Customer Reviews

Marcel Cellier Presents Mysterious Albania

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Mr. Cellier is best known for combing the archives in Bulgaria for the cream of thirties years of records to produce
Le Mystere des voix de Bulgare volumes 1 and 2.

Here he has brought the same fine ear to Albania, combing the vaults for wonderful representative tracks of the various styles to be found in the various traditions there. There is nothing academic is the result. This is simply a great listenable record.

Just by way of example, the two tracks representing the ancient polyphonic style of Vlore are the best I've ever found. Take that as indicative of the collection as a whole. If you have any interest in Albanian traditional music, start here.

Recorded in 1979 and 1980, when Albania was still terra incognita for Americans (see the movie, Wag the Dog), Marcel Cellier took his Nagra recorder to this country sandwiched on the Adriatic between Greece, Bulgaria, and Balkan Macedonia and made a discovery of rare musical idioms that you can share by listening to this unusual album. While influenced somewhat by Turkish, Slavic, and Greek musical forms over the ages, Albania music is essentially folk, rural, and ancient. Polyphony and drones characterize it. An ensemble of flautists, as seen on the cover, produce a mesmerizing sound that must be as old as the hills. Other instruments presented are reeded flutes, fiddle, two-stringed lute, and frame and double-headed drums. Two-part and four-part choral pieces are also found here among the 16 diverse examples. If you want to hear Euro-Asian music that defies simple categorization, investigate this album and step back in time.