Check out this short (and sadly prematurely cutoff) video of Toumani Diabate, giving a very basic but amazing demonstration of the fundamental elements of the Kora!

You can find more information about Toumani, one of the most accomplished Kora players in the world, via his myspace page.

Dub Echoes, is a new music documentary out, now making the rounds in the festival ciruit. It was made by a Brazilian crew and is in the vein of excellent Studio One Story but by way of other more electronic-music slanted documentaries like Modulations: Cinema for the Ear and Better Living Through Circuitry.

You can also watch it on you Youtube.

Audium is a 169-speaker sound-theatre on Bush @ Franklin in San Francisco. Every Friday and Saturday, composer Stan Schaff treats audiences in the 49 seat theatre to an exploration of dynamic 3D sound through his avant-gardist and Musique Concrète compositions. The works are spatialized in real-time by the composer himself and last about an hour. I went to the show last night and very highly recommended it!!!

Larger images up on flickr and some really good shots of the interior from some other folks.

This morning, the San Francisco Chronicle had a delightful and illluminating article (complete with photo gallery) on the craftspeople and the top-flight acoustic instruments they make for professional musicians.