Sommaire pour May 2026 de Songlines

Latin music is having a moment. In truth, it’s been happening for a while, but it has finally hit the UK. Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl half-time show in February – predominantly performed in Spanish – helped his last album, DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS (released in January 2025), reach #2 on the UK album charts. Then, in March, Rosalía won International Artist of the Year at the Brit Awards, thanks to LUX, released late last year. It made her the first artist who doesn’t primarily sing in English to win a Brit. There has always been talk of Latin music breaking through. There was the Latin pop explosion of the late 90s with Ricky Martin, Jennifer Lopez and Enrique Iglesias, with Shakira not far behind. Then reggaeton had its first wave.…

The ornate and rather magisterial confines of Rochdale Town Hall were the setting for an evening of live music on Tuesday, March 17, which highlighted how broad the criteria can be for an award dedicated to folk, roots and acoustic albums from Britain and Ireland. In total, nine albums from 2025 had been nominated for this first-ever Folk Album of the Year award, and eight of the nominees played on the night. Scottish harpist Grace Stewart-Skinner and her group provided an early moment of catharsis, her field recordings of local voices speaking the disappearing Avochie dialect dissipating to reveal intricate compositions featuring Stewart-Skinner’s clàrsach (harp), alongside violin, double bass and restless drums. Peggy Seeger notched up the emotion even further with a spell-binding rendition of ‘The First Time Ever I…

Kiya Tabassian has spent over two decades building bridges. Exiled from Iran at 14, he settled in Montréal and founded Constantinople in 2001, an ensemble that has made the dialogue between Persian tradition, Mediterranean music and contemporary composition its defining purpose. Their longest and perhaps most loved collaboration is with Senegalese griot and kora master Ablaye Cissoko, a partnership that began over ten years ago and has now produced a third album. Estuaire is a cycle of intimate musical portraits honouring quiet, real-life figures encountered over years of shared touring. We spoke with Tabassian about that journey and his experiences of exile, especially in light of the US-Israel war on Iran. Your partnership with Ablaye Cissoko goes back many years. Why do you keep returning to this collaboration? What makes…

The Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona is my favourite concert hall in Europe and one of the architectural highlights in a city overflowing with them. The Palau isn’t a Gaudí, like many of Barcelona’s most famous buildings, but shares his Catalan Modernista style, which is less like the modernism of minimal Bauhaus and more akin to a local version of Art Nouveau, such as Jugendstil in Germany or Secession in Austro-Hungary. Built between 1905 and 1908 for the Orfeo Català choral society, it is the only concert hall in the world to be declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The architect was Lluís Domènech i Montaner (1849–1923), three years Gaudí’s senior. The outside of the building is a flamboyant combination of brick, stone, tiles and mosaic. Inside, the…

In Mexico, one can’t feel pain unless one sings it,” says Silvana Estrada. “It’s such a misogynistic country – tough guys who don’t get hurt, but hurt others. Chavela [Vargas] opened a world of feelings to people; she was a safe space where you could cry, hug your friend and tell someone you love them. She sang from her own pain, so you could feel yours.” Estrada is currently touring her critically acclaimed second solo album, Vendrán Suaves Lluvias (2025), a devastatingly fragile collection of songs led by her acoustic guitar and Venezuelan cuatro playing, underscored by emotive string arrangements with touches of Hammond organ, pedal steel, harp and brass. But the album could not have been made without the influence of Chavela Vargas, a towering figure in Mexican ranchera…

We review full-length global music, roots and folk albums (not singles or EPs), available on CD, digital or vinyl. Please note we only accept digital submissions. Email details of albums to reviews@songlines.co.uk for consideration African Fiesta Roger Izeidi Presents Vita Matata With African Fiesta Planet Ilunga 9/10 A powerhouse from the golden age of Congolese rumba. African Fiesta was formed in 1963 by singer Tabu Ley Rochereau and the brilliant guitarist ‘Dr. Nico’ Kasanda after they had left Le Grand Kallé’s seminal orchestra African Jazz. They brought several others with them, too, including on maracas the resourcefully entrepreneurial Roger Izeidi, who had managed African Jazz and formed the label Vita – sometimes called ‘Vita Matata’, a Swahili phrase that translates as ‘intense battle’ – almost solely as an outlet for…

