Azerbaijani Gitara is a series of compilation albums released by Swiss label Bongo Joe Records. The albums compile music in the genre of Azerbaijani gitara, which was first developed in the 1960s as Azerbaijani musicians like Rafiq Hüseynov fused traditional genres such as mugham with western styles on Czech Jolana guitars. The first volume (2020) compiles music by RüstÃÂm Quliyev, a native of Nagorno-Karabakh who remains popular in Azerbaijan thanks to the YouTube channel run by his nephew. The second volume (2024) compiles music by RÃÂhman MÃÂmmÃÂdli, one of the first players to replicate traditional vocals with heavy distortion on the electric guitar.
RüstÃÂm Quliyev was born in 1969 in Kosalar, a village in Nagorno-Karabakh. In the 1990s he moved to Baku to escape the violence of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. Quliyev's first instrument was the Azerbaijani tar, and from that background he developed a distinct sound on the electric guitar. Quliyev made a living playing at weddings and on Azerbaijani TV, and he remains popular in Azerbaijan, partly due to the YouTube channel run by his nephew Vasif Javadli. Quliyev died of lung cancer in 2005.
Azerbaijani Gitara was compiled by ethnomusicologist Ben Wheeler and anthropologist Stefan Williamson Fa, who also wrote the liner notes together. Wheeler and Williamson Fa's record label Mountain of Tongues had previously released several of the tracks on a 2019 cassette compilation of Quliyev's music.
In a review for The Times, Clive Davis called the album " one of the most unusual and exhilarating releases of the year" and "hypnotically danceable." Jim Hickson of Songlines particularly praised the tracks "ÃÂfqan Musiqisi" and "Yanñq KÃÂrÃÂmi".
RÃÂhman MÃÂmmÃÂdli was born in 1961, and played the garmoshka as a child. He learned to play electric guitar in the mid-1970s, and used it to play Azerbaijani folk songs and mughams with heavy distortion; he was one of the first to do so. MÃÂmmÃÂdli currently teaches tar at a music school in Fuzuli. In Azerbaijan he has the nickname "the man with the singing fingers.
Azerbaijani Gitara Volume 2 was compiled by Ben Wheeler, Stefan Williamson Fa, and Cyril Yeterian, and released on Bongo Joe on 31 May 2024.
Adriane Pontecorvo of PopMatters wrote that "in every song here, MÃÂmmÃÂdli sets high standards in terms of creativity and continuity...the music here stretches wide the bounds of mugham, and RÃÂhman MÃÂmmÃÂdli dazzles." Jim Irvin of Mojo called MÃÂmmÃÂdli's playing "an extraordinary noise, an acidic tone dialed up in all directions...a stinging sound that could loosen your dentistry." In a 5-star review for Songlines, Jim Hickson wrote that "what is most astonishing is the sheer vocality that [MÃÂmmÃÂdli] gets out of his guitar. At times there is an uncanny sense that the sounds he makes are literally that of a master singer." Francis Gooding of The Wire compared MÃÂmmÃÂdli's sound to a "cat that has swallowed a laser cannon."