Artist: Papua New Guinea Stringbands with Bob Brozman
Album: Songs of the Volcano
Label: Riverboat
Release Date: October 25, 2005
Web: www.bobbrozman.com
Clips: www.worldmusic.net
Rating: 4.3 out of 5
Guitarist extraordinaire and academic Bob Brozman is one of the most prolific talents in music today. He is a Professor at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, has released over 25 albums, tours worldwide, is a founder of International Guitar Seminars and has published many writings in his areas of musical expertise.
This is a man obsessed with music, learning and sharing. If you have seen him perform live, you know what I am talking about. His contagious passion and encyclopedic knowledge made him the perfect choice to pull together this fantastic new CD and DVD project set to be published on October 25th and entitled "Songs From The Volcano".
There are so many great things to say about this release, I guess I will just start with the packaging. The CD and DVD come in a slim digipak, which I’m a big fan of not only for environmental reasons, but because jewel cases crack and just don't look as good. When you open up the digipak you'll find an extremely informative and well-written booklet, a CD and a dual-sided DVD.
Riverboat Records was thoughtful enough to make sure that people on both sides of the pond would have no issues viewing the DVD since each side is encoded for a different region. This was such a breath of fresh air in an environment where major labels are making it harder to listen to the music you buy the way you want. You will not find any copy protection schemes here. The CD runs over 70 minutes and the DVD is just packed full of information and live performance.
This is not only a fantastic "album", but a immersive learning experience. If you soak "Songs of the Volcano" in as I did you will surely come out a more knowledgeable person.
Article comments
1 - Bob Brozman
Thanks for the very insightful and kind review. I'll add that, yes, I do play with each band, but ONLY as a "member"...in other words, playing in each band's style WITHOUT injecting any Westernizing or my personal styles. You see, I am a musician first and above all--I like to PLAY!
Thanks again, and pleasze check out my other collaborative releases: Digdig, with Rene Lacaille (Reunion Island Indian Ocean), Mahima, with Debashish Bhattacharya (Calcutta India), Jin Jin, with Takashi Hirayasu (Okinawa), Ocean Blues, with Djeli Moussa Diawara (Guinea)--all of which hit the top ten in europe's World Music charts, and all the Hawaiian collaborative releases I have done, etc.... Thanks again!