Parno Graszt

Over the last 20 years, Parno Graszt has done more than simply play the music of Northeast Hungarian Gypsies; they are that music. Their lifestyles as Roma and their music-making are inextricably intertwined.

This connection shows in the instruments the eight musicians of Parno Graszt use in their uplifting renditions of unique song traditions from their native area: everything from guitars, tambura, and accordion, to milk churn, a stereo pair of water cans, and rollicking improvised vocal bass lines.

Cited by many of Eastern Europe's leading Roma/Gypsy bands—including Little Cow—as an invaluable influence, Parno Graszt's uninhibited, boisterous, and community-oriented shows blur the line between audience and band, as the players leap off the stage and pass instruments and salutations freely around the room. Speaking for many a critic and fan, Simon Broughton (Rough Guide's ethnographer extraordinaire and editor of UK world music magazine Songlines) enthused, "They do not use sources of Gypsy music; they are the source itself."


Natacha Atlas

For Natacha Atlas, almost anything can be roots music. Born in Belgium to an Arab Muslim father of Palestinian, Egyptian, Moroccan, and Sephardic lineage and an English mother, Atlas grew up in the Moroccan-dominated suburbs of Brussels. There she become fluent in French, Spanish, Arabic, and English; immersed herself in Arabic culture; and trained in raqs sharki (belly dance).

Atlas’s incandescent voice shimmers with an evocative command of the complexities of Arabic music. Her own style, which she playfully calls cha’abi moderne, fuses Arabic and North African music with Western electronic music, and demonstrates wide-ranging influences from Arabesque (the Arab-influenced music of Turkey) to drum 'n' bass and reggae.

In 2001, Atlas was appointed as a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Conference Against Racism. According to Mary Robinson, the 1997-2000 UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights, Atlas “embodies the message that there is strength in diversity. Our differences—be they ethnic, racial or religious—are a source of riches to be embraced, rather than feared."


Steve Riley & The Mamou Playboys

The three-time Grammy Award-nominated Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys have spent decades plumbing their Cajun roots. The result fills dance floors while maintaining a stunningly clean and cohesive approach to the beautifully varied sounds of their Southwest Louisiana stomping grounds. Drawing on the area’s wealth of French, Scottish, Afro-Caribbean, Native American, and German influences, the Playboys know how to rock and how to reveal the soul of a region whose diversity reflects that of America itself.

Steve Riley is a widely acknowledged master of the Cajun accordion and its singularly powerful sound. He combines his virtuosity with searing emotional vocals, strong songwriting, soulful fiddling, and onstage charisma.

David Greely is one of Cajun music's most eloquent voices on the fiddle. Driven by a hunger for knowledge and harmony, he revels in archival research, unearthing rare melodies, linguistic arcana, and historical prose and poetry which he crafts into songs that marry the distant past to the future.

Guitarist Sam Broussard plays acoustic, electric, and electric slide guitar and carries the music of his ancestry to radically new places. His skilled and passionate solos often end in cloudbursts of spontaneous applause.

Kevin Dugas' percussion and Blazos Huval’s electric bass stoke the boilers and make the musical machinery of The Playboys run effortlessly, whether they are singing ballads of mournful lost loves or whipping out a blazing, irresistible two-step.


La Excelencia (L.A. premiere)

NYC-based La Excelencia is at the forefront of a new generation of salsa, musicians committed to infusing the party-hardy genre with a cutting-edge vibe and social consciousness. These revolutionary salsa ambassadors’ bold new sounds and potent messages have caught on with dancers and fans worldwide.

The life of the barrio moves La Excelencia’s music and its hardcore, horn-intensive sound, known as salsa dura. In a mere five years since its founding, the young twelve-piece salsa orchestra has been called “the real deal” by the New York Times, released two critically acclaimed albums, and sold out the world-famous Barbican in London in a concert that was broadcast live on the BBC. Currently, La Excelencia is one of the most sought-out salsa orchestras around the globe.

Jews on Vinyl Revue (L.A. premiere)

Presented in association with the Idelsohn Society for Musical Preservation, the Jews on Vinyl Revue brings musical legends and pioneers together with up-and-coming musicians to create a one-of-a-kind intergenerational collaboration.

An international singing star from Tel Aviv to Tokyo, Hedva Amrani is a third-generation Sabra, born to a leading Yemenite family in Israel. She had her first hit in the 1960s while serving in the Israeli Defense Forces and has recorded albums in Israel, Japan, and the United States. She rose to fame as part of the ’60s duo Hedva & David, whose song "I Dream of Naomi" won first place at the Yahama Song Festival in Tokyo, went gold, and established Hedva & David as major stars in Japan. The duo disbanded in the 1970s, but Hedva has had a thriving international solo career ever since. She continues to release solo albums in the U.S., Israel, and Japan.

A visionary jazz pioneer, Kabbalist, and anthropology professor, Fred Katz is best known for introducing cello to jazz, which he perfected in the 1950s with his famous stint with West Coast jazz legends, the Chico Hamilton Quintet. Katz has had an extraordinary career, from his early days studying with Pablo Casals, to his work in Hollywood scoring Roger Corman films like Little Shop of Horrors and A Bucket of Blood. He also wrote an anti-Vietnam War piece for solo cello entitled "The Soldier Puppet," and had a stint in the late 50’s as an A&R man for Decca Records, where he created the experimental Jazz Moods series.

From solo jazz cello albums like Fred Katz and His Jammers to his stint conducting jazz arrangements for Sidney Poitier (the forgotten Sidney Poitier Reads Plato album) and Harpo Marx (the almost forgotten Harpo in Hi-Fi) and his 1980s stint teaching jazz in a Benedictine monastery with a bongo-playing nun and a sax-playing priest, Fred Katz’s musical career continues to delight and surprise everyone involved.

Kenge Kenge (California premiere)

The guardians and masters of ancient yet vital sounds from Kenya, Kenge Kenge’s name in the Luo language means the “fusion of small, exhilarating instruments.” And indeed, the group transforms the intriguing traditional instruments of the Luo people into something new, festive, and funky. Their infectious performances are full of exuberance and joie de vivre.

Originally formed in the early 1990s to back a choir, the group soon began to focus more on roots music from the Luo community of Western Kenya, characterized by lyrical arrangements and hints of guitar-driven benga pop music. Dense textures of rhythm and chant are overlaid with an unusual assortment of self-made traditional instruments: nyatiti lyre, bul drums, the nyangile sound box, ongeng’o metal rings, asili flute, and the oporo horn.

Despite the menagerie of striking instrumental sounds, the vocals are the true centerpiece of Kenge Kenge, full of character and contrast. Their video “Obama For Change” became a YouTube phenomenon and played a role in inspiring the international campaign in support of Barack Obama. Tremendously popular at home, Kenge Kenge have toured from Norway to Thailand, bringing their irresistible dance music and sense of celebration to the world.