Kalakan (band)

Kalakan
Kalakan and Madonna in O2 Arena (Berlin) during The MDNA tour 2012
Background information
Origin	northern Basque country
Genres	Traditional music
Labels	ZTK diskak, KML recordings
Website	kalakan.fr
Members	Jamixel Bereau Thierry Biscary Xan Errotabehere
Past members	Frédéric Chambon Paxkal Indo

Kalakan is a music band from northern Basque country composed of Thierry Biscary, Jamixel Bereau and Xan Errotabehere. It is characterized by minimalist arrangements (vocals, percussions) of basque traditional songs. After having collaborated and toured Europe with pianists Katia et Marielle Labèque, the trio become known to a larger audience when they collaborated with Madonna during The MDNA Tour.

Kalakan was created in 2009 by Paxkal Indo and Thierry Biscary from their txalaparta duo. After touring Europe with pianists Katia et Marielle Labèque performing an arrangement for two pianos and Basque percussion of Maurice Ravel's Boléro, they invited percussionnist Frédéric Chambon to join them to form a trio. Before going on their first artist in residence program to prepare their first record, Chambon was replaced by singer and percussionist Jamixel Bereau.

Kalakan album was recorded at Laguna Records in Biarritz and mixed at studio K in Paris by producer David Chalmin during autumn 2010. Katia and Marielle Labèque recorded "Kantuz" with a piano arrangement made by Joël Merah, and Basque choir Anaiki from Paris contributed backing vocals to "De Treville-n azken hitzak". This first album was co-produced by Basque record label ZTK Diskak, representing Paxkal Indo, and Italian record label KML Recordings, representing Katia and Marielle Labèque. 2000 discs were duplicated, with a portion of them being distributed by Abeille musique (France) and Elkar (Basque country).