Iyaranla: Oro Cantado

Seattle, Washington's, Omo Alagba Afro-Cuban music ensemble has been invited to present music from their new CD Iyaranla (Oro Cantado) at the 10th International Congress of Orisa Culture and Tradition in Ile-Ife, Nigeria, this July. The album has been funded through a grant from the Seattle Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs, and features songs and drumming that the ensemble says, ...were uprooted from Nigeria and resurrected in Cuba. Drums and songs that found voice in New York and sanctuary in Seattle. Now, after being separated from their source within Nigeria-Yoruban culture for centuries, the music will journey home in performances before the greatest living elders of the tradition and over 2000 participants from 23 countries representing the Yoruba diaspora. The CD will make it's official release through Ibori Records on May 23, 2013, in a free, donation-only Omo Alagba performance hosted and sponsored by the Fremont Abbey Arts Center, beginning at 7PM. Ensemble leader Steven Cherena has just been awarded a Heritage Preservation grant by 4Culture to document the journey in a film produced by Portland, Oregon's, Ibeji Pictures. The group chose to record the entire Iyaranla, a sacred song-cycle used in most Afro-Cuban Lukumi ceremonies known as Bembes or Tambors, primarily as a learning tool for community members in Seattle and the extended Yoruba diaspora, and secondarily as an artistic piece that captures, for the first time in high-fidelity, this important piece of threatened heritage. The album was recorded at Orbit Audio, a boutique Seattle recording studio, by a team including Grammy award winning audio engineer Rick Clifford. Ibori Records founder, Chaz Mortimer, says, In 30 years of recording the most influential artists of our time, including Tupac, Gloria Gaynor, Lee Ritenour, Bill Withers..., at the best studios in LA, Rick Clifford brought a level of expertise and quality to the production that few 'Folkloric' albums can claim. The album is a gem of cultural expression and preservation, and speaks to people from all walks of life. More information about the ensemble and a five minute teaser for the upcoming film about the project, entitled Children of the Sacred Elders, can be viewed at OmoAlagba.com.