(Channel 4 News: 1300 PST, February 23, 2011) Professor Tim Niblock discusses the Libya crisis and what could happen next in the country as Gaddafi's grip on power loosens.

This year the Fes Festival presented two excellent drumming ensembles, The Master Drummers of Burundi, and the Korean Samulnori Hanullim Ensemble. Experiencing these two groups got me thinking about how much we rely on our own cultures to interpret sound.

It's not that I don’t believe music can cross boundaries, but I also believe that as we grow up our own culture informs us of how to hear things, and even how to evaluate the quality of the music we are listening to. The drummers from Burundi were excitement personified, and they were rightly presented on the big stage at the Bab Makina, where their athletic gestures and mighty, deep-voiced drums matched the grandeur of the setting. The Korean drums were presented in the more intimate Batha Museum, and although they were no less athletic, the statement was nuanced.

Again it had me thinking about what we are and are not comfortable listening to. Two hundred years ago, most occidental opinions of music were filtered through European classical standards. African music was considered barbaric. In the USA things changed about 90 years ago with the introduction of "Race Records" that brought the music of the African American population into broader distribution and the public consciousness.  It's been a love story ever since, and these days most American pop music continues to be a blend of Western harmonic concepts with African American grooves and gospel-influenced vocals. So the drums of Burundi already felt familiar as the progenitors of music I grew up with.

But what of the drummers from Korea?  The higher pitched timbres and shifting rhythmic deconstructions that transitioned into ferocious grooves reminded me that sometimes we have to push hard with our own listening to "get" something that has been around for thousands of years. That’s why I thought to insert part of an interview I recorded about a year ago, and to focus on this ensemble in my post.

I had seen Kim Dong-Won in the wonderful documentary "Intangible Asset Number 82," about the journey of Australian jazz drummer Simon Barker to find the Korean shaman whose music inspired him. Dong-Won had been Barker's guide, and he was in town, playing with Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road Ensemble, so I set up an appointment. I was anxious to get his insights into the film, and I also asked him to talk about Korean folk music: the way the vocals functioned, and about the philosophy behind the drumming technique. I have edited a small part of that interview into my video here.

CALLING ALL FILMMAKERS!

Our friends at explore.org have teamed up with HATCH to champion the selfless acts of others through a film competition at this year’s HATCHfest Bozeman.

The explore/HATCH award presented by explore.org will be given to a filmmaker who best tells the story of a remarkable individual’s actions in response to a devastating environmental event. From a woman who adopted orphaned children after the tsunami to a captain and his crew that saved the 115 survivors of Deepwater Horizon, explore.org wants to see how you define heroism in the face of catastrophe while inspiring others.

explore.org is a multimedia organization that documents leaders around the world who have devoted their lives to extraordinary causes. Both educational and inspirational, they create a portal into the soul of humanity by championing the selfless acts of others. In line with explore’s mission, HATCH inspires service and makes a positive impact on people and the planet in a creative way through film, music, photography, journalism, fashion, architecture, design, technology and more.

Winner of the first explore/HATCH award presented by explore.org will receive an all-expense-paid trip to HATCHfest Bozeman September 22-25 and be presented with a Canon HD SLR camera package from explore.org’s founder and documentary filmmaker, Charles Annenberg Weingarten, and HATCH. If you or someone you know has made a film highlighting a cause that inspires others to make a difference, submissions are now open!

Funding for the explore/HATCH award is made possible through the efforts of explore.org and the Annenberg Foundation.

Withoutabox Submission Guidelines:

• Submit a short documentary that has been completed in the last 5 years
• The short film will showcase a remarkable individual’s actions in response to a devastating environmental event
• Submission length for explore/HATCH award is 20 minutes or less
• DVD submission must be labeled explore/HATCH award
• Any accompanying paperwork and the outside of the envelope must be labeled explore/HATCH award
• Deadline is August 25, 2010, no exceptions will be made
• The final 5 nominees will be posted on explore.org for audience consideration
• The explore/HATCH award panel will announce the winner September 1, 2010

Learn more OR submit now!

In my last post about the Fes Festival of World Sacred Music, I didn't dwell very much on individual performances, since I was more concerned with conveying the feeling of being at the festival. So this time out, I'm taking the other route and just giving you a performance, sans any commentary from me. If you have never heard the Taarab music of Tanzania and Zanzibar, you may be surprised at how sweet it is. This is in large part due to the use of the Qanun, a most celestial sounding instrument. Taarab is a fairly recent genre, having been a court music created specifically for pleasure. There are even times when it sounds so pretty I find it ambient, and what with the beautiful sail-like shades shielding us from the sun in the courtyard floating serenely on the wind above us, the purely instrumental melodies sent more than one member of the audience into a trance. (As you will see, it even put a baby to sleep!)  But when Shakila Saidi started to sing, she changed that dreamy vibe, and supplied just the right amount of edge to keep me alert and appreciative.

If you would like to know more about the Qanun and to see a demonstration of this fascinating instrument, I recommend checking out the Turkish virtuoso Tamer Pinarbasi, whom I covered in a former posting.

This post will be a little bit different from my others. Rather than simply reporting on the music from the Fes Festival (which I will do in other postings) I'm going to try to convey the experience of being there. I've taken everything I shot from my first full day and laid the most vivid parts out, travelogue-style. So you're getting a full day in under 9 minutes.

A word on the video quality: I went with my Flip camera which was fine for some things, and truly inadequate for others. So you are going to see some pretty grainy stuff every now and then (low light, fuzzy zoom, or both).  You are also going to see some very high quality video that was kindly supplied to me by a REAL filmmaker with a REAL camera. So all in all it will be a bumpy ride. But frankly, Fes is a bumpy ride. That's why I start out with a statement from my colleague Cindy Byram, who has attended the festival for 6 years in a row, and who speaks from experience. In the end I agree with her 100%.

