With Ronroco, Gustavo Santaolalla, an Oscar winner for his score to Brokeback Mountain in 2005, fuses conventional styles with a progressive sensibility, in an album of original tunes inspired by traditional Argentinean music and influenced by music of Japan, Africa, and Eastern Europe. The record takes its name from the ronroco, a stringed instrument similar to the charango, although slightly larger and lower in pitch. The charango, a small South American guitar similar to the ukulele, has ten strings arranged in pairs and a body that was originally fashioned from an armadillo shell. “I’ve been playing this instrument since I was a kid, collecting songs and thoughts about this record for a long time,” says Santaolalla. “The idea was to make a non-traditional album, a sonic landscape.”

Ronroco features Santaolalla on charango, ronroco, Andean pipes, whistles and guitar, in collaboration with long-time partner Aníbal Kerpel on vibraphone and melodica. The result is unlike anything Santaolalla has recorded in the past: an intimate musical journey and a unique work of love that has been years in the making. Ronroco is a project for which Santaolalla holds special affection: “This album materialized a different, less well-known side of me,” says Santaolalla. “The challenge was to keep it simple without giving up some rough edges, staying within the boundaries of the subtlety and delicacy that this music needs.”