Charlie Wheatley’s Ratcliffe Cross (Charlie Wheatley, 8/10) is a beautifully thoughtful instrumental set. The London-born musician looks to England and Wales for his debut: a fine collection of traditional dance tunes filtered through a contemporary, yet never obtrusive, sound: “a conversation between the old and the new”, as Wheatley describes it. The album takes its name from the area in East London’s docklands where Wheatley lived while working on the record, and a sense of history and vitality pulses throughout. ‘Jack Warrel’s’ softens the traditional hornpipe into a more playful, hypnotic touch of loveliness, while ‘Petticoat’ takes Playford’s ‘PetticoatWag’ and loosens it into a chilled, smooth dance. It’s a charmingly intimate recording, with Wheatley performing solo guitar, viola, harmonium and cello da spalla. Instrumentals continue on Night Flight ’75 (Vertical…

Adrianne Greenbaum Di Klezmer Flute Nisht Fargesn Borscht Beat 8/10 The dramatically fraught, poignantly expository nature of klezmer music courses through Di Klezmer Flute Nisht Fargesn, the latest full-length recording by celebrated classical flautist, historian and educator Adrianne Greenbaum. With keen facility Greenbaum breathes new emotional life into familiar klezmer material, while her original compositions uphold the contemporary vitality of the tradition itself. From the swinging cadence of ‘Grupp’s Kichel Bulgar’, a sprightly wedding dance featuring Joshua Horowitz on button accordion, to the solemnly paced ‘Far Di Kale’, Greenbaum explores Jewish marriage and celebratory music. To ‘Seven Blessings/Sheva Brachot,’ Greenbaum’s flute lends crystalline support to glorious chanting by her cousin and a close colleague. ‘Fun Der Khupe’ is infused with infectious effervescence. ‘Triplik’s Dobranotch’, a Greenbaum original, stems from a…

Tamás Szőnyei Popular Music and the Secret Service in Hungary, 1945–1990: Records, Files and Uncovered Stories Routledge This is the first account of how the secret service attempted to oppress dissent in popular music in socialist Hungary. Tamás Szőnyei worked in the Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security, and it’s from that first-hand source that most of the previously unseen documentation comes. Hungary was the most liberal of the Eastern Bloc countries, with less censorship and more freedoms than its more hardline neighbours. This was the policy of János Kádár, the Communist leader put in charge after the crushing of the 1956 uprising by Soviet troops. His appointment appeased Moscow and brought benefits to the Hungarian population. While Elvis was never seen on Hungarian screens, rock’n’roll did reach Hungary,…

True to George’s word, The Rose Hill has plenty going on to interest Songlines readers. Check out Hekatones on 24 APR and the Brazilian coco rhythms of Coco dos Pretos on 4 JUN. The line-up for Brighton Festival is looking strong this year with Asian Dub Foundation performing a live film score for La Haine (7 MAY), Sampa the Great being joined by WITCH as Zamrock Allstars (9 MAY) and Beninese legend Angélique Kidjo (16 MAY) just a few of the highlights across May. Concorde 2 is a seafront venue hosting everything from the high-energy The Cuban Brothers (8 MAY) to roots acts like Valerie June (1 JUN). Green Door Store is an independent venue known for bold programming and strong community spirit. Check out country blues singer Charlie Parr…

In the 1920s and 30s, dance orchestras played in ballrooms and at private events for Ghana’s coastal elite. There, they developed a style which borrowed from local rhythms, including those of Ghana’s neighbours, as well as the music introduced by Afro-Caribbean soldiers stationed on the coast. With big bands utilising similar instruments to their Western counterparts, this up-tempo music came to be known as highlife, due to the lifestyles of the rich denizens who came to see the bands. After Ghana gained independence in 1957, highlife became akin to a national music. Groups increasingly incorporated local percussion, utilising brass in a similarly funky fashion to Afrobeat, and eventually the guitar became the lead instrument. It’s fair to say that from the late 60s, and through the 70s, thanks to artists…

Alana Casanova-Burgess had been covering Puerto Rican culture for various media outlets when Hurricane Maria hit the island in 2017, causing almost 3,000 deaths. “I don’t think there’s a Puerto Rican person on the planet who wasn’t affected by that”, she says. The daughter of a Puerto Rican mother and an English father, Alana grew up in the Dominican Republic and regularly visited her mother’s country as a child. Now resident in New York, she visited Puerto Rico following the hurricane, producing a dispatch for public radio titled ‘After the Storm’ on what was actually happening. In that report, she homed in on how the media distorts events after a natural disaster, and on what she describes as “Trump’s villainy” in regard to the US president’s response. The report was…

