Breakfast time blues


Wake up feeling all is good with the world. Decide I really should be more positive about BBC Radio 3. Switch on their breakfast programme presented by Martin Handley. First music is more than promising, Rachmaninov arrangement of Mendelssohn followed by Malcolm Arnold film score. Then Martin Handley announces next track will be a listener request from a disc of children's favourites featuring Zippity Doo Dah and Santa Claus got stuck in my chimney. Throw myself across room and stuff first CD I can grab into player. Abdoulaye Diabate, Djeli Moussa Diawara and Moussa Cissoko's delicious brand of jazz from the unlikely combination of piano, kora and percussion fills the room. All is good with the world again.

* Confession time: my copy of Kora Jazz is a pirate CD bought in Morocco. The RIAA should just view it as a promotional copy.

* Trivia time: OAOP will be taking an extended summer intermission in a few weeks while we pursue some paths in Europe. One of them leads to a monastery where the kora is used to accompany the Divine Liturgy. More kora here and here.

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