NYC Radio Live

This is a fascinating conversation with Dennis McNally, who tells the inside story of the Grateful Dead as revealed to him during a dozen years on the road with the band, by the members themselves, and from a mountain of research.  Ben Ratliff writes in the New York Times, that Dennis "had more access to his subjects and their trails of paper, recording tape and roach clips than almost all previous rock biographers."
With cameos from the Hell's Angels, the CIA, the Beat Poets, the Grateful Dead's adventures encapsulates the story of counter-culture America itself... and depending on your perspective, serves as a cautionary tale.  
Dennis is also the author of Desolate Angel: Jack Kerouac, The Beat Generation & Americaand Highway 61: Music, Race and the Evolution of Cultural Freedom. 
 
 

Celebrating the release of his new album, Monroe Bus, we get to hang out with Andy Staman!  Andy Statman is one of his generation's premier mandolinists and clarinetists, and has made major contributions to both Jewish music and bluegrass.  He describes his compositions and performances as "spontaneous  American-roots music and personal, prayerful hasidic music, by way of avant-garde jazz."

We get to hang out with Ilusha and listen to selections from his new album, Yes & No.   Singer and guitarist Ilusha Tsinadze was born in Soviet-era Georgia and emigrated to the U.S. at the age of 8. Yes & No is a musical conversation between the contemporary sounds of Brooklyn and the traditional music his family left behind in Georgia.
Ilusha has become recognized for his distinct interpretations of Georgia folk music following his first album, Deda Ena (Mother Tongue), the wildly successful single, Mokhevis Kalo Tinao, and tours across the U.S., including a 2018 performance at Carnegie Hall. With a background in jazz and many years spent playing in the NYC music scene, he has found his own voice in the rich musical traditions of his ancestors.
In making his latest album, Ilusha collaborated with Grammy award-winning arranger and producer Kyle Sanna, in Brooklyn, NY. He also traveled to Georgia with a laptop and mics in hand, adding artists that have inspired him over the years. His American musical collaborators are considered some of best world and jazz musicians in New York City, including Peter Hess (clarinet, Slavic Soul Party), Chris Tordini (bass, Tyshawn Sorey) and Vitor Gonçalves (accordion, Anat Cohen).

While out in Bombay, we visit the author Namita Devidayal, whose compelling new biography, The Sixth String of Vilayat Khan shines new light on the maestro's genius.  Namita, author of The Music Room, speaks about this poetic new work and reflects on both dark and light sides of her subject.  

We hang out with one of the greatest drummers of his generation, Eric Harland!  We chat about what he's learned form the  many great musicians he's played with, philosophy, meditation, his own journey and generally get into it.
Eric will be coming to town with Zakir Hussain and the Masters of Percussion
April 24 at the Town Hall...
 

n a stunning display of North and West African fusion, El Foukr R’Assembly, a group traveling all the way from Algeria performs live on WKCR.  The musicians from Algeria, Burkina Faso and Ghana come together for two explosive sets of music
A taxi-driver & a farmer, a graphic designer, a sound engineer and an art-major student, Oualid Khelifi as the producer and filmmaker had met them lin 2014 at various parts of Algeria before suggesting a long term project around docfilm and experimental AfroFusion music linking the Maghreb with the rest of Africa.So far, the project has recorded, documented or produced 18 African musicians from Algeria, Niger, Ghana and Burkina Faso.
Todays show features
Amine Lehchili,Abdelhak BenMedjbariJustice Nii Adjiri aka ShikomeAdama DiarraLabib BenslamaYounes KatiNazim Bakour

This was one of my favorite early episodes.  Cosmas Magya is a master of the Mbira ( a type of thumb piano) from the Shona tribe in Zimbabwe.  Here he performs and explains the way the instrument is used in ceremonies to contact ancestors.  We’ll also hear a track he recorded with another powerful Mbira player and vocalist Beauler Dyoko. (Rebroadcast from 2011)

Hailing from Venezuela, Betsayda Machado & Parranda El Clavo made their New York debut at GlobalFest  last year. The group’s electrifying live set, complete with pitch perfect harmonies, dazzling dancers, and irresistible rhythms earned them legions of new fans and a feature in the next days’s New York Times.
We sat down with Betsayda with her manager Juan Souki and learned more about the Afro-Venezuelan tradition. She talks us through a few tracks on their first album,  Rural Recordings Under the Mango Tree, which is available through the Indiegogo campaign that brought them here.
Betsayda Machado and Parranda EL Clavo

Before their premier of an exciting new work Nature/War/Love we hang out with Karou Wantanabe, Parul Shah and Sameer Gupta.  We also check out slections from Karou Wantanabe's latest album Néo.
In Nature/War/Love Shinobue flute and taiko drum virtuoso Kaoru Watanabe, known for his work on Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs and Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, and hybrid Indian classical tabla and modern jazz percussionist Sameer Gupta (Coltrane Raga Tribute, Adam Rudolph) team up with Indian classical and contemporary choreographer Parul Shah,whose work is expanding the classical medium beyond cultural boundaries.
 Through the lens of lush contemporary compositions and dynamic improvisations, the thematic material found in traditional works such as Ghalib, Mahabharata, Amaterasu, and the Tale of Genji provides a framework for these three brilliant artists to explore the connections between these ancient texts and today’s world.

