Friends: It’s been a long time since my last dance-oriented mix (2010) but I recently got back on the stick and caught up with the several dozen music blogs I follow, so I’m happy to present another seasonal mix featuring my fave tunes to enhance your weekends.
Also: In the past I’ve broken the mixes up into individual tracks for ease of finding your favorite tunes, but I’ve gotten complaints from people who found themselves playing it out of order or on shuffle mode. So if you want it as 18 discrete tracks (still mixed), let me know.
ZIP file contains a single 192k mp3, cover art in two sizes, and a text file with the track listing.
1 / Tycho / Dive (Keep Shelly In Athens Remix)
2 / Arsenal / Melvin (Compuphonic Remix)
3 / Saint Etienne / Hug My Soul
4 / Cinnamon Chasers / The Day That Never Came (Synthetic Jacques Remix)
5 / Only Children / Down Fever
6 / Debukas / Golden Mind
7 / Joakim / Nothing Gold (Todd Terje Mix)
8 / Housse de Racket / Aquarium (Bufi Remix)
9 / Bottin feat. Jupiter / Sage Comme Une Image (Spiller Remix)
10 / Alexandre Louvré / This Feeling
11 / Aeroplane / Without Lies (Black Van Remix)
12 / In Flagranti / Autoscopy
13 / Shadow Dancer / Voice Tracer
14 / MRTN / Slow (Apparent Motion Remix)
15 / Map of the World at Night / Sometimes Always Never (Clinton Houlker Remix)
16 / Hidden Plastic / Skirt
17 / Van She / Idea of Happiness
18 / Sigur Rós / Ekki Mukk (D33J Remix)
Today, we close out our Dengê Mezopotamya run with two more tracks, recorded under star-exploded skies in the Rub al Khali desert, just a few miles outside the Liwa Oasis.
Station: Dengê Mezopotamya [UKR] Frequency: 7540 kHz Rec Date: 11-Oct-2010 [1626UTC] Xmtr Loc: Mykolaiv (Nikolayev), Ukraine (46N49 032E14) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
We continue our Dengê Mezopotamya love-fest with three more tracks from the Ukraine transmission. The pieces this week range from traditional dengbêj singing to modernized folk-pop, with a lovely and haunting stop between the two poles for a heyran (a melancholy love ballad).
Station: Dengê Mezopotamya [UKR] Frequency: 7540 kHz Rec Date: 11-Oct-2010 [1626UTC] Xmtr Loc: Mykolaiv (Nikolayev), Ukraine (46N49 032E14) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
Back here, we promised you some more Kurdish dengbêj singing, and that day is finally upon us. This time, it’s coming via Dengê Mezopotamya, a ShortWaveMusic favorite that made its debut here during the 2010 Bulgarian season. We were rewarded with a bumper crop of Iraqi Kurdish music during our time in the UAE, so we’ll be featuring Dengê Mezopotamya at length over the next few weeks. Let’s warm up with this long-form dengbêj piece recorded via their Ukraine transmitter.
Station: Dengê Mezopotamya [UKR] Frequency: 7540 kHz Rec Date: 11-Oct-2010 [1626UTC] Xmtr Loc: Mykolaiv (Nikolayev), Ukraine (46N49 032E14) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
We’ve heard from the Sultanate of Oman twice before on ShortWaveMusic – once on shortwave proper and later on mediumwave – but this week’s recording is slightly different again. Here we present a hypnotic long-form track from Oman’s Al-Shabab (Youth Programme) channel. Al-Shabab is a relatively recent addition to the Omani radio landscape; it was launched on 23 July 2003 to coincide with the Sultanate’s Renaissance Day.
