Exotic and free, tight and complex.....


Amazon reviews are a perfect example of the damage inflicted by citizen journalism. But one reviewer did get it right when they praised the Hadouk Trio's "exotic and free, tight and complex" mix of self-styled 'vegetal groove' jazz and world music. The Trio's name is a conflation of its unique instrumental line up - hajhouj (another name for the guembri of the Moroccan gnawa) and doudouk (Armenian flute). Formed in 1996, the original line-up was Didier Malherbe (doudouk), Loy Ehrlich (guembri) and Steve Shehan (percussion). Didier Malherbe, who spent time in India and Tangiers in the 1960s and sessioned with Ravi Shankar, is the driving force behind the band, and four of their albums from 1999 to 2009 have been brought together by Naïve in the box set above, which retails for the price of four budget CDs. Sample the Hadouk's signature sound here, and Condona, another pioneering jazz meets world music combo, are showcased here. Just for fun I have appended below a photo, which first appeared in Chance music from the souk system, of me surrounded by guembri and other exotic instruments in the appropriately named Bob Music in Essaouira Morocco.


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