Description
The Musicians of the Nile are a well-respected troupe of Nubian Gypsy performers from Egypt, a country whose name is not coincidental to the genre. They have been performing internationally since the ’70s and were featured in the excellent Gypsy film Latcho Drom. Though the Musicians of the Nile come from the lesser-known southern arm of the “Gypsy road,” their music nevertheless shares the sometimes rowdy, sometimes melancholic love of life found in the music of their Romanian or flamenco cousins. Substituting North African instruments like the rebab and arghul, theirs is a life-affirming cry from the heart driven by plenty of Middle Eastern and African percussion, equally as raw as that of the group’s counterparts in Europe. Charcoal Gypsies perfectly illustrates the cross-pollination of cultures that the migration of Gypsies has exerted since the Ottoman Empire, this time flavored by the Islamic countries of North Africa. –Derek Rath