According to a contemporaneous article in the Oman Daily Observer, Al-Shabab was launched to “present fast-moving cultural and entertaining programmes catering to ‘the young at heart’”, according to station representative Abir Tannir al Balushi. The article continues:
In its initial transmissions, the Youth Programme will focus on public service announcements such as pharmacies on duty, flight timings, film screenings, concerts, and hotel activities, as it awaits programme sponsorships. Moreover, with a view to keeping its young listeners up to date with the latest trends in the world of entertainment, the programme will spotlight well-known Arabic performers and poets the world over. The Youth Programme will be presented by Ahmed Abdullah al Ghasanin, Nada Abdullah al Balushi, Ahmed Darwish al Hamedani and Abir al Balushi, a regular presenter of various programmes on the Sultanate of Oman Radio — English FM.
At the time of this recording, Al-Shabab was booming into the expansive desert region of Madinat Zayed, where we put up stakes in an extravagant hotel called the Tilal Liwa for several nights. The Tilal Liwa was another one of those absurdly fancy desert oases which were seemingly legion throughout the UAE, and although it was nice enough, it was far more than we required as a roof over our heads between all-night sessions in the deep desert, which fanned out in every direction from the Tilal Liwa’s grounds.
Station: Radio Sultanate of Oman Al-Shabab (Youth Programme) [OMA] Frequency: 106.9 MHz Rec Date: 11-Oct-2010 [0707UTC] Xmtr Loc: Record Loc: Madinat Zayed, United Arab Emirates
Prior to the emergence of the Pakistani state, the services that would later become Radio Pakistan were a wholly-owned part of the Indian Broadcasting Company. When Pakistan was created in June of 1947, the Pakistan Broadcasting Service became its fully autonomous broadcasting arm. Shortly thereafter, Radio Pakistan arrived on shortwave, where it continues to broadcast in 34 languages via its External Service.
Radio Pakistan has lately been making the rounds in the national media for incurring a deficit of over Rs2000 million over six years. As a result, the usual arguments have flared up over the efficacy and longevity of radio as a means of communication in the Internet and satellite era. Pakistan’s Standing Committee on Broadcasting and Information seems to be working in favor of the network, approving the recommendations of the Pakistan Broadcasting Company (PBC) to siphon additional funds from tax increases. But employees of the stations have purportedly not been paid for several months as of March 2012, and artists have likewise accepted a delay in honoraria while the financial picture is ironed out. Here’s to hoping Radio Pakistan manages to stay afloat; while they’re a relatively rare catch here at ShortWaveMusic, it’s nice to have them around.
Station: Radio Pakistan [PAK] Frequency: 15100 kHz Rec Date: 11-Oct-2010 [0626UTC] Xmtr Loc: Islamabad, Pakistan (33N27 073E12) Record Loc: Madinat Zayed, United Arab Emirates
This week, we present the return of a classic feature which gained the blog quite a bit of buzz and traction in the early days. The DUELING XMTRs! series began as a cute showcase for the synchronicity and serendipity of the ionosphere, as two (or more) stations wove in and out of each other on the same frequency. But as our methodology improved, these little sonic accidents seemed to become fewer and farther between, and for years, there were no recordings worthy of being crowned with the title. Happily, this collision between ERTU Egypt and the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran – on mediumwave! – fits the bill perfectly. Welcome back!
Station: ERTU Egypt [EGY] vs. Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran [IRN] Frequency: 1071 kHz Rec Date: 10-Oct-2010 [2140UTC] Xmtr Loc: Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
Situated on the Gulf of Aden, within kissing distance of the volcanic island of Perim, Djibouti was one of the last African countries to gain sovereignty from the French in 1977. Today, Djibouti is a member of both the African Union and the Arab League; the country has long served a strategically important role as a free trade zone between Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Recently, echoes of the Arab Spring have splashed over to its shores, as native Djiboutians have called for the resignation of controversial president Ismaïl Omar Guelleh. The country also ranks low for freedom of the press on the African continent, with a Freedom House score of 73 and a number of high-profile arrests (including alleged torture) against the members of a clandestine radio station, La Voix de Djibouti. All that being said, Djibouti has a rich and kaleidoscopic culture, influenced variously by French, Somali, Arab, and Afar traditions, and this naturally carries over to its music as well.
