Groove Medicine - Groove music - a new compilation

Relax and dream awake on a healing cloud of colour, drums, vocals and groove music. Float in a rhythmic dreamscape of tribal inspiration to soothe and accompany you down a river of warm ambient mixes with. Compiled from well known and upcoming artists in the worldbeat genre, this album will call your consciousness through soft, potent, ancient melodies.

Listen to the tracks at Groove Medicine

Customer feedback:

Wow! What a great album, so relaxing, like Buddha Bar or Ibiza Chill out... love it.

African Tribal Music Rolls On In For The New Millennium

It seems that, over the past 20 or 30 years, we’ve evolved from one music style taking over each new decade – 60’s and 70’s rock, 80’s pop – to gradually seeing (or hearing, as the case may be) much more diversity in mainstream music.

Techno, pop, rock and R’n’B fused together to create mainstream music in the 90’s. During the first decade of the new millennium however, tribal music has joined the blend. Rhythms and melodies that we’ve historically left to the ‘new age’ crowd are now making more noticeable inroads into popular music by mixing with beats that we are more familiar with – and doing so rather successfully!

Now that tribal dance music has become readily available to a greater audience, why shouldn’t it be more popular?

As part of its very nature, tribal drum music has a primal beat. Ceremonially used as an expression of emotion, African tribal drum music symbolizes a heartbeat that brings up a certain mood in the dancers. Emotion goes beyond race, culture and religion, and communicates to us now, just as it did to tribal people dancing on the African savannah hundreds of years ago.

A Slave Trade Side Effect

Tribal dance music has played an important part in the evolution of many European and Western music genres. When you listen to European music styles, it does not really come as a surprise that the slave trade brought together hundreds of different styles of tribal dance music that began influence various music genres. Tribal drum music became an important part of the evolution of modern music styles, from rock’n’roll and jazz to techno and dance.

The Twist & the Jitterbug

Dances such as The Jitterbug and The Twist were created by the fusion of popular rock music and tribal beats. These catchy rhythms and dance moves wriggled their way from our ears directly down to our feet without stopping to ask for permission – the only way you can stand still when they take hold of your spinal column is by nailing your feet to the floor. Even more stolid folks decided that was too painful, so they threw away the hammer and boogied their way into miniskirts and blue-suede shoes.

Tribal Dance Music in the Contemporary World

Now, fifty years later, tribal dance music is no longer merely a background sound. Recording artists such as Ariel Kalma, Adesa and Professer Trance have helped to keep tribal music alive and well in modern culture. These musicians, among many others, have gathered tribal dance music with rhythms reminiscent of rock, pop and R’n’B from far-flung places such as Australia, Egypt, India, Pakistan, Africa, North America and Central Europe. To create the scintillating tune overflowing with liveliness and movement, they blend didgeridoos, African singing and Tibetan chants blend with guitar riffs and smooth saxophone notes.

As music continues to change grow, our hope is that people and nations will change in the same way.

A roadmap for the future?

The first 10 years of this new millennium have been widespread with both success and tragedy. As people all around the world celebrate and grieve together, as we become more accepting of diverse beliefs and ways of life, hopefully we will follow in the direction that music leads – a harmonisation of mankind’s numerous voices into one melodic sound. The tribal music that once played such an essential part of our history is now guiding us into a peaceful future.

Hot drumming music video on YouTube

Awesome drumming music... check it out on YouTube:

Tribal Rocks! - Tribal music at its best!

New compilation CD Tribal Rocks! by Music Mosaic:

Tribal music of modern trance dance with a twist of the tribal world: The drums entrance past and present in an intoxicating party with ethnic influences, uplifting rituals and celebrations of Life - dub mixes of percussion, tribal voices, didgeridoo, with inspirations from Africa, North America, Egypt, India, Central Europe, Pakistan, Australia. - Dance till you drop!

With artists such as Hilight Tribe, Professor Trance, Ariel Kalma - Listen to sound samples and have fun!

African Drum Music – so much more than just entertainment

Even in the 21st century, African drum music is one of the most energetic and moving types of percussion. We can observe its influence, not just in alternative and world music, but also in modern mainstream music genres such as hip hop, pop and dance.

