Ragas

As is usually the case with Shankar, the music is quite accessible to Western ears. The jor section of the piece "Dhun" is quite tuneful, for example. And the brevity of the raags (five, ten, 16, and 21 minutes) really helps. The five-minute track is a stirring tabla solo by Alla Rakha with minimal accompaniment by Shankar. Highly recommended for Indian music beginners.

The saxophone is not an instrument usually associated with Pakistani music. And Pakistanis are not especially famous for collaborating with Norwegians. But that is what listeners have on this incredible recording. The music is predominantly Pakistani in sound, tonality, and structure; voice, sarangi, and tabla improvise along with Garbarek's saxophone on every track. For aficionados of Indian or Pakistani music, this is a great recording; Garbarek's lines are right in step with the traditional styles of improvisation. Listeners unacquainted with these traditions will find this recording a mesmerizingly exotic disc. Those familiar with Garbarek's work will be very surprised. This is a completely unique recording for him; one can only hope that he makes further explorations in this vein.

Sequenza21
In 1970 or thereabouts, Cage wrote his Song Books, a collection of 90 vocal/theater pieces. Solo for Voice 58, from the Song Books, amounts to a collection of pitches upon which the vocalist can improvise, and include microtones. From this raw material are derived the "18 Microtonal Ragas", and this is a fascinating and often beautiful album. The vocalist, Amelia Cuni, is nothing short of amazing as she puts forth a virtuosic performance in conjunction with three other musicians on electronics/drones and percussion. While this could have amounted to mere chinoiserie, the musical instincts of Cuni and her colleagues, along with the freedom afforded by Cage himself, make this a very individual and wonderful composition, one which acknowledges the influence of Eastern musics without imitating them for the sake of cheap imitation.