2005 2:18 pm

Check out a group call: Cool Crooners

Also an interresting album that contains swing from all over the world:
Putumayo Swing around the world (Great CD)

www.putumayo.com

jacques_g
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#13 Post by jacques_g » Tue Aug 29, 2006 12:47 pm

Pocail wrote:Check out a group call: Cool Crooners

Also an interresting album that contains swing from all over the world:
Putumayo Swing around the world (Great CD)

www.putumayo.com
Is this the group you are referring to:

http://www.sternsmusic.com/disk_info.php?id=502305-2

"The Cool Crooners of Bulawayo".

There are a couple of Lindy-able songs on this album and one Cha-Cha if I remember correctly.

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JesseMiner
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#14 Post by JesseMiner » Tue Aug 29, 2006 1:07 pm

The Cool Crooners of Bulawayo are a great band. I got turned onto them on through Putumayo's Swing Around The World compilation (we talked about it on the August episode of Hey Mister Jesse), and have since picked up both of their albums: Blue Sky (you've referenced the link up above) and Isatilo. I recommend both!

Jesse

Haydn
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#15 Post by Haydn » Tue Aug 29, 2006 2:50 pm

Just picked up this thread. There's another Township Jazz CD that I have called -

Township Swing Jazz, Vol. 1
http://tinyurl.co.uk/qwbs

Allmusic/Amazon has one available at the moment. There's also a Vol. 2, not quite as good, and there don't seem to be any available to buy now.

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