And really, are you surprised it’s still popular? African drumming music is not just a joy to listen to, it seems to plug directly into your spinal cord via your gut and makes you want to move. You may not be surprised to know that African drumming was originally used as a way of communication, as well as playing an integral role in African culture. It could represent an entire spectrum of human emotion, which made it suitable to be part of each ceremony and celebration.

The music was so integral, in fact, that early slavers recognised the power of African drumming music, both as creating symbols and as a means of communication, and forbade the use or possession of drums in slave camps. Thanks to the strong spirits and wisdom of the African people, this form of expression continued—they simply resorted to tapping out a rhythm on their chest, arms, thighs, and whatever else was available to keep the music alive.

The diversity of cadence and sound that has grown from African drumming music is matched only by the variety of the African percussion instruments that have made their way around the globe.

Djembe Rhythms & Drumming

Incredibly versatile, the djembe drum is one of the most well-known African percussion instruments. A skilled djembefola (djembe master) can provide such a range of djembe beats on one drum as to keep an entire room of dancers busy.

Djembe techniques are quite an art form on their own and a djembe player typically spends several years learning from a djembe master before becoming a djembefola themself.

Kpanlogo Drums

Communly used as a ceremonial drum, the kpanlogo drum originates from the Greater Accra Region in West Africa. Kpanlogo rhythms were frequently used as a way to communicate between tribes and family groups because of the drum’s brilliant ability to create sounds that carry over long distances.

African Talking Drums

Crafted from wood and rawhide, African Talking Drums are shaped like an hourglass with the rawhide stretched across both ends, creating two surfaces for drumming. These particular drums are most often played with a stick on one side and with the hand and fingers on the other. As the name suggests, they were also commonly used in communication.

African Bongos

Now here’s a drum that we’ve all heard of! Bongos, which are widely used in Cuban drum music and dance music throughout the world, are thought to have become well-known in Cuba as a result of the slave trade. It is usually fairly squat and generates a beat with a fairly high pitch.

Dun Dun Drums

Dun Dun drums, which are also identified as dundun drums and dun dun duuun, are thought to originate from the Malinke area of Mali. The three sizes of Dun Duns, from smallest to largest, are Kenkeni, Sangban and Dununba. They can be played apart from each other but are also played strapped together in groups of two or three.

Ngoma Drums

These drums have a meaningful connection to certain groups of people in Uganda as ceremonial instruments. The word ‘ngoma’ is Swahili for ‘drums’, which makes describing this particular drum a little difficult. The name is most often used for an group of 6 or 7 drums of various sizes strapped together and played as a group.

Itotele

Another drum popular in Cuba is the mid-sized, goblet-shaped one called the Itotele. Sometimes a waxy substance is used to coat the drumhead to create a duller sound.

As can be seen from the variety of African percussion instruments that we’ve mentioned – and the dozens more that we haven’t talked about – African drum music is varied and is a fantastic style of artistic expression. It’s a pleasure to create, and a pleasure to listen to!

Ariel Kalma - a musical life - interview

Wow! A great interview of Ariel Kalma and his musical life! See and read at:
http://www.seaoftranquility.org/article.php?sid=1566

Trance Dance Music by Professor Trance (Frank Natale)

"My purpose is to empower the individual through Trance Dance Music. This is accomplished by improving the quality of the individual's life through their participation in 'Trance Dance: The Dance of Life', rather than the useless search for life's meaning. My focus on Trance Dance provides the dancer with direct experience, rather than just more data and dogma." - Frank Natale

'Trance Dance International' was founded by Frank Natale (author) aka 'Professor Trance' (artist). He brought trance dance to the West for the first time.

Frank's shamanic approach combines the Goddess cultures and Amazonian plant shamanism. The Goddess cultures were Earth grounded spiritual paths, which dominated the Mediterranean and Europe 35,000 years ago before 'his'-story, the time of male-dominated societies began. Amazonian Shamanism combines the use of teacher plants and trance dance within the context of spiritual ritual.

Committed to dance movement as a healing force, Natale, with his band Professor Trance, has produced quite a number of CDs, and we have incorporated some of his best tracks into the following compilations:


Drumming Planet - more info
Tribal Trance dance - more info
Drum Trance - more info
Tribal Groove - more info
Groove Temple - more info

 All 5 are exceptional trance dance music CDs.
Check them out, listen to tracks via Bandcamp or iTunes, or get an old-fashioned CD. Almost any format is available....