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Next Stop... Soweto Vol. 2: Soultown, R and B, Funk and Psych Sounds From The Townships 1969-76
Second of a 3-part series exploring underground South African music during the late '60s and '70s. Touches on mbaqanga and jazz artists who dabbled with soul and funk fusions during the early '70s: the Mgababa Queens and Mahotella Queens, and great SA jazz combo The Heshoo Beshoo Group, more. 22 tracks.

Andy Palacio and the Garifuna Collective
Watina
Belize music star Palacio's first US release is an all-star affair that shows off the diversity of Central America's Garifuna culture in a contemporary tour-de-force of melody and rhythm. Each track on Wátina is based on a traditional Garifuna rhythm and all of the lyrics are in the Garifuna language.

Samy Izy
Tsara Madagasikara
The "red island" of Madagascar is a unique natural reserve with animals and plants some of which cannot be found anywhere else but here. The shimmering music landscape is also unique, marked as it is by the diversity of peoples living on the island. After many years of silence, a new sensationally varied project has reached us from there. The music legend Sammy founded a new band for these Network recordings: the singer Bosco and his female vocal partner Amiziou; the accordionist Medicis, influenced not only by the lightning speed of tsapiki, but also by traditional tromba salvation ceremonies; the percussionist Petit with his fine feeling for changes in style and rhythm. Sammy also invited top-ranking guests to he studio: flautist Rageroge, with his primal Madagascan roots; the Tana Gospel Choir, and, reviving an almost forgotten tradition, the nine-piece wind orchestra Ambodirana Centre. Many of the tracks on this CD take up the rhythms and melodies of African dance music, one of the many innovations of this inner-Malagasy crossover. Listen

Deux accords diront
Eisherz
It's been ten years since the foundation of deux accords diront, 10 years that Anne Niepold and Aline Pohl have been creating their universe. Their motto? Adventure! Not trad, nor jazz, nor classical, nor world but a mix of all and none that creates a genuine and funny performance - fascinating, surprising, spontaneous, free. Eisherz (heart of ice) tells the story of the heart through the music: its beats, its palpitations, its arhythmias, crises and arrests - its restarts, its humors - some dark, some light - its 'take heart!'

Luigi Cinque Tarantual Hypertext O'rchestra
Tangerine Café
fRoots says: 'definitely deep Mediterranean, even though it draws elements from further afield... staggeringly well integrated and arranged through all its different layers and levels... Wow!'

Oysterband
Meet You There
On sale: The 2007 studio album by the Brit folk-rock legends.

Leilia
Consentimento
The first cantareiras, the teachers, the feminine force - with pristine voices mixed contemporary music, comes a unique sound with musical production and attention for details. More than 20 years working for the recovery of our musical tradition. ConSentimento is a tribute to all that women who made and continue to make creation the reality through preservation and transmission of the Galician oral tradition. With many thanks to Eva Castiñeiras, a singer, pandereteira, and a woman like so many anonymous women who seed our land with art, culture and beauty.

Mahsa and Marjan Vahdat
Songs From a Persian Garden
In May of 2007, KKV and two Western embassies arranged a remarkable concert. In a Persian garden in Tehran, the singers Mahsa and Marjan Vahdat broke the ban on public performances by women. The two sisters were accompanied by Knut Reiersrud and five other Norwegian and Iranian musicians

A Banda Das Crechas
ABDC
Andrew Cronshaw writes in fRoots: 'For decades A Casa das Crechas at Via Sacra 3 in Santiago de Compostela has been the best known session-bar in Galicia's folk music revival, the most likely place to run into and play with musicians from Spain's green north-west and sometimes from abroad. On May 31st 2009 a bunch of those who were around of its long-time and more occasional denizens, some widely-known, some not, gathered there to record the music they like and has united them over the years. Played and sung with a nice balance of democratic directedness of arrangement and non-studio informality and on a shifting cast of instruments including fiddle, gaita, flutes, sax, accordion, guitar, banjolin and the exuberant rattle-patter of pandeireta, the material is mostly Galician – xota, muiñeira, pasodoble, marcha procesional, rumba, and songs including a spirited Meu Cabaliño and the Cuban-emigration song Unha Noite Na Eira Do Trigo - but also includes tunes that have drifted in from the rest of the European folk revival, from Sweden, Ireland and the Balkans, learnt from the likes of Väsen, JPP and Andy Irvine, and been enwrapped in a Galician embrace.'

Camilla Granlien Band
Jarnnetter
Two great poets from Lom: Tor Jonsson (1916–1951) and Olav Aukrust (1883–1929). Though their views of rural life were far apart, it held a great influence on them both. Tor Jonsson faced much hardship in his youth and came to be critical of the closely-knit rural society, while Olav Aukrust, a champion of religious and national causes, held a more positive view of rural communities, people and lifestyles. Differences notwithstanding, it is obvious from the titles and form of their poems that both drew inspiration from traditional music. We have set some of their poems to traditional tunes both old and recent, and included a few songs they might have heard at home.

Daniele Sepe, Ensemble Micrologus, Und Rote Jazz Fraktion
Kronomakia
Neopolitan arranger, composer and saxophone player Sepe, joined by two ensembles, takes on the early music of Italy in his usual shocking style, seamlessly joining jazz, classical and early art music into a beautiful whole.

Solfrid Molland
Katedral for tapte drommer
On Katedral for tapte drømmer [Cathedral of Lost Dreams], the Norwegian accordionist is joined by some great names in Balkan music: Romanian hotshots Taraf de Haiduks, French-Russian gutarist Pascal de Loutcher and Gypsy singer Ionut Guluna.

Kardemimmit
Kaisla
Produced by Antti Järvelä (Frigg, JPP), this young band focuses on the kantele but with interesting new compositions inspired by Finnish folk traditions. Highly recommended.

Samy Izy
Tsara Madagasikara
The "red island" of Madagascar is a unique natural reserve with animals and plants some of which cannot be found anywhere else but here. The shimmering music landscape is also unique, marked as it is by the diversity of peoples living on the island. After many years of silence, a new sensationally varied project has reached us from there. The music legend Sammy founded a new band for these Network recordings: the singer Bosco and his female vocal partner Amiziou; the accordionist Medicis, influenced not only by the lightning speed of tsapiki, but also by traditional tromba salvation ceremonies; the percussionist Petit with his fine feeling for changes in style and rhythm. Sammy also invited top-ranking guests to he studio: flautist Rageroge, with his primal Madagascan roots; the Tana Gospel Choir, and, reviving an almost forgotten tradition, the nine-piece wind orchestra Ambodirana Centre. Many of the tracks on this CD take up the rhythms and melodies of African dance music, one of the many innovations of this inner-Malagasy crossover. Listen

Flukt
Drufiacc
On the second CD by this wonderful Norwegian group traditional Nordic music meets classical and blues, driven by a trio of fiddle, accordion and percussion to produce a compelling and driving sound. The purest of tunes and the simplest of moods exemplifies the mastery of Sturla Eide fiddle (hardangerfiddle), Øivind Farmen (accordion) and Håvard Sterten (percussion).