Master Musicians of Jajouka - Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Jajouka (1971)

Artista: Master Musicians of Jajouka

Álbum: Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Jajouka
Año:1971
Género: Música tradicional de Marruecos
Duración: Disco original: 45:57 - Reedición de 1995: 45:58
Nacionalidad: Marruecos

Lista de Temas:
Edición original:
1. Part 1
2. Part 2
Edición de 1995:
1. 55 (Hamsa oua Hamsine)
2. War Song / Standing + One Half (Kaim oua Nos)
3. Take Me with You My Darling, Take Me with You (Dinimaak A Habibi Dinimaak)
4. Your Eyes Are like a Cup of Tea (Al Yunic Sharbouni Ate)
5. I Am Calling Out (L'Alta)
6. Your Eyes Are like a Cup of Tea (Reprise with Flute)

Alineación:
- Master Musicians of Jajouka
Productor, presentador: Brian Jones

Hace unos días, varios cabezones proponíamos ayudar con los comentarios a discos que estaban pendientes de postear en la lista interminable del gran Moebius. Tuve la suerte de que me tocara este disco, a ver qué les parece a ustedes.

Los Maestros Músicos de Jajouka, apodados por el escritor beat William S. Burroughs “la banda de rock ’n’ roll de 4000 años”, son un conjunto de música tradicional marroquí, más específicamente de las comunidades sufi de la cordillera del Rif, que en cierto modo representa el inicio, o uno de los inicios de lo que hoy conocemos como “música del mundo”. Tim Leary, el profeta del ácido, también los conoció a fines de los 60 y escribió sobre ellos usando el eufemismo de Burroughs. Para cuando los vio Brian Jones, el grupo ya contaba al menos una década de presentar su alucinante música ante el ojo y el oído occidental pues desde los años 50 tocaban en el restaurante Las 1001 Noches (fundado por los mismos poetas beat) del puerto de Tánger, que entonces era zona “internacional”.

Pintura de Mohamed Hamri: Brian Jones y los Maestros Músicos de Jajouka

Su verdadero golpe de fama se dio en 1971, con el lanzamiento del disco que hoy comentamos, que incluye grabaciones de campo en las que participó como coproductor el Rolling Stone Brian Jones, un año antes de su trágica muerte. El disco, que ha salido en dos versiones (aquí presentamos las dos), fue grabado en las tierras de estas comunidades el 29 de julio de 1968, mientras Jones se encontraba en Marruecos procrastinando respecto a su trabajo en los Stones, a los que todavía pertenecía, si bien su papel en la banda se había ido desdibujando y el talentoso artista había ido cayendo en un espiral autodestructivo. Se han escrito kilómetros de textos sobre Brian Jones: fundador y primer líder de la emblemática banda de los “Reyes Viejos”, como les dice Juan Villoro, pero aunque algunos escarban en los chismes y rumores hasta encontrar que la depresión de Jones se inició cuando Keith Richards le quitó a la novia y que su muerte fue producto de un asesinato, casi todos coinciden en anotar que Jones fue efectivamente el fundador, que lideró el primer momento de los Stones (les dio su mítico nombre), que formó el repertorio de blues con que salieron a la luz, que contribuyó un montón de riffs y aires que no le serían reconocidos (se dice, por ejemplo, que temas psicodélicos como “Ruby Tuesday” le deben ideas a Jones), y que era un multiinstrumentista interesado en instrumentos provenientes de culturas no occidentales.

Así, en 1968, quizá cansado del tren de pop star que le tocaba tripular, y ciertamente rodeado de no muy buenas vibras en los Stones, viajó una vez más a Marruecos y asistió a la sesión de música tradicional que quedaría preservada en esta grabación y a la que su nombre se adjuntaría brindando beneficios tanto a los músicos del Rif como a la posteridad de su propio paso por la escena pop de fines de los 60. Hay que aclarar que el papel de Jones en la grabación se reduce a la coproducción y postproducción; no hay intervenciones suyas sobre la música, no hay fusión: se trata de la música originaria en plano de autenticidad, pues ni siquiera fue registrada en un restaurante lleno de ingleses y franceses, sino en el entorno cultural propio de los músicos, sin otra presencia externa que la de Jones y el equipo de grabación. Ya en Inglaterra, en el estudio, Jones trabajó con las cintas estéreo añadiendo phasings, ecos y otros efectos.