There are four main venues for the festival: three paying, one public. One generally starts the day at the Batha Museum courtyard, an intimate setting with a magnificent Barberry tree that spreads its shade over 65% of the area. After a dinner break, you head on out to catch the "Big Act" at the impressive walled Bab al Makina (another paying venue) and then pass through the Bab Boujloud public performance area on your way to the last musical event, at the lovely Dar Tazi, where you can sit at a table under the trees, sip mint tea, and listen to Sufi chants. The public performances have been added in the last few years, and this is where you will find your everyday Moroccan, since the paying venues are too expensive for most. The music there is more local, and I was particularly taken with this venue, as you will see.

As to the music?  Everything I saw had merit on some level, and some even made my heart sing. But to put in my two cents, I believe that for the  most part making music and listening to music is a transcendent act, so what is NOT sacred music?  Still, I guess calling it "sacred music" makes it easier to give the Festival a theme, and since the event and the vibe are so dogma-free and tolerant, how can I complain?

Special Encore Presentation this Monday at 5pm PST/8pm EST!

This past May at the 2010 Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride, our partners at explore.org received a very special honor, the Moving Mountains Prize, for their film "Fish Out of Water." The Moving Mountains Prize is awarded when a film depicts a unique mission or extraordinary impact of a non-profit organization. Featured in "Fish Out of Water," Sun Valley Adaptive Sports helps war veterans cope with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) through fly fishing and other therapeutic outdoor activities. And as you will see when you watch the film, this organization is truly moving mountains.

"Fish Out of Water" began airing on Link TV in March (also available to watch online), but we are airing a special encore presentation because in addition to celebrating explore's success at MountainFilm, we were also introduced to a touching story that unfolded during the festival awards ceremony.

Christian Ellis, a vet whom Director Charlie Annenberg Weingarten became close with during the making of his film, experienced terrible traumas in Iraq. Losing many of his friends and fellow soldiers in combat, surviving a broken back, and suffering from severe PTSD, Christian returned home to a new reality.

Struggling to move forward, Christian returned to his music studies for the first time since he was 15. It had been a long-time dream of his to sing opera, and with a little encouragement from his new friend Charlie and two years of singing lessons, on Memorial Day Christian realized his dream. Closing the awards ceremony at the Mountainfilm Festival in Telluride, after the screening of "Fish Out of Water," Christian sang a moving aria about his experiences in Iraq.

Fast forward to minute 10 to hear Christian's aria. It's a true testament to the resilience and strength so many men and women of service embody:

Higher Ground - Mountainfilm Awards Video from Mountainfilm in Telluride on Vimeo.

Global Pulse host Erin Coker has spent the last two weeks strutting the red carpet, interviewing filmmakers and stars for the San Francisco International Film Festival. The festival produces daily coverage for their Scoop Du Jour mini-site. Here, Erin speaks with legendary actor Robert Duvall, directors John Waters and Walter Salles, writer/producer James Schamus and others at SFIFF's Award Night.

Click here to check out all of Erin's videos for SFIFF.

This week marks the beginning of the San Francisco International Film Festival, a must for Link TV fans in San Francisco. On the Link TV blog we'll let you know about some great films screening at the festival that you should look out for in the future, regardless of the city you're in. One of the best things about living in a city like San Francisco is the opportunity to see an international line up of films year round, but we all hope that the Internet will give us more and more chances to connect with world cinema and documentaries.

Earlier this year I was at South by Southwest in Austin, and reviewed the documentaries Marwencol and Life 2.0, which are both screening at SFIFF this week. Marwencol offers not only a glimpse back into our childhood world of make believe, as told through a moving personal story, but stands up as an exploration of folk art and its delicate relationship to the world of its creator.

Also screening this week is The Oath, a riveting documentary portrait of Abu Jandal, Osama bin Laden's bodyguard of four years, and Jandal's brother-in-law Salim Hamdan, who was released from Guantanamo after the landmark case Hamdan v. Rumsfeld Supreme Court. Director Laura Poitras was given striking access to Abu Jandal, and follows him with her camera, even when she's not there in person, as he teaches young students about jihad, drives his taxicab, and slowly reveals to us his past actions and dreams. Jandal is a study in the uneasy balance between religion, pride, and truthtelling - the more we're let into his charismatic world, the less we're able to trust what we're hearing. PBS' POV will premiere The Oath in September.

Here's another cool showcase from GlobalFEST, the gift that keeps on giving. We had heard about Alif Naaba from a former Linker from Burkina Faso. She wrote and said "keep an eye out for this guy, he's good!" Well she was right, and he is. As usual it's hard to get good footage when there are lights flashing directly into the camera lens, but it's worth it to hear an artist who has not gotten much coverage in the USA. In his homeland, Naaba is known as the "prince with bare feet." As you'll hear, he has a lovely voice, and here sings in Mooré.  His songs are mostly topical and socially conscious; something we love here at Link.

NEXT WEEK: A very special interview with David Harrington of the Kronos Quartet!

Today the San Francisco Film Society announced its program for the upcoming San Francisco International Film Festival. This event is always a must for Link TV viewers in San Francisco, and the festival often features work by directors featured on Link! But this year there's an extra connection -- Link TV partners Method, who created the initial design work for Link's ViewChange.org (beta launching in June), created the festival's trailer and designed all the print materials, including the program. 

You can browse the film selection, and watch the trailer, on the SFIFF website. Documentaries include Marwencol and Life 2.0, both covered on this blog when they screened at South by Southwest earlier this month.