State radio is officially (and exclusively) administered by Radio Télévision de Djibouti (RTD), which began under a different name as a colonial instrument in the 1950s. Through the 1960s and most of the 1970s, local radio and television simply served as a repeater for transmissions from the Office of French Radio and Television (ORTF). Once Djibouti gained independence in 1977, the newly-minted Republic established RTD on a non-existent budget, operating under technically impoverished conditions until a German broadcasting authority helped to upgrade their equipment in 1983. That year, Djibouti’s international service on shortwave – Radio Djibouti – was born.
Station: Radio Djibouti [DJI] Frequency: 4780 kHz Rec Date: 10-Oct-2010 [2019UTC] Xmtr Loc: Djibouti, Djibouti (11N35 043E05) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
After one night in the corny, 1980s-Bond-style hotel atop Jebel Hafeet, we were finally ready to make our sojourn out into the Rub’ al Khali, or the Empty Quarter. The Rub’ al Khali is one of the largest and most inhospitable deserts in the world; it spans about 650,000 square kilometers and includes territory in Oman, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Yemen. Predictably, there are vast oil reserves in the Empty Quarter as well, most of which are administered by the Saudis. Much like Timbuktu at the edge of the Sahara, the Empty Quarter is saturated with lore; the name itself has connotations of erasure, disappearance, and negative space.
Soundwalk’s project depended on this mythical aspect to carry the symbolic weight of its project, which was to capture the dense and ceaseless flow of voices, music and data as it traversed the Empty Quarter. The Rub’ al Khali was a place in which the naked eye and ear could discern only a vast and seemingly endless expanse, secretly engulfed by oceanic swarms and tides of invisible, intangible communication. Our mission was to set out into the desert to produce a sound portrait of this ionospheric caravan.
From Jebel Hafeet, we circled back through Al Ain and headed west on E 22, then cut south through our first long stretch of pure desert. The Rub’ al Khali is an exceptionally gorgeous desert, with deep, dramatic, rippling dunes colored in a vibrant, cinnamon-like hue by a mineral known as feldspar. Even at high noon, when other deserts tend to look washed-out and anemic, the Rub’ al Khali retains a cinematic quality. And as the sun retreats into the dusk, the desert’s breathtaking evening colors create a spectacle almost as awesome as the Northern Lights. Early evening into night in the Rub’ al Khali is an unforgettable time, and when combined with the breathtaking radio reception, I can safely say I’ve had few experiences as synaesthetically magical as those few nights in the desert.
Reception from East Africa was particularly strong here, and this week we’ll be rolling out three pieces from the Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea (also known as Dimtsi Hafash). The VO Broad Masses is a curious case in radio lore; it began as a revolutionary clandestine station in the 1970s in favor of the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF). Once Eritrea gained its independence in 1991, the station became the country’s official media outlet. The station still broadcasts from Eritrea’s capital, Asmara, in languages ranging from Tigrinya to Oromo, on 7175 kHz (and 837 mediumwave). In addition to government-sanctioned news and information, the station spins tons of excellent homegrown Eritrean and Ethiopian music. The station remains susceptible to severe jamming from neighboring Ethiopia, usually in the form of a hashy, “rushing”-type white noise; no such jamming was heard from the UAE, but there is a bizarre, intermittent blurting noise of unknown origin on these recordings.