Jones, que para entonces planeaba tocar con Jimi Hendrix, y que había participado en un par de grabaciones de los Beatles, entre otras interesantes colaboraciones, no alcanzó a lanzar producciones solistas; solo dos grabaciones llevan su nombre en el título, esta de los músicos de Jajouka y el soundtrack de la película alemana A Degree of Murder (1967), protagonizada por Anita Pallenberg, la chica en cuestión entre Jones y Richards. Cerca de un año después de la grabación, de regreso en Inglaterra, luego de la “conversación” en que se “acordó” su retiro de los Stones, Jones murió en circunstancias nunca aclaradas (se habla de abuso de drogas en combinación con el asma que sufrió desde los cuatro años de edad). Siempre es doloroso e inútil hacer reflexiones como esta, pero quién sabe hasta dónde hubiese llegado su trabajo, en el que vemos el interés etnomusicológico y la intención de usar instrumentos no ortodoxos. Podríamos decir que en esta grabación de los músicos de Jajouka se encuentra una de las semillas que más tarde harían la escena de la “música del mundo” y que, dejando de lado la forma en la que esta se suaviza para el oído occidental, ha contribuido a que conozcamos la expresión de culturas de las que, de otro modo, no tendríamos ni noticia.

Los Maestros Músicos de Jajouka, por su parte, si bien es difícil saber hasta dónde se remonta su tradición, han tenido una trayectoria propia de exposición hacia la cultura occidental desde los años 50, cuando fueron “descubiertos” por los poetas beat; ellos mismos fundaron el restaurante Las 1001 noches en donde los maestros solían tocar para públicos extranjeros, antes de que esta producción de Brian Jones sirviera como trampolín para que su fama trascendiera al público interesado en música tradicional no occidental.

Pertenecen a la etnia jabala del noroeste marroquí, que significa algo así como “montañeses” o “gente de la montaña”. De origen berebere, adoptaron el idioma de los árabes en la época en que su imperio dominaba el norte de África y buena parte de España, por lo que en su dialecto actual hay presencias bereberes y españolas, procedentes tanto de la Edad Media como de las décadas que Marruecos pasó bajo dominio español, entre 1912 y 1956. Los jabala profesan la variante sufi de la religión musulmana, caracterizada por una profunda espiritualidad. De ahí que la música de los Maestros de Jajouka tenga un fuerte componente basado en la intensidad de un sonido que permite el establecimiento de un trance religioso. La razón por la que el título del disco destaca las “flautas de Pan” de Jajouka no tiene que ver con el sonido propiamente de esta música, más percusiva que melódica, sino porque Burroughs pensaba que había una relación entre esta etnia y el culto romano antiguo al dios Pan. Se dice que en la Edad Media tocaban para sultanes y los acompañaban en sus viajes anunciando con música su llegada. Jajouka, la localidad de la que proceden y que les da nombre, se encuentra en las montañas Ahl Srif, al sur de la cordillera del Rif en Marruecos. 

Además de la producción de Jones, a principios de los setenta fueron registrados por el cineasta Arnold Stahl para un documental del que también se haría un disco doble, Tribe Ahl Serif: Master Musicians of Jajouka, y luego un sencillo. Más tarde, el saxofonista Ornette Coleman, uno de los baluartes de free jazz también grabó con los maestros. 

El grupo musical es numeroso, representa un evento de celebración colectiva en el que participan con cantos e instrumentos incluso los niños de la comunidad. Se trata de formas musicales polirrítmicas, en la que no faltan esquemas que la música occidental entendería como de compases complejos (un tremendo ritmo parecido al 5/4 se aprecia en temas como “I Am Calling Out”), ampliamente dominada por percusiones de distintas tesituras a las que se agrega un coro de vientos (algunos parecidos al oboe pero mucho más sonoros) que alcanza la estridencia de las orquestas de pututos de los Andes. Eventualmente se escuchan cantos también corales, pero el ritmo parece ser lo más característico. El resultado son trances musicales muy intensos, apoyados por improvisaciones colectivas (nada que ver con un instrumentista destacado sobre los otros), que nos dejan ver por qué les resultó tan atractiva a los occidentales de los 50 y 60.

Carátula de la edición de 1995

Aquí presentamos la edición original y una reedición posterior (1995) modificada, en cuya producción participó el minimalista Philip Glass. Ambos lanzamientos se diferencian por la forma en que se escribe “Jajouka” (en el disco original dice “Joujouka”, pero parece que los etnolingüistas y los propios músicos han optado por el deletreo con a) y porque las dos pistas indiferenciadas y sin título de la primera producción (lado A, lado B), en la segunda han sido divididas en seis y se les han puesto nombres, probablemente de manera un tanto arbitraria. En los scans de esta edición están los textos de Burroughs y otros escritores para quien quiera profundizar en esta sorprendente historia musical. La carátula del original, que es la que pusimos al principio para identificar el disco es una pintura del artista local que llevó a Jones a Jajouka, Mohamed Hamri, en la que aparecen los Maestros Músicos con el Maestro Rolling Stone. 

