record label
"Big Three" music labels
A record label or record company is a brand or trademark of Sound recording and reproduction, music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a Music publisher, ...
, established in London in the mid-1980s, that specializes in Cuban and
West African
West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Ma ...
recording artists, among other international music stars. The label's founding principle was to be an artist-led company with all aspects of each release tailored to the artist. This continues to be the label's way of working. World Circuit celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2006 by releasing ''World Circuit Presents...'', a 2-disc retrospective compilation album. In 2018, World Circuit was acquired by
BMG Rights Management
BMG Rights Management GmbH (also known simply as BMG) is an international music company based in Berlin, Germany. It combines the activities of a music publisher and a record label.
BMG was formed in October 2008 after Bertelsmann sold its st ...
.
History
1986 to 1999
In 1986, the label released its first albums, María Rodríguez's ''La Tremenda'' and Abd El Gadir Salim's ''Sounds of Sudan Volume One''.
World Circuit's first taste of major success came in 1993 with the teaming of Ali Farka Touré and American guitarist Ry Cooder on the
Grammy
The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achievements in music. They are regarded by many as the most prestigious a ...
award-winning album, '' Talking Timbuktu''. The album went on to sell over a million copies worldwide; a remarkable total for an album of its kind.
During the mid-nineties World Circuit began working with new artists, who would go on to become long-time label stalwarts. Moving away from their usual Latin and West African emphasis, World Circuit released the album ''Rumba Argelina'' by Spanish group
Radio Tarifa Radio Tarifa was a Spanish World music ensemble, combining Flamenco, Arab-Andalusian music, Arabic music, Moorish music and other musical influences of the Mediterranean, the Middle Ages and the Caribbean. The name of the ensemble comes from an im ...
. ''Rumba Argelina'' propelled them to cult fame, achieving great popularity across Europe. Another artist to make an immediate impact was Senegalese multi-instrumentalist and singer
Cheikh Lô
Cheikh N'Digel Lô (born 12 September 1955) is a Senegalese musician.
Early life
He was born to Senegalese parents in Bobo Dioulasso, Burkina Faso, and began playing drums and singing at an early age.
Career
In 1976, he joined Orchestre Volta Ja ...
. The dreadlocked maverick's debut album ''Ne La Thiass'' was produced by Youssou N’Dour, and is underpinned by indigenous
Mbalax
Mbalax (or mbalakh) is the urban dance music of Senegal, Mauritania and the Gambia. The musical style is rooted in the indigenous instrumental and vocal styles accompanied by polyrhythmic sabar drumming of the Wolof, a social identity that incl ...
and
Flamenco
Flamenco () is an art form based on the various folkloric music traditions of southern Spain, developed within the Gitanos, gitano subculture of the region of Andalusia, and also having historical presence in Extremadura and Region of Murcia, ...
rhythms.
In 1996, Cooder was invited to
Havana, Cuba
Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.world-music producer Nick Gold of the World Circuit record label to record a session with two African High-life musicians from
Mali
Mali, officially the Republic of Mali, is a landlocked country in West Africa. It is the List of African countries by area, eighth-largest country in Africa, with an area of over . The country is bordered to the north by Algeria, to the east b ...
in collaboration with Cuban musicians."Interview with Ry Cooder in Los Angeles" by Betty Arcos, host, "The Global Village" Pacifica Radio 27 June 2000. ''Buena Vista Social Club'' site.
Public Broadcasting Service
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia
Arlington County, or simply Arlington, is a County (United States), county in the ...
(PBS). Retrieved 18 March 2007. On Cooder's arrival (via
Mexico
Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...
Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was foun ...
. Retrieved 20 March 2007 the musicians from Africa had not turned up and it transpired later that they had been unable to secure their visas to travel to Cuba.
As a result, Gold and Cooder changed their plans and recorded three consecutive albums with Cuban musicians instead. First, they recorded ''
A Toda Cuba le Gusta
A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, and others worldwide. Its name in English is '' a'' (pronounced ), plural ''aes''.
It is similar in shape to the Ancient ...
'' by the Afro-Cuban All Stars,Nigel Williamson. Sleeve notes from Wim Wenders' ''Buena Vista Social Club'' documentary, Road Movies Filmproduktion, Berlin. Licensed by FilmFour Ltd, 1999. an album of big band Son Cubano music produced by
Juan de Marcos González
Juan de Marcos González (born Juan de Marcos González-Cárdenas; January 29, 1954) is a Cuba
Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of isl ...
.Sleeve notes from ''A Toda Cuba le Gusta – Afro-Cuban All Stars'', World Circuit Records WCD 047, 1997. They then recorded the multi-million selling '' Buena Vista Social Club'' album,Sleeve notes from ''Buena Vista Social Club'', World Circuit Records WCD 050, 1997. produced by Cooder. The third album, '' Introducing...Rubén González'', was recorded in just two days, produced by Nick Gold and arranged once again by Juan de Marcos González.Nigel Williamson. Sleeve notes from ''Introducing...Rubén González'', World Circuit Records WCD 049, 1997. All three albums were recorded at Egrem
studios
A studio is a space set aside for creative work of any kind, including art, dance, music and theater.
The word ''studio'' is derived from the , from , from ''studere'', meaning to Wiktionary:study, study or zeal.
Types Art
The studio o ...