Station: Voice of the Broad Masses of Eritrea [ERI] Frequency: 7175 kHz Rec Date: 10-Oct-2010 [1917UTC] Xmtr Loc: Asmara-Selae Daro, Eritrea (15N13 038E52) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
This week marks the ShortWaveMusic debut of Radio Payam-e-Doost(“Message From a Friend”), a station which produces programming pertaining to the Bahá’í faith. The station (founded in 1994) operates from transmitters throughout the Middle East and Africa, but is presently headquartered in Great Falls, Virginia. Their Web site offered the following summary statement in 2001:
[This program] has only one aim: to educate its listeners and dissipate misinformation about the Baha’i faith which has permeated the Iranian community for the past century and a half, depriving Muslims and Baha’is alike of a chance to live, work and worship freely and in total harmony in the cradle of one of the most ancient civilizations in the world.
Broadcasting in the Farsi language, the station nonetheless also offers an array of musical pieces and interludes throughout their broadcasts. Here’s a brief example.
Station: Radio Payam-e-Doost [MDA] Frequency: 7480 kHz Rec Date: 10-Oct-2010 [1801UTC] Xmtr Loc: Kishinev-Grigoriopol, Madagascar (47N17 029E24) Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
Long-time readers may recall that Sudan Radio Service was the last station I received before packing up my radio for good in Bulgaria, and I recall feeling somewhat cheated that I hadn’t come across it earlier. Administered by an NGO called the Education Development Center (EDC), Sudan Radio Service debuted in July of 2003 with an abbreviated, hour-long broadcast of news summaries and music. By 2010, they had expanded to six hours on shortwave and an additional 12 on FM in the Khartoum area. Programs are available in 11 regional languages, as well as English and Arabic.
I was fortunate to get a few more minutes with Sudan while in the UAE. This tune shares some of the jump of last week’s Oman interception, albeit approaching from a more familiar Afropop vein. Great stuff.
Station: Sudan Radio Service [SDN]
Frequency: 17745 kHz
Rec Date: 10-Oct-2010 [1654UTC]
Xmtr Loc: Sines, Portugal (37N57 008W45)
Record Loc: Rub Al Khali near Liwa, United Arab Emirates
This week, we bring you two Middle Eastern transmissions on the mediumwave band.
The first is from Radio Sultanate of Oman, heard here just a few weeks ago on its shortwave frequency of 15140 kHz. Danceable, catchy, and punctuated by joyous bursts of ululation, this tune is almost impossible to resist.
Station: Radio Sultanate of Oman [OMA] Frequency: 576 kHz Rec Date: 9-Oct-2010 [2100UTC] Xmtr Loc: Haima, Oman (19N58 056E16) Record Loc: Jebel Hafeet, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
On a completely different continuum, here’s another number from Ardabil in Iran, previously featured in our 2010 season in a gloriously meditative number. The province of Ardabil has a significant Kurdish and Azeri population, and this piece is clearly derived from their traditions.
Station: IRIB Radio Iran Ardabil [IRN] Frequency: 1197 kHz Rec Date: 9-Oct-2010 [2142UTC] Xmtr Loc: Parsabad, Iran Record Loc: Jebel Hafeet, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
Hello friends: I am home, safe and sound, from Mali, with a phenomenal amount of audio and video to share with you. I’d like to first send my endless gratitude to those of you who contributed to the Kickstarter campaign in late 2011 – you truly made this trip happen. Contributors should look for their reward packages in the next few weeks as I trawl through my audio. Until then, a few things:
1. If you haven’t already seen the documentary video of the trip on YouTube, check it out:
2. I will be posting a great deal of audio here that will not be hosted on SoundCloud. Please be sure to add this blog to your RSS/feed readers to be informed of special updates.
3. There will most likely be a long-form broadcast of the Mali material on a radio station in the Boston area in the next few months. Please stay tuned for details.
4. For some reason, I can’t get on to my own site from home at the moment. Until I can resolve that little issue, updates may be a little slower than usual.
After much more ado than any of us had bargained for, my colleague’s missing luggage finally arrived on Yas Island, four days late. We were now seriously delinquent in getting out into the southern and eastern desert areas. But I soon learned that there were more substantive challenges ahead than simply chasing down lost luggage.
There are two parallel roads that lead out of Abu Dhabi to the Western city of Al Ain: one is E22, the helpfully-named Abu Dhabi-Al Ain Road, and the other is the Truck Road which follows along E22 to the south. Most cautious people seem to advise traveling via the main road, as the behavior of the trucks and the condition of the roads make the alternative sound a little too “adventurous” for most. As I recall, we split our time between the two, and found the Truck Road to be faster in general.
The problem with driving in the UAE is not the scenery. On an aesthetic level, it’s quite a lovely place if your tastes run toward desertification (as mine do). The city of Al Ain is a clean 150km arc across the northeastern arm of the country. As you leave the industrial and commercial labyrinth of Abu Dhabi, the landscape grows progressively more open and unfettered by stunt architecture and strip malls. It’s a lovely expanse of sandy brown, broken up occasionally by smaller towns like Al Khatim and Remah. The downside is the native drivers, all of whom appear to be auditioning quite ostentatiously for the next installment of The Fast and the Furious. Highway fatalities in the UAE are so legion that auto manufacturers have installed an alarm system that goes off automatically whenever a vehicle exceeds the highway speed limit. However, the alarm tone is a fairly muted sound similar to that of a seat belt warning, which makes it easy to ignore by simply cranking up the stereo. I don’t think I need to spell out the safety hazards here. It can be particularly harrowing after dark, when most people advise the novices to stay off roads in remote or unfamiliar areas.
Fortunately, we arrived in Al Ain with plenty of daylight to spare. This is also when I first learned that our planned “itinerary” was completely unconfirmed and unverified. We were essentially operating on hearsay when it came to our destinations and lodging. In addition to the delightfulness of that news, it also proved difficult to get direct information about anything. The people of the UAE are, on the whole, incredibly helpful and friendly folks. And while I wouldn’t say that anybody lied to us on purpose, it seemed that concrete details were hard to shake out. No one had any hard details on places to stay outside the tourist circuit. As a result, we ended up driving far out into the desert, often up and down the same highway, in search of lodging whose existence was strictly hypothetical. One place had been shut down for many months, yet the property was immaculately maintained and a guard remained at the entrance to turn away prospective visitors. We couldn’t find any trace of another recommended hotel. As for the rest, they were all in the busy heart of Al Ain, and therefore unsuitable for the task of highly sensitive radio reception.
Our last hope was a prohibitively expensive mega-hotel built atop the fabled Jebel Hafeet mountain, more famously known as the site of “the greatest driving road in the world.” We had hoped to avoid the hotel in favor of something more rustic and low-key, but were unsurprisingly unable to rustle up a local home or hostel to stay in at the last second. As the day grew longer in the tooth, we cut our losses and headed up the Jebel Hafeet Mountain Road, which afforded a breathtaking view over the Rub al Khali on its western side and the UAE/Oman border to the east. For all the charmlessness of the hotel itself, it was certainly the most visually sumptuous spot in the area. Few experiences in the UAE could beat hearing the faraway calls to prayer while tracing the web of city lights as they retreated into the Empty Quarter. It was enough to forgive the corny Miami Vice interior of the Mercure Grand Hotel, which looked as if it had been modeled on some 1980s vision of gaudy Western prosperity.
The hotel was perched right on the face of the mountain, so we set up as close to the fenced-off edge as it was possible to get. Fortunately, most of the hotel guests staked out spots at the bar after dark, so we were (mostly) left in peace to try our hand at reception conditions. Here’s a characteristic slice of Afropop from the Voice of America‘s Botswana transmitter to start things off.
Station: Voice of America [BOT] Frequency: 4930 kHz Rec Date: 9-Oct-2010 [1837UTC] Xmtr Loc: Selebi-Phikwe, Botswana (21S59 027E39) Record Loc: Jebel Hafeet, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
Traveling to the UAE was an exciting opportunity for a variety of reasons, but one of the most important was the wider access to Quranic broadcasts. As any regular reader of ShortWaveMusic will know, I’ve had a long-standing infatuation with the sound of the adhan and muezzin recitations on the international bands. But the UAE was my first Islamic-majority country, and I was looking forward to soaking up all of the incredible traditions, music, and recitation associated with Islam.
