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Maurice el Médioni
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Descarga Oriental - The New York Sessions


Descarga Oriental - The New York Sessions For decades Maurice El Médioni has been captivating audiences by using his right hand to play classic “Oriental” rhythms and the left hand to create eclectic rhythms from Cuba and America’s Deep South. In this, his first album in a decade, he teamed up with top Cuban drummer Roberto Rodriguez, another musical refugee who found solace in a port city (New York). Together, they interpret nine original songs that are produced and arranged by the latter. The joyous result makes one wonder why no one had thought of such permutations before. The dexterity of Médioni’s playing on “Ana Ouana” or “Malika” gives the impression that the pianist has been practising these uptempo scales all his life.

And yet it is only recently that Médioni returned to his first passion, music, and illuminated his retirement after his career as a tailor. He celebrated his return to the stage by releasing his first CD, “Café Oran”, in 1996. Since then, he has toured the world either playing solo or accompanying the grand figure of Judeo-Arabic music, Lili Boniche. “The basis of my music is Andalusian, but I mix in boogie-woogie, jazz and Latin sounds,” he said recently. “Despite this, my (playing) still has the resonance of the Maghreb.” A perfect example of this mixture, put into a retro style, is the dreamy “Tu n’aurais jamais dû”, backed by Oscar Oñoz and his muffled trumpet.

Médioni is unfortunately let down by his voice - full of nostalgia but as flat as his piano-playing is bouncy and rippling. Luckily, he confines it to a couple of tracks only, preferring to marry his instrument with the dextrous percussions of Rodriguez. The musician from the East Village in Manhattan accompanies Médioni’s keyboard riffs in variations that go from “son” to “guarache”, via old-time boogie-woogie. “I was asked to bridge two worlds,” Rodriguez says in the sleeve-notes, “As I listened, the Arabic and Sephardic connection became very clear, the strong presence of the African rhythms, as well as the beautiful and romantic melodies, just like in a Cuban song.” Journalist Philip Sweeney likens the result to a North African Eddie Palmieri, but the salsa virtuoso never added Médioni’s “Maghrebian” piquant, an Algerian sauce that peppers this CD and provides a welcome glow to some scintillating songs.

March 2006

Daniel Brown


  

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