Debashish Bhattacharya is simply one of the greatest guitarists walking the earth.  The slide guitar master will be performing at GlobalFest this year, and we give a preview of what to expect, revisiting a  Hurricane Sandy Benefit Concert Debashish performed in NYC in 2012 with his daughter Anandi and brother Subashish. 

Seven-time Grammy® winner Paul Winter has a body of work that chronicles his wide-ranging experiences in the musical traditions and natural environments of the Earth.  The saxophonist, composer and bandleader founded Living Music as the recording context for his ensemble, the Paul Winter Consort, and his community of colleagues, which includes some of the world’s finest jazz, world, and classical musicians, along with notable voices from the great symphony of wildlife.
It was a blast when he came by my apartment,  played some instruments,  hung out and talked about the big event coming up:  His 35th Annual Winter Solstice Celebration.
The Cathedral at St. John the Divine during the spectacle of Paul WInter’s Solstice Celebration

Here's our first recording from Ragas Live Festival 2018! A beautiful set from 11pm to midnight from Anirban Dasgupta (sarod), Mir Naqibul Islam (tabla).
 
Anirban is the youngest son and disciple of Pt. Buddhadev Dasgupta. Needless to mention, he grew up with the very best ambience of Indian Classical music, with his older sibling, Bhavani Shankar also following his father’s footsteps. Not to be left behind, Anirban also took to playing the Sarod from an early age under the able guidance and tutelage of his illustrious father. A wonderful product of innate talent, years of grueling toil and delicate musical nurture, Anirban remains an extremely humble and self-effacing artist. In 1987, he stood first in the All India Radio Music Competition. He has performed widely in India as well as in the UK, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium and USA.
 
Mir Naqibul Islam (tabla) is a classical music performer in Bangladesh and New York, both as a soloist and an accompanist. Though trained in a purely traditional style, he incorporates many genres and influences into his playing. He is fortunate to have Shri Ashoke Paul, a disciple of Padmabhushan Pandit Jnan Prakash ghosh, as his guru for the past 17 years, learning the technical and aesthetic aspects of tabla playing. Mir has also learned from Janab Syed Hafizur Rahman, Shri Madan Gopal Das, and Pandit Suresh Talwalkar. Mir is currently taking musical instruction from Pandit Anindo Chatterjee.

We hang with the great Turkish musician Ozan Aksoy. He performs live on Ney and Saz and we  check out tracks from his new album entitled, Ozan.
 
The New York City based musician Ozan Aksoy’s destiny was set with his birth name - Ozan - an ancient title for mystical bards in West Asia. As a child growing up in Turkey, he first learned to play the saz (lute) from his father, and soon demonstrated remarkable breadth as a multi-instrumentalist, becoming proficient in many of the string, woodwind, and percussive instruments of the region. He developed a passion for the music of ethnic and religious minorities in his country including the Kurds, Armenians, Laz, and Alevi, among others. Later in college, as an early member of the critically-acclaimed ensemble Kardeş Türküler (meaning Ballads of Solidarity), Ozan and his colleagues performed the songs of these unrecognized and suppressed peoples, pushing the boundaries of inclusion in Turkey. During his time with the group they released four albums and toured extensively throughout Europe, spreading their message of diversity and acceptance. Ozan then relocated to the United States to complete a doctorate in ethnomusicology and further develop his multicultural repertoire.

A freewheeling interview with Zakir Hussain, widely hailed as one of the global percussionists of our time. This was recorded in November of 2018.  We later chatted in 2020 and the maestro performed on our Ragas Live Festival both also available on this podcast.   
Zakir Hussain, who first made a name for himself accompanying legends such as Ustad Ali Akbar Khan,  avi Shankar, Ustad Vilayat Khan, Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia, Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma, and countless others has grown to become a global figure. Prominent in world music projects, he has collaborated with artists as diverse as George Harrison, Yo-Yo Ma, Giovanni Hidalgo, Jan Garbarek, Van Morrison, John McLaughlin, and Mickey Hart.