featuring Lee?
THE KNITTING FACTORY
IS PROUD TO PRESENT
MASTER MUSICIANS OF JAJOUKA
W/ BACHIR ATTAR AND VERY SPECIAL GUESTS
SATURDAY, FEB 28th
AT THE OLD KNITTING FACTORY (74 LEONARD ST. BETWEEN BROADWAY AND CHURCH)
Proclaimed
"one of the most musically inspiring groups in the world" by
Mick Jagger, the Master Musicians of Jajouka perform a hypnotic style of music that The African Music Encyclopedia described as "a strange (at least to Western ears) combination of high-pitched, nasal, buzzing sounds (imagine a swarm of bees) with surging waves of rhythm which can induce an ecstatic trance state."
Jajouka is a small ancient village perched above a long valley in the blue Djebala foothills of the Rif mountains several kilometers from Ksar el Kebir, in northern Morocco. Once upon a time—a time before history —when the past was remembered in words and music recited in the fire-lit dark—a group of migrants, perhaps from the Phoenician settlement of Lixus on the Atlantic coast, made their home on the Mountain of Owls in the gold-green foothills of the Moroccan Rif. There, above the winding valley of the Loukous, a music was born in the magic and mystery of the darkness which for years beyond counting has survived, absorbing all influences that have come along, from Roman Gods and Islamic Saints, to the development of a modern Moroccan kingdom.
Unknown to the Western world for most of their history, the Master Musicians of Jajouka were "discovered" in the '50s by beat novelist William Burroughs and composer/writer Paul Bowles, who recorded the band for the Library of Congress. Brian Jones was introduced to the group by painter, writer, and metaphysician Brion Gysin. Starting in the early '90s, the Master Musicians of Jajouka were led by Bachir Attar, whose father had led the group in the late '60s. The Master Musicians of Jajouka's first tour of the United States in 1997 included a reenactment of the week-long lunar feast of Aid El Kabir. In 1999, the group was visited by Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo. By the end of the '90s, the electronica world embraced the group as well; Talvin Singh produced their 2000 album The Master Musicians of Jajouka Featuring Bachir Attar.
The Master Musicians were the Royal Court musicians for seven kings of Morocco prior to Morocco's occupation by France and Spain, and subsequent Independence in 1956. To this day, the Master Musicians, along with the holy man of the village, heal mental illnesses of the people sent from around Morocco.
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