The throat singing circus has certainly passed through the UK but never really took off in the way that it has in the US. And although I have a distant memory of catching the music at a WOMAD years back, I have to confess I came to this subject area pretty fresh. The accompanying CD and DVD filled in a few gaps though.

If you never heard the music though the book would still be a fascinating read for its forensic stripping away of the assumptions we bring to music. What happens when music is not built around melody? What if music was not about entertainment or even performance but a private matter between you and nature? What if stylised imitation ‘mimesis’ of natural sounds was more highly prized than a memorable tune? What if the very fact of performing a sacred piece in front of an audience undermined its purpose?

Ted Levin gets to the heart of a musical system profoundly different from our own and shows how performers and audiences get tangled up in the different assumptions they bring to music. Indeed, right at the outset, Levin cuts loose the concept of music preferring the broader activity of ‘sound making’. Tuvan throat singing with its shamanic connections also has to deal with the added madness of western ‘healers’ copying the form but profoundly misunderstanding it and making sounds to harm not heal.

Ted Levin comes alive in the book’s pages for his honest and troubled account of his own part in this tangled story. Should a Swedish cheese commercial be allowed to use the music? Does this undermine the music or bring it to wider attention? Is he insulting the artists or helping them make a living?

Tuvan music is big business now, well at least it is by Tuvan standards. Musicians face artistic compromises on a daily basis and for many these compromises cut to the heart of their spiritual beliefs. Families are abandoned for long periods as the bands criss-cross the world festival circuits. Alcoholism and burn out are endemic. Ted Levin helped make this possible and he doesn’t shirk from examining the dilemmas thrown up by his actions.

Balanced against this, the success of bands like Huun-Huun-Tu has brought Tuva to the attention of many, kick started a revival of traditional music within Tuva, provided a good living for many musicians and their families and allowed the musicians to explore other musical forms as equals.

At times the book reads like a travel book detailing trips to remote places, at times it is a heavy musicological tome and at others it is perceptive and engaging social commentary. Perhaps it is best described though as an extended love letter full of reminiscence, wonder, puzzlement, self-examination and passion.

Theodore Levin (with Valentina Süzükei) - Where Rivers and Mountains Sing: Sound, Music and Nomadism in Tuva and Beyond is published by Indiana University Press

Link: http://iupress.indiana.edu