The Pagan Music List 30
The PAGAN MUSIC LIST is an attempt to create a comprehensive list of Pagan, Heathen, Esoteric, Animist, and related music that we listen to and love. We include embedded YouTube, Soundcloud, or Bandcamp links when possible for each artist.
Previous collections in this series have been archived here, and new collections of reviews will be posted monthly (supporters get early access to new collections—find out more here).
We also provide a constantly updated index of artists that we have reviewed by name and genre.
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Collection 30
Omiri, Kalakan, Aman Aman
Omiri
”Electro folk” (Portuguese)
Website: https://omiri.eu/eng.html
Recommended Album: ?
Omiri —which is a ‘'band” made up of just one man, Vasco Ribiero Casais — makes some rather … interesting music. Sometimes they seem like a joke band (and sometimes perhaps they are), but also quite a few songs of theirs are quite serious.
Omiri makes “electro folk” versions of old Celtic songs from Portugal, using techno beats, traditional instruments, and recorded samples of traditional songs together. The result can be quite fun on its own, but then there are their videos.
For instance, here’s a live performance video of “Gloria.”
And another one, quite fun, is a live performance of Repasseado, a traditional celtic dance:
Kalakan
Folk/Traditional (Basque)
Website: https://www.kalakan.eus/home
Recommended Album:Elementuak
Kalakan is a folk music trio from the Basque region of Spain, best known for collaborating on one of Madonna’s tours.
The Basque language, known as euskara, is what is called a language isolate, meaning that there are no other spoken languages related to it linguistically. This is because the region where the Basque themselves live is very isolated, and no known migrations in or out of the area appear to have occurred for millennia.
Kalakan (their name means “chatter”) performs traditional songs with slight updates on traditional instruments, particularly a unique form of percussion.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find English translations for their songs, but here are two which are quite beautiful. The first is Ene Ama Zenari:
And a second, much older one, Elemtuak, shows off particularly their percussion:
Aman Aman
Traditional (Sephardic)
Website: https://amanaman.bandcamp.com/album/musica-i-cants-sefardis-d-orient-i-occident
Recommended Album: Musica i cants sefardis d’orient i occident
Aman Aman is a one-off project spearhead by Mara Aranda, better known for her work in L’ham de Foc and with the Al Andaluz Project. Specifically, Aman Aman is a collection of Jewish sephardic songs from the Iberian peninsula, but it’s included in this pagan music list because of the pagan influences on those songs.
Here, for example, is the song Los Guisados de le berendjena. Originally a Greek melody, the title translates as “The ways to cook eggplant.”
Another song is a lullaby, Durme, which exists in mutliple languages throughout the Mediterranean.