DakhaBrakha - Little Hare/Mermaids

 #DakhaBrakha #folk #Ukrainian folk #world music #Eastern European folk #folk rock #music video

Until you hear the music, the most striking thing about funky Ukrainian folk band DakhaBrakha is the headgear. Made of coarse, black lamb’s wool, the group’s towering hats evoke a faraway world of Cossacks and shepherds, dramatically complementing the traditional lace wedding dresses, thickly draped beaded necklaces and embroidered tunics that make up their costumes. The band’s music is just as captivating. DakhaBrakha’s sound, which the group calls “ethno-chaos,” is an anarchistic reinterpretation of traditional Ukrainian folk songs blended with eclectic influences like Middle Eastern sounds and a touch of R&B. “There’s nothing like it out there,” says Bill Smith of Riot Artists, DakhaBrakha’s North American agent. (The group’s members speak very little English.)
The four musicians — Nina Garenetska, Olena Tsibulska, Iryna Kovalenko and Marko Halanevych — play a variety of instruments, including cello, piano, bass drums and darbuka, accordions, jew’s harp and the didgeridoo. Even more impressive are the vocals: harmonies layered with riotous birdcalls, eerie whistles and wails, and Halanevych’s falsetto, Smith says. The quartet came together in 2004 as the house band for Kiev’s experimental theater company DAKH, but has only recently made inroads on this side of the Atlantic. After its North American debut at Toronto’s Luminato Festival in 2013, the group gave rousing performances last year at New York’s globalFEST and at Bonnaroo, with Rolling Stone singling out the band as the Tennessee festival’s “best breakout.”
DakhaBrakha, which means “give/take” in Old Ukrainian, draws on a repertoire of songs that the band’s three female performers — all of whom trained in folklore and ethnomusicology — have spent years researching in rural Ukrainian villages. Yet DakhaBrakha’s thoroughly contemporary compositions represent such a departure from the original Eastern European melodies and styles that their sound can seem as unfamiliar (and intriguing) to native Ukrainians as it can for American listeners. “It’s difficult to describe what they do; you’ve got to see it,” Smith says. “And then people just get hooked. It’s mesmerizing.”  From: https://www.washingtonpost.com/express/wp/2015/04/02/get-to-know-funky-ukrainian-folk-band-dakhabrakha/

BraAgas - Live World Music Festival, Bratislava, Slovakia 2019

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

#BraAgas #Balkan folk #medieval #Scandinavian folk #world music #Sephardic folk #traditional #ethno #Czech Republic #live music video

BraAgas is an all female quartet created in 2007 after the split-up of the band Psalteria. The first two albums were hard to define genre-wise. “The first album called No.1 was a mix of everything – medieval and folk songs as well,” says Katka Göttlich (Katerina Göttlichova). The four members of BraAgas have been playing for a long time. In addition to the previously mentioned Psalteria, the musicians played in other bands. “Our experiences from other bands have merged here – for me and Karla it was the Psalteria band, for Beta it was Gothart. Michaela had been sometimes the guest in different groups (e.g. Krless) before BraAgas originated,” says Göttlich.. The fact that the band was formed by professional musicians helped them record albums immediately and also with touring. Live playing is one of those things BraAgas can do really well. Their third CD, Tapas, is the result of their live concert art. The band won the music competition Česká spořitelna Colours Talents at Indies Scope Festival organized by Indies Scope Records and the Colours of Ostrava Festival supported by Česká spořitelna. The recording of an album was part of the Česká spořitelna Colours Talents prize. “The second one called No.2 – Media Aetas was purely medieval long single and the album Tapas has already nothing to do with ‘medieval times’. It’s an album containing songs which we have discovered and adapted and also those few ‘hits’ which we’ve taken the liberty to modify; those that the listeners of world music will definitely recognize.“ The four musicians play mostly ethnic instruments and historical replicas. Many guests helped them at the studio and there were also some electronic elements. Thanks to the electronics, a new modern sound was developed for Tapas, which was produced by David Göttlich and Petr Koláček. Tapas includes songs from various parts of Europe, including Spanish, Balkan, Nordic and Italian sources, originally dating back to anywhere within a thousand years time span, interpreted in a very modern way. Current members include: Katerina Göttlichova on lead vocal, cittern, guitar, bagpipes, shawms; Alzbeta Josefy on vocal, davul, darbuka, duf, riq; Karla Braunova on vocal, flutes, recorders, clarinet, shawms, chalumeaux, and bagpipes; and Michala Hrbkova on vocal, fiddle, cittern.  From: https://worldmusiccentral.org/2017/01/09/artist-profiles-braagas/

The Czech band BraAgas traveled all the way to India to perform at a respected world music show. Honza Hrbek entrusted us with the experiences of this for us exotic country. During the first seven years, a number of top world music bands from many countries performed at the Sur Jahan festival in India, but there was no Czech performer among them. BraAgas and I were lucky enough to be the first.
To play in India at a festival with such a good name as Sur Jahan (formerly Sufi Sutra) is an opportunity that can be refused, but the reason for such a refusal is very hard to find. Especially when in the Czech Republic the thermometer is determined to stay around minus fifteen, while in Goa it is a tropical thirty and small. So we went to the airport on a frosty Prague morning, expecting the perfect care of Qatar Airways for a music festival in a much more favorable climate.
The journey was not as easy as we had planned, but in the end we reached Calcutta in the same six pieces in which we left Prague. And that certainly wasn't the only departure, because if you've never been to India, Calcutta will probably leave you breathless. From the way cars, animals, people, motorbikes and rickshaws move on local roads, ants could learn, the luxury hotels that grow from the tin sheds of local slums, to the hundreds of thousands of Calcutta's special breed dogs, all under the unrelenting haze of smog, Calcutta is not easy to believe.
In Calcutta, the stage was set up in a park in front of the Queen Victoria Memorial. About eight meters next to the stage was the main road, which (thanks to the very specific Indian traffic) somewhat disturbed the listeners, especially in the back rows, which the sound engineer solved by turning up the volume. The equipment on the stage and the general conditions for playing were otherwise exemplary, and the festival itself, with its organization, boldly competes with the most famous European counterparts of a similar rank. Carefully selected bands from Europe and India, excellent transport and facilities at the festival, with the added value of the organizing team, who showed immense willingness and a positive attitude, whether it was a wish to see a temple dedicated to Kali or to visit musicals.
The move from Calcutta to Goa brought another culture shock. From a bustling metropolis that could fit all the inhabitants of the Czech and Slovak Republics, to a former Portuguese colony that resembles a Caribbean paradise and evokes an atmosphere of absolute calm that even the ever-present cockroaches trying to get into your drink cannot disturb. Goa is an oasis of everything you need on vacation, beautiful beaches, nice people who don't hesitate to take you home, and low excise taxes. So we weren't there on vacation, but some details can be appreciated even in a limited period of time.
At Sur Jahan, bands met enthusiastic music fans not only at concerts. Workshops were part of the festival - in Calcutta we performed with an Indian band, then in Goa alone, and we explained to the audience what life is like in our homeland, the history of our instruments and other details about our life in Europe.  Translated from: https://www.ireport.cz/clanky/rock-blog/rockblog-rejzi-nechci-ani-videt-aneb-po-indii-s-kapelou-braagas

Maria Muldaur - Don't You Make Me High (Don't You Feel My Leg)

 #Maria Muldaur #folk #blues #country #jazz #folk rock #Americana #pop rock #1960s #1970s

