Balkan Tango

Otros Aires is a XXI's Century audiovisual Tango project created, produced and directed by the Argentinean musician & architect Miguel Di Genova. It was made between Barcelona and Buenos Aires ports in 2003. This project counts with many collaborators like: Diego Ramos (Piano & arragements), Lalo zanelli (Piano), Martin Bruhn (Drums), Martin Paladino (Drums), Manu Mayol (Drums & production) Pablo Potenzoni (Drums), Christian Maturano (Drums), Carlos Ocorso (Percussion), Hugo Satorre (Bandoneon), Lisandre Donoso (bandoneon), Emmanuel Trifilio (bandoneon), Joe Power (Harmonica). It has 12 years of career, 4 studio albums, 1 live album, a documentary DVD and more than 30 tours around Europe, North America and South America.

Boban & Marko Markovic Orchestra & Fanfare Ciocarlia - Balkan Brass Battle (2011) {Asphalt Tango Records CD-ATR 2911}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 305 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 110 Mb
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© 2011 Asphalt Tango Records | CD-ATR 2911
World Music / Balkan / Brass / Gypsy

Prepare yourself: here comes the heavy, heavy monster sound! From the wild, wild East - Romania & Serbia - the two foremost Gypsy brass bands are taking the stage to see who blows hottest and hardest. There's gonna be a showdown! For the first time ever Fanfare Ciocarlia and the Boban & Marko Markovic Orchestra are taking the stage together. Neither act is willing to play support. So both bands will be on stage at the same time, getting their game on and going toe-to-toe. A sound clash? More like a battle royal! The Gypsies are ready to get in the ring! Following in the great tradition of brass battles from the Balkans to New Orleans, this scrap will determine who is King!

Eleni Karaindrou – “Greece’s most eloquent living composer” in the words of Time magazine – was born in Teichio, a mountain village in central Greece. She still retains vivid memories of the sound world of her childhood: "the music of the wind, rain on the slate roof, running water. The nightingale's singing. And then the silence of the snow." Sometimes the mountains would echo to the sound of flutes and clarinets played at village festivals. “I still have a strong memory of the Byzantine melodies I heard in church and the continuous voices of the men accompanying the chanter," she has said. Resonances of this sound world, imbued with the history and suffering of her native land, have found their way into the many scores she has composed for film, TV and theatre in the past four decades.

Ederlezi spans 10 years of Goran Bregovic's film music career, covering much of his work for Balkan director Emir Kusturica as well as to the movies Toxic Affair and La Reine Margot. It shouldn't be a shock to discover that Bregovic's music is steeped in the culture of his homeland. His compositions for Kusturica's Underground are a goulash of foot-stomping gypsy festivities, like the Balkan take on Carnaval in "Cajesukarije Cocek" and the thunderous trumpet on "Kalasnjikov". For the film Le temps des gitans he wrote "Talijanska", which begins with a pleasant jaunt on the accordion, makes a daring turn into a cul-de-sac of brooding drones, and then returns to the welcome safety of the starting point with a larger ensemble. There are also many unexpected encounters on this collection, the most surprising being Iggy Pop's vocals on the EZ-listening pop of "TV Screen". Others include the juxtaposition of tender acoustic guitar and chimes with narration by Johnny Depp on "American Dreamers" and the crooning of dark angel Scott Walker on "Man From Reno".

This album is an explosive encounter between two explosive cultures: ¨La Gitana¨ and ¨la Tanguera¨ Recorded and produced between Sofia (Bulgaria) and Buenos Aires (Argentina), this project is the alchemical combination of these two energies, each in its way unique but also incredibly similar. Two distinct musical languages combine to create a new one, with its own unique character called Balkan Airs.

The Opale Concerto for accordion and string orchestra was composed in 1994. Richard Galliano dedicated it to his teacher, Joe Rossi. Just like the titular gemstone Opal, the concerto symbolizes a variety of colors and the interplay of styles.

The idea of bringing together Eastern European folk dances and tango nuevo is a sound one. Astor Piazzolla, tango nuevo’s founding father, surely heard similar folk dances as a kid growing up in New York City’s East Village, and one can discern their echoes – however faint – in his music. On this brief programme, violinist Zachary Carrettin and pianist Mina Gajic´ interweave a set of Seven Balkan Dances for solo piano by Serbian composer Marko Tajčević (1900 84) with a half-dozen contemporary takes on tango nuevo by Ray Granlund (b1975).

First of all, if you haven't seen Emir Kusturica's film Underground yet, do so now. You'll discover a masterful depiction of 20th-century Balkan history through metaphor, by turns comically zany and profoundly heartwrenching (I cried). The soundtrack that Goran Bregovic created for UNDERGROUND is a wonderful stew of Balkan influences: gypsy brass, some old geezer singing in Romani, and great big drums pounding complicated circle-dance rhythms. Showing that today's borders are arbitrary, he also brings in three singers from the Shopsko region of Bulgaria, whose traditional vocal techniques include some striking yelps and leaps of sevenths.

Undoubtedly the most versatile of all instruments, the guitar’s unrivalled cross-cultural popularity has made it synonymous with musical genres far and wide. From Congolese soukous to Calcutta slide guitar, this collection features kindred creative spirits who have harnessed its limitless expressive potential.

Is it jazz? Some of it is, but much of it isn't. Then what is it? The Ensemble FisFuz (for the purpose of pronunciation, there's an umlaut over the `u' in `Fuz') plays world music, an amalgam of sounds and themes from Spain and Portugal, the Middle and Far East, Mediterranean and Klezmer music, and, yes, with Trovesi several albums his affinity for folk music and a variety of popular forms. And as his marvelous duet albums with accordionist Giani Coscia (see esp. In cerca di cibo, 2000) have shown, he can improvise on almost any melody! Although he melds well with clarinetist Maye, and they do wonderful harmony and counterpoint passages together, it is easy to tell when Trovesi is in the lead -there is a bluesy tone to his clarinet, a way he skews notes as though swerving up to them at moments. Maye plays equally well -her clarinet solos sound `purer', as I just said, less blues-intonated.