Rising Stars: World

Did someone say eclectic? If there’s one word — one English word, anyway — to describe our rising world stars, that would be it . . . unless, perhaps, you want to go with awesome. We’ll start our journey in New York, where Forro In the Dark summon a bass ’n’ beat-heavy Brazilian vibe — complete with honkin’ baritone sax — on “Perro Loco.” Believe it or not, Zimbabwean transplant Chiwoniso was born in Washington State, but right from the first mbira plunk of “Kurima,” she stakes out a singular style that fuses R&B, jazz, soukous, and folk with just a dollop of funk for spice.

In Next Steps, follow world music’s rising stars from Soweto to the Middle East.

Fusion anyone? Just like the trade routes that crisscrossed the globe, bringing all sorts of intriguing spices from far away, the artists in our Next Steps pepper their music with shockingly exotic flavors. In Turkey — a country whose biggest city sits right on the divide between Europe and Asia — Niyaz sways to a hypnotic, Pakistan-meets-Persia trance groove in “Ishq - Love and the Veil,” while inventive quartet Deolinda takes us to Portugal, with the unique neo-fado of “Um Contra O Outro.” And Afro-pop song thrush Thandiswa sets a Soweto beat against her Jenny-from-the-block-style R&B vocal in “Nizalwa Ngobani?”

In Deep Cuts, our melting pot welcomes infusions from Senegal and New Mexico.

While world music started out as a straightforward description of authentic, indigenous sounds, the genre’s evolution has expanded that definition to cover the various melting-pot artists out there — up-and-coming musicians whose stylistic experimentation has set them apart. Based in Albuquerque, but influenced by a range of Balkan/Eastern European traditions, is A Hawk and a Hacksaw (violinist Heather Trost and accordion player Jeremy Barnes), whose “No Rest for the Wicked” offers a taste of the mixed flavors on 2011’s Cervantine. And if you like the idea of Senegalese soul with hints of Malian blues, and warm Bob Marleyesque vocals, look no further than Nuru Kane (“Bobo”).

It’s a great, big, wonderful, scary, complex world out there, and people are making all kinds of music in every corner of it — so much so that you could spend every waking second of your day just trying to keep up. Alternatively, you could do what the heavy hitters do: delegate. And that’s exactly where we come in, with un puñado of the latest world-music rising stars. Think of us as your sonic emissaries, dispatched around the globe to encourage a healthy trade in sounds by the most exciting new artists . . . and to pick up samples while we’re at it. We’ve got your klezmer, your reggae, your forro, your fado, and a whole lot more. We’ve sailed the seven virtual seas and brought back a bounty of musical booty just large enough to fill your iPod. You don’t need a passport — just a willingness to try out something unfamiliar, strange, exotic, enchanting by up-and-coming world musicians.