But at Webster Hall on Sunday night, where Ms. Tagaq, who is Inuit, performed as part of the world music showcase Globalfest, she made it sound fiercely contemporary, futuristic even. Recalling animal noises and various other nature sounds, she was a dynamo, delivering a sort of gothic sound art while she stalked the small basement stage with feral energy.

This festival, now in its sixth year, presents a casually touristic view of a handful of the world’s musical cultures, though true strangeness is rarely prized. Instead, many of the groups here verged on genre originalism — the night was often a streamlined, somewhat homogenized representation of the world’s music — even if many are themselves carpetbaggers, style revivers and nostalgists.

Watcha Clan, at least, seemed mindful of the past decade’s worth of popular music, highlighting one of the weaknesses of this iteration of Globalfest: it felt like a look backward. More than ever, world music is becoming aggressively hybridized with hip-hop and electronic music — Brazilian baile funk, Angolan kuduro, South African kwaito — but these sounds were nowhere to be found. Even Globalfest’s traditionalism is selective. While many groups wielded accordions, there was no regional Mexican music — banda, Norteño — to be heard. Even in its breadth Globalfest can feel narrow.

from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/13/arts/music/13fest.html?_r=1

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