Among the first stations I heard was Quran Kareem, launched in 1979 in Abu Dhabi and carried on 98.1 MHz in the FM band. Although the station began strictly as a vehicle for Quranic recitation, it has since become something of a lifestyle channel for Muslims, now including “recitation, interpretation, Counsel, programs for children and women and those with special needs, family life and other topics of interest the listener in different Muslim affairs and acts of worship as well as Quranic competitions.” [1]
This week, we offer an excerpt from Quran Kareem, our first recording from the famous mountainside of Jebel Hafeet. (More on that next time.)
Station: Quran Kareem [UAE] Frequency: 98.1 MHz Rec Date: 9-Oct-2010 [0303UTC] Xmtr Loc: Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates Record Loc: Jebel Hafeet, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates
We leave Jebel Ali with another long-time veteran of these pages: the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran (VOIRI). Delay-crusted Quranic recitations and sweeping, string-laden bumper music are the order of the day. A perennial favorite.
Station: Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran (French Svc) [IRN] Frequency: 13600 khz Rec Date: 8-Oct-2010 [1832UTC] Xmtr Loc: Kamalabad, Iran (35N46 051E27) Record Loc: Jebel Ali, United Arab Emirates
Nearing the end of our time at Jebel Ali, here’s a rather typical piece of African-flavored gospel in the Dinka language (native to South Sudan) from the American religious broadcaster Adventist World Radio.
AWR previously on ShortWaveMusic here and here.
Station: Adventist World Radio (Dinka Svc) [AUT] Frequency: 9755 kHz Rec Date: 8-Oct-2010 [1818UTC] Xmtr Loc: Moosbrunn, Austria (48N01 016E26) Record Loc: Jebel Ali, United Arab Emirates
It was our third full day in the Emirates, and the remainder of our luggage had yet to materialize. We were by now quite bored with the continental breakfast buffets, swimming pools, and diluted Westernization of Yas Island. My traveling companion wanted to make some VHF recordings of ship-to-shore and cargo traffic at the Port of Dubai, so we decided to make one more venture closer to home. The trick was to find someplace within spitting distance of the port without having to deal with the chaos and electrical interference of the port itself. We settled on Jebel Ali, a region about 50km south of the port, and the future site of the Palm Islands, a pair of extravagant manmade archipelagos whose design resembles the swirl on an expensive cappuccino.
The Palms were still under construction during our visit, so many of the thoroughfares along Jebel Ali were either closed or restricted. Down one unmarked road we stumbled upon the imposing gates of JAFZA, the Jebel Ali Free Zone, where we engaged in some friendly banter with an armed officer who was amused by the Hollywood address on my American drivers’ license. He sent us down the road to the Jebel Ali Golf Resort and Spa – another one of those peculiar lavish distractions which are a specialty of the UAE. It bears noting that almost everywhere we went in the Emirates, we were railroaded into staying in some glitzy monstrosity of this sort which served Western food, played Western music, and clearly catered to oil money from our part of the world. Which is how, in an otherwise barren industrial area south of Dubai, we found ourselves driving through a micro-landscape saturated with artificial greenery to the Jebel Ali Hotel, where pudgy investors and their pale offspring frolicked poolside to a blaring soundtrack of generic, high-energy techno-pop. Walking through reception, we passed ourselves off as guests and headed to the outermost perimeter of the property, hoping to find some relatively quiet beachfront away from the action.
