Track Listing

1. Meeting by the River
2. Longing
3. Ganges Delta Blues
4. Isa Lei

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3180 in Music
• Released on: 1993-02-23
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .19 pounds

Amazon.com
Ry Cooder has long had an interest in other people's music, from the blues and gospel of black America through classic jazz and the music of Cuba. Even by this standard, his meeting with Mohan Vishwa Bhatt is certainly a departure. He is neither a serious student of Indian music nor in any way a master of its intricacies. Yet on his improvised session (this album was recorded without rehearsal in one evening), he and Bhatt truly collided musically and created moments worthy of the world-music Grammy they received for it. Bhatt is an iconoclastic character himself. He plays a modified box he calls the mohan vina that is a hybrid of a classical Indian instrument and slide guitar. He is long trained in the arduous classical style, yet his work has always demanded a lot of freedom. His duets here with Cooder are completely unique, liberating both artists from the usual constraints and creating a new musical style that is unlikely to be repeated or imitated. --Louis Gibson

Customer Reviews

In the true spirit of confluence
The album truly encompasses the spirit of the confluence, of different worlds, different music, different thoughts, united in harmony, in the cool shade of the banks of the ganges.

Vishwa Mohan Bhatt is as effortlessly beautiful as ever. The flowing quality of his music, with delightful legatos splashes as his solos meet the solid boulders and branches of Ry Cooder's slide guitar. If anything I feel Ry Cooder was too quiet on this album, though, the blues/jazz influence was underplayed a little.

The title piece is one of my favourites, though Isa Lie is equally wonderful.

Magical music from another place and time.

Isa Lei
"Isa Lei" is my favourite piece on this cd. It is a FIJIAN farewell song, not Hawaiian like most people tend to think. Being a Fijian myself, I couldn't help but cry when I first heard Ry Cooder and Bhatt's rendition.

one of cooder's finest
Ry Cooder has made a lot of music that's nice to listen to as 'background music.' All of his film soundtracks are enjoyable, but they never strike one beyond that.

In Meeting by the River, Cooder and Bhatt create music that is at once unique and interesting. Bhatt, as always, is outstanding on his own mohan vina, and Cooder gives one of his best performances.

Interestingly, this CD was recorded in one take, in an LA church with outstanding acoustics. This is an impromptu session, but the musical ideas seem very refined.

One of my all-time favorites, and a must-have for any Cooder fan.