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Written in Folk Roots issue 66, 1988


GRUPO DIDÁCTICO-MUSICAL DO OBRADOIRO-ESCOLA DE GAITAS & ZANFONAS, UNIVERSIDADE POPULAR DO CONCELLO DE VIGO
Instrumentos Musicais Populares Galegos
Sonifolk H-026/3 (1987)

Never expecting to get this opulent boxed set for review, I bought it at a festival, and found I had a bargain - three LPs, a book and 20 colour slides, all dealing with the instruments and music of Galicia. By the time the review copy arrived, a couple of months of breakfast-times had been cheered up with big, swinging tunes played on every relevant instrument the bagpipe and hurdy-gurdy school/workshop of Vigo University could come up with.
      As this is an instrumental project it doesn't feature any of the characteristic Galician ensemble singing, by turns energetic and stirring, full of parallel thirds, but apart from that it covers the music of the area pretty comprehensively, from demonstrations of the range and scales of the featured instruments, through traditional ensemble playing, to arrangements with parallels in the work of O'Riada or Shaun Davey in Ireland. A great shop-window for Galego music, instruments and musicianship, and I should think destined for classic status.
     The label, Sonifolk, which covers traditional music throughout Spain, is now distributed in Britain by Topic. I hereby volunteer for a whole-label review.

     
© 1988 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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