Ruper Ordorika

Ruper Ordorika, a Basque singer and composer, updates the folk songs of Spain’s Basque region through contemporary arrangements. Working alongside lyricist Bernardo Atxago, he crafts material that fuses regional traditions with the textures of Western rock and blues. Born in Onate, Spain, Ordorika relocated with his family to Vitoria at age twelve, where the active local rock scene quickly captured his attention. Two years later he returned to Onate and found himself drawn more deeply toward traditional repertoire. During his time at the University of Balboa he began his songwriting partnership with Atxago.

His first album, Hauta Da Anphora, appeared in 1980 and favored a stripped-down setting in which his acoustic guitar alone supported the vocals. By contrast, the follow-up, Ni Ez Norugako Errege, issued in 1983, incorporated both acoustic and electric instruments within a full band framework. After spending several years in London, Ordorika came back to the Basque region to make his third record, Bihotzerreak, which was released in 1985. In 1994 he joined diatonic accordionist Joseph Tapia and mandolin-and-acoustic-guitar player Bixente Martinez to document a collection of traditional pieces titled Hiru Truku; the collaboration yielded a sequel, Hiru Truku II, four years afterward.

For the 1998 album Dablien Harria, Ordorika enlisted three improvisatory musicians based in New York.