unwelcomeness

at the Troubadour

 

 Podcast Video: Play Now | Play in Popup

 
Chirgilchin is one of the more famous traditional music groups from Tuva, an isolated, semi-autonomous country in the South of Siberia. In the rest of the world, throat-singing (or overtone singing, the Tuvan version of which is known as Khoomei) is the most well-known of Tuva’s cultural traditions, mostly because of its difficult-to-describe, eerie multi-tone sound. Put in really simple and inadequate terms, it’s a drone-like note made with the vocal chords, over which one or several whistly tones are created by manipulating the air after it passes the vocal chords, allowing the singer to produce a variable chord of sorts instead of a single pitch. Chirgilchin are masters, and they operate annual music camps in Tuva and Northern California. They played in LA twice recently during the World Festival of Sacred Music, and we were lucky enough to be at one of their performances. The video clip above is about 3/4 of their encore song.

Chirgilchin plays music for goats

Dates for the rest of their current US tour here.