Customer Reviews

Moorish Music from Mauritania

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
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When I asked for this wonderful music to be played over the sound system of my local record store, there were complaints about "Islamic music" from people of other faiths. What they failed to see is that the messages of these devotional, patriotic, new and old songs, all of which are sheer poetry, speak universal truths. Even without the English lyrics provided in the sleeve, the intensity and beauty of these performances leave you in no doubt that this is a deeply spiritual and happy music. And what music! Accompanied by her family on acoustic Mauritanian and electric instruments, Dimi mint Abba's voice is astonishing. With a vocal dexterity that seems to defy the impossible, she makes light of quarter tones and intricate scales heavily influenced by the Arabic tradition. The mesmerising purity of her voice is difficult to describe. Not knowing Mauritanian music at all, the nearest comparison I can make is with the Indian devotional music tradition. But there again, Miss Dimi's voice often reminds me of the range and intensity of Maria Callas and the quicksilver fluidity of Jimi Hendrix's guitar playing! Which means that this is an unique performance; a gift to an unsuspecting world. I have just one other Dimi mint Abba CD on a French label. I hear she is much loved in Arabic speaking Africa and the Middle East. So one can live in hope that her fans are demanding more recordings which will eventually find their way to our part of the world.

Amazing Female and Male Vocals, Hypnotic Trancelike Acoustic Set followed by Electric Set that will make you want to get up and dance.

Dimi Mint Aba is now a world music superstar; it is tragic her stuff is unavailable and out of print in the USA. Is it a masonic conspiracy, or just too much brittany spears. Would like to hear this on the loud speakers at whole foods and not just the same ole same ole 60's rock.

for more on African culture and the Mauritaneans: Africa Adorned

WHY OH WHY is this CD no longer available? I got it out of the library a long time ago and have attempted to order it twice. It no longer appears in music stores in the U.S. This CD is one of the most beautiful, inspiring, and passionate recordings EVER! Please. . . someone find me a copy. . .

Unbelievably, this was the first quality studio recording of Moorish music of the Islamic republic of Mauritania, the debut of singers Dimi Mint Abba and Kalifa Ould Eide. The hand of Ali Farka Toure is in there somewhere, too. Whatever, this is one great, great disc, if for no other reason, it is one of the few places you can access the extraodinary vocal gifts of the aforesaid, Dimi Mint(daughter) Abba. Both artists, known locally as iggawin, continue to hold and cherish traditional forms while improvising within them; an attitude that reminds me of the equally astonishing mugham singers in the East, Azerjaiban, wherever. This is one disc that a lover of the human voice cannot afford to miss.

brilliant . life changing buy it

This album is available from World Circuit, Ltd. Cheers!

Khalifa Oulde Eide and Dimi Mint Abba together with 2 women back-up singers have created an album of music which pierces the prayer time of anyone at prayer. This sounds to me as if the entire Muslim world fixed it's hearts on the love that binds us. Eide plays an instrument called the tidinit and the electric guitar in the manner of musicians dating back thousands of years, and together with the voices of Abba and the other women drives the demons of the desert deep into the ground where they can only eat themselves.
Music like this changes lives, it reinforces the life force, it transcends time and it speaks to a post-terrorist world in which we all celebrate and dance to the rythms' of life and unity.
I couldn't recommend a recording more highly than I do this one. Listen and you will pray in your own heart, not for a divisive deity but a unified humanity.
I must go now, the Whirling Dervishes are knocking at the window.