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Week of May 26th...

This week we immerse ourselves in the amazing rhythms and exotic modes of North African music, where influences from Arabic music, Africa and Europe have created fascinating hybrids for centuries.

The program is a memorial to the much-loved Nubian master musician HAMZA EL DIN, who passed away this week after a lifetime of service to music, leaving hundreds of thousands of devoted fans -- a great man.

We begin with one of his compositions, then journey wide and deep with selections by the Bay Area fusion group STELLAMARA, French World/Ambient duo RAJNA, DEAD CAN DANCE and LA's multi-cultural YUVAL RON ENSEMBLE. Later, authentic Armenian and Persian contemplative gems from DJIVAN GASPARYAN and HOSSEAN ALIZADEH, and several gorgeous pieces by Tunisian oud master ANOUAR BRAHEM and his French trio.

We journey to North Africa and beyond on a DESERT CROSSING...

[ view playlist ]     [ play 30 second audio promo ]

Finally, Firefox!

It has taken far, FAR longer than we would have liked, but we are finally fully Firefox compatible on both the Windows and Mac platforms.

Fine print: We require Firefox 1.5 or later, we can't support Windows NT, and you must be running Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) or 10.4 (Tiger), plus Windows Media Player for the Mac, v. 7.1.3 or later.

Most of the site will work with Firefox on Linux and Unix as well, but there is still no easy solution to running Windows Media streams on Linux/Unix, which kind of defeats the purpose of the service. Linux/Unix users can run our legacy service streams using Firefox and Real Player.

Though Firefox market share is only about 9% of web browsers, Firefox users are a very vocal, progressive minority. We're sorry it has taken so long, but 95% of the delay was out of our hands. The other 5% was rewriting our site to detect Firefox, supplying the correct code, and testing, testing, testing. Thanks to our extraordinarily patient beta testers, everything is now working smoothly. Please report any problems to [email protected].

Week of May 19th...

May is a good time for easy, breezy spacejazz and we have just the rerun for it. This show starts with a French take on the late great BILL EVANS, then mines the lighter side of the vast ECM catalog. Music is by OREGON, JOHN SURMAN, CHARLIE HADEN and PAT METHENY, DAVID DARLING, and TERJE RYPDAL, plus a track from one of the fine Windham Hill "Summer Solstice" compilations by DAVID ARKENSTONE.

Light, cool, and oh so refreshing: ZEPHYRS.

[ view playlist ] [ play 30 second audio promo ]

Week of May 12th...

Possibly the sole advantage of global warming is the opportunity to immerse ourselves in the music of the warm-weather cultures. This week we start with a classic Balinese/African track from ROBERT RICH's "Rainforest" and strike off into electronics and ambient sounds of nature, with selections by JAMES JOHNSON, ELVE and STEVE ROACH, plus suitably languid music by LARAAJI, PETER KATER and BRUNO SAN FILIPPO.

Grab a cold drink and join us for a globally warmed journey called FLOATING GARDENS.

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Disk Failure Fixed

Late Sunday May 7th, we had a disk failure on one of our streaming servers that caused error messages and lack of service for Eastern U.S. and European users. It has been repaired and is now working normally. We are continuing to monitor the system to verify stable operation. Please report any problems to [email protected] Thanks for your patience if you were one of the affected users!

Week of May 5th...

This week we return to our long-running love for the sound of Indian devotional music, building a show around an extraordinary new album by RASA which provided not only the majority of the music, but the title.

TEMPLE OF LOVE also includes fine selections for sitar and bansuri flute from other stalwarts of contemporary Indian music, including ANOUSHKA SHANKAR (yes, Ravi's daughter), BEN LEINBACH, AL GROMER KHAN and STEVE GORN.

Slow, ardent, and very beautiful...

[ view playlist ] [ play 30 second audio promo ]