.This will probably be a good listen for people who have not heard any of her previous work. Oyo is a great introduction to Kidjo's music and proves just how universal the language of music is. And it's about time that we began to really learn about what's going on on our own continent, and maybe concentrate less on knowing trying to learn all the lyrics to Jay-Z and Mariah Carey songs.Click to read the article
.There are Makeba songs here, of course, including an overexcited version of Mbube and a well-performed treatment of the lullaby Lakutshon Llanga. Then there are some unremarkable covers of songs made famous by Curtis Mayfield, James Brown and Otis Redding. A treatment of Aretha Franklin's Baby I Love You is genuinely soulful and there's a surprisingly successful version of Sidney Bechet's Petite Fleur (in French), along with a song that Kidjo co-wrote with the great Brazilian guitarist Vinicius Cantuária (who sadly doesn't make an appearance), and an upbeat traditional song from Benin. In short, this is a typically uneven set of songs that will sound better in Kidjo's bombastic stage shows.Read More
Angelique Kidjo sings in six different languages on her latest album — two fewer than she speaks.Read More
She realizes that few, if any, of her fans are as linguistically versatile, but she views differences in language as an opportunity, not a hindrance.
Kidjo, a native of Benin, a small country next to Nigeria on the western coast of Africa, said she has learned through her extensive travels that it is the music — and the emotion behind it — that brings people together, not necessarily the lyrics.
"Music is a universal language," Kidjo said during a telephone interview from her New York City apartment. "That's one of the first things I learned from traditional singers and musicians from my country — the power of music to bring people together.
"Music breaks boundaries."
Kidjo knows better than most, as she has traveled the world both as a musician and as a UNICEF goodwill ambassador. When words fail, she knows she can always turn to her music.
Kidjo, a four-time Grammy nominee, will bring her exotic brand of polyrhythmic Afro-pop to the Giant Center tonight when she opens for singer Josh Groban.
Groban happens to be one of the many stellar musicians who guest-star on Kidjo's latest album, "Djin Djin" (pronounced Gin Gin).
He helps out on a cover of Sade's "Pearls," and Kidjo said they will perform the song together tonight during Groban's set.
Also featured on the album are Alicia Keys, Carlos Santana, Branford Marsalis, Ziggy Marley, Joss Stone and Peter Gabriel.
"The only one I had for sure from the beginning was Alicia Keys," Kidjo said. "Because we have worked together in the past, she expressed an interest in what I was writing and she said, 'Let's do something together.'
In the middle of enthusiastically speaking about the uniting power of music, Angelique Kidjo stopped herself to ask: ``Can you imagine this world without music? Can you? ... People would be jumping off the roofs every day!''
Would people just start making noise until they brought back music?
``I think that's how our ancestors discovered their voice, by screaming and listening to the echo in nature, and listening to the heartbeat to discover a sense of rhythm,'' said Kidjo, on the road somewhere in California. ``Music has always been there for human beings.''
Kidjo will bring her soaring voice and a group of five musicians who specialize in the rhythmic sounds of Afropop to Kalamazoo Valley Community College's Dale Lake Auditorium on Saturday. In addition to music from her native West Africa, she offers modern pop, American R&B, and South American and Caribbean styles.
It's hard to imagine that people will sit still through her show. She'll certainly be dancing, Kidjo said. ``I'm in paradise when I'm on stage.''
Kidjo was born in the West African country of Benin in 1960 and moved in the '80s to Paris, where she became a popular performer. In the '90s, she had a series of Afropop dance hits and earned Grammy nominations. She currently lives in New York City.
Her latest CD, ``Djin Djin'' (due out May 1 on Razor & Tie), has Kidjo singing with guest stars Joss Stone, Alicia Keys, Peter Gabriel and Carlos Santana. It's also a return to the more traditional sounds of Benin and of Africa in general.
Kidjo disputes that it's a return, however. Musically, ``I've always been in Africa,'' she said. Read More
West African singer Angélique Kidjo speaks eight languages. But when asked if it's true she hates recording in the studio, she doesn't use any of them. She just groans.
"It's not my culture," says Kidjo, who has been performing in front of real people — rather than a recording console — since she was a 6-year-old in Benin.