Blue Lu Barker was a New Orleans singer married to the guitarist Danny Barker. They wrote this very sensual song, with Blue Lu singing, "Don't you feel my leg 'cause if you feel my leg you're gonna feel my thigh, and if you feel my thigh, you're gonna go up high." This was pushing the limits in 1938. The song was produced by J. Mayo Williams, who was one of the biggest blues music producers of the '30s and '40s. For Barker, this was her first single after signing with the Vocalion label, and it became a national hit, leading to appearances with Cab Calloway and Jelly Roll Morton. The Barkers appeared at the New Orleans Jazz Festival in 1989, and in 1998, this appearance was released as the album Live at New Orleans Jazz Festival. Danny died in 1994 and Blue Lu in 1998.
Maria Muldaur brought new life to this song when she recorded it for her 1974 self-titled album, with the title altered to "Don't You Make Me High (Don't You Feel My Leg)." That same year, Muldaur had her big hit "Midnight At The Oasis," and when she rose to stardom, she stopped performing "Feel My Leg," as she didn't want to be known for her sexuality. In her interview with Rolling Stone that year, she explained: "It's a funky song, fun to do, but I had to stop doing it. That's my concession to avoid being typecast as a sexy singer, period. I dropped it after I saw a Marilyn Monroe TV special early this year. I saw her entertaining the troops in Korea, up there singing 'I Can't Give You Anything but Love' to acres and acres of horny GIs. Shelley Winters was on the show and she said something about how far Marilyn might have gone if she hadn't let herself get stuck with an image as a sex symbol who couldn't do anything else. That shook me. You can't rely on physical image alone. That's sure as shit gonna fade. The shape of your tits and butt ain't always going to be so good. I want to be a singer long after I'm not so hot to look at."  From: https://www.songfacts.com/facts/blue-lu-barker/dont-you-feel-my-leg


BeauSoleil - Kolinda

 #BeauSoleil #Michael Doucet #Zydeco #Cajun music #traditional #world music #folk

The formation of BeauSoleil, one of the best known and most highly respected Cajun bands in the world, is due to fiddler Michael Doucet's desire to keep the unique southern Louisiana culture and music from extinction. But while BeauSoleil originated to help preserve his Cajun musical heritage, over the years it has also been known for its innovation. They are continually adding spice from other musical genres including jazz and Caribbean. In this way, BeauSoleil keeps the music vital and contemporary.
Doucet was born and raised in Cajun country surrounded by the old French songs that comprise the basis of the music. But from the time of his birth to his adulthood in the 1960s, Cajun culture began to disappear. Young Doucet, thinking Cajun music antiquated and passé, began his musical career playing rock with New Orleans influence. He began getting into folk-rock towards the end of the '60s and even tried singing a few of his numbers in French. It was a song from the British folk group Fairport Convention and their song, "Cajun Woman," that re-sparked his interest in his native music. He went to France and England in 1973 just before he was to enter grad school in the U.S. He ended up staying many years studying with Scottish fiddle great Barry Dransfield, who eventually introduced him to his idol Richard Thompson. Later, Doucet credited Thompson for influencing his own compositions. The young fiddler's stay in France also had a profound influence. There he saw that the roots of Cajun were still very much alive. The old songs were still sung, and he heard their centuries-old influence in newer folk songs. It made him realize how modern Cajun music was in comparison. In the mid-'70s, Doucet joined Coteau, an improvisational folk-music based French group that was known as the Cajun equivalent to the Grateful Dead. After a time with them, he returned to the U.S., determined to immerse himself in Cajun musical history. A grant from the National Endowment for the Arts supported him as he located the nearly forgotten early composers and performers of Cajun music.
Armed with many traditional Cajun songs, Doucet formed BeauSoleil with some of the finest Cajun musicians, Dennis McGee, Dewey and Will Balfa, Varise Connor, Canray Fontenot, and Bessyl Duhon. Their band name literally means "good sun" and is a reference to a fertile region in Nova Scotia. In the 17th century, French speaking Acadians lived in the Canadian province until conflicts with the French and British forced them to migrate down to Louisiana where they became called Cajuns. BeauSoleil cut its first record in 1976 and released it only in France. They made their American debut the following year with The Spirit of Cajun Music. It was an eclectic work illustrating the many musical styles from which Cajun music is derived. Since 1985, the band has been nominated for (and won) numerous Grammys. They have played on movie soundtracks such as The Big Easy, Passion Fish, and Belizaire the Cajun. They have played at jazz and folk festivals around the world and have also appeared on numerous television shows ranging from CNN's Showbiz Today to Austin City Limits to Late Night with Conan O'Brien.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/beausoleil-mn0000161612#biography

Disappear Fear - Priceless

#Disappear Fear #Sonia Rutstein #folk rock #folk pop #alternative folk #indie folk #power pop #worldbeat #singer-songwriter #1980s #1990s

Hi Sonia, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?


I was five years old when my Aunt Laura took me out of kindergarten to attend the Flower Mart near the Washington Monument on Charles Street in Baltimore. It was around noon and for the first time, I saw Louis Armstrong perform, Hello Dolly. I was quite short so looking up at him I was looking directly into the sun rays was like swords of light into my eyes around the black outline of a man playing the trumpet and singing.
It was the first time I saw the sound from a radio come alive. It was REAL. I believe at that moment I decided I wanted to make music that could be heard on the radio and to be real on stages around the world. It made me feel good and that’s what I wanted to do, make folks feel good. I started writing songs when I was 14 and playing downtown at the dingy and famous Peabody Bookstore. my mother would drive me to the gig and my sister and I were paid $50 for two 40 minute sets.
It was a whole lot better than the $1.40 an hour I was making pizza and sundaes at the Beef Inn. So making music was my dream and has become my destiny but that is a bit of how it started. How I got to where I am I am today… was practice practice practice a bit of luck, a lot of naivety, determination, and perseverance. A publishing company in London heard my first record and flew me and my sister (singer/business partner) over to England and we signed our first publishing deal. We continued to play and amass a nice following in the USA and now around the world.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way? Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?


The most important thing to me was/is to be true to myself. It is a high price to pay. But it is the only way I can sleep well at night. As a kid, I would see all this glitter and gold on TV Stevie Lawrence and the Las Vegas guys, and that sort of thing and it seemed so phony. I wanted REAL. So folk music with harmonies and guitars that didn’t need a bunch of electricity just authenticity seemed the way to go. My sister Cindy and I had already been singing together for 25 years so starting our own band, disappear fear was a logical step.
But female and out lesbian independent singer-songwriters were not at all present in the local national or international pop or rock or folk music scene. There were out gay performers in the gay market but we wanted to be 100% inclusive so we had to show the world and essentially audition at every club and radio station we stepped foot into and we did just that. Once the folks started coming out we had the upper hand we could call the shots and make the show really great. We did get ripped off financially. There was a club in downtown Baltimore we had a CD release concert and our contract said we got 80% of the door and the owner got 20% of the door and the whole bar tab. We had a counter at each door entrance that calculated our earnings to be $2600.
But at the end of the night, the dude gave us $500.00. we told him that he had shorted us and he said, “that’s enough money for two girls in one night”. The police station was right around the corner and we did file a report but nothing happened and we went back out on the road so no follow-up. Once also in Baltimore, we had a 2 monthly contract with a bar for every Wednesday night. The first night we packed the place and then someone yelled, “KiSS iN” and all these lesbians started kissing. and we got fired at the end of the night. The owner said he, “did not want THOSE kinds of people in his club”. We took the case to court and we met with The Council for Human Relations- they offered us in settlement $2000 to amend the $ we lost but they did not apologize for their homophobic and blatant prejudice.
We did not accept the settlement. At this time. I was still working for the Rape Crisis Center in Baltimore City. My dear friend. Lynnel said to me, “Sonia -show business is crazy and cutthroat. You can either spend your time chasing down the bad guys or move on”. We moved on. Touring in the southeast in the early 90s the sound guys wouldn’t even look you in the eye. They wanted a dude to talk to tell them what was needed for that night tech-wise. And it was not limited to the south it was prevalent across the country. And then on the other end of the career spectrum struggles - once you start making a little money the evil wanna-be’s wanna beat and take advantage of you. I find it is best, to be honest. In the celebrity-mania culture that we live in it is valuable to know the difference between dream and reality. You can’t really buy success - your heart and soul know the difference.

