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INTRODUCING LIMúR A SITE BURSTING AT THE SEAMS WITH IBERIAN DELIGHTS

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Salwarpe’s thread about non-English language albums, got me enthusiastically foraging about. To my delight I discovered…

LIMuR – THE IBERIAN ROOTS MUSIC CHART

Also known as..
Lista Ibérica de Músicas de Raíz | Lista Ibérica de Músicas de Raiz | Llista Ibèrica de Músiques d’Arrel | Erroko Musiken Zerrenda Iberiarra | Llista Ibérica de Músiques de Raigañu | Lista Iberica de Mosicas de Radiz | Lhista Eibérica de Músicas de Raiç |

That’s all the dífferent languages spoken in the Iberian peninsula. Anyone who has been to Bilbao or San Sebastain will recognise that Erroko Musiken Zerrenda Iberiarra is the Basque name

It seems to be based in Portugal but it covers music from all over Spain and the Basque Country.

Here is their mission statement…

We understand Iberian roots music as any musical expression with roots in Iberian cultures made anywhere on the planet, as well as any musical expression with roots anywhere on the planet made by Iberian artists and/or in Iberian lands, Iberian being understood as referring to any territory under Spanish, Portuguese, Andorran or Gibraltarian administration, including those located outside the Iberian Peninsula.

Every three months they publish a list of the best 25 albums. And then at Xmas they do a best of the year list. There are a lot of excellent artists, most of which are new to me. As icing on the cake, every quarter they also produce a SPOTIFY PLAYLIST of 25 songs.

We’ve talked about music from Spain and Portugal before on the AFTERWORD. Most recently Rosalia has quite rightly been getting a lot of attention.

Other names that have been mentioned are Mariza, Ana Moura, Ketama, Cesaria Evora, and thanks to @GUIRI we are now all fans of Linda Guilala

You’d think that living up here in the Frozen North, I wouldn’t get many chances to see many artists from Spain and Portugal.
But that’s not really so. I got to see Rosalia’s remarkable show at the Roskilde Festival in 2023.

And about 20 years ago, SÖDER TEATER here in Stockholm were for a while booking a lot of Portuguese artists. I got the opprtunity to see fado stars like Mariza, Ana Moura and Mafalda Arnauth and then some more modern bands like Deolinda and Oquestrada. They even booked the wonderful Ojos de Brujo, electro-flamenco from Barcelona.

Our summer Culture Festival booked another Barcelona band Muchachito Bombo Infierno. They kicked up a storm and had one guy in the job whose job it was throughout the gig to paint an enormous mural on a canvas at the back of the stage.

And a few years earlier, the festival had the remarkable world music band Radio Tarifa.
The name of the ensemble comes from an imaginary radio station in Tarifa, a small town in the Spanish province of Cadiz, Andalusia, the closest part of Spain to Morocco.

I hadn’t heard anything from them in years and was surprised and delighted that their comeback album, after 20 years absence , LA NOCHE, was LIMuR’s album of the year. Very good it is too.

Dig into those LIMuR lists and find your new favourites. In the comments, I’ll name some of my new discoveries…

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Comments

  1. RADIO TARIFA

    CARMINHO . A major star in the fado world. You maý know her as she sings a beautiful duet PROMESAS with Rosalia on her latest album.

    RETIMBRAR a band from Porto who’ve been going for years and sing wonderfully sophisticated, melodic pop songs.

    Also from Porto are SOPA DE PEDRA, a 10 piece, a capella women’s choir

    Dancas Obscuras, a Portuguese accordion quartet

    Doble Pletina , a pop band who write beautifully catchy pop songs. Just one song i was hooked.

    To make sure you get hooked, here’s another song..

    • Kenya! That sounds rather wonderful.

      I look forward to your report on the music scene in East Africa on your return.

      I suspect that there are not so many folk clubs with a chance for you to drop in and sing.

      • For me, the music scene of East Africa consists mainly of birdsong. My family’s life doesn’t much brush up against the local music scene, more’s the pity. However, my brother’s garden has resounded to an English trad baritone. I’ve brought shedloads of new songs with me.

    • I know what you mean, @junior-wells. It’s important that our music listening is a joy and not a chore. We can’t listen to everything.

      My Iberian binge this week is like going back to an enormous jigsaw I was working on years ago. Rediscovering old favourites and finding new artists that I really like.

      I was listening to this gorgeous 1990s song by San Sebastian band Le Mans.

      You Tube suggested this 2011 track from by a Barcelona band I’d never heard of.

