Ocora East Asia 1

i know i have been a terrible blogger. not to mention stupid: lost a lot of links a few weeks ago when the rapidshare account ran out, and i didn't know about the "transfer links to collectors account" thing. (grrrrrr...) so there are a few requests to get to... going to get to them one at a time. (the 2 most recent OCORA Africa ones, "Bruitset Ambiances" have fresh links)

and now, onward and foward!

____Chen Zhong is one of China's most revered musicians and teachers. Seventy-five when this recording was made, he has spent a lifetime playing several instruments and keeping the Shanghai style alive. This is music for two, three, or four play and Zhong is accompanied by two Chinese musicians and the French Sino-musicologist Francois Picard. In various combinations they play flutes, ocarina, fiddles, and zithers. The ocarina in question is not the Western ocarina of course, but a round clay flute with a 7000-year history; reviving its use in secular music is one of Zhong's many achievements. Zhong plays solo pipa (lute) on one track and exhibits some impressive fingerpicking. On another, Zhong plays end-blown flute (something like a recorder) and is accompanied by Yang Lining on the zheng zither, which in this piece is strummed gorgeously in the manner of a harp.

Teruhisa Fukuda performing six of the most representative pieces of the Kinko School, developed in the 18th century from traditions of itinerant komusô zen monks for whom enlightenment could be reached through the sound of the shakuhachi flute.