From: https://voyagebaltimore.com/interview/daily-inspiration-meet-sonia-disappear-fear-rutstein/

Paula Cole - Sessions at West 54th 1997 / Live at The 9:30 Club 1997

Sessions at West 54th 1997

Live at The 9:30 Club 1997 - Part 1

Live at The 9:30 Club 1997 - Part 2

 #Paula Cole #singer-songwriter #alternative rock #alternative pop rock #indie rock #art rock #piano rock #1990s #live music video

Twenty-five years ago, singer-songwriter Paula Cole released her sophomore album and major-label debut, This Fire, which spawned the perennial future Dawson’s Creek anthem “I Don’t Want to Wait” and the top 10 hit “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” The latter was Cole’s breakthrough single and was nominated for Record and Song of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance at the 1998 Grammys, but not everyone appreciated its irony or subtext. Cole, a staunch feminist, intended the moody tune — about a disillusioned, barefoot-and-pregnant housewife and her no-good cowboy husband — to be a social commentary on traditional gender stereotypes. But that message was lost on many listeners (including conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh!), who mistook it to be about a woman literally yearning for a macho Marlboro Man-type hero to come rescue her.
“Oh, yes. And they still believe that — there's still those folks holding out!” Cole laughingly tells Yahoo Entertainment/SiriusXM Volume. “It was so bizarre. You put out a piece of work and you know what it means, but then you let it go out into the world and it's like witnessing, I don't know, like an anthropological study. You learn about people. It was one of Rush Limbaugh’s favorite songs; he’d play it on his radio station! In some ways, it was horrific. In the moment, it was galling. I remember even though Spin magazine had been supportive of me, they didn't get it. One of the writers wrote that I was the ‘Tammy Wynette of Lilith Fair.’ And it was so the opposite — I was actually one of the most outspoken feminist dark horses on that whole stage.”
Cole explains that she was listening to a lot of British new wave band XTC at the time of the song’s creation. “Their writing is so funny and smart and clever, and I thought to myself, ‘I want to write something clever and turn it on its head.’ There's irony woven in, there's melancholia woven in, but from a woman's point of view. So, it really was like a gender-role wink-wink- nudge-nudge kind of laugh, kind of an examination of our society with some sadness, and with a little bit of a country song in there too. And then you blend it all together and there's this conversation and there's this learning — and confusion.”
Cole notes that “all the feminists got it” then and now (she’s very proud that indie-rock sister trio HAIM covered “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” in 2019), and that the song’s nuances were always better grasped by international audiences. “Another observation is that America has the fundamentalist, puritanical approach to things, but when I went to Europe, they so got it,” she recalls. “I remember in Spain especially, they loved the irony and the laughter — like, the ‘shiny gun’ is a phallic reference, totally tongue-in-cheek. Whereas this ‘shiny gun,’ America didn't get that.”
Along with the three nominations that “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” received at the 40th annual Grammy Awards, Cole was an overall seven-time nominee that year, winning in the Best New Artist category and making history as the first solo woman to be up for Producer of the Year. Cole reflects on that year — when some of the other major Grammy nominees were her fellow female singer-songwriters Shawn Colvin, Sheryl Crow, Jewel, Fiona Apple, and Lilith Fair organizer Sarah McLachlan, and playing Lilith Fair “felt like the original feeling of Woodstock” — fondly, even though her whirlwind success was admittedly daunting at the time.
“It you look at the Grammy nominations that year, it was really diverse. It was fantastic. I loved that time,” she says. “And the hip-hop scene then too, with Lauryn Hill and Missy Elliott and TLC and Lil’ Kim, was a really interesting time. Before, DJs were literally told not to play a woman after another woman on the radio, or you couldn't play more than one woman in an hour. It was difficult to move that needle, but we did move it. It did feel like we were changing culture a little bit. I think it kept coming back down to the art of the song and the point of view, being articulate and smart and badass; that perspective was embraced, and it didn't matter even what genre you were in. It was just about, do you have authority and authenticity in your voice? And the thing is, we're still here. All of those artists that we've named are still here. Like, we're in it for life. We're lifers.”
That being said, while Cole has released nine albums since This Fire, and is most definitely a lifer, she didn’t follow-up that double-platinum album with another overtly commercial release, and she has kept a relatively low profile ever since. “I felt like [Peter Sellers’s Being There character] Chauncey Gardner; it all happened very quickly,” she says of her ‘90s success. “I'm a wicked introvert, like a very thoughtful writer and kind of a shy person. And I was incredibly humbled and gratified by the success, but it was a lot to handle. I guess I wanted to shed off that ill-fitting snakeskin and retreat a little bit.” Cole’s third album, 1999's Amen, was therefore a massive stylistic departure from This Fire, a “neo-soul album with neo-soul influences” that, once again, was misunderstood by many fans.
“I didn't know necessarily what the public wanted, and I wasn't making my next album for that. I had no clue,” says Cole. “I just knew that I was listening to a lot of hip-hop and soul and Marvin Gaye's What's Going On album, and it just moved me so much. That album was really like a guide for what became Amen. I think it surprised people. You know, I'm a white girl and I've probably received some unnecessarily harsh criticism around that stylistic influence. But it was authentic to me. I felt like I wanted to sing about spirituality in a soulful way. I wanted to sing about social justice. I didn't want to sing about my boyfriend all the time. I wanted to expand upon lyrical themes, and weaving in social justice is really important to me.”
Cole took a seven-year hiatus after Amen to focus on motherhood, and she confesses, “I definitely thought about leaving the music business.” It was her idol Emmylou Harris, who had taken hiatuses in her own career, who ultimately convinced Cole to keep going. “She said to me, ‘You can't quit. It just happened too fast.’ For me, it happened really fast, and I needed to take myself away from that and find my authentic path and make my eras of different albums. You know, like Picasso had his ‘Pig’ era and his Blue Period, and Joni Mitchell had her Mingus album and everyone dumped on her for doing that. So, I just have to be truthful to myself. I can't predict what people will like. I needed to have my daughter and take some time, and now I'm back and on my own label, and it's much more flowing and prolific and free. And I'm so much happier.”
And so Cole, a self-described “frustrated jazz singer” who says she thinks “about race every day because my daughter's biracial,” continues to follow her own path. She just released her 11th, social-justice-oriented album, American Quilt, a collection of traditional folk covers that includes one original composition, “Hidden in Plain Sight (I Dream),” inspired by historical stories about slave quilts during the Underground Railroad era. She admits she still has some mixed feelings about the This Fire/Amen period of her career, because at the time she “got caught in a corrupt record deal [with Imago/Warner]. I'm still dealing with all that. They don’t reissue or remaster my work from that, even though this year is the 25th anniversary of This Fire, so it's really frustrating. I feel like I'm kind of locked, like that part of my life is locked in a cage, like inhumanely locked in.”
However, a few years ago, Cole decided to re-record her above-mentioned other big ‘90s hit, “I Don’t Want to Wait.” And after the song had not been featured on streaming or DVD versions of that TV series for years because Sony had only purchased the on-air rights to the track, Cole’s new version has finally been restored to all six Dawson’s Creek seasons on Netflix — which, in a full-circle development, has boosted what she describes as her “tortoise”-like career.
“I can feel it at the shows; I can feel it in the new fans that are coming to my socials,” Cole marvels. “The millennials knew “I Don’t Want to Wait” from the original Dawson's Creek, and then it kind of disappeared. And now, again, it's starting. It's really sweet. It's really sweet to see it touch new generations. That's got to be one of the best feelings in the world, when new young people are finding your work — and they find it for themselves, without bias, without context, and they just love it for what it is and in its simplest form. I love it. It's just so beautiful.”  From: https://www.yahoo.com/video/paula-cole-recalls-how-her-biggest-90-s-hit-was-misunderstood-it-was-horrific-184814249.html

Żywiolak - Bóstwa

 #Zywiolak #Slavic folk music #folk rock #world music #folk punk #folk metal avant-folk #neo-pagan folk #Polish #music video

