[TR24][OF] Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, Jie-Bing Chen, Bela Fleck - Tabula Rasa - 1996 (World, Fusion)

Grammy Nominee - Best World Music Album - 1996

From Amazon:

It's no rare event these days when great musicians from opposite sides of the planet come together in a musical merging project. The "West Meets East" concept is not new; it's been going on since Debussy heard Balinese gamelan, since Bartok recorded Morrocan "Chleuh", since Reich studied drumming in Africa. And in the modern age of studio recordings, it is certainly not a new phenomenon -- just ask the Beatles, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis, John MacLaughlin, AfroCelt Sound System, Don Cherry, and even Ry Cooder.

This record sits easily with the aforementioned as a monumental cross-cultural musical merging. It is one of the finest available. I believe it even surpasses the legendary "Meeting By the River" of V.M. Bhatt and Ry Cooder.

In this record, Bhatt teams up with legendary Bluegrass banjo player Bela Fleck and erh-hu artist Jie-Bing Chen. Just as important, though in the background, are Ronu Majumdar on bansuri, Poovalur Srinivasan on mridangam, and Sangeeta Shankar on violin.

What sets this record apart from others is that it perfectly blends the various styles and instruments brought to the table without sacrificing the ethnicity and authenticity of any. And this I believe is the crucial asset in effect here -- because how often do these cross-cultural mergings turn into really a "Western" record with some exotic sounds? Usually, one party takes a backseat role to the rest.

Not so here. Each player adds their own unique element to the mix, and nothing is sacrificed. The end result is a truly unclassifiable genre of music of the utmost quality. No player is eschewing any part of their musical heritage to "fit" into the scope of the project: if you could fade out everything except Bhatt's mohan vina, you would be hearing excellent traditional-sounding Indian folk music. Tweak the faders to isolate Fleck, and you would hear bluegrass music with all its chromaticism, inflections, etc. Pick out Jie-Bing Chen's erh-hu, and you will most likely hear pentatonic scales straight out of the Far East. And yet, the end result is a perfectly-balanced amalgamation of the disparate styles that somehow sounds like these instruments have played in the same settings for years.

The best track on this record is "Earl in Shanghai," which illustrates this perfectly. When Chen begins the tune alone, the pentatonic melody sounds distinctively Asian. Then, Fleck enters, adding a Western chromaticism to the mix. When the track takes off with the added percussion, we are left with a real bluegrass foundation, with the same pentatonic melody in the top (with one added passing tone), all over a solidly Indian mridangam beat cycle. The overall result is of the utmost quality.

That being said, I believe this record surpasses even the legendary collaboration between Bhatt and Ry Cooder. This album is decisively more composed and rehearsed than the "Meeting By the River." While the Cooder/Bhatt meeting is undoubtedly great, there are several giveaway moments in the recording that show how quickly it was thrown together. It's really a jam session -- at times one person moves through a transition while another doesn't, the endings of the songs happen abruptly...it's a monumental record, no doubt, but this one is miles above it in terms of quality and professionalism.

Well, enough blathering on. For some of the most relaxing and beautiful world music you will ever hear, pick up this record. You will not be disappointed.