Behind a cluster of trees, we came upon a long stone dock protruding out into the marina. Since twilight was now beginning to color the horizon, we pretended as if we were simply going for a scenic evening stroll. The dock staff chatted and monitored us casually as we reached the end of the dock and unloaded our gear beneath a winking harbor light. Away from the headache-inducing thump of the poolside, the area took on a luminous hush. We had a beer from the bar and settled into our headphones just as night curtained over the water.
Once again, we were rewarded for our efforts by some stunning DX: Sudan, Iraqi Kurdistan, Guinea, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, the Central African Republic, Madagascar, Nigeria, Iran (of course), and the UAE’s Southeastern neighbor, the Sultanate of Oman.
Amazingly, this is Radio Sultanate of Oman‘s first appearance on ShortWaveMusic, so I’m happy to welcome them here with a pair of folk-pop numbers beamed from the southern town of Thumrait.
Station: Radio Sultanate of Oman [OMA] Frequency: 15140 kHz Rec Date: 8-Oct-2010 [1520UTC] Xmtr Loc: Thumrait, Oman (17N38 053E56) Record Loc: Jebel Ali, United Arab Emirates
This week, we bring you music from another quasi-official clandestine broadcaster, this one serving the people of Iraqi Kurdistan via the Kurdish Democratic Party. Radyo Dengi Kurdistana(“The Voice of Kurdistan”) has come and gone in parallel with important Kurdistani historical milestones, surfacing in 1965, 1968, 1974, 1978, and continuously since 1980. Per the excellent ClandestineRadio.com, the station has broadcast from various sites in Iran, Azerbaijan, and (presently) northern Iraq.
Today we bring you a melodious sample of Kurdish a cappella singing as performed by an unidentified dengbêj: the traditional epic poet, historian, and tale-spinner of Kurdish society. While this is not the most characteristic of dengbêj melodies (more of those to come), it remains a simple and ravishing piece of vocal folklore. A must-listen.
Station: Radyo Dengi Kurdistana [IRQ] Frequency: 3995 kHz Rec Date: 8-Oct-2010 [1417UTC] Xmtr Loc: Sulaymaniyah, Iraq Record Loc: Jebel Ali, United Arab Emirates
This week, from the stalwart Voice of Turkey, we have a fine piece of highly danceable türkü: a branch of Turkish folk-derived music performed on both modern and traditional instruments. This broadcast comes to us purportedly via the Voice of Turkey’s Çakırlar transmitter, although it appears on a map to be just outside of Ankara. (My apologies for the harshness in the opening bars of this piece; I hadn’t yet found the proper frequency at the start of the recording.)
Station: Voice of Turkey [TUR] Frequency: 9530 kHz Rec Date: 7-Oct-2010 [2019UTC] Xmtr Loc: Çakırlar, Turkey (39N58 032E40) Record Loc: Al Limghadar, Umm Al Kuwain, United Arab Emirates
We ended up being stranded on Yas Island for a few days longer than planned due to a luggage mishap, so to keep distracted we took day trips up the Western coast of the UAE peninsula. We were never interested in the oil-built grotesqueries of the major cities, hoping instead to see some aspect of local life, so we cruised past Abu Dhabi and Dubai and headed up Route 11 E towards Ras Al-Khaimah.
Over those several days, we stumbled into all sorts of fascinating sights in this most open of countries along the Persian Gulf: flaming refineries; mysterious industrial architecture; the numerous ports, along which it is rumored a healthy smuggling operation still thrives to provide contraband nuclear materials to Iran. On this particular night, however, we contented ourselves with a night spent monitoring along the rocky shoreline of Al Limghadar in Umm Al Quwain.
I don’t believe these quieter sections of the UAE get much tourist traffic, so we felt free to set up digs in whatever random, semi-abandoned spot we fancied. The landscape of Al Limghadar was similar to that of a New England-style waterfront: all giant boulders which reverberated with the sound of lapping water beneath. This precarious setup was not without its hazards: I dropped the battery cover to my Eton E1XM between the rocks while installing a fresh set of D cells and regrettably lost it to the tides.
