Bendo

GEMINI marks Macklemore’s first solo project in 12 years, following two releases with producer Ryan Lewis including the multiple-GRAMMY award winning album The Heist and 2016 release This Unruly Mess I’ve Made (featuring Platinum-certified single "Downtown"). Collectively Macklemore’s music videos have been viewed over 2 billion times and he is one of only two rappers to have a Diamond-certified single. The viral video for current hit single “Glorious” feat. Skylar Grey starring Macklemore’s 100 year old grandmother garnered over 30 million views in less than a month, while the video for “Marmalade” feat. Lil Yachty starring a Mini Macklemore and a Lil Lil Yachty was viewed over 11 million times in less than a week. “Glorious” continues to climb the charts, Top 40 radio, Billboard’s Hot 100, Spotify’s Global Top 50, racking up 2 million streams a day. In the past year, the Seattle rapper released two solo songs “Wednesday Morning” and “Drug Dealer,” performed on Ellen and The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, was featured in an MTV special with President Obama about the opioid epidemic in America and was the first US citizen ever to participate in the Presidential Weekly Address.

Pianists and guitarists don't always mix well,"" Eric Legnini says. There can even be a kind of competition in the air between these two instrument worlds, these two mini orchestras on their own, these two popular technical tools that everyone has tasted at one time or another. However, it is far from being his case, says the Belgian: on his side, relations are rather good - even if, he confesses in a loud laugh, that he is only a ""poor guitarist"" who can only play ""three poor Brazilian chords"". But it must be said that the native of Huy (near Liege) grew up with a father who was a fan of Django Reinhardt: ""there were always some that resonated in the house"", he recalls. And then, along the way, Eric Legnini met some of the best specimens of the genus.

Some musicians experience a sacred and deeply intimate relation with their art. When a 19-year-old Dhafer Youssef discovered Indian music in Vienna, where he was studying classical music, it had the effect of a bewildering epiphany on him. Hindu sonorities struck a deep chord within Dhafer’s musical soul – thirty years later, the Tunisian composer reminisces : « I was both filled with wonder as well as deeply convinced that one day I would be performing alongside the most legendary players of Indian music ». A memorable show from Ali Akbar Khan, the master of Indian sarod, at the Wiener Konzerthaus in Vienna came to seal the deal for the vocalist and oud master. From then on, Dhafer Youssef lived and breathed Indian music. Or was it Indian music that had appointed him to become its messenger?