Magnus Mehta & Sarathy Korwar – What Does It Mean? Russ: What do you get when you put two percussionists in a London studio with hundreds of percussion instruments? The results could be horrendous, but thankfully, on this new EP, Mehta and Korwar delicately process kanjira, tabla, calabash, balafon and more to create restless, inquisitory grooves possessing a strange, compelling beauty. Arooj Aftab & Beck ‘Lilac Wine’ Erin: Arooj Aftab and Beck unite on a special rendition of ‘Lilac Wine’, released as part of the HELP(2) album, proceeds from which go to support children affected by conflict. It largely stays true to the emotive bare-bones style of the Buckley and Simone versions, but gradually blossoms into a stunning duet, Aftab’s and Beck’s soft, yet powerful, voices entwining to give the…

WIN Sam Grassie p70 One of three vinyl versions of the Glaswegian singer-songwriter’s Where Two Hawks Fly could be yours. Just tell us: Who directed 1980 fantasy flick, Hawk the Slayer? Ali & Charif Megarbane p44 Win one of three vinyl editions of psychedelic Indonesian-Arab collab Tirakat by answering this question: In which city was Megarbane born? Huw Marc Bennett p82 Bag one of three vinyl copies of the Welsh instrumentalist’s enigmatic folk-jazz album Heol Las by answering the following: Which animal’s skull is the focus for the Mari Lwyd ritual? COMPETITIONS Submit your entry for each competition via the website: songlines.co.uk/competitions. Winners will be chosen at random. Only one entry per competition per household. No cash alternatives. If you would prefer not to be sent details of other Songlines…

“I’m not a professional, just passionate,” insists Bart Cattaert, founder and owner of Brussels-based Planet Ilunga, a label dedicated to Congolese music, particularly the sound of Congolese rumba, or ‘Rumba Lingala’. This genre emerged in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo during the late 1940s, characterised by a fusion of local traditions with Cuban music (which was being imported into the country by labels such as EMI beginning in the 1930s). Planet Ilunga focuses on archival recordings from the 1950s and 60s, released on high-quality vinyl with extensive sleeve notes. Cattaert first encountered his now-beloved music some 20 years back, having stumbled across a compilation CD. “I was enchanted,” he enthuses, “it became an addiction.” Cattaert began devouring all the literature to be found on the subject and…

Bay recently. Dad’s shock Alzheimer’s Disease diagnosis and sudden retirement have hit this family extremely hard in the last four months. We knew it would happen eventually, but were hoping that these final dates, and a summer season of a select few festivals, would be a nice way for him to bid farewell to his many fans after last spring’s gorgeous US tour. So, life does its thing! And the dates have indeed been wonderful, just without my genius father’s presence, though he did rehearse with us and exists in the music, albeit transformed into a fish, swimming through everyone’s memories and his incredible body of work. I must deliver here our gratitude to the many friends, peers and admirers of Dad who have stepped up to support our family…

Four musicians are on stage, playing tango with incisive passion and vigour. There’s a violinist – occasionally throwing in that scratchy rhythmic chichara that gives tango music its bite – joined by a bandoneón player, a flat-cap-wearing double bassist and a final member sat at the grand piano. They’re playing to a packed-out hall at Bozar, Brussels’ leading music and arts venue, and though their encore is by Astor Piazzolla, the purpose of their show is to introduce the music of a contemporary of Piazzolla’s, the virtually unknown, but fascinating Eduardo Rovira. The musicians call themselves SONICO, taking their name from a Rovira album/composition, and they formed just over 10 years ago in Brussels. They wanted to show that Piazzolla, tango’s most celebrated composer, wasn’t the genre’s only tearaway; that…

Charif Megarbane  Hawalat (Habibi Funk, 2025) From hypnotic Somali grooves to smoky, swirling beat‑tape textures, drifting through the melancholy flair of classic Italian film scores and Arabic melodies made even more affecting by Sven Wunder’s lush, heart‑tugging strings, Hawalat traces the threads of Megarbane’s musical explorations and weaves them into a gorgeous, incredibly cohesive record. Cosmic Analog Ensemble Expo Botanica (Hisstology, 2022) From one of Megarbane’s strongest solo projects, Expo Botanica animates the secret life of plants through fuzztone guitars reminiscent of 1960s and 70s exploitation cinema, buoyed by the airy, playful charm of library‑inspired orchestrations and swelling synths. Trans-Mara Express  All By Mistake (Hisstology, 2015) Though Trans‑Mara Express is one of Megarbane’s more electronic solo outlets, All By Mistake leans firmly into beat‑tape territory: short, sample‑driven sketches built on…

