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Rapa Iti
Tahitian Choir
Rapa Iti
Genres: Dance & Electronic, International Music, Pop
 
  •  Track Listings (15) - Disc #1

The 126 a cappella voices heard on this 1991 field recording are not actually from Tahiti but from the island of Rapa (a.k.a. Oparo), a thousand miles southeast from Tahiti, the last outcropping of land in the South Pacifi...  more »

     
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CD Details

All Artists: Tahitian Choir
Title: Rapa Iti
Members Wishing: 0
Total Copies: 0
Label: Triloka Records
Release Date: 9/24/1992
Album Type: Import
Genres: Dance & Electronic, International Music, Pop
Styles: Ambient, Pacific Islands, Tahiti
Number of Discs: 1
SwapaCD Credits: 1
UPCs: 744447719223, 044447719248, 4010394019225, 669910102954, 744447719247

Synopsis

Amazon.com
The 126 a cappella voices heard on this 1991 field recording are not actually from Tahiti but from the island of Rapa (a.k.a. Oparo), a thousand miles southeast from Tahiti, the last outcropping of land in the South Pacific before Antarctica. The island's very isolation has allowed it to preserve a unique choral tradition based on quarter-tone harmonies, three-against-two rhythms, tenor-against-alto counterpoint, soprano trilling and bass-voice drones, and percussive exhalations. All 15 selections on this album date back to the days before the island's first encounter with Europeans in 1791 and have a distinctly non-Western character. The music's eerie strangeness is combined with an unmistakable beauty that made this album a surprise hit on the worldbeat charts. --Geoffrey Himes

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CD Reviews

Other worldly and joyful
05/23/2001
(5 out of 5 stars)

"The reviewer above gives you the technical reasons for the other worldly feel to this album. What is missed is the sheer sense of joy of singing that this album conveys. I think it is that quality which makes this album so successful. I would like to comment on the statement that all of the songs are pre-contact with Europeans. #3-Himeme Tatou is the hymn "Once I was bound by sin's galling fetters..." copywrited in 1917 and renewed in 1945 by the Nazarene Publishing House. I also believe #13 is another hymn but I can't quite place it. Maybe someone else can.I highly recomment this album to anyone who would like to hear something different and joyful."