Algunos textos sobre el disco de aquí y allá:

Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Joujouka was an album produced by Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones. The album was a recording of the Moroccan group the Master Musicians of Joujouka, in performance on 29 July 1968 in the village of Jajouka in Morocco and released on Rolling Stones Records, and distributed by Atco Records in 1971. Jones called the tracks "a specially chosen representation" of music played in the village during the annual week-long Rites of Pan Festival. It was significant for presenting the Moroccan group to a global audience, drawing other musicians to Jajouka, including Ornette Coleman.
The album was reissued in 1995. The executive producers were Philip Glass, Kurt Munkasci, and Rory Johnston, with notes by Bachir Attar, Paul Bowles, William S. Burroughs, Stephen Davis, Jones, Brion Gysin, and David Silver. This deluxe album included additional graphics, more extensive notes by David Silver and Burroughs, and a second CD, produced by Cliff Mark, with two “full-length remixes.”
Painter/novelist Brion Gysin first heard music from the area with American writer Paul Bowles at a festival in Sidi-Kacem in 1950. Entranced with the music's sound, he later was led to the village to hear the music in person by Moroccan painter Mohamed Hamri. Gysin, along with Hamri, brought Brian Jones to hear the village music in 1968.
The album's music included songs meant for the village's "most important religious holiday festival, Aid el Kbir". The festival's ritual of dressing a young boy dressed as "Bou Jeloud, the Goat God" wearing the "skin of a freshly slaughtered goat", involved the child's running to "spread panic through the darkened village" as the musicians played with abandon. Gysin connected the ritual, performed to protect the village's health in the coming year, to the fertility festival of Lupercalia and the "ancient Roman rites of Pan"; he referred to the Bou Jeloud dancer as "Pan" and "the Father of Skins". This name stuck, leading to the reference to Pan in the album's title.
Jones, recording engineer George Chkiantz, and Gysin travelled to the village in 1968, accompanied by Hamri and Jones's girlfriend Suki Potier to record the musicians using a portable Uher recorder. Jones worked on the two-track recordings in London, adding stereo phasing, echo, and other effects. Jones edited the full-band selection to 14 minutes by "cross-phasing fragments of a work that runs to some ninety minutes in uncut form".
The album included three types of music: repetitive vocal chants "similar to those employed throughout Islam", flute and drum music featuring "several distinct melodic motifs and improvisations over a drone" played by two flutists and several drummers, and the full village orchestra's drum and horn music played to accompany the "frenzied dance of Bou Jeloud, a Moroccan Pan".
The New York Times reviewer Robert Palmer reported that the call-and-response horn motifs are "handed down from generation to generation". Palmer, noting the "drumming rhythms are definitely African", paraphrased Gysin as connecting the musical origins to Spain, "from the Moorish courts of Cordova and Seville".
The cover illustration on the 1971 album was originally a painting by Mohamed Hamri depicting the master musicians with Brian Jones in the center. Jones edited the album and prepared the art work together with designer, Al Vandenburg. He put one of Hamri's son’s paintings on the inside cover. Jones finished producing the LP several months before his death in 1969.
The album's release date was initially set for September 3, 1971, but was pushed back to October 8.
Jones' ex-girlfriend Anita Pallenberg said that Jones had wanted to incorporate the Jajouka sound into the music of the Rolling Stones. In the Jean-Luc Godard movie Sympathy for the Devil, Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts is seen playing a Jajouka drum during a rehearsal.
In 1995, a CD reissue of the album was issued. It was licensed from Allen Klein's Musidor by Point Music. A new 1990s photo of Bachir Attar, by his wife and manager American photographer Cherie Nutting, replaced Hamri's original painting of Brian Jones and the Master Musicians of Joujouka which Jones had chosen as his cover. It also included in a side bar a photo of the late Jones by Michael Cooper as well as further contemporary photos of and a "Bou Jeloud" dancer by Nutting. The CD's album title changed to "Brian Jones Presents The Pipes of Pan At Jajouka" to tie in with The Master Musicians of Jajouka led by Bachir Attar. The name Master Musicians of Jajouka was used on the Master Musicians of Joujouka's second album due to contact conflicts. While the original vinyl album consisted of "two untitled, unbroken LP sides", the reissue separated the songs into six tracks with titles. The reissue cut the Master Musicians of Joujouka out of their rights and resulted in international protests organized by Frank Rynne and Joe Ambrose at concerts by Bachir Attar in London, New York and San Francisco as well as Philip Glass concerts in London and elsewhere. Brion Gysin's original sleeve-notes were altered to remove all reference to the central role that Hamri played in introducing him to the music of the village. A Brion Gysin illustration decorated an essay by Paul Bowles in the liner notes. The CD's executive producers were Philip Glass, Kurt Munkacsi, and Rory Johnston. Brian Jones was credited as producer. The multi-page booklet also included reminiscences and edited essays about the original band written by Brion Gysin, (who died in 1986 and therefore was not consulted), David Silver, Stephen Davis, William S. Burroughs, Brian Jones, and Bachir Attar.
A "Joujouka" group, mentored by Hamri from the 1950s until his death in 2000, continued releasing records on Sub Rosa Records, using their original name, Master Musicians of Joujouka as used on the 1971 release and Mohamed Hamri's Tales of Joujouka. And the group The Master Musicians of Jajouka led by Bachir Attar continues to record music and now issues CDs on their own label Jajouka Records, in addition to performing on regular tours and recording music for film scores.
In 1995 Frank Rynne and "art-terrorist" and writer Joe Ambrose using Mohamed Hamri launched an international campaign demanding their interest in their recording with Brian Jones be recognised and that the re-release be withdrawn from sale until their concerns were addressed. The group led by the second youngest son of Hadj Abdesalam Attar still perform under the name Master Musicians of Jajouka led by Bachir Attar, recording the song "Continental Drift" in Tangier with the Rolling Stones on the Steel Wheels album in 1989. Led by Attar's son and successor, as band leader Bachir Attar, also released soundtrack recordings under the Jajouka name and album recordings under the name Master Musicians of Jajouka Featuring Bachir Attar in the 1990s and 2000s. According to Bachir Attar the Master Musicians of that early group were led by tribal chief Hadj Abdesalam Attar. Rikki Stein who managed the Master Musicians of Joujouka/ Master Musicians of Jajouka noted that in 1971 the leaders of the musicians were Mohamed Attar, known as Berdouz, who led the drummers and Mallim Fedal who led the pipers. This throws doubt on the claim that Hadj Abdelsalm Attar was leader, tribal or otherwise, in the late 1960s or early 1970s. However, Rikki Stein has since pointed out that there were regular elections held amongst the musicians and their supporters, who were also permitted to vote. In the late sixties and early seventies Hadj Abdelsalam Attar was, effectively, the 'Rais' (President) of the Al Sarif Folklore Association created collectively by the musicians of Jajouka, and was widely recognised as being Jajouka's greatest musician. Subsequently, though, in the early seventies elections were held and Maalim Fedal was elected Rais and continued to retain that title, certainly until the European tour organised by Rikki Stein in 1980.
^Wikipedia