Aline Gonçalves, Andrea Ernest Dias, Carlos Malta & Eduardo Neves Obra Viva de Hermeto Pascoal – Vol. 1 Flautas Rocinante 6/10 Hermeto Pascoal (1936–2025) was one of Brazil’s most adventurous and influential musicians. Known as ‘The Sorcerer’, this multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger and sonic experimenter could blend jazz, Brazilian folk, avant-garde techniques and the natural sound of the world itself. Obra Viva, literally ‘Living Work’, is the debut volume in a series exploring Pascoal’s unreleased work. It examines his approach to wind instruments and small ensemble composition of flute-centric works written from the early to mid-1980s, and was drawn from the composer’s personal archive. Performed by a quartet of world-class flautists with additional contributions from pianist Marcelo Galter and trombonist Rafael Rocha, under the musical direction of Bernardo Ramos, there are…

Sardinian for ‘continuation’, Sighìda (Mare e Miniere, 8/10) pairs veteran composer Mauro Palmas on liuto cantabile with young organetto virtuoso Giacomo Vardeu. Together, they fuse the island’s dance forms with Basque influences, treating Sardinian traditional music as an evolving, shifting dimension of possibility. This creates translucent textures, which also includes reinterpretations of songs by Riccardo Tesi and Abdullah Ibrahim. While the title-track pairs gentle melodies with string arpeggios and improvisation, ‘Danza Maggiore’ navigates various vibrant regional dance pulses. The album reaches its peaks on ‘Nanneddu Meu’ and ‘Libera me Domine’, as polyphonic harmonies from Cuncordu e Tenore de Orosei join the duo, adding profound depth. Shift to the poignant vocality of the Sicilian-born, France-based Luisa Briguglio, whose debut, Truvatura (Liburia Records, 7/10), represents a sophisticated entry into contemporary folk songwriting.…

What about your time in India resonated so strongly with you? When I travelled in India, I was going through very tough times in my personal life. It was not like, ‘I feel bad, so I’ll go to India,’ but a few days before I travelled, something happened that was very hard for me. Then I found in the landscapes and in the Hindustani music a space to heal. It was very strange, because I’d never been there before 2021. When I was there, I did not feel that I was home, of course, because it’s not my home. But the landscapes resonated as if I had known them forever. You mentioned the struggles you went through at the time. How has that impacted your music? Everything I live, everything…

What was the nature of your work in the Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security? After I wrote a book on the secret surveillance of literary life, I decided to quit journalism and worked in the archive for 10 years before I retired. My job was to help other researchers find what they were interested in. The great thing for me was to see their work materialise in books and theatrical performances. Yes, they thanked me, but the most important thing was to see what they could do with my help. Have any informers complained to you about revealing them in the book? No reactions yet, because it’s only just come out and it’s in English. But I wrote a previous book on the surveillance of rock music, and…

“Jazz music was purely cerebral. It wasn’t going to the heart. His music was cerebral, but also went to the heart. It could be aggressive and passionate. It could make you cry.” Al Di Meola is telling me about his love of Astor Piazzolla. His voice is emotional, expressing something beyond admiration for the Argentine composer who reinvented tango. He is describing a moment that forever impacted his musical career. The moment happened in Japan in the early 80s. At the time, Di Meola knew Piazzolla’s name but nothing more. By chance, he ran into vibraphonist Gary Burton in a hotel elevator. Burton was playing with Piazzolla’s group, so he asked him what the music was like. “He said, Al, it’s the hardest music I’ve ever played in my life.…

TOP OF THE WORLD TRACKS 01 Tehrani Drom & Parisa Karimi Molan ‘Sizeh Salam’ From Unveiled on Lulaworld Records Montréal-based Iranian singer Parisa Karimi Molan sings an Azeri song for those who long for their homeland, accompanied by setar, tar and accordion. See p64 02 BCUC ‘Umdumakhanda’ From The Road Is Never Easy on Outhere Records The Afro-psychedelic septet sing of unfulfilled hopes and dreams, underscored by hardships in Soweto with their customary percussive intensity and urgency. See p51 03 Sam Grassie ‘Where Two Hawks Fly’ From Where Two Hawks Fly on Broadside Hacks Recordings Ronnie Browne’s bittersweet Corries song, about loss and the passage of time, is rendered with quiet intimacy and stately warmth by this young Glasgow-raised guitarist and vocalist. See p57 04 Stelios Petrakis ‘Agrilos’ From Lyric…

Speak to anybody in Louisiana, and they’ll tell you there’s music in their blood. That may sound hyperbolic, but it’s no idle boast. On my recent week-long trip around ‘The Pelican State’ – named for the teeming birdlife that populates the bayous and cypress swamps of this sultry, sprawling landmass in America’s Deep South – nearly everyone I spoke to, even random strangers, was either in a band or related to somebody who was. Even without the Mardi Gras celebrations that start on January 6 (Twelfth Night/Epiphany) and culminate on Fat Tuesday (‘Mardi Gras’ in French) – which this year fell on February 17 – the streets literally hum with jazz, blues, funk, soul and, in southwest Louisiana particularly, Cajun and zydeco music. Distinct from Creole (of mixed Black, usually…