It may not be her culture, but Kidjo's spirited world-beat, Afro-pop albums have earned her four Grammy nominations and fans from Africa to Paris to Toyko. She makes her third appearance at the Houston International Festival on Sunday.
It's a fitting gig for Kidjo. The 46-year-old singer prefers a global approach, incorporating gospel, jazz and Latin and Caribbean influences into her sound.
"I like music that gives me the ability to try anything I want to try," Kidjo says. Say a peppy multilingual duet of the Rolling Stones' Gimme Shelter with Joss Stone? Or an a cappella version of Bolero, with original lyrics in Ewe, a language spoken in Ghana?
"That was all about how music can transcend the matter of language," she says about Lonlon, her take on Maurice Ravel's classical war horse. It's the last track on Kidjo's new album, Djin Djin (pronounced gin gin), due May 1.
Kidjo says Ravel was one of the first classical composers to use the model of African music — particularly the percussive elements and emotional content — in his pieces.
"The first thing that comes to me about that music is love. Love seems so simple yet so complicated. That love demands a lot of work, a lot of commitment to do it right."
Typically, Kidjo says, the hardest part about a new album — aside from recording it — is finding the inspiration. Djin Djin sprang from her travels as a UNICEF goodwill ambassador.
"I've seen a lot of people's suffering, people's strength and people's joy. Even the ones who have nothing are sometimes the happiest."
Djin Djin's theme is the joys and sorrows of life, including birth, individuality, oppression and isolation.
"I didn't even know I was even influenced, but the songs just came to me. Some songs come fully. Beginning to end, you can hear them loud and clear in your head."
Usually, though, Kidjo starts with a thought that eventually puts itself to music.
"I don't write with my ears. I can hear the music in my head. I'll start humming the music and the lyrics." The rhythm, percussion and melody follow.
In those cases, Kidjo says, the music determines which language she'll sing. Djin Djin includes languages of Benin, Nigeria and Togo, as well as English and French.
Kidjo's major albums — Oremi, Black Ivory Soul and Oyaya! — reflected her exploration of popular music in the United States, Brazil and the Caribbean, as well as their African origins.
She skewed that approach to create Djin Djin. A pair of African percussionists became the center of the project. Kidjo then invited others to build on their rhythms.
Six of the album's 13 tracks feature guest musicians — Alicia Keys, Joss Stone, Josh Groban, Peter Gabriel, Ziggy Marley, Carlos Santana and Branford Marsalis all contribute.
"It was important to me that all of these great musicians come with me back to my roots," Kidjo says. The challenge was "not for them to be me or me to be them."
Her friends were up to that challenge, she says.
"There's something in the rhythm that is universal, that calls anyone in. It's infectious, they couldn't resist it," Kidjo says. "Those drums — even dead men can wake up and dance."
Kidjo also enjoyed the company. The studio sessions transformed from something to be endured to something to look forward to.
"I just wanted to stay in there, it was so fun," Kidjo says.
That's the reward of taking creative risks, she says. It's an emotion she likes to share with her audiences.
"What I want people to get out of my concert is the power of joy, because if you are a joyful person, you are a great achiever. Joy is strength; fear is not. Fear brings you back down in a hole."
Yes, Angélique Kidjo drops a lot of names. But you would, too, if you knew and worked with all the people she does; and you probably wouldn't do it as entertainingly as she does. Like classical-pop singer Josh Groban, who appears in a starring cameo role on her upcoming album, "Djin Djin" (out May 1 on Razor & Tie Records) -- and whose show Kidjo will open at Raleigh's RBC Center tonight.Read More
"We met a few years ago, when Jimmy Carter received the Nobel Peace Prize," Kidjo says, calling from a tour stop in Philadelphia. "Josh told me, 'I am a huge fan of your music,' and I thought, 'OK, who am I to say to the contrary?' Then I thought he was amazing, his voice and the way he sings. We kept meeting here and there. The second time was in Rome at 'We Are the Future: You Are the Answer,' a concert for children in countries at war. So finally, I called to have him come sing with me, and he did when he was in New York to do 'Good Morning, America.' "
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