Welcome to the latest post in the Homegrown Plus series, featuring Susana Behar, one of the leading voices in Sephardic Song, with a hand-picked ensemble of accompanists. Just like other blogs in the series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with Susana, and connections to Library of Congress collections. Susana Behar was born in Havana to a Cuban family with roots in the Sephardic community of Turkey. From an early age, she was immersed in the traditional music of her homeland as well as the evocative kantikas in Judeo-Spanish (Ladino) passed down by her grandparents. In 1965 she emigrated to Venezuela, where she started to explore and perform the music of her adoptive country as well as Latin American and Jewish folk music. She earned a degree in biology from the Universidad Central de Venezuela before moving to Miami, where she has lived and performed ever since. In the concert, she performs Sephardic, Cuban, and Venzuelan songs, joined by Michel Gonzalez on guitar, Adolfo Herrera on percussion, and Saul Vera on mandolin and bandola llana. In the interview, she tells us about her life in Cuba, the trauma of her family’s departure, and her life in Venezuela and the United States, with an emphasis on the intersection of her Latin American and Jewish heritage.
The latest post in the Homegrown Plus series features Ensemble Sangineto, one of the most popular groups on the Italian folk scene. Just like other blogs in the series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with the musicians, and connections to Library of Congress collections. The ensemble Sangineto is comprised of three talented singers and instrumentalists. Adriano and Caterina Sangineto are twins -- Adriano plays Celtic harp and Caterina plays bowed psaltery. Jacopo Ventura rounds out the trio on guitar. The group sings in three-part harmony, with Caterina's clear voice taking the lead. The Sanginetos are children of a world-renowned luthier who has spent years crafting instruments for some of the leading folk and early music performers, so their childhood was spent meeting and listening to such musicians as Derek Bell of the Chieftains and Alan Stivell, a foundational artist of the Breton music revival. Ventura is a conservatory trained classical guitarist who has branched out to play many of the stringed instruments common in European and Asian folk music. Their concert takes you on a trip through Italy via a traditional song from each region, with medieval, Celtic, jazz, and contemporary stylings among others, thrown in for good measure.
In the interview, we learn about their lives and the world of Italian folk music.
The latest post in the Homegrown Plus series features Boots Lupenui and the Kohala Mountain Boys performing heritage songs of the Kohala region of the Big Island of Hawai’i. Led by Boots Lupenui, the Kohala Mountain Boys are committed to uncovering and preserving musical treasures that helped to define the moku of Kohala on Hawai'i Island. In Boots's words, "Old-time Kohala music is soulful, playful, poetic and fierce, the manifold voice of a vibrant and extraordinary people. We want to recover and share the heirloom songs currently known only to a few isolated and precious old voices, their words and tunes unsung for years. The ancient musical essence of our beloved and mystical Kohala may be lost in this generation. Reclaiming our heirloom songs strengthens our ancestral ties to our homeland. It is a source of pride that can be shared by all the families and all the people of Kohala, for generations to come." Lupenui and his team were the recipients of a Community Collections Grant to document songs written by Kohala residents which might otherwise be lost; the collection is online at the Library of Congress website. This concert provides another way to experience these songs. Just like other blogs in the series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with the musicians, and connections to Library of Congress collections, as well as Boots's finished documentary film about documenting the heirloom songs of Kohala.
Welcome to our latest post in the Homegrown Plus series, featuring Louis Michot and Leyla McCalla, an outstanding duo performing traditional French-language music from Louisiana. Just like other blogs in the series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with the musicians, and connections to Library of Congress collections. Louis Michot is a fiddle player and lead singer for the Grammy-award-winning Lost Bayou Ramblers. In addition to fiddle and vocals, Louis plays guitar, bass, ti-fer (triangle), and accordion--all the instruments of a typical Cajun band. Leyla McCalla was born in New York City to Haitian emigrants and activists. McCalla is a master of the cello, tenor banjo, and guitar, as well as a multilingual singer and songwriter. She is a founding member of Our Native Daughters and has appeared at the Library of Congress as a member of the Grammy-award-winning Black string band The Carolina Chocolate Drops. This event spotlights the New Orleans-based Nous Foundation and their Community Collections Grant project, "La Musique Nous Réunit: Documenting Louisiana French Music."
In this post, the American Folklife Center highlights a July 2024 concert performance and oral history interview with the Swanky Kitchen Band--an ensemble performing fiddle-based kitchen band music from the Cayman Islands.
The latest post in the Homegrown Plus series features the Skye Consort and Emma Björling, an eclectic group performing British, Irish, Canadian, and Scandinavian music and songs in a variety of traditional and modern styles. Just like other blogs in the series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with the musicians, and connections to Library of Congress collections.
This post in the Homegrown Plus series features the Windborne Trio, a vocal group from New England. Windborne is usually a quartet, but Jeremy Carter Gordon was prevented from performing at this show. Luckily, before Jeremy joined the group, Windborne toured as a trio, so they had the repertoire, arrangements, and experience to put together a stunning show without him. Consequently, for this concert Windborne was Lynn Mahoney Rowan, Will Thomas Rowan, and Lauren Breunig. In their concert they performed a mix of old and new favorites, including American, English, Georgian, Corsican, and Basque songs. Just like other blogs in the Homegrown Plus series, this one includes a concert video, a video interview with the musicians, and connections to Library of Congress collections.
In this post, the American Folklife Center (AFC) highlights a May 2024 concert performance and oral history interview with the Somapa Thai Dance Company and Orchestra--an ensemble performing traditional music from Thailand, whose members now predominately live in the Washington, DC metropolitan region. The AFC organized Somapa's performance in celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and as part of the 2024 Homegrown Concert Series.
Rachel Sumner and Traveling Light, a trio from the Boston area playing bluegrass and old time music, are the latest entry in our Homegrown Plus series, in which we include a concert video, an interview video, and a set of links to explore. You'll find it all in this post...along with a bonus song video! Singer, multi-instrumentalist, and Lennon Award-winning songwriter Rachel Sumner is a fixture of the Boston roots and Americana scene. She fronts the trio Traveling Light on vocals, guitar and banjo, with Kat Wallace on fiddle and Mike Siegel on upright bass. Together they specialize in applying their deeply rooted bluegrass know-how to new interpretations of traditional folk songs and tightly crafted original songs written by Sumner. The band has previously participated in our Archive Challenge at Folk Alliance International and contributed a song to our special Labor Day presentation in 2003. In this concert they made a special effort to play some songs that are part of the American Folklife Center archive, making this another entry in the Archive Challenge as well.