Żywiołak, initially formed in Warsaw in 2005, is a Polish folk rock band steeped in mythos. Its name references the Elemental, a magical being said to harness the power of nature in the form of air, fire, water, or earth. Their lyrics sing of epic battles (in Wojownik, or Warrior) and explore the traditions of the early peoples of Poland, including the Vandals, a Germanic tribe that originally lived in Southern Poland and whose conquests spanned throughout Europe (in Epopeja Wandalska, or Vandal Epic). Żywiołak revives the history of its native nation while also connecting to a larger global community.
Before the release of their debut album, Nowa Ex-tradycja (New World Tradition) in 2008, Żywiołak’s line-up was in flux. A percussion instrumentalist, Maciej Dymek, joined original members Robert Jaworski and Robert Wasilewski and was followed by two female vocalists named Anucha Piotrowska and Izabella Byra. From 2008-2011, singer Monika Sadkowska replaced Byra. Following her stint with Żywiołak, Sadkowska pursued climate activism and worked with the World Wildlife Fund.
Musically, Żywiołak blends classical folk instruments with rock and metal elements like distorted guitar and heavy bass. Many tracks feature the hurdy gurdy, a crank-operated instrument with similar range to a violin found across cultures in Medieval Europe. In addition, the female vocalists occasionally utilize diaphony, a dissonant vocal harmony found in traditional Slavic cultures, to create tension and contribute to the witchy feel of many of their tracks.
Despite Catholicism’s religious dominance in Poland, Żywiołak is unafraid to reference pagan magic, evil spirits, and witchcraft. Oko Dybuka (Eye of the Dybbuk), a track on their first album, references a malevolent ghost from Jewish folklore. Czarodzielnica (Witch’s Night) is a vivid incantation, a song that invites in a myriad of mythical mischief makers including Slavic folk icon Baba Yaga, who often appears as an old crone who lives in a house with legs.
The song Bóstwa (Deities), included on 2017 album Pieśni pół/nocy (Midnight Songs), mirrors Żywiołak’s place as an ambassador between Slavic folk tradition and modern, Western rock through its depiction of Kupala, a pagan holiday celebrated on the longest day of the year. Originally practiced as fertility rites and an homage to the Sun, Kupala became Ivan Kupala, and fused with the Christian John the Baptist in a process known as syncretism.
Istanbuł (Istanbul) begins with an acknowledgment of the social effects of Catholicism and embraces Europe’s religious diversity. This track is featured on Żywiołak’s concept album Globalna Wiocha (Global Village), where the band composed songs based on major cities in Europe, including Moscow, Berlin, and Oslo. Through this album, Żywiołak reveals its modern, pan-European stance without losing the pride of its original Polish source material.  From: https://popkult.org/zywiolak/

Daemonia Nymphe - Deos Erotas

 #Daemonia Nymphe #neofolk #darkwave #neoclassical #folk #ancient Greek music #theatrical #traditional

The Greek band, Daemonia Nymphe, based in London, tours and participates in the most popular medieval, folk and fantasy festivals in Europe and America with musical performances featuring sounds of ancient Greek instruments. "The Daemonia Nymphe was born out of a love for the world of ancient Greek art for sculpture and architecture of the archaic and classical eras," explains Spyros Giasafakis, the musician, who studied at the School of Fine Arts of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. After many years of searching for the ancient sound, the first tracks were recorded and the first album was released. Along the way came the meeting and collaboration with Nikolaos Bra, manufacturer of "ancient" Greek instruments and the band created their own world that attracts haute couture companies and representatives of cinema and theater.
"From the beginning, we had proposals in both theater and cinema, perhaps because our music tends to create images," says Spyros Giasafakis, who founded the band in 1994 with his brother, Pantelis Giasafakis, noting that in recent years the band has a stronger presence in theater scenes. "The audience that does not know us can imagine a musical documentary" he mentions, hastening to clarify that in the performances of the team, musicians and dancers from different countries, the sounds of the lyre, the varvitos and other instruments act in a modern context. "In the beginning, we had an endless desire to experiment, discover and form our own original sound" emphasizes Spyros, referring to the band's first steps.
”We didn't want to imitate what we heard, but cultivate our own style. At the same time, there was a love for the world of ancient Greek art and, in particular, for the sculpture and architecture of the archaic and classical eras. Thus began a search for ancient sounds that inspired us to create our own world. In the process, of course, we had no choice but to compose music without the restrictions of a supposed reproduction of ancient Greek music."
In explaining the elements that music today lacks that was characteristic of the ancient world, he clarifies that there was a greater variety of styles because there were many more "scales". However, he notes that there are still musical traditions today that have just as great a variety of scales and sounds. "The system with notes was clearly different and letters of the Greek alphabet were used to show the progression of the melody. So if archeologists found carved letters on a slab that didn't make sense as a language, or there were lyrics underneath, it was obvious that it was music," he responds to the question of how to locate the musical pieces of ancient Greece.
The reconstruction of the ancient instruments is the work of Nikolaos Bra, "a very intelligent technician who devoted his life to the study of ancient instruments,"as Spyros Giasafakis describes. The band has selected from these instruments from time to time the lyre, the varvitos, the triangle, the formiga and the samviki. Commenting on research in foreign universities to reconstruct ancient Greek music so that we hear it for the first time as it was heard thousands of years ago, he assesses that "all efforts to approach ancient Greek sound are interesting" but notes that "remarkable efforts have also been made outside the university”.
Regarding the music created by Daemonia Nymphe for cinema and television, he notes that almost from the beginning the band had proposals in the field of both theater and cinema, perhaps because their music tends to create images. "In recent years, we are more into theatre, and we've been lucky enough to work in London with Theater Lab Company, founded by the talented director Anastasia Revi. We have performed "Oresteia", "Antigone", "Medea" and "Lysistrata" in London theaters and then "Macbeth" at the Central Theater of Northern Greece, directed by Anastasia Revi. It is very creative and interesting to work as a composer in a context that is meant to serve other senses besides the auditory. In this respect, there is a common element between live performances and theater, he points out.  From: https://www.greecehighdefinition.com/blog/daemonia-nymphe-ancient-greek-music

The Wild Reeds - Where I'm Going

 #The Wild Reeds #alt-country #folk #indie/alternative rock #contemporary folk #folk rock

Three women and a banjo? Any band fitting those specifications must be a carbon copy of the Dixie Chicks, right? That's just one of the eye-roll-inducing comparisons the Wild Reeds has had to contend with since releasing its folk-inspired full-length, "Blind and Brave," in 2014. Filled with Americana essentials like harmonium and fervent, shimmering harmonies from the trio of lead singers and songwriters — Kinsey Lee, Sharon Silva and Mackenzie Howe — the album bears only minor resemblance to country music's once-scorned Grammy winners. But, that doesn't stop others from inventing parallels between the two.
"People listen with their eyes," Silva, 26, reasons by telephone a half hour outside of Los Angeles. In the band's early days, around 2010, when live shows consisted of open mic nights, and before drummer Nick Jones, 26, and bassist Nick Phakpiseth, 28, solidified the lineup, Silva would get aligned with husky-voiced actress Zooey Deschanel, who also moonlights as a singer in the pop duo She & Him. "Is it 'cause I have bangs?" she asks, referring to the "New Girl" star's distinctive hairstyle.
Silva hopes the tendency to lump girl groups together as interchangeable entities cools now that a feminist movement, re-energized by the current political climate, emerges from coast to coast. "Even though it's been such a gnarly year for our country, it's been great because people are looking for female-fronted bands and they are looking to support bands with minorities," she says.
The Wild Reeds' vivid major-label debut, "The World We Built" (Dualtone), will also help set the band apart. Recorded in Connecticut with producer Peter Katis (The National, Local Natives), the album lasers in on the women's precise harmonies while expanding the sound palette to include spaced-out guitars, beefy drums and whimsical strings. Silva doesn't know what held her back from embracing the electric guitar, but "now it's kind of hard to prevent myself from buying another fuzz pedal."
She also eliminates any speculation that her vocal connection to Lee, 26, and Howe, 27, is intuitive or the result of some shared sixth sense. Credit the stunning melding of their voices to an intensive rehearsal schedule, fueled by Silva's nitpicking. "We really put in the time," she says. Although the album's 11 tracks were written before the election, many have taken on new meaning with Donald Trump in the White House. "We've got this song 'Capable,' and every night I have to resist saying, 'I'm so much more capable than the president gives me credit for,'" she says. "We were never a political band and I don't think that we aim to be, but as a woman, I feel very convicted to tell mostly other women — and other people — 'Hey, we've got each other's backs, we can do this.'"  From: https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/music/ct-wild-reeds-ott-0505-20170502-story.html

