Ethiopian Music - Artist Spotlight: Gigi

For today's Ethiopian artist spotlight, I'm going to make a very obvious selection. Chances are, if you've taken even a cursory peep into the world of Ethiopian music, you've sighted this artist: Ejigayehu Shibabaw, otherwise known as Gigi. 

Gigi shares a number of biographical similarities with Minyeshu, the last artist I featured. They were both born and raised in Ethiopia, and both performed with the Ethiopian National Theater before emigrating. 

Both married non-Ethiopian musicians (Gigi married prominent American musician/producer, Bill Laswell). Now, both are members of the Ethiopian diaspora--Minyeshu in Europe, Gigi in the United States.

Since leaving Ethiopia, Gigi has released a solid--if somewhat confusing!--discography. The confusion stems from exactly how many CDs she's released. Although her record label (Palm Records) claims that 2006's Gold & Wax CD is Gigi's "long-awaited second album," overall it seems like it's really her sixth or seventh. 

So how does this add up?

First, in 1997, Gigi released two independent albums: Tsehay and a French compilation of Ethiopian love songs called Éthiope: Chants d’Amour. Both of these discs are now pretty obscure, and I haven't been able to track down a copy of either one. However, at the time, Éthiope: Chants d’Amour marked Gigi's first appearance on the music scene and paved the way for the creation of her first major album, 1998's One Ethiopia. 


One Ethiopia, with its reggae-tinged title track, brought Gigi her first real taste of success within the Ethiopian community. This album, while a good effort, does not appeal to me as much as her later albums because of the production values. Its recording relies upon synthesized, computer-generated instruments, rather than actual drums, saxophones, etc. Although I know this synthesized approach is typical of Ethiopian music at the time (a cultural phenomenon that deserves a whole post of its own), it can sound dated to modern-day, Western listeners. However, as usual, Gigi's beautiful, warm vocals stand out, no matter what the background instrumentation.

Thankfully, for her next album (2001's eponymous Gigi), Gigi ditched the synthesizers in favor of real instruments, and the difference immediately leaps out of your speakers. Enveloped in earthy guitars and paced by real percussion, Gigi's voice glows. This newfound vibrancy caught the attention of music critics, and Gigi landed on many critics' "best of" lists in 2001, even earning a mention in the New York Times' “best of the obscure among 2001's albums” list: 

"In songs about love and the country she left behind, Gigi's modal melodies and urgently questioning voice rise out of grooves that swirl jazz and funk into the complexities of Ethiopian pop, broadening the music without Americanizing it." 

And yet, the next album Gigi released was exactly what the critics warned against: an Americanized version of her music. Sort of. 

Illuminated Audio, the 2003 follow-up to Gigi, marks a strange entry in Gigi's discography, because it's not really a new album. Illuminated Audio is a remixed version of the 2001 album, Gigi, with Bill Laswell-styled redos of the same songs. Which makes for an album that isn't bad at all, but that perhaps feels a bit unnecessary. While it's enjoyable, Illuminated Audio is an album that leaves Gigi fans wishing for more, especially in the way of original material. 

But Gigi made up for the potential misstep of Illuminated Audio in a big way. That same year, Gigi (as one part of a group of musicians calling themselves Abyssinia Infinite) contributed vocals to the album Zion Roots, a collaborative effort to return to the acoustic roots of traditional Ethiopian music in a meaningful, yet fresh way. And they succeed beautifully. Zion Roots is a flat-out gorgeous album. 

Please do yourself a favor and buy this CD. It's one of my favorite modern Ethiopian music finds and is worth the price for the first track alone: "Bati Bati," a lush, dreamy song elevated to sublimity by Moges Habte's haunting saxophone work and Gigi's plaintive vocals. Track 7, "Aba Alem Lemenea," is also captivating. With songs this exquisite, it's no surprise that Zion Roots earned a nomination for the Critics Award in the BBC Radio 3 Awards for World Music in 2004.


Finally, Gigi's latest work, 2006's Gold & Wax, marked her return to a solo album. And while it doesn't rise to the thrilling aesthetic heights of Zion Roots, Gold & Wax--as one Amazon reviewer noted--"picks up right where [Gigi] left off five years ago....Not much of a departure from her debut, but there's no point in complaining about more of a very good thing." 


And overall, Gigi's music is indeed a reliably good thing and an essential part of any modern Ethiopian music collection, particularly Zion Roots and Gigi. 

Some of my favorite Gigi songs...

- "Bati Bati" from Zion Roots

- "Gud Fella" from Gigi

- "Gomelaleye" from Gold & Wax

- "Aba Alem Lemenea" from Zion Roots   

This last song is particularly interesting to me, as the first time I heard it, it was immediately arresting; a stop-you-in-your-tracks type of song. As I was trying to describe it, the phrase that kept recurring to me was "painfully lovely," though exactly what made it "painful," I couldn't quite put my finger on (especially since I had no idea what the lyrics were saying). However, I later read an interview with Gigi where she commented on the origins of this song, saying she wrote it as a cry to God:

"'Aba Alem Lemenea' means 'Father, Why the World for Me?'. It's a song that I wrote when I was kind of sad...you know, when you feel like you don't know why people do things around you, why they say things to you, or why you love and hate at the same time, why you're rich now and poor tomorrow. It's like when I lost control of my life. You know that the world is out there, but you can't help yourself from doing bad things, like smoking. (laughs). It's spiritual song. It's also kind of a prayer to God saying 'Help me.'"

Proof yet again that the heart of any good song, its emotional truths, know no language barriers. Music itself is a truly transcendent language.

Wednesday, October 01, 2008 | Labels: , , |

 

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