After a short opening set of Mexican music by Chicago-based quartet Sones de Mexico, the four members of La Musga¤a took the stage. The Castillian group challenges any preconceptions one might hold about Spanish music. With an instrumental lineup that includes bagpipes, clarinet, cittern, and button accordion, La Musgaña's music is a surprising hybrid of Celtic, klezmer, and Latin music. Their energetic, hour-long set of instrumentals drew heavily from their latest album, Las Seis Tentaciones, which consists primarily of traditional Salamancan compositions. Although percussionist Luis Delgado and bassist/guitarist Carlos Beceiro each doubled on other instruments, the group's multi- instrumentalists are Jaime Muñoz, who performed on clarinet, flutes, and button accordion, and Enrique Almendros, who played lap dulcimer, bagpipes, and gaita charra y tambor¡l (a performance style peculiar to Salamanca's Tambor¡leros, involving playing a three-holed flute one handed while simultaneously beating a snare drum-like tambor¡l hanging from the wrist with the other). Although La Musgaña's music has deep traditional roots, it was played with considerable verve and flash by the youthful quartet, and pieces like "Charro Zamorano" are given a contemporary drive by Beceiro's fluid electric bass playing. In an era when crossing musical borders has become commonplace, La Musgaña produces a captivating hybrid by interpreting the music creole of their native region of Northern Spain, itself a cultural crossroads.
--Michael Parrish (St. Charles, IL)