Laura Love - Sessions at West 54th 1998 / Philadelphia Folk Festival 1997

Sessions at West 54th 1998 

Philadelphia Folk Festival 1997

 #Laura Love #folk #Afro-Celtic #Americana #Afro-Carribean #folk rock #funk #R&B #world music #singer-songwriter #live music video

Singer-songwriter Laura Love has seemed like music's Next Big Thing for years now, a Northwest favorite occasionally brushing with national acclaim for her "Afro-Celtic" mix of exuberance, social conscience and heart. At 44, with a decade of comfort-level success behind her, the West Seattle resident has published a memoir with an accompanying CD. But "You Ain't Got No Easter Clothes" has nothing to do with Love's career, her Carnegie Hall showstopper or her folky-bluesy-jazzy soulful sound. Instead, it's about a child's bewildered love for her mentally unstable mother and a childhood so harrowing it could be used to argue for leniency if she ever committed a crime. Consider this, for instance: The scene where Love slips a noose around her own neck on her mother's command -- after being ordered to kill the pet cat as part of a planned family suicide -- is only a crest in the book's hills and valleys of tragedy. The memoir could have been a horror show, but it's eased by wry humor and amazing grace. And for Love, whose music often has been more global than autobiographical, the publishing debut is "just gravy" after the cathartic process of writing down her life. She wrote without expecting anything to come of it, she said, and found a literary agent through an Internet search after the manuscript was complete.
"I just wanted it to be written down somehow, even if it was just for me.” said Love. "There are few experiences in adult life that loom as large in my head and are as close to the surface as those childhood memories." Love and her older sister, Lisa, were raised in Nebraska by their mother, a highly intelligent, gifted teacher who was fearsomely mentally ill. Their father, Preston Love, one-time sax player for Count Basie, they were told, had died in a car crash when the girls were young. With novel-worthy characters and plot twists, Love describes how she and her sister stumbled through youth in an orphanage, a series of foster homes and their unstable home. Their poverty reached the point where a burglar who kicked down the door told the frightened children who were home alone, "Damn, y'all got less than I do."
The breaking point came not with those life-and-death struggles, but when a neighbor girl mocked Love as she walked home from church with her family.
"You ain't got no Easter clothes!" the girl taunted, as if Love's mother walking right beside her could provide no protection. Love attacked the girl like an animal, with claws and teeth. It's a scene that's hard to square now, with her generous voice and laid-back grin. "I just fell from grace that day, so hard," she said. Love knows she could have tipped either way in life. She said she needed to decide in those years "whether I was going to be a thug or enrolled in society." She was saved, she thinks, by the safety net of social programs such as Head Start and WIC, and the loving example of good teachers and social workers. "To be kind has always felt more powerful to me than to be mean and cruel," Love said. That goodness more than balanced the harsh realities she saw, such as the landlords who tried to turn her away when she began supporting herself at age 16, saying "we've never rented to coloreds."
Love committed her own cruelties and mistakes on the way to adulthood and they're also recounted in the book as plainly as if she were speaking from the stage, telling the whole story beginning to end. Where she did end is with understanding and forgiveness for her mother -- and for an unexpected figure, her father. As a teenager, Love stumbled on an advertisement for a Preston Love concert, talked her way into the show despite being underage and saw, in a shocking flash, that her father wasn't dead after all. He had fathered Love and her sister while married to another woman and raising his own family, she wrote. He was pleasant enough to Love, but never a father figure who took responsibility for her and her sister or felt any blame for the catastrophes they suffered. In her youth, "I was very angry about that and bitter," she said. As an adult, she worked on finding her own forms of family instead of brooding on all that she had lacked. College helped give her a broader perspective. "I've always lived better than 90 percent of the world," she said.
Today, Love is focused on those big-picture wrongs, more inclined to be angry about political cuts to the social programs that helped her, for instance, than to brood about the individual wrongs she endured. "For the most part, I'm grateful for all those things that happened," she said. "All the bad things, too." There's a joy in not being a powerless child anymore, she said, in not being forced to wait for the car that will take you to another dreadful foster home or bleak room. "I exercise every modicum, every bit of choice that I have now," whether it means voting in elections or choosing to eat only humanely raised meat, Love said.
Love supports herself full time with her singing career. She said she's hugely fortunate that she can spend only short blocks of time touring and long periods at home with her family. She and her partner, Pam, along with her best friend/business manager and her older sister, share a West Seattle home. They're now building a solar-and wind-powered house in the Okanogan, "swinging hammers" together, hoping to raise their own food and reduce the amount of natural resources they use and even create a cat sanctuary to protect songbirds from Love's beloved strays.
After 16 years of not knowing if she was alive or dead, Love tracked down her mother in Colorado a few years back with the help of fans who read the request on the liner notes of Love's albums. "I just love her dearly and feel like her mind has been like a torture chamber for her," Love said. In a last unexpected twist, Love is now a mother herself, to an angelic blue-eyed toddler who came to her and Pam in 2002 as a 7-month-old foster child with eight broken bones. "It had to be that bad for me to think I could be a better parent than someone," Love said. She has found patience and enjoyment over the past two years that she couldn't have imagined in herself and a happiness in responding to her daughter the way she wishes her mother could have responded to her.
Love describes the genesis of her singing career in her book as a soaring talent show where "I understood that I would never do anything else for the rest of my life but sing." She loves playing shows and festivals and the applause her music brings. And yet she isn't consumed with thoughts of selling out arenas or signing with another major label (she was represented by Mercury records a few years back), or otherwise seeking fame. Music doesn't define her, she said, it's only one of her great loves. She's truly thankful that she can play bass guitar and sing. "But, really, it's thank God I'm alive."  From: https://www.seattlepi.com/entertainment/music/article/musician-laura-love-survived-a-miserable-1151077.php

The Vespers - Lawdy

 #The Vespers #folk #Americana #roots music #contemporary folk #bluegrass #music video

Here’s another great song from Nashville’s own The Vespers, a remarkable group we’ve been celebrating for years here. Written by Phoebe Cryar, this is “Lawdy.” The Vespers are two sisters (Callie and Phoebe Cryar), and two brothers (Bruno and Taylor Jones). All four are multi-instrumentalists, covering upright and electric bass, guitar, banjo, drums, mandolin, ukulele, accordion and more. The Vespers was the sister’s duo at first; they named their group The Vespers after Phoebe found this word for evening prayer and Callie liked it, because she felt it easy to remember. They sing, as the saying goes, as only siblings can sing. Siblings who are great harmony singers, that is. Their two voices in perfect visceral harmony is the engine of this group. But it needed more, and when they met the musical Jones brothers at a campfire jam, they found the missing parts of their band, and they expanded to be four. “Lawdy” has recently had a new surge of new attention after being featured in the TV show “Longmire.” It is from their second album The Fourth Wall, released in 2012. The title of the album, they said, refers to the invisible fourth wall which separates the performers and the audience; it’s a wall they aim to tear down.  From: https://americansongwriter.com/todays-favorite-newly-discovered-song-lawdy-by-the-vespers/