En Allmusic:

In 1968 Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones traveled to Morocco and taped parts of music at the Rites of Pan Festival. It's uncertain whether this should be considered a Brian Jones album, or an album by the Pipes of Pan at Jajouka, or an album by the Master Musicians of Jajouka, as the performers on this recording are most commonly known in the West. The important thing to know is that it's a document of Moroccan traditional music that achieves trance-like effects through its hypnotic, insistent percussion, eerie vocal chanting, and pipes. Originally divided into two untitled, unbroken LP sides (although these are broken down and officially titled on the CD reissue), it should be kept in mind that these are merely edited excerpts of performances which can last for hours, and thus they offer only a taste of the live event. Although the first part in particular builds and builds in relentless energy to whirling climaxes, there are discrete and different performances here, some featuring female chants, others less intense male vocals, and others passages of unaccompanied instruments which sound like flutes (credits and details on the original release are sparse). While this music had been performed in this fashion for a long time before Jones documented it, this was among the first of such recordings to receive reasonably wide exposure (although it was released after Jones' death) in Europe and North America. Thus this recording anticipated the wider popularity of trance-like music among both electronic rock and progressive African musicians later in the 20th century.
Richie Unterberger

En Global Rhythm:

Morocco has intrigued Westerners for centuries. From Eugène Delacroix’s images of the country to Edith Wharton’s travel writings, many travelers to Morocco have sent home images of a tantalizing, mysterious, and certainly exotic land. (The accuracy and sensitivity of those depictions, of course, may be something else altogether.) The fascination with Morocco reached a peak with the popularity of writer Paul Bowles’ Morocco stories [see Endtrack, page 66] and the influx of Beat authors exploring the country (and especially the infamous city of Tangiers).

