Latin-Beat vs. Afro-Beat: Take Your Pick

If LA is any indication, then musica Latina and Afro-Beat are the two cornerstones of world music. I’d say that’s about right. LA is closer to Latin America of course, so it’s only logical that that style is a little bit easier to come by here than the African. But we get top-notch salseros from New York, also, such as Sammy Figueroa and Oscar Hernandez who played at MacArthur Park on Wednesday night. I wouldn’t place them any higher than Jose Rizo’s ‘Jazz on the Latin Side All-Stars’ at Hollywood & Highland Tuesday night, though. Maybe it’s because Justo Almario played with both, or maybe it’s because Jose Rizo has truly rounded up some of the best players in LA all in one place. I wasn’t familiar with them before the show, so sauntered in late and was barely able to squeeze my butt in. Jose Rizo’s group includes such luminaries as Poncho Sanchez, Alex Acuna, and a list that goes on forever. What Sammy Figueroa had were the sensitive songs and arrangements of keyboardist Hernandez, songs with a personal touch, not covers. Songs are always better when performed by the original composer.

The African music last week was provided by Mili Mili. Though a mélange of styles sung in Arabic, Portuguese, and Swahili, this music most closely resembles that from the Eastern ‘Swahili’ Coast of Africa and is distinct from typical ‘Afro-Beat’, less funky and livelier, a la Caribe. Add in elements of Brazilian music and Algerian ‘rai’ and you’ve got something truly unique. I hope to see more of these guys. Afro-Beat can take on many other forms also, given their worldwide forced diaspora. One of the most unlikely is that of the Garifuna on the shores of Central America. This was the style of music on hand at Grand Performances at the water court of Cal Plaza on Friday, played by the Garifuna Collective and joined by Umalali, a group of women singers who can wail with the best of them. They were here for a tribute to the late Andy Palacio, who died suddenly of heart problems a few months ago. They dress in the same Aunt Jemima style you find from Salvador, Bahia, Brazil to Clarksdale, Coahoma County, Mississippi, and though certainly their music is that of Africa, it has been filtered through many influences of church and state.

In fact the Umalali women’s sometimes-eerie wailing is reminiscent of the American Indian chanting you can hear any Sunday morning on KUYI from the Hopi rez. Maybe this is not as strange as it seems on the surface, and not just a figment of my imagination, for while much is made of the Garifuna’s preservation of African culture on the American coast, this is not entirely true. The language they speak is an Arawak-based one, hence their former designation as ‘Black Caribs’, notwithstanding the fact that Caribs and Arawaks were separate groups frequently at odds with each other. Misery loves company of course and survival seeks the straightest path to fulfillment, so here we bask in the glory of their accomplishment. Perhaps vocals are passed through the mitochondrial DNA of music, the women’s lineage. You heard it here first. BTW for all the rap about the 'tenuousness' of Garifuna culture, that's because many are now in Bed-Stuy and South LA. Very few if any 'Red' or 'White' Caribs remain anywhere. As in Mexico, ancient voices speak through modern disease-resistant carriers.

Another anomaly of this diaspora a la force is the import of the African marimba to become the national instrument of Guatemala. This is the broad sort of music Masanga Marimba brought to the Mac on Thursday. Barack was accepting his nomination that night so I only heard one song by them, but I liked it. The puny tinkling that passes for Guatemalan traditional music is totally transformed when played by a half-dozen or so wild men at so many monster marimbas. Supposedly this was Zimbabwean marimba music, but since I'm not familiar with such and since there were no Africans in the band, I couldn't attest to it. Taiko Project was there that night too doing something similar with Japanese theatrical drumming. This is the kind of Chinese-descended orchestral drumming I'd hoped to see earlier at a Korean show, but didn't find. I've been interested in this ever since I saw my wood-carvers in Hanoi building a drum almost as big as the room it was being built in. The highlight of the evening was the two ensembles playing together while police arrested a man in the audience for d & d. Price of the music? Free. Price of the show? Priceless.

The music doesn’t die as the summer comes to an end, but it definitely starts going into hibernation. Still it’s not over yet; summer still has a couple weeks to go. This week the best tickets look like Los Pinguos at Cal Plaza Friday noon and Stratospheerius that same evening at MacArthur Park. See you there.