Um, MF Doom, Madlib and Oh No, a good bit. Fela Kuti!
(cannot be repeated loud or often enough -- the editor of his autobiography described Fela as one of the three greatest globally influential black musical voices of the 20th century, along with James Brown and Bob Marley; I don't mean to mindlessly parrot that or argue with it, but have been trying to understand and evaluate it).I listen to a good deal of Indian classical and, I suppose, "fusion" music.
L. Shankar seems to play a mean something-like-a-violin (and maybe actually a violin).
Le Trio Joubran are an impressive set of luting brothers with a couple albums.
Recent additions to the library:
Don Giovanni
(hmm: a track on The Klazz Brothers, Cuban Percussion Meets Mozart - or something like that - is the reason for this; they do sort of cuban jazz or lounge songs based on popular themes of Mozart, and the one based on Don Giovanni's climax - "don muerte" - seemed to have a passage from Chopin in it, so I had to get DG and listen for that theme, in case Chopin cribbed it from Mozart, which, as you know, would be perfectly permissible in the genre, but in fact does not seem to turn out to be the case. most of the items in this list will not have such lengthy parenthetical explanations . . . expressed);Bob Marley's box set; Senor Coconut and his Orchestra; Marc Ribot y los Cubanos Postizos; Charlie Parker; James Brown; Eric Satie piano works; Olivier Messaiaen; a bunch of Coltrane, Eddie Jefferson, Carmen McRae; and a collection called Jazz Piano History.
seriously.