Like their alt-folk and bluegrass brethren, Crooked Still, Red Molly, Blame Sally and the late, lamented Nickel Creek, The Vespers are adept at conveying back porch harmony with deep-rooted humility and soaring spirituality. They may be young - the two brothers and two sisters who make up the quartet are barely out of their teens (and one is only 19!) - but the reverence for tradition and home-grown sensibilities echoes consistently through every one of these rootsy homilies. Indeed, the melodies come across like Sunday morning hymns, songs that combine gospel fervor with a supple delivery.
Given the fact that "The Fourth Wall" is only the quartet's second album and, like their first release, 2010's "Tell Your Mama," also an independent effort, their competence - and confidence - is all the more impressive. The title is taken from theatrical jargon that delineates the unseen divide through which an audience observes the performers on stage, an appropriate handle that also connects to the album's easy embrace. Songs such as Better Now, Got No Friends and Will You Love Me convey wistful folk finesse...all plucking banjo, willowy harmonies, breezy tempos and down-home designs. But it's their deeper reverence that envelopes these tracks, particularly their mournful cover of Son House's Grinnin’ in Your Face (the sole cover), Lawdy and the album's lovely hymn-like closer Winter.
Youth and contemplation oftentimes make odd bedfellows, but these earnest shuffles and hushed laments manage to infuse celebration with solemnity and make that mix sound effortlessly enticing in the process. Two albums on, the Vespers have demonstrated their ability to tap into a timeless thread and garner contemporary appeal. In so doing, they emulate a neo-gothic imprint that might have been etched in Appalachia. "The Fourth Wall" is something truly special.  From: https://www.countrystandardtime.com/d/cdreview.asp?xid=4868

Red Molly - Wayfaring Stranger (Live)

 #Red Molly #folk #bluegrass #Americana #country #contemporary folk #traditional #roots music

Red Molly are a Roots/Americana trio originating from the upstate New York area. This is a band I’ve loved from the first time I heard them, though, surprisingly, they’ve never made a big impact outside of their home country. They have toured internationally and always draw a good audience, many of which go on to be committed fans, much like myself, and it always surprises me that they’ve never broken through in a big way. Perhaps that’s by design as much as anything else – these women seem too grounded and too committed to making their music to want to compromise enough for the celebrity machine.
The original line up of Abbie Gardner, Laurie MacAllister, and Carolann Solebello came together at the 2004 Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, in Hillsdale, New York state. The three singers, songwriters and musicians were the last ones left at a song circle, liked the way they sounded together and the way their instruments complemented each other and decided to work together as a band. The band name is taken from one of the characters in Richard Thompson’s well-known song, ‘1952 Vincent Black Lightning’, though the band didn’t know it was a Thompson song at the time, having only heard the Del McCoury version! All three were up-and-coming performers in their own right, having been writing and recording as individuals for some time, before meeting up. It was their ability to create intricate vocal harmonies that marked them out from the start, but the combination of Gardner’s fine slide dobro playing alongside Solebello’s guitar work and MacAllister’s intuitive bass and guitar playing, with the occasional banjo foray, meant they could also produce a compelling instrumental sound that worked particularly well with their harmonising voices.
The Falcon Ridge Folk Festival became a major talisman for the band. Not only was it the location of their coming together but it was the catalyst for their career as a band taking off. In 2006 they received the most votes in the Festival’s Emerging Artists Showcase, bringing them to the attention of audiences in the wider region and resulting in WUMB radio in Boston naming them Top New Artist of the Year and their debut live album, “Never Been to Vegas” as one of their albums of 2006. The following year they toured with the Falcon Ridge Preview tour and their career was really up and running.
The band recorded their debut studio album, “Love & Other Tragedies” in 2008 and it climbed to number 15 on the Americana chart in the U.S. The original line-up released one more album together, “James”, in the May of 2010. This album performed slightly better, making it into the top five of the same chart, before Carolann Solebello quit the band, in June of that year, to pursue solo projects. She was replaced by Molly Venter, a singer/songwriter based in Austin, Texas, who had already released four albums and had an established reputation as a solo artist before joining the band. This new line-up really cemented the band’s reputation, particularly on the festival circuit. Venter brought a bluesier voice to the band, giving them an option for a slightly harder edge. They’d been predominantly known for more folk based material up to this point but the new line up seemed that bit more versatile and their repertoire now covered the full range of Americana styes. Their third album, “Light in the Sky”, which included contributions from both Solebello and Venter, was released in 2011 as the band continued to build their following.
It’s in live performance that this band really shines. Their albums are good but they never capture the fun of their live gigs and their easy rapport with an audience. It’s that ability to really win over a live audience that has seen Red Molly become darlings of the American festival scene and they’ve been four times featured artists at Merlefest, one of America’s biggest roots music festivals, as well as making regular appearances at the likes of Rocky Grass, Bristol Rhythm & Roots, Suwannee Roots Revival and many other festivals and events around the US and further afield. I was lucky enough to catch their last UK tour and they remain one of the most enjoyable bands I’ve witnessed live.  From: https://americana-uk.com/whatever-happened-to-red-molly

Light in Babylon - Baderech El Hayam

 #Light in Babylon #Michal Elia Kamal #world music #Mediterranean folk #ethno folk #Turkish folk #Middle Eastern folk #music video

The Ingathering: What’s the band’s story, did you get started playing on the streets?

Michal Elia Kamal: We started playing on one specific street, called İstiklal Avenue [İstiklal Caddesi, or Independence Avenue], not everywhere.

Specifically just that one street in Istanbul?

Yes, İstiklal Avenue, it is a very special place. We started around 11 years ago in Istanbul on İstiklal Avenue, which is in the city center near Taksim Square. It’s very specific and a very special place. That was in 2009, almost 2010, and that moment was also a very good time in Turkey, culturally. Istanbul was chosen to be the cultural capital of Europe, and that period was like a golden time. It is not like that anymore, by the way, but then it was a place with a really big potential for musicians, and artists in general. İstiklal Avenue is a huge avenue with no cars. There are more than two million people passing through there every day. It is very crowded, very touristy, and it was like an artists’ avenue. You had bands playing there—even half-organized—proper bands brought their equipment and put on concerts. You had a puppet show. It looked like a festival. It was not an organized festival, but it was like that every day. It was so intense.

Is that where you met Metehan Çifçi (Mete)?

I wanted to learn music, and I wanted to start my own project. I traveled in India, worked a bit in Europe, and decided I was going to dedicate my life to music. I had even already looked at music schools in Israel. But I looked around, and many of my friends studied music in Israel. I saw them struggling, actually. They are really high-level musicians. They put a lot of money and effort and study into it, and I didn’t see them achieving what they deserved. That changed my mind a bit, and I thought that maybe music school was not the place for me.
I continued to travel. I passed through Turkey almost by chance. It was just before I was about to go back to Israel to figure out what I was going to do, and I just discovered Istanbul. I discovered it not only in a musical way, because it was also a place that’s attractive to me in a much more personal way, too. I arrived in Istanbul, and I started to feel my heart beat. I arrived at İstiklal Street, and I asked my friend — I was with a Turkish friend — I said, “Is this like a holiday or Independence Day or something?” And she told me, in this heavy accent, “No, this is Taksim, baby.” Something was happening there. That was normal, every day. I saw all the musicians, everybody was playing, and I realized that this was the place for me.
I had met Julien, and together we were thinking about building up a project. I knew I could find musicians in Istanbul. Julien said, “There’s İstiklal Street, let’s play there a little and see how it goes. Maximum, it doesn’t work.” We rented a small room in a neighborhood nearby. We earned a little money. Then he said, “There’s this one santur player. I saw him play solo on İstiklal Street. He’s very shy. He doesn’t speak English. But he’s really, really good. We need to find him.” Every day, we went to İstiklal Street, and finally, we found him. We approached him — I had my own songs already that I wrote — and we said, “Can we play?” He said, “Yes,” and I think that moment was when we played our first song as a band. We didn’t know Turkish. He didn’t know English. But it was like, bam. At that moment, something was created. A crowd started to form, and that was the very first moment, 11 years ago. It was like this magical moment, like the spark was there, and all the rest is history. We played one song, a second song, and 10,000 songs since then.

You had instant chemistry.

Yeah, I don’t think that’s happened to me before or after like that. I don’t know what it is in Mete. He’s Turkish, but today he’s family, after all we’ve been through.

What language do you speak with him?