From those sessions we bring you a fresh find from Ethiopia: the ShortWaveMusic debut of Radio Fana, a multilingual commercial outfit spearheaded by the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the country’s ruling party. The station began many years ago as a clandestine operation against the country’s then-ruling Communist organization, the Derg; Fana subsequently became a commercial property when the EPRDF’s politics became mainstream. Today, Fana provides AM, FM, and shortwave service throughout Ethiopia, and they are currently in the process of launching a television affiliate under a repurposed brand, Fana Broadcasting Corporate.
Station: Radio Fana (Amharic Svc) [ETH] Frequency: 6110 kHz Rec Date: 7-Oct-2010 [1840UTC] Xmtr Loc: Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (08N58 038E43) Record Loc: Al Limghadar, Umm Al Quwain, United Arab Emirates
Here’s an odd one from the archives: a complete recording of a Death Announcement program as heard on Radio Station ZIZ, St. Kitts. According to geographer Bonham C. Richardson, these announcements have been broadcast by ZIZ since at least the early 1980s, possibly longer. In his article Migration and Death Ceremonies On St. Kitts and Nevis (1981), he says:
Three times each day on the local radio station serving St. Kitts and neighboring Nevis, death announcements, accompanied by mournful organ music, inform listeners of the local deaths and funeral arrangements. When the death announcements are aired, everyone in the islands’ small wooden houses, rum shops and marketplaces stops to listen. [1]
Whether or not the entire community continues to listen in this rapt fashion some thirty years later, I can’t say. But you can take a few moments to reflect on this example recorded during a trip to the Virgin Islands in 2006.
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Station: ZIZ, St. Kitts [KNA] Frequency: 555 kHz Rec Date: 14-July-2006 [1135UTC] Xmtr Loc: Basseterre, St. Kitts (17N19 62W42) Record Loc: At sea off the coast of St. Kitts
Tonight I was rooting through some archival material and came across this previously-unheard piece from the early era of ShortWaveMusic: a nice interception of Radio Kuwait from August 2006. Enjoy.
Station: Radio Kuwait [KWT] Frequency: 9855 kHz Rec Date: 13-Aug-2006 [~2200UTC] Xmtr Loc: Kabd, Kuwait (29N16 047E53) Record Loc: Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts, USA
This week, a quick dip back into Iran with a short group vocal piece recorded via Bandar-e Mahshahr in Khuzestan Province. Unlike the earlier pieces from Hormozgan, it is less surprising to hear this uncharacteristic music in the Khuzestan region, as it is considered to be one of the most ethnically and culturally diverse in all of Iran. The area is home to a number of rare and unique dialects, including Khuzestani Arabic, Shushtari, Dezfuli and Behbahani; many of these also bring their own folkloric and musical traditions into the mix. Today’s piece is only an aperitif from the vast menu of musics heard in Khuzestan.
Station: IRIB Radio Iran [IRN] Frequency: 576 kHz Rec Date: 6-Oct-2010 [2318UTC] Xmtr Loc: Bandar-e Mahshahr, Iran Record Loc: Yas Island, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
Most of you are by now aware of the situation unfolding in northern Mali, the most shocking of which is the kidnap of three tourists and the murder of another in broad daylight at a popular restaurant in Timbuktu. A decent summary of the situation can be found here:
I have been monitoring this situation as closely as possible from sources both within and outside of Mali, relying on a synthesis of first-hand accounts and media reports. At the present time, my weighted opinion is that I have no plans to change my itinerary. My departure is still a month away as of today, so any subsequent action will of course be taken into account. In the worst-case scenario, I will go to Mali and conduct my recordings in the southernmost territories, including Bamako, Sikasso, Segou, and possibly Kayes (as an alternative to Timbuktu).
Rest assured my colleagues and I are exercising all due diligence in proceeding with our plans. Updates will be posted here and at the project’s Kickstarter page.
