Here’s another leftfield one from the Windham Hill label. A high mixture of Latin American rhythms, warm digital synthesis, and exploratory brass instruments, High Plateaux by the Argentine-Mexican duo of Bernardo Rubaja and Cesar Hernandez, cement itself as one of the high points and sadly little, further defined areas of little-known Latin American New Age music. With my apologies to blog guest Chris Morris, who is exactly doing this elsewhere, we can and should do better to go outside the myopia of known, Western flavors and traffic in other places that time seems to have forgotten. With a spectacular assist by producer Mark Isham, this duo’s release hinted at various intriguing ideas that remain viable for current listeners/musicians.
Multiculturalism is this great word that needs far greater promotion. Far from the USA, in places like South America, we must admit, that we’re not immune to prejudice or subserviency.
Looking at ourselves as better than another country because of color, culture, or money. Looking as us validated through the European prism (or the prism of others) has tended to rob those in these communities of their communality with the lands shared among each other. Its tended to make multicultural exchanges either hot messes or great ideas done in parallel worlds.
So, setting aside egos as Argentinian and Mexican multi-instrumentalists Bernardo Rubaja and Cesar Hernandez, respectively, did in 1987, took a bit of courage. A blend was sought after, rather than a compartmentalization of their different folk backgrounds. Yes, you hear the rhythms of tango, waltzes (stuff that’s typically “Argentinian”) but you also hear Andean, huastecos, and other Latin American styles drive this floating music in places that still sound uniquely theirs. A product of 1987, High Plateaux on occasion might skate the line of “smooth jazz” or “smuzak” (my own term, coined for engaging muzak), due to the high degree of musicianship by all the players involved, but it never ceases to be interesting.
Wherein Japanese New Age you might hear the digital mallet place the listener on a cultural land, here we notice the pan flute/zampoña (the scourge of many dreaded “El Condor Pasas”) take a bit of the center stage, and luxuriate into a more meditative mood, capturing the sensitivity and dexterity it can be capable of when in the hands of those who think that more can be done with it. “Puerta Del Sol” may start off as a lightweight, cinematic Peruvian-thing but it mutates through various sonorities rendering it a powerful statement piece where synthetic elements can take the essence of these folk influences and create something truly forward-thinking — it’s not often you hear a charango duet with evolving arpeggiating minimal stuff.
Peruvian-Boricuan percussionist Alex Acuña joins the duo for wonderfully active rhythms that recall his more esoteric ideas with the Weather Report, Lee Ritenour, and Gabriela. “Forest” gives you a touch of that. Mark Isham, through production ideas and horn work, takes some of the askew ambient found in his work with Art Lande (heck, even on his own Vapor Drawings, see: “Raffles In Rio”) and seems unafraid to tap it as a sweetener for songs like “Reflective Colors”. On songs like these, a fading apparition of some moonlit ballad takes on the aires of barely there boundary-less minimalism. All of this is gorgeous stuff to hear, for sure.
“Indian Woman” takes advantage of the meandering waltzes of Latin America for a gorgeous lilting dance of barely there ambient romanticism (with brilliant hints of dub stylings…). The first side of the album ends on a fascinating Balearic “Mar (The Sea)” a song that uses the rhythm and ethos of salsa music to create a moonswept New Age slow jam that sits just as comfortably in your headphones as out in some starry-eyed intimate night.
The flip side finds the duo adding a livelier touch. “Oro Blanco (White Gold)” evolves into a quite moving fourth world-esque play of minimal electronics and meditative horn motifs, where Rubaja and Hernandez’s synth interplay works perfectly with the ambiance from Isham. The rest of the album edges around hues in that manner.
Never moody and quite vibrant, High Plateaux holds a special place in my collection (much like Joan Bibiloni’s more esoteric stuff) as ambient music you can break out on a particularly nice day. Light, heavy stuff, for anyone to enjoy. Anyway, in the end, I do wonder why they didn’t release anything else together after this. There was some kind of promise here.