A Blast of January: Preet Brar and Miss Pooja with "January"

Today's random tune comes all the way from India. January is by Preet Brar and Miss Pooja. Preet Brar is a Punjabi singer who incorporates humorous elements into his songs and also has a few scrapes with the law. Miss Pooja is an Indian actress and singer who is widely credited with reviving Punjabi duet singing and is the biggest selling female bhangra artist in India and abroad. She has released over 70 duets with different male singers, and her prodigious career includes over 3000 singles, over 300 albums, over 800 music videos and five films. January can be found on the their 2007 album Petrol 2.

Globalquerque Video 7: Rahim AlHaj and Liu Fang

Today's Globalquerque video is of Albuqerque's own oud master Rahim AlHaj and Chinese pipa master Liu Fang performing in the Fountain Courtyard at the National Hispanic Cultural Center during Globalquerque 2014 on September 20th in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Liu Fang was born in China and currently lives in Montreal. She is described as the "empress of pipa" and is considered one of the foremost players of the pipa and the guzheng. She plays both traditional Chinese songs as well as classical Chinese music and modern compositions from the East and West. Rahim AlHaj was born in Iraq and emigrated to Albuquerque as a political refugee. He has been playing the oud since the age of 9 and studied in Iraq under the greatest masters of the oud. His political activism against the Saddam Hussein regime forced him to leave Iraq in 1991, and he lived in Jordan and Syria before coming to the US. He detailed in the concert how he wrote songs for oud and pipa and found Liu Fang to play them - and this song is one of those that he wrote.

I shot this on my Samsung Galaxy and because I was using zoom the video is a little grainy. There is also a bit of background sound from cicadas, which Rahim Alhaj notes before they play.