World Music

By kate on April 2nd, 2002

World Music. What does that phrase mean to you? For years, I avoided world music because it simply didn’t interest me. Lately, that has completely changed.

It started with a few CDs that were sort of westernized world music: Songs from the Victorious City by Anne Dudley (of Art of Noise) and Jaz Coleman, and Traveler ’99, a compilation from Six Degrees Records. They were owned by good friends of mine, I heard them, and ended up owning them.

I guess it makes sense that my attitude really changed when I came home from my big backpacking trip to southeast Asia. The funny thing is that, aside from Balinese music, I really didn’t pay a lot of attention to music while travelling. But now that I’m back, I can’t get enough world music. It just sounds new and interesting to me.

Here are some of the CDs that Steve and I have acquired this year and that I can’t seem to get enough of: