Watch the world’s greatest stories unroll before your eyes! Baltimore's beloved festival of scrolled panoramas known as crankies, returns for its 7th year of fireside wonder. A full lineup of artists and musicians coming soon.
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We might be a bit biased, but we think Nathan & The Zydeco Cha-Chas are one of the most dynamic zydeco bands on the planet. Led by deeply soulful Nathan Williams, the Cha-Chas are zydeco band with some serious blues chops whose sound is deeply traditional and also uniquely their own.
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Cheikh Lô is one of the great mavericks of African music. A superb singer, guitarist, and percussionist he has created his sound, an evolution of Senegalese mbalax, the intricate dance music of Senegal, by incorporating a variety of West African music.
Lô dedicates both his life and music to Baye Fall, a specifically Senegalese form of Islam. It’s a part of the larger Islamic brotherhood of Mouridism which was established by Bamba (Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba M’Becke) at the end of the 19th century. Bamba’s closest disciple Cheikh Ibra Fall established the Baye Fall movement. Lo’s own visual style is inspired by the Baye Fall trademarks - patchwork clothes and long dreadlocks.
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Over the past dozen years, Carsie Blanton has been making music that personifies play. Her work has been called “impeccably catchy” by critic Robert Christgau, with musician John Oates admiring her songs’ “sly wit and urbane imagery” that remind him of Cole Porter. She’s toured across America and Europe sharing stages with Madeleine Peyroux, The Weepies and others.
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Tufan Derince, at the crest of a wave of young Kurdish musicians who have swept over the corridor linking Diyarbakır—the capital of Kurdish culture in Southeast Turkey—with urban centers of Kurdish migration along the Eastern Mediterranean, has performed at hundreds of weddings across Turkey. Recently relocated to the Netherlands he has already made a major impact on Kurdish music scenes in Europe, collaborating with refugee Kurdish musicians from Syria, creating a novel blend of electronic pop and heavy electrified Kurdish folk music.
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