      I was a fan on the spot. The magic of pop music, eh.

      You Tube and Spotify can sometimes make some excellent suggestions.

  5. It is often useful to look through threads of the past.

    Back in September 2024 we had this rather lively chat about fado….

    Farewell to the duddy duddies of fado?

    i enjoyed jogging my memory. Great to be reminded of that fine band Radio Macau.

    But had to hang my head in shame to see that @fitterstoke had wisely suggested that I listened more to Carminho.

    v

    I just found this excellent live set where she also explains a little about her relationship with fado.

    • Ah yes: I read your comment above, about the readers here probably knowing Carminho from the Rosalia album. I was just composing my mildly indignant response when I spotted this comment! I am certainly not the most wide-ranging, cosmopolitan listener when compared to your good self @Kaisfatdad (and other specialists here) – but I do love fado, especially gloomy, minor key fado. I assume that it speaks to the same part of my psyche that draws me to Nico and VdGG and Sibelius’ 4th symphony – but who knows?

      I haven’t seen that session above – looking forward to watching it!

  6. OMIRI from Lisbon is an ELECTROFOLK DJ and rather fun.

    Not just a knob-twiddler, he’s also a multi-instrumentalist.

    I wonder how common the Swedish nyckelharpa is in Portuguese folk music.

    Great to see that some of the audience are dancing,

    I suspect that our most nimble-footed contributor, @thecheshirecat, would be in his element.

    Here’s a funky fado.

    That really is quite a party that he’s got going on there. in those clips.

      • Great choice @hubert-rawlinson. She discovered the nyckelharpa whiLe studyIng here in Sweden

        Here’s WIKI…..

        After being awarded a biology scholarship in 2000, Alcaide travelled to Sweden where she was first exposed to the Nyckelharpa, a traditional Swedish instrument that dates from medieval times. Attracted by the complexity and depth of its sound, Alcaide taught herself how to play the nyckelharpa on the streets of Toledo, Spain.

        In 2005 she returned to Sweden to further pursue her music studies and to specialize in this Swedish folk instrument. During this time she was also influenced by other musical traditions and began studying other instruments and voice. She graduated from Malmö Academy of Music (Bachelor in Performing Arts) after successfully completing a personalized program in which she focused on world music, combining her interest in traditional music with the study of more modern techniques.

        As far as I know, she has never played in Stockholm, which is a shame.

        Like Radio Tarifa, she has explored Spain’s musical history.

  7. A quartet of Portuguese accordionists. To many of you that will sound like the Houseband from Hell.

    But I’ve taken a real shine to Danças Ocultas-

    This article Is an excellent Introduction

    https://www.cultureworks.at/en/dancas-ocultas/

    Four accordionsts from Agueda near Porto who are among the most innovative and most exciting representatives of contemporary Portuguese music. For 35 years now they have been rising on the international music scene – with an apparently very simple concept: tranquil, lyrical, more or less traditional, with only four diatonic accordions.

    The quartet’s name, Hidden Dances, has nothing to do with mysterious domains but means that Dancas Ocultas play music for dances that have yet to be invented. Famous Fado plays a minor role, the band’s inspiration comes rather from traditional village music, Tango Nuevo and the chamber music exemplified by the Russian Terem Quartet.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?

    v=ncabmbNsA0o&list=PLN9YVdk7twdg2RbWpgjvRVp9dKxnIOD7_

    Interestingly, one of their biggest fans is Gabriel Gomes, the accordionist of Madredeusm whose album O Espiritu do Paz was the first Portuguese music I’d ever heard. I was spellbound.

    They were enormously successful internationally. and Wim Wenders was a mega-fan. He made a movie with them

    So were many Japanese music lovers……

  8. Time to go Up North to the Basque country and another finne accordionist, whose music will make you want to dance. XABI BURRUXAGA

    Perfect for the DANCE TENT at a summer folk festival.

    West to Galicia now. I heard this floorfiller on Swedish radio this morning….

    Berroguetto are veterans of the Galician Celtic music scene. Sit back and enjoy.

  9. We’ve just had a couple of tracks by artists from the north coast of Spain.

    The Basque Country which for many reasons, not least their very idiosyncratic language, is a law to itself.

    And then there are the two autonomous communities of Asturias and Galicia, both of which have a strong Celtic identity.

    To my regret, I have never been to this part of Spain. But I have a good friend here in Stockholm who used to work in the Basque Country and makes frequent visits, He’s introduced me to a lot of stuff, not least underground band, Negu Gorriak

    and accordion maestro, Kepa Junkera

    Kepa is a real local hero, but the chap playing the pipes, Carlos Nunes, became quite an international celebrity due to the two years he spent on the road with The Chieftains 25 or so years ago.. I knew of his music but until today I’d not heard about his work with Paddy Moloney and his band.

