Riga Raga

Riga Raga - Lo Fringaire


Riga Raga - Charivaris

Years before he discovers the emboladores from brazilian Nordeste (a discovery that partly leaded to the project he's mainly well-known for: the fabulous trobadores), Claude sicre was part of a band circa 1977 whose LP (on the Revolum label) contained all the germs of the unique reflexion on folklore he built through the years.

Cleaning the folklore appelation from its dusty crusts, especially through his book Vive l'Américke, he relentlessly questionned its inner meaning: a community music, related to daily social functions and interactions (games, nursery rhymes, weddings, feasts of all kinds, strikes, ...), whose characteristics are determined by an adaptability to circumstances and an ability to englobe the whole community beyond ages or origins. And made the diagnostic that many french problems are, for historical reasons, directly related to the lack of a decent folkloric entry in the cultural building, comparing to other countries (latin american, indian or african ones especially).



Riga Raga - Regrets de Maidon


Riga Raga - A Minjat mon Blat

This reflexion is not pure theory, but is the reason why Riga Raga sounds unique comparing to any other folk attempt from that time: with Luc Charles-Dominique, Olivier Laurent et Renat Jurié, Sicre collaborated for a unique junction between the occitan roots and an unpredictable freak, hallucinated and comic horizon. Rough and brilliant, music gets rid of almost every classic folk instrument, and is often made of simple ones on purpose (pignato, sounarel, wood pieces, self-made whistles...), with a fundamental place given to voice, never relying on virtuosity, and revisiting popular dances (Rigaudon, Goignade...) or shepherds dialogs. Moreover, consciously far away from any binarism between popular culture and a wise one, this record knows that by digging its obsessions, it ends up sounding completely challenging for adventurous music lovers . A personal way of thinking music that we have still a lot to learn from.

For french readers, a very complete interview by Jacme Gaudàs is highly recommended here.
Whole album, with detailed liner notes, avalaible thanks to the amazing Continuo's blog, while few copies are still avalaible here.