At first, we spoke with our hands, plus a little English, and a little Turkish. Now he’s learned English. I taught him English, and he speaks English like an Israeli [laughs]. We’ve also learned Turkish. Nowadays, we speak English and a bit of Turkish. But in the beginning, we started from scratch. It started from music, which is the main thing. I think it’s what’s beyond language that makes the connection. Even Julien, he’s from France — today he is my husband — I am Israeli, Persian, and Jewish. But the three of us, we say we are dreamers, and that’s what we had in common. We had this culture of dreamers. We decided to go out from our comfort zones, and achieve some inner dream or inner wish, and to take that risk. Choosing music as a lifestyle is a risk. Playing in the streets is a risk. It is not conventional. That was the first thing that brought us together. It was very clear. You didn’t even need to explain it in any language. It was something that was very clear for the three of us, and that’s why it worked.

You said you’re Persian, do you speak Farsi, too?

I understand Farsi, but I don’t speak it that well because I grew up in Israel. I was born and grew up in Tel Aviv. My parents spoke Farsi at home, but I didn’t speak it. People who came to Israel from Iran had to leave something behind. They realized that they were not going back there. That was also something my parents realized. They ran away from Iran so I would have a better future and have a normal life. I am very grateful for that. I have singer friends in Iran, and it is not a place I want to be. I think my parents made a decision to sacrifice something so I would be able to integrate better in Israel — that my first language would be Hebrew and that my first identity would be Israeli.

But did you hear Iranian music around the house?

Yes. You need to sacrifice something, but there are some things you cannot take out. I grew up in a Persian home, with the huge carpets, Persian music, and only Persian food. I think that is why I found myself, eventually, in Istanbul, because it is like a bridge for me. It’s my personal bridge between Iran and Israel. When you grow up in Israel and come from an Iranian family, you grow up in a sort of conflict. My parents told me about a world that doesn’t exist anymore, because it’s the Iran from before the revolution, and today Iran is something else. I also think my parents were conflicted. They came from Iran, but at the same time they are Jewish and Israeli.
That conflict for me is not only between being Israeli and Iranian, but it is also a conflict between east and west. I grew up in Ramat Aviv, which is a very good neighborhood in Tel Aviv and very Ashkenazi. I was the only Mizrahi in my class in my school. I was always very different, and I grew up in a very Mizrahi and Iranian home. On one hand, I enjoyed the privilege of growing up in modern society, in Israel, where women are more empowered, for example. It gave me confidence as a women in this world, and all the benefits you get that come from the west, including the education. But on the other hand, I still have the rich culture from home — the colors and the smells and the music and the warmth and all this stuff they brought from Iran.
I think that is also a conflict you find in Istanbul — between east and west — and sometimes, it’s not always a conflict. It isn’t always a negative thing. It’s a positive thing. It’s a mix. It’s something that is always there, the question of identity, and it is something I speak about a lot in my music. However, after 10 years of meeting people from all over the world and making music and having fans from many religions and cultures and countries — including countries I can not even enter — I am learning more and more about the common things we do have. Maybe it sounds like a cliché, but east, west, Jewish, Muslim, Christian — we all have a choice. Every individual chooses, and takes responsibility for his own choices. It doesn’t matter what his background is. In every language, we feel love, or anger, it is something we all have, and we have a choice, to either choose the positive side or to chose the negative side. That is something that I found in many people, and I find it again and again at every concert.
About the question about identity, that is getting blurrier with time. Not blurry — it is always inside me — but it is becoming less important. For me, Mete is not a Turkish guy from a Muslim country, to me, he’s family. His religion or his background isn’t relevant, because you have a different kind of connection with the person. He’s a human being. But why is that connection possible? Because he made a choice similar to my choice. And then you spread that to a big amount of people and fans.  From: https://theingathering.substack.com/p/light-in-babylon-and-the-universality

Maria Muldaur - My Tennessee Mountain Home

 #Maria Muldaur #folk #blues #country #jazz #folk rock #Americana #pop rock #1960s #1970s

In autumn 1962, the young blues fanatics Joe Boyd and Geoff Muldaur arrived at the Cornell Folk Festival in Ithaca, New York, too late to hear the performers they’d come to see, Doc Watson and Sleepy John Estes. As Boyd recounts in his memoir White Bicycles, they stuck around for a post-gig party where the musicians and fans unwound and sang old gospel tunes. “We noticed a dark-haired beauty with a long black braid accompanying the Watson party on fiddle or keeping time with a set of bones. Geoff was too shy to talk to her, but swore he would marry her.”
The young lady was the Greenwich Village-born Maria Grazia Rosa Domenica D’Amato, and she did marry Geoff, performing with him in the old-timey Jim Kweskin Jug Band, and eventually recording two albums as a duo for Reprise Records, 1969’s Pottery Pie and Sweet Potatoes in 1972. By 1973, their marriage was over and Geoff joined Paul Butterfield’s band Better Days just as Maria Muldaur’s career was about to skyrocket. She recorded her first solo album, supervised by two men she called “the dynamic duo,” her old friend Boyd and Warner/Reprise staff producer Lenny Waronker. “I had heard what Lenny did for Randy Newman and Ry Cooder, and I just loved what he could do with acoustic material,” she told the writer Jacoba Atlas. “There’s a total presence there that a lot of acoustic bands miss.” Boyd, who’d produced Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, the Incredible String Band and Fairport Convention, among others, once told the British writer Penny Valentine his job was simple: “I just keep anything bad from happening. I keep the path clear, love the music I’m working with, and have the experience in my ears to know what doesn’t sound right.”
A spectacular group of musicians was brought in for the sessions, including guitarists Cooder, David Lindley and former Byrd Clarence White, drummers Jim Keltner and Jim Gordon, fiddler Richard Greene, pianists Dr. John, Jim Dickinson and Spooner Oldham, Bill Keith on banjo and steel guitar, and Klaus Voorman, Ray Brown and Chris Ethridge playing bass. It’s difficult to imagine a better combination of talents for the situation.
Released in August 1973, Maria Muldaur is a potent blend of country, blues, folk and pop, and it still sounds fresh. Muldaur wasn’t a songwriter, but her instincts for picking material were spot on. She gave crucial exposure to several unknown or under-appreciated songwriters, including Kate McGarrigle (“The Work Song”), Wendy Waldman (“Mad Mad Me” and “Vaudeville Man”), Dolly Parton (“My Tennessee Mountain Home”) and David Nichtern, whose “Midnight at the Oasis” became Muldaur’s sole Billboard top 10 hit when released as a single.  From: https://bestclassicbands.com/maria-muldaur-solo-debut-album-review-5-19-20/

The Dead South - OurVinyl Sessions / Paste Studio NYC

 

 OurVinyl Sessions

 

 

 

Paste Studio NYC

 

 #The Dead South #folk #bluegrass #roots music #contemporary folk #acoustic #live music video

 

