I am known as both an academic and as a professional flute improviser and musical director of ‘Charanga del Norte,’ a band I formed in 1998.
I am many things – an academic, a writer, a professional musician, a linguist (French, Spanish, Hindi, Linguistics) and a teacher; I combine my professional work as a performer with my academic career.
The firms Xaudia and Extinct Audio provided period specific microphones for our British Academy funded research project. See their site for more details. Other artists using their ribbon microphones include Laura Marling and Lianne la Havas. Seems Charanga del Norte have been ahead of the curve with their Pachanga Time album!
Have contemporary technological changes in recording and the search for perfection been to the detriment of musical skills? Do today’s digital approaches create recordings that are too mechanical and lacking in the human touch? While older unedited recordings maintain their ‘liveness’ in the case of many Latin recordings of the mid-20th century, is it possible to go back to those days, now that digital layering and editing are part of the creative process? What is lost by removing the ‘imperfections’ of live performance in the mix?
Charanga del Norte release their new album Pachanga Time on Spotify here https://open.spotify.com/album/2sMgBBxS7AX59njbvFC3Ot and later in the year on Vinyl – the new tracks are also available online here: https://fuga.ffm.to/pachangatime
The Charanga del Norte cocktail
18:30-19:30, The digital dinner party Friday 19 June 2020
Join food historian and artist Tasha Marks for a unique taste of the British Academy Summer Showcase. Inspired by the work of three British Academy researchers, this cook-along and conversation is sure to be food for thought. The pairings start with a cocktail, influenced by Sue Miller’s work on Latin music. Do have fun making your own cocktail after Tasha’s demonstration and check out our new album ‘Pachanga Time’ to dance with too (released the same day) – shimmy around your back garden or living room to our music to literally raise your spirits – now you can listen and drink us at the same time!
IASPM UK’s online ‘London Calling Conference featured our British Academy funded research and more on this can be found here: https://london-calling-iaspm2020.com/paul-thompson-sue-miller-barkley-mckay-leeds-beckett-university-uk/ Archaeological researchers are finding new ways to explore historical events, practices and processes. A particularly potent method is experimental archaeology, which involvescontrolled experimentation in order to answer specific questions. For researchers working in […]
“Latin music in the USA was booming in the 1950s and 1960s, with New York recording studios humming with the sounds of Cuban flute, tenor voices, charanga violins, congas, timbales, güiro, bass and piano. Over time the move from traditional recording techniques to new technologies changed the way this music was performed. Join musicologist Sue […]
In this post musicians from Charanga del Norte reflect on their recording experiences on this British Academy funded project which involved studio recordings with some live takes (for the rhythm section and then the string section) and then the live takes at All Hallows Church, Hyde Park, Leeds at the end of 2019. In these reflections, musicians talk about the pros and cons of live take recording and about capturing that all important element of spontaneity and sabor essential to Cuban/Latin dance music performance.
Consultant producer, Latin Grammy award winning musician and producer Nestor Torres (http://www.nestortorres.com/) has been involved as consultant adviser in these British Academy funded recording experiments. IN CONVERSATION WITH NESTOR TORRES In the first of several conversations between Nestor Torres and Sue Miller discuss the project overall, how to capture liveness, Latin music performance values, Nestor’s […]
This is the first of several live music documentaries of Sue Miller and her Charanga del Norte made by Tim Blackwell and recorded on ribbon microphones by Paul Thompson and Barkley McKay. This forms part of a research project funded by the British Academy. Here is a live take of Sue’s arrangement of ‘Bronx Pachanga’ with a cheeky little Watusi middle.