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Strings Attached
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Beat (The), Strings Attached >>
One of the joys of listening to South African Zulu vocal ensemble Ladysmith Black Mambazo is the way in which the male voices fill all the aural space. The waves of harmony hang beautiful tones and overtones on nearly every conceivable sonic notch, while the slow legato style leaves few nooks and crannies for ornamentation, much less a breath. So, the strings of the English Chamber Orchestra and members of the International Festival Orchestra have their work cut out for them on No Boundaries (Heads Up Africa). Arranger Isak Roux floats violins over the choral group's heads, sweeps low strings under their feet, and stirs in bouts of percussion. Between verses he interpolates orchestral maneuvers that primarily restate the melodic themes and mark time until the voices re-enter. While this isn't far off the mark from what orchestration does for pop music in general, it would have made a huge difference if a dazzling soloist urged us to actually look forward to the instrumental sections.
Paul Simon showed lots of smarts co-writing "Homeless" with Ladysmith's Joseph Shabalala. The pair penned a memorable song that played to both artists' strengths. A similar approach would have worked wonders on this project. Simply supplementing "Homeless" with strings doesn't improve on the original a cappella version, and the same can be said for "Awu Wemadoda." Sometimes the instrumental additions actually make for a bit of an incongruous muddle. The violins and donkey clip-clops that introduce "Dona No- bis Pacem" resemble a Van Dyke Parks slice of pop Americana and mix weirdly with the Latin lyrics despite the song's folkie African gospel character. Give it points for confounding genre expectations, I guess.
On other tracks, transplanting Ladysmith to classical music turf definitely yields a mixed bag. Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" has the virtue of combining tenor Robert Brooks with the Ladysmith blend of voices, but Roux's arrangement takes the starch out of the Zulus by shoving them into the background. "Sanctus (Heilig, Heilig, Heilig)" is something else again, however. The interplay between the operatic Brooks and the hymnal Ladysmith is inspired, and the alternation between Schubert's text and Shabalala's Zulu vocal parts is brilliant. More of this equal give and take would have made the entire cd must-listen, rather than just this single track. As it is, No Boundaries is lovely and dependably attractive, especially for folks uncomfortable with an entire disc of unaccompanied vocal music. It just doesn't fly as high as it might have. 03/01/05
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