Dolores Keane (1953–2026) Irish folk singer with a “sacred voice” Music was a constant presence in Keane’s childhood. She grew up in Galway with her aunts Rita and Sarah, both celebrated sean-nós singers, and traditional Irish musicians like Willie Clancy would often gather in her family home. In a 2023 interview on the Tommy Tiernan Show she reflected on this upbringing, saying music “was just a way of life”. Keane co-founded the traditional Irish band De Dannan in 1975 and toured with the band for the next two years before relocating to London after meeting, and eventually marrying, fellow folk musician John Faulkner. The duo regularly performed in London’s folk clubs, toured worldwide and recorded several albums together in the 70s and 80s. She enjoyed a successful solo career, releasing…

“I WANTED TO RECONNECT WITH THE NEW MUSIC SCENE IN URUGUAY” Jorge Drexler started his career with the ambition to sound local to his country, Uruguay. Yet, as his popularity blossomed and he began to tour more widely, he realised that he had much in common with people across Latin America. “I am South American”, he once told me after having this realisation. This wider perspective on his own identity was reflected in his music as he embraced collaborators from across the continent, while primarily recording from his base in Madrid, his home for the past 30 years. On his latest album, Taracá, he decided the time was right to return to where it all began, so he headed to Uruguay, ready to reconnect with his country and explore what…

Anna Lowenstein Through the Walls Adhyâropa Records 7/10 Anna Lowenstein is a fine UK-based klezmer violinist and composer. This record is a very personal one, based on her own klezmer research and her experiences of encountering Hasidic music and characters in Stamford Hill, London, despite being brought up in a secular family. The music is written for string quartet, with Lowenstein joined by Flora Curzon on violin and Francesca Ter-Berg on cello (who have their own duo, Fran & Flora) and Meg Hamilton on viola (who plays in the klezmer and Balkan band She’koyokh). Together, they create a super-lively and spirited sound. The most entertaining track is without doubt ‘The Super Glatt Sher’, a spirited square dance over which Lowenstein recounts the story of getting back into her flat after…

Bei Bei Two Moons Bei Bei Time Productions 7/10 Known for her numerous appearances on film and video game soundtracks (notably Mulan, Kung Fu Panda 4 and Civilization VII), California-based guzheng and guqin zither virtuoso Bei Bei has spent two decades breaking new ground with her ancient instruments. On her latest release, she collaborates with electronic music producer Paul Elliott, who imbues Bei Bei’s semi-improvisations with a lo-fi ambient quality. The impeccable zither playing is blended with cinematic soundscapes, synth basslines and mid-tempo beats, evoking night-time cityscapes and mid-autumn twilight. Additional texture is provided by guest musicians on traditional Chinese instruments: erhu (fiddle), sheng (mouth organ), dizi (flute), as well as sanxian and zhongruan lutes, creating welcome tonal contrast and interplay with the zithers. Bei Bei’s performance is exquisite throughout,…

The Warsaw violinist Magda Drozd immerses herself in ambient sounds with a swirling tone that sometimes holds rougher edges on her mood-shifting third album. In both digital and cassette form, Divided By Dusk (Präsens Editionen, 6/10) features lead and chorus voices, with deep drones residing amid the backdrop. A riff sometimes develops, or percussion embellishments are featured as the palette expands and changes with each track. A billowing dance number, ‘Piosenka Ludowa’, has a very folkish character, then ‘Hungry Nightmares’ shifts to a calming vocal wordlessness, with horns appearing in this orchestrated miasma, followed by the hymnal ‘From The Depths’. Another type of ambient is shaped by High Water Haze, as Michigan’s Benny Bienkowski releases Boreal (Island House Recordings, 7/10), an exercise in country abstraction from a maximalist multi-instrumentalist who…

Roberto Fonseca & Vincent Segal Nuit Parisienne à la Havane Artwork Records 8/10 This careful, contemplative recording was made during a collaborative tour. Both Fonseca and Segal have top-class credentials and extensive, boundary-defying versatility. They have produced here 11 tracks with a certain interiority, an intimacy that creates a strong illusion that they are playing in your living room, just for you. Not that there’s anything wrong with this. Rather the opposite – especially if you are actually in your living room. Segal is a classically trained cellist – evidenced by the tone elicited in his standard use of the bow – who during his long career has collaborated with musicians as diverse as Elvis Costello, Cesária Évora and Sting. Évora’s style was often compared to that of Buena Vista…