,
Havana
Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.Livingston Studios, London, prior to their release on the World Circuit label in 1997. In 2008 World Circuit released a 2-CD set of the Buena Vista Social Club live performance at
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall ( ) is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is at 881 Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between 56th Street (Manhattan), 56th and 57th Street (Manhattan), 57t ...
recorded in 1998.
Nick Gold had met Jerry Boys after working together on an album with Oumou Sangaré during 1993 and they subsequently began their close collaboration on Cuban music projects in 1996. In 2001 Gold bought the Livingston Recording Studios from Boys, which enabled most of World Circuit's artists to record and mix music at that site.
Nick Gold and World Circuit are also responsible for bringing the
Senegalese
Demographic features of the population of Senegal include population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population.
About 42% of Senegal's population i ...
band Orchestra Baobab to world fame after its 2001 re-release of the 1982 record ''Pirates Choice'' in Europe (originally compiled and released by World Circuit in 1987).
2000 to 2009
''Mandé Sessions'' trilogy
In the summer of 2004 the World Circuit team of Nick Gold and Jerry Boys travelled with a mobile studio to Mali to record a trilogy of albums at the Hotel Mandé, Bamako. The first album in the series, '' In the Heart of the Moon'', released in June 2005, is a collaboration between Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté that went on to win a
Grammy Award for Best Traditional World Music Album
The Grammy Award for Best Traditional World Music Album was an honor presented to recording artists between 2004 and 2011 for quality traditional world music albums. The Grammy Awards, an annual ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally ...
. Second in the series is ''Boulevard de l’Indépendance'' by Toumani Diabaté's pan-African Symmetric Orchestra, composed of musicians (mostly griots) from across the old
Mali Empire
The Mali Empire (Manding languages, Manding: ''Mandé''Ki-Zerbo, Joseph: ''UNESCO General History of Africa, Vol. IV, Abridged Edition: Africa from the Twelfth to the Sixteenth Century'', p. 57. University of California Press, 1997. or ''Manden ...
of west Africa, who play a mix of traditional instruments including the kora, djembe,
balafon
The balafon (pronounced , or, by analogy with ''xylophone'' etc., ) is a gourd-resonated xylophone, a type of struck idiophone. It is closely associated with the neighbouring Mandé peoples, Mandé, Bwaba Bobo people, Bobo, Senufo people, Seno ...
electronic keyboard
An electronic keyboard, portable keyboard, or digital keyboard is an electronic musical instrument based on keyboard instruments. Electronic keyboards include synthesizers, digital pianos, stage pianos, electronic organs and digital audio work ...
.
The third and final part of the ''Mandé Sessions'' trilogy, '' Savane'' (released July 2006), was also the first posthumous Ali Farka Touré release. It was received with wide acclaim by professionals and fans alike and was nominated for a Grammy Award in the category "Best Contemporary World Music Album". The panel of experts from the World Music Chart Europe (WMCE), a chart voted by the leading World Music specialists around Europe, chose ''Savane'' as their Album of the Year 2006, with the album topping the chart for three consecutive months (September to November 2006). The album has also been listed as No. 1 in the influential
Metacritic
Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...
's "Best Albums of 2006" poll, and No. 5 in its all-time best reviewed albums.
2010 to present day
In February 2010, World Circuit released the successor to Ali Farka Touré and Toumani Diabaté's, ''In The Heart of the Moon'' (2005), '' Ali and Toumani''. Recorded over three afternoons at Livington Studios, London, in 2005, with contributions from Orlando "Cachaíto" López on bass, and produced by Nick Gold, it was Touré's final studio album, and lasting legacy.
In October 2010, World Circuit released Afrocubism's self-titled debut, a long-awaited collaboration between some of Cuba's and Mali's most esteemed musicians, including Eliades Ochoa,
Bassekou Kouyate
Bassekou Kouyate (born 1966) is a musician from Mali. His band is known as Ngoni ba.
Life and career
He was born into the Kouyate family in Garana, Barouéli Cercle, 60 kilometres from Ségou, in 1966.Frank Bessem's Musiques d'Afrique: At t ...
, Toumani Diabaté, Lassana Diabaté and Kasse Mandy Diabaté. It was a collaboration which was initially intended to take place some 15 years earlier, but never arose as a result of visa complications. In December 2011 the album ''Afrocubism'' was nominated for a Grammy award in the category of Best Traditional World Music Album.
Following Ali Farka Toure's death from cancer in 2006, Toumani Diabaté continued to record for World Circuit as a solo artist, releasing '' The Mandé Variations'', a classical-sounding album of solo kora in 2008, and duetting with his kora playing son Sidiki Diabate on 2014's '' Toumani & Sidike''.
As time ran out for many of the veteran musicians World Circuit had recorded in its early years, the label brought young and previously unknown talent to the fore. Fatoumata Diawara's 2011 debut '' Fatou'' introduced a new female voice to rival her fellow Malian singer Oumou Sangare, whom she had once backed.
Mbongwana Star, a new seven piece band from the Democratic Republic of Congo released their debut album, '' From Kinshasa'' on World Circuit in 2015 and in 2017 the label released '' Ladilikan'', a ground-breaking collaboration between Trio da Kali, comprising there young Malian musicians, and the Kronos Quartet. Produced by Nick Gold, the project was sponsored by the Aga Khan Trust for Culture.
The veterans of Orchestra Baobab also released a new album in 2017, '' Tribute To Ndiouga Dieng'', and celebrated its release with a world tour in 2018.