The Dead South, the four piece from Regina, Saskatchewan, whose high energy take on bluegrass has won them deserved plaudits, are back on the road. When last in London two years ago they played to a packed out Brixton Academy. This time it was the Shepherd’s Bush Empire, a majestic old theatre on four levels, where The Dead South’s dedicated fans again turned out in force for what felt like a homecoming. The standing room seethed while those above gave the balconies a good shake as all participated in what felt at times like a kind of revival meeting. That sense of cult, in a nice way, was intensified by the many fans who matched the band’s sparse pioneer look of big hat, white shirt, black trousers and braces. These folks looked as if they’d come in from a day in the fields rather than the Central Line to Shepherd’s Bush. They came looking for togetherness and a show of furious intensity. They were not disappointed.
The Dead South have had a few line-up changes but are now back to the quartet who formed the band a decade ago. Traditional bluegrass has branched out into alt-bluegrass, jamgrass and all manner of derivations as many outstanding bands have taken bluegrass in new directions. Where The Dead South have carved their own furrow is in the sheer simplicity of their style that drives in part from their punk roots. Acoustic guitar, mandolin, cello and, of course, banjo, with a kick drum for rhythm is all they need. They look the part with a deep sense of darkness about their lyrics that in some cases come across as almost a pastiche on traditional bluegrass. Whether that is the intention or not (in some songs it probably is), the show is blistering. All four put every ounce of their musical ingenuity and sheer energy into their performance. The stage setup is similarly stark. What look like four stained glass windows are spaced out along the back of the stage with corresponding low light from the storm lanterns in front of each of the four mic stands. The absence of any drum kit, keys or amplification turned the stage into a kind of dark secret meeting place, which in a way, it was.
House lights off and the rendezvous with these mysterious players from Saskatchewan was underway. A menacing banjo abruptly stopped for a tantalising few seconds as frontman Nate Hilts rasped, “My baby wants a diamond ring” in a voice that sounded as if it had been soaked in a vat of whiskey for years. On guitar, Hilts duelled with Colton Crawford’s banjo as mandolinist Scott Pringle and cellist Danny Kenyon harmonised on the chorus. The Dead South were back.
“Hello, we’re The Dead South” announced Hilts politely, if slightly unnecessarily. He was among friends. Thus began a setlist played mainly at ferocious pace, punctuated with precipitous drops of speed, that spanned the Dead South’s three studio albums. A newcomer, if there were any, might have felt rather overwhelmed by the sheer pace as songs could seem to blend into each other. For others, a Dead South show is the perfect way to let off a bit of steam and after a two year furlough, why not? But live, The Dead South convey the incredibly skilled musicianship as they recount the stories, usually bleak, that make their albums so compelling.  From: https://americana-uk.com/live-review-the-dead-south-shepherds-bush-empire-london-18th-march-2022

Bluegrass Situation: “Diamond Ring” doesn’t end well for one of the characters, which is common in bluegrass. What story were you trying to tell in this song?

Nate Hilts: It’s a story of a man who’s trying to appease his partner. She finds that a diamond ring would make her happy and so he is going to do whatever he can to make sure that he gets that diamond ring for her. And it turns out to be a tragic ending, of course. Just like all of the songs I write. [Laughs]

Did you know it would end so gruesome?

NH: You know what, no! But when you’re doing a video it’s like, yeah, we need a body count!

Videos have been a crucial part of your career. Do you find that that’s been a good way to be introduced to new fans?

Colton Crawford: Yeah, I think so. We had our first big splash with the “In Hell I’ll Be In Good Company” video. So I think a lot of our fans discover us through YouTube. I think like our songs work well with music videos, too. They’re cinematic and “soundtrack-y.” We’re definitely inspired by film soundtracks and Tarantino and Spaghetti Westerns.

Are there filmmakers that inspire you or that really resonate with you?

CC: Clint Eastwood for sure. Tarantino for sure. Even those old B horror films, Wes Craven and that kind of stuff.

NH: You could give us an array of movies and we’ll find stuff that we like about it. Who did Drive?

CC: That was Nicholas Winding Refn. That movie is all about the atmosphere. I think our songs are kind of like that too.

Was there a certain encounter that triggered you to write “Blue Trash”?

CC: Lyrically, yes. [Laughs]. This one was a lot of fun for me because the verses and the chorus are the same banjo part. It’s just the choruses are played in halftime with that shuffle feel, but it’s the same thing. I do a couple of different bends and stuff like that. I came up with that slow part first and wanted to “Scruggs-ify” that slow part, so it was a lot of fun.

NH: But lyrically that song was triggered by listening to a purist group on Bluegrass Junction that was dismissing bands like us, who aren’t quite pure. You know, we stem from bluegrass, but we do our own thing with it. And this song we heard was basically telling us to go away.

CC: “Blue Trash” is sort of like a cheeky love letter to bluegrass. It’s a bit of a response to that.

NH: It’s not a hateful or hurtful response. It’s more like, you know what, we’re here and we love bluegrass music.

So what’s your response when someone’s like, “Well, they don’t play bluegrass…”?

NH: “Yes, you’re absolutely right, but what do you want us to do?” We’re not saying that we’re playing bluegrass. We love bluegrass. The reason that this band was started was bluegrass. And here’s what we do with bluegrass. We take our parts of it. Colton on the banjo, he’s playing better than half the folks you hear on Bluegrass Junction, and it’s fantastic that we can have those elements, but we’re not claiming to be the best, or to be stealing it. We’re just trying to be a part of the community and play music.

Tell me about what you mean when you say the band started because of bluegrass.

NH: Oh, when I first met Colton, I was listening to a lot of Old Crow Medicine Show and Trampled By Turtles and listening to some older bluegrass. Colton had just got a banjo, started playing.

CC: Steve Martin was the first actual banjo player that I listened to. Actually there were indie bands that I was into in high school and university, like Modest Mouse — their one record Good News For People Who Love Bad News, there’s a lot of banjo on that. I always just loved the sound of it. And then I discovered that Steve Martin was a world class picker. I was always a metal guitarist. So there was actually a lot of crossover. I just love that fast picking style. Growing up, my guitar lessons were all classical fingerstyle guitar, but then I played in metal bands in high school. So the banjo is like the perfect middle ground between an acoustic fingerstyle guitar and metal guitar.

Colton, did you take some time off?

CC: I did, yeah. When we first started the band, we just hit the ground running with the touring and we were making no money. So we’d be on the road for a month and a half to two months at a time in a minivan, playing every single day. I’ve always had this tough time sleeping, but I had a year of really, really bad insomnia. I think the worst part about insomnia is that you’d think at a certain point you get so exhausted that your body would just pass out and you’d have a great sleep. But the thing with insomnia is the more tired you get, the less likely you are to sleep. It’s the worst, it’s just hell. I went through a year of that and I just said, OK, I’ve got to step away from this. And of course, like two weeks after I left, “In Hell I’ll Be In Good Company” got posted to Reddit and everything started to blow up. But I was still really good friends with Nate, kept in touch with the guys all the time, always figured that’d be part of writing the next record regardless. And then I got some help and figured it out a little bit. Then sort of approaching it a couple of years later, I just said, you know, I want to take another swing. Thankfully these guys, they could’ve told me to fuck off, but they didn’t. So I’m grateful for that.

NH: Yeah, Colton wouldn’t even look me in the eyes when he sat down with me. He was doing a lot of this [looking down] “I’ve been thinking…” and just staring at the table and I’m like, “What’s he going to say? What’s coming?”

CC: I had no idea how you guys were going to react at all.

NH: He said, “Hey, we should go for a beer, I want to talk about something.” I was like, “I think he’s going to come back.” [Laughs]. In our minds I was like, he’s probably never coming back because we travel a lot and that was a big, big part of it. So what do you do? Unless we stop traveling as much as we focus just on writing or something.

CC: It’s not realistic.

NH: Yeah, for what we do, besides YouTube content, the way that we’re able to function so well is by touring.

CC: Yeah. Our main product is our live show. I love our records but definitely our show is what we do.

Tell me about when you’re off stage. What is your dynamic like?

CC: It’s pretty much just like this. Just hanging out and everyone gets along pretty well for the most part, which is really nice. We’ve been a band for almost seven years now and we still like being around each other, so that’s good. Yeah, it’s a lot of fun. We always say we’re friends first, a band second, and a business third, so we try and keep that in mind.

What do you hope people will take away from that experience of seeing you guys play live?

CC: I think most people show up for a really, really good time, and that’s what we’re trying to do. We’re not a political band. We don’t really have any kind of message. I think our main focus with the live show is just fun. It’s a weird thing because it’s almost frowned upon in the arts. You know, [the perception is that] if something’s fun, it can’t really be true art. We don’t agree with that at all. I don’t think there’s enough fun these days. Everything’s so serious all the time, so we just want people to come and enjoy themselves and have some fun. It stands out when a band’s having fun, because there’s a lot of serious songwriting and sadness out there.

NH: We write tragically, but a lot of times we have humorous spins on stuff, or the song sounds super cheery but it’s actually quite sad. But we still have fun with it. We don’t take ourselves too seriously.

From: https://thebluegrasssituation.com/read/the-dead-south-have-a-message-for-bluegrass-purists/