In 1950, author Bowles and painter/inventor Brion Gysin first heard a group of musicians from the foothills of the Rif Mountains known as the Master Musicians of Jajouka; for centuries, the forefathers of these players had been the courtly musicians for Morocco’s sultans, but their wild music (to which many attributed healing powers) were virtually unknown in the West. That all changed in 1968, when Gysin’s friend Brian Jones, the then-guitarist for the Rolling Stones, traveled to Morocco and heard these legendary players and the roiling, awesomely loud sounds of their oboe-like ghaita pipes. Jones went on to record an album with the Jajouka musicians, Brian Jones Presents The Pipes Of Pan At Jajouka (spelled Joujouka on the original LP release). In the wake of that record release in 1971, scores of other musicians followed in Jones’ footsteps to Jajouka, among them, the groundbreaking jazz saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman.

Although Hadj Abdessalam Attar (the Jajouka musicians’ leader at the time of the Jones recording) passed away in 1982, his legacy and talent for blending old and new has carried on through his son and successor, Bachir Attar. Under his leadership, the group has performed and recorded with such trendsetters as beat master Talvin Singh and globetrotting guitarist and producer Bill Laswell.

The influence and impact of Brian Jones Presents The Pipes Of Pan At Jajouka is hard to overestimate; for quite some time, it was the only “Moroccan” album available in the West. Thankfully, the last decade has seen an enormous upswing in the availability of Moroccan music abroad and increased opportunities for Moroccan musicians to present themselves without the scrim of foreigners’ perceptions. And with this burst of recording has come a panoply of voices, underscoring the fact that there is no single Moroccan style. Rather, whether their music is traditional, contemporary, religious, or secular, these artists are making their voices heard in a larger marketplace.
Anastasia Tsioulcas

 Del sitio oficial de los Maestros Músicos de Jajouka:

The remarkable music played by the Master Musicians of Joujouka, a remote village in the Ahl Srif tribal area south of the Rif in Northern Morocco, is thousands of years old.
In the 15th century, when the Sufi saint Sidi Ahmed Schiech arrived in the village, he wrote music for the Masters’ ancestors which could heal disturbed minds. Today’s Masters are blessed with the Baraka or spirit of their saint and use touch and prayer to heal.
The Masters’ performances feature a dancer dressed as Bou Jeloud, a Pan-like figure half goat half man. Although the character of Bou Jeloud is found all over Morocco, it takes on different form in Joujouka.
In Joujouka, Bou Jeloud gave an Attar ancestor the gift of flute music and bestowed fertility on the village every spring when he danced. The music relating to this is the Masters at their most mind-blowingly powerful.
In 1951, the American writer Paul Bowles and the Canadian painter Brion Gysin travelled to a Sufi music festival in Sidi Kacem, a couple of hours from where they were living in Tangier.
When he heard the Masters, Gysin said he wanted to listen to their music every day of his life. In Tangier, he met Mohamed Hamri, a would-be painter from Joujouka. When Hamri took Gysin to Joujouka, Gysin discovered to his astonishment that the music he’d fallen in love with was played by Hamri’s uncles.
Gysin and Hamri opened a restaurant in Tangier called The 1001 Nights and members of the Masters became the house band. It was here that legendary Beat figure William Burroughs first heard the music.
In the late 1950s Gysin and Burroughs lived in the Beat Hotel at 9 rue Git le Couer, Paris. Here Gysin invented the Cut-Up Method of writing and theDreamachine with Ian Somerville and worked with Burroughs, Somerville and filmmaker Antony Balch in Cut Up film experiments to a soundtrack of the Masters Musicians made by Gysin.
When the Rolling Stones were in Tangier in 1967, Hamri and Gysin met them and Hamri formed a bond with Brian Jones. Brian went to Joujouka, where he, too, fell in love with the Masters’ music, although he said ‘I don’t know if I possess the stamina to endure the incredible, constant strain of the festival’. He returned in 1968 to record the Masters.
Before he died in 1969, Brian had prepared the cover, and edited and produced the album of recordings he made of the Masters. Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Joujouka was released in 1971, honouring Brian’s memory and exposing a wider audience to the remarkable music of the Masters for the first time.
In January 1973, jazz musician Ornette Coleman recorded with the Masters. A small part of what was recorded was released on the 1975 album Dancing In My Head album. Also in 1975, Hamri’s book Tales of Joujouka was published.
Thanks to Rikki Stein, the Masters played at Worthy Farm, the site of Glastonbury, for the first time in 1980 as part of a three-month tour which included a week’s residency at London’s Commonwealth Institute.
http://www.joujouka.org/

Acá uno de los temas


Y acá los Maestros Músicos de Jajouka en 2013



¡espero sus comentarios!