A tapestry of American roots, Haitian rhythms & African desert blues.

 

Drawing from the roots music traditions of America, Niger and Haiti the Bethany & Rufus Roots Quartet, featuring Yacouba Moumouni and Bonga Jean-Baptiste, come together to create an unexpected tapestry -- weaving the desert winds of Africa with Vodou traditions of the new world and the folk music of America.

 

The music crosses continents and musical boundaries and surpasses "fusion" to become an enthralling and inspiring living history of folk, rhythm and blues conjuring the ancestral traditions of both the old world and the new.

 

Bethany (vocals), as the daughter of legendary 60’s Folk singer Peter Yarrow (Peter , Paul & Mary), draws from an incredible legacy of folk music she has been surrounded by since she was a child. With a powerful voice full of soul and emotion, she reaches straight into the heart of the listener taking them on a journey across time, continents, and cultures.

 

Yacouba (vocals, flutes), master of the fulani flute and a pre-eminent voice of Saharan Blues, is a singer, flutist and leader of the jazz-ethnic band from Niger, Mamar Kassey. Probably the best known Nigerian musician outside the country, Moumouni is much beloved in his home country. With his melodic Fulani flute playing and soft-spoken vocals in the Songhai or Peul language, he has has helped preserve the musical traditions of Niger.

 

Bonga (percussion,  vocals) is a dynamic performer and master of the Afro Haitian drum, who descends from a rich lineage of Vodou ceremonial drumming and song. One of the few drum experts outside of Haiti, he continues to build traditional drums using techniques that are centuries old.

 

Rufus (cello, guitar) has taken the cello into previously unknown realms whose noted collaborations include African, Arabic, and American music forms; he has released a solo CD Songs for Cello on the Daqui  label.

 

In January 2007 Bethany & Rufus released their debut record 900 Miles on Hyena Records. The press was universally positive. The UK Guardian called the CD Intensely musical a splash of sunlight between the grey cracks of mediated culture; others called the disc incredibly rich Jazz Times; inventive and haunting Buffalo News; intimate and of great beauty Geotheque; and ...transcendent Le Nouvel Observateur. For the duo, it was a great triumph not just personally, but for the genre of folk music. It was so rewarding to get folk music out of the box of the usual expectation of voice and strummed guitar and turn a whole other kind of audience on to these old songs., says Rufus. It was like putting American folk music back into the context of the folkloric traditions of the world.

 

In 2009, after their return from the Festival Daoula in Bamako, Mali, Bethany & Rufus expanded their group formation to include Yacouba Moumouni (Niger) and Haitian Percussionist 'Bonga' Jean-Baptiste. The expanded group came into being on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of their Label Daqui. Yacouba was appearing with his ground breaking group from Niger, Mamar Kassey, on the same stage as Bethany and Rufus and joined them for one of their songs. The rest is the kind of magic chemistry that can never be planned.

 

The following summer the expanded group was invited to perform at Les Nuits Atypique and while doing a promotional spot on Radio France for the festival they were invited to perform on the Live a FIP radio series in March of 2009 that was released as a Live CD September 10 2009 as a co-production with Radio France and Daqui Records.

 

It was in the process of rehearsing for the Live a FIP recording that the group really came into focus. Individually all of the members of the group have been instrumental in expanding the role of traditional forms in their respective musics: Bethany draws from the many songs that her father collected as part of the seminal folk movement of the 60s. Yacouba has dug deeply into the folkloric Hausa, Djerma, Peul and Songhai traditions of Niger and Bonga is the descendant of a very rich lineage of Vodou ceremonial drumming and song. Bonga has also traveled extensively through Haiti collecting and learning the different manifestations of Haitian song and folklore. Rufus has taken the cello into previously unknown realms and is noted both for for his astonishing collaborations with folkloric artists from around the world, as well as his improvisation based solo cello repertoire and critically acclaimed CD Songs for Cello (Daqui Records). It is with this background that all four musicians have come together to create a sound that, although based around the song forms of American traditional music, reaches back to a common root that has inspired everyone involved.

 

Currently back in the studio working on their next studio album with their expanded group, called the Bethany & Rufus Roots Quartet, (slated for release on Daqui Records in 2011), Bethany & Rufus are still going strong. Theres a spirit and history alive inside the music were making, says Bethany. Its like there is something else that is pushing us along something that needs to be done and wants to be heard. There is a very beautiful and magical element of destiny in all this. It is awe inspiring to walk this road of folk music and follow the voices of your ancestors. She laughs, It definitely keeps us honest and humble!