Thursday, February 18, 2016

galician folk

Since last summer, I got to know most of the regular folk sessions going on in Oxford city (thanks to the young folkie in the family). While I don't spend all that much time listening to folk, the democratic spirit meaning that I can just walk into a pub and join in is very attractive.

In the process, I discovered that Galician folk is my favourite variety. That’s music from the Northwest corner of Spain, the square that sits on top of Portugal – not to be confused with the region in Eastern Europe which for a short time bore the same name, I think the Habsburg Empire only renamed that area to annoy the Polish, or something along those lines.

Anyhow, so the traditional music from Galicia is really lovely, and it also knows a few keys other than G major. I’ll start a new tag on it beginning with this master post listing some of the links I have discovered so far.

local:

Oxford Pandeireteiras

Galician session at Oxford

Xogara – Oxford-based band mixing Galician and other influences

global:

Radio galega: son galicia Galician music 24/7 - two other radio channels in Galician also available via this page.

Xeitona – YouTube tutorials - also on blogspot, twitter, facebook ...

Luar na Lubre – a Galician band that became famous worldwide in the 90s after collaborating with Mike Oldfield, but is still active today.

Ghastas pista? news from the Galician folk scene

Folkoteca galega (tunes database)

Video evidence to follow soon ...

PS In the process I also discovered the Galician language, about which I'll rave some other time.

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