Ciro Hurtado Mixes It Up On New World-Fusion CD Selva

Lillian

New member
PERUVIAN FOLK MUSIC MAESTRO CIRO HURTADO MIXES IT UP WITH A VARIETY OF WORLD-FUSION INFLUENCES

Yes, anyone who has heard any of Ciro Hurtado’s recordings in the past 25 years knows he is an exceptional Latin-styled acoustic guitarist (he even had two solo guitar albums just a few years ago). But in the past few years he has proven he is one of the top world-fusion composers, arrangers and producers around. He mostly works within the framework of a melting pot of Latin, Peruvian folk and new age with occasional additional influences creeping in (music from India or Mexico, or tidbits of rock’n’roll). But, seriously, if you want South American folk music filtered through a North American lens, you probably cannot do any better. Hurtado was born and raised in Peru (much of the time deep in the nearly inaccessible Amazonian rainforest), and while he was growing up he played much authentic native music from the tropical jungle and from high in the Andes Mountains. Hurtado has never forsaken his roots, but with his last album, Ayahuasca Dreams, he began to explore those early influences more thoroughly, and he continues that on his latest release, Selva (which means jungle in Spanish).

Half of the new album is comprised of instrumentals and the other half has a variety of women singing in Spanish. So often Anglo-Americans find music a turn-off if there is singing in a language other than English, but this is one of those times when the lyrics really do not matter to non-Spanish speaking listeners because the various females sing in such a beautiful way, the music just floats and flies around making for a catchy enjoyable sound that should have appeal to just about anyone.

Put that together with some lovely acoustic guitar picking (and a tiny bit of electric), a variety of wood flute solos, a little accordion, solid bass-drums-percussion backing, a few keyboard touches and some ethnic instruments, you end up with an exceptional Latin-based world music sound that has energy and passion (occasionally straying from slow and mid-tempo to upbeat), but mostly staying in the realm of soft and gentle (which is why he has so many new age music fans). Bottom-line: a winner from beginning to end. Available online as a CD or digital downloads at many of the regular web sales sites.
 
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