    This article put me in the picture.

    https://www.folkworld.de/3/carlos.html

    It’s a extraordinary story. And it all started in Brittany at the Lorient Celtic Festival. Celtic Connections in Glasgow started in 1994. The Inter-Celtic Festival of Lorient is an annual Celtic festival, located in the city of Lorient, Brittany, France. was founded in 1971 by the legendary piper, Polig Monjarret, who became good friends with Paddy Moloney.

    Here’s an except from the article

    When Carlos was 13, he had his first concert outside of Spain, at the Lorient Celtic Festival. “In Lorient I met many, many musicians from other countries, and all this international character of Celtic music impressed me. When I was 13, I promised to myself: Carlos, your life will be the celtic music, the traditional music. So after that my life was a correct line, all the time.” Indeed it was. In the same year he has had this talk with Paddy Moloney, and from then on his carreer went from one height to the next.
    At the age of 18 Carlos recorded with the Chieftains his first film, ‘Treasure Island’. He remembers that it was very important for Spain, “all the people in Spain, when they saw the captain John Silver with the ‘lorro’ (parrot) – and Galician pipes, that was – ‘What’s that, what’s that’ in Spain. And ‘Treasure Island’ was also a very important work for me.”
    “After ‘Treasure Island, I started to make very long tours with the Chieftains, America, Australia, Japan – countries I never could imagine that Celtic music works there.” And then he had the opportunity to record his first album – before that, he had collaborated in many projects and many albums; first time that he has recorded he was 15.

    His first own album, ‘Brotherhood of Stars’, is, as Carlos states, “a solo album, but it is a very special album”. Nearly 50 guests were invited for this album, and reading the names of those guests you can already see what status Carlos has in the intnernational music scene. There are Celtic musicians (the Chieftains), but also from the Rock’n’Roll, from the Cuban Latin music, from the flamenco. Actually it is the first time that flamenco music is played together with Celtic music, pipes with Flamenco guitar – that was never before. “I thing it is pure fire. For me the collaborations are very important, because on this way we can open the Celtic music to new ideas, to new audiences. We have on the album a song with a Spanish pop star called Luz Casal, she is a voice from the Rock’n’Roll, but this kind of voice sometimes works very well with this music – why? – because it is a very energetic kind of voice. – And with the Bluesman Ry Cooder; he couldn’t imagine himself playing Spanish celtic music, you know, with his Blues guitar. I met Ry Cooder, when I recorded with the Chieftains and Sinead O’Connor in New York, two years ago. And he was very interested in this double connection, the Celtic and Latin. And he is one of the 40 or 50 guests.”

    Here’s Carlos on tour with the Chieftains

    And here he is with Ry Cooder

  10. The Chieftains’ interest in the Celtic music of Galicia led to the album Santiago in 1996 which was a remarkable labour of love. I’d never listened to it today and it is a remarkable album.

    Along with the Chieftains and Carlos Nunez, the musicians include Ry Cooder, Linda Ronstadt and Los Lobos, And from Cuba, Omara Portoundo and Compay Segundo, who went on to work with Ry on the Buena Vista Social Club album.

    Do read this excellent article.

    https://grokipedia.com/page/santiago_album

    I had no idea that so many emigrants from Galicia settled on Cuba.

    From Santiago de Compostela to Santiago de Cuba.

    Just to round things off, here are the Chieftains in concert with Kepa and Carlos

    What a treat, Enjoy.

    There’s rather lovely version of Raglan Road,

    i love Celtic Heartbeat, the album they did with Van.

  11. While we’re up here in Asturias and Galicia, we ought to say something about the gaita, the distinctive local bagpipes, and the gaiteros, the pipers who play them.

    What better example than Susanne ?

    She is real bagpipe royalty. Her dad is a famous bagpipe maker and her grandad was a famous piper.

    I learnt all that from this rather informative review from 2002-

    https://agreenmanreview.com/music-2/susana-seivanes-alma-de-buxo/

    It is actually rather remarkable how much the denizens of this blog know about all the different kinds of bagpipes. Just take a look at this vintage thread from 2022…

    Today is of course International Bagpipe Day

    Finally, an article bout the Celtic culture of Galicia by Amanda Hogan which is an excellent read…

    https://folkworks.org/blog/returning-riotously-joy-filled/

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