Šutka a body and soul experience

 

Today we move a little further in, to a place where I learned a lot of music from Romany people, and bought even more crazy outfits and gadgets: Šuto Orizari, in short Šutka is just outside Skopje, the biggest Romani settlement of Europe. When approaching the place, specially in Summer months, this is what you very likely will encounter: a wedding procession or party in the streets: 

I went many times to Šuto Orizari and guess how I mostly spend my time there: Learning music and jamming with Romany Musicians. This is a little video I took during a rehearsal with the Čerkezi Orchestar, a Brass group led by Trumpeter Asan. Those rehearsals are very special, and a little bit like a Music Market place. Every 15 min or so another musician from the family or the neighbourhood comes in, joins for a a bit, drinks some coke or bright-orange fizzy drink, and then leaves again…

 

Let me take you around Šuto Orizari, especially the market. You find many famous brands there, looking better and shinier than the same brands in our high street stores:

  

Spending time in Šuto Orizari, or in short called Šutka, we should know a little more about Roma culture. This is an article about female Romani musicians from Šutka, which I wrote a few years ago:

FEMALE ROMANY MUSICIANS IN ŠUTO ORIZARI

Whilst reading, you may want to listen to some gentle background music, here a typical female Romany song: 

The great thing of cyber travel is, time and space is not issue, so lets dive today into the World Romany Day Celebrations in Šutka, after all, you can celebrate Romani Culture on any day in the Year, and I certainly think today is a day where we need some music and dance:

Before we travel on, let me share you one typical Šutka song I learned from Romany musician, Bajsa Arifovska, probably the only well-known professional Romany instrumentalist in the Balkans, in Europa, maybe in the whole world?

Grey Doves flying to Macedonia, North Macedonia that is...

2021 is just starting, and we are still locked down – but only on the outside by the politicians. In our hearts and minds we have all freedom to travel to wherever our imagination brings us. In that in mind, lets hop back on the Balkan Express and I shall take you to Macedonia - stop, lets be precise, I shall take you to North Macedonia.

Tu tune into our new voyage, let me play you a song I really love, and which I’m currently learning myself:

Dejgidi ludi mladi godini 

Hey you crazy young years, you flew away like grey doves

Lets start our North Macedonia right in the centre, in the capital Skopje. For our arrival, we chose a a very environmentally friendly way of travelling:

I will now take you onto a 3-in-1 City Tour:

1st: Here a good article about the place: 

https://www.britannica.com/place/Skopje

2nd: Whilst reading, you could listen to some music:

3rd: Look at Skopje images: I took those on my travels from 2016 to 2019:

Let me show you the arches next to the National Museum. I ‘beamed’ Tatcho Drom, there for the finale of a solstice performance in lockdown: Here we are playing Kukja Imam Na Pelister: 

I would like you to finish the day in nice and fulfilling way, by teaching you a song. This is based on the Vardar, the river which flows right through the centre of Skopje and gives it a lot of its charm: Jovano Jovanke:

Last Stop Southern Serbia: Vranja

 Good Morning to Vranja !

Vranja is a town in Southern Serbia with a high Romany population. In Yugoslav times, folk ensembles repertoire included dance suites, which they called ‘Vranjansky Čoček’. These were inspired by Romany music and dance and are fantastic to both listen, and of course, dance to. Enjoy!

Sadly I have to say, that this type of Romany music was and is neither created and often not performed by Romany musicians. Nevertheless, it is enjoyable. So I hope you will also enjoy my arrangement of another Vranjansky Čoček, which has even another non-Romany middle man, or rather middle woman meddling with it. This is Tatcho Drom performing:

Towards the end of our Serbian cyber travel, I would like to teach you another piece of music: Nišava Kori Pani, a Serbian Romani Gypsy song, here as instrumental version. I love the ‘internal’ combination of Serbian music style with Ottoman influences in certain part, see, or rather learn for yourself:

In my own cyber travels on YouTube, I came across this one. Join me in a little time travel in Serbia: watch the piece you learned last time on a music video from 1993. Make sure you stand up to do so, so you can’t fall off your chair laughing…

I feel, I would like to leave Serbia in a more serious mode, by sharing a song full of old history: Vidovdan, translated to 'St Vitus Day'. This song refers to the battle of Kosovo in 1389. Read more here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vidovdan_(song)

Travelling to the land of the Spirit and visiting a Serbian Music Legend

Ground breaking for Serbia's, or rather former Yugoslavia's music, and neck-breaking for many a TV show or concert organiser, the late Šaban Bajramović. Get to know the man, his full persona, including imprisonments, gambling and his amazing musical career in this publication – unfortunately this article misses each first letter of his name ’Š’, so add it in your mind in front of each ‘aban’….

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2008/aug/15/serbia

To make Šaban's musical acquaintance at the same time, you could listen to the video below whilst reading:

Šaban has hugely influenced the development of Serbian popular music. A Romany, loved and respected by both Romany and non-Romany, he was crowned 'King of Gypsy Music' in India by Indira Ghandi in the late 1980s, when the work 'Gypsy' was not yet politically incorrect... 

He composed and performed lots of Serbian songs, with lyrics and Serbian and Romany language back to back, thus influencing Serbian music slowly with Romany elements, which due to his huge popularity left large footprints on popular Serbian music of that time. Lets watch him live:

Time to travel to the Southern borders for today's Serbia, to a place with a high Romany population and great music, a music with much more Ottoman influence then in the rest of Serbia: Whilst travelling, lets listen to Đelem Đelem, the song considered as Romany Anthem:

The world of Emir Kustorica, fantastic phantasy cyber space

 Whilst in Serbia, one can not bypass the movie world of Emir Kustorica. A Yugoslav film maker, famous for his Balkan Romani-themed movies, creating un-imaginable worlds. As much as he seems to be ridiculing the culture at times, I actually have experienced plenty of scenes which could have been part of the movies, however, they occurred ion reality when researching and jamming music with Romany musicians in former Yugoslavian regions. 

Lets start our cyber explorations in the real village of Drvengrad, a village built by the famous Balkan Movie maker Emir Kustorica to function as scenery in his movies. It is such a beautiful place, I will first share my own snaps taken there on my visit in 2006:

Some more professional images, and some history about this lovely village you van read here:

http://www.serbia.com/visit-serbia/natural-beauties/ethno-village/drvengrad-an-enchanting-ethno-village-by-emir-kusturica/

The movies are full of fantastic music - as they gained fame around the western world, Balkan Romany music also became famous. It's high time you dive yourself a little into the Emir Kustorica's world. Lets start wit one bit of music, the Underground Tango from the movie Underground:

In my own concerts, I dive regularly underground, in as many meanings as the word offers. Here a little excerpt from a Tatcho Drom performance, a dance medley starting with a Serbian Rhumba BoCaCeZo, then we drop into our interpretation Kustino Oro, from the same movie as above:

Lets finish todays journey with another learning experience for yourself. This is Bizerka, a great cheerful waltz tune, I love the social dance for it at least as much as the tune....

Southern Serbian Brass Adventures

Today we cyber travel even further south in Serbia. Anybody who likes Balkan Brass Music and Balkan drinks (alcoholic ones apply here) will know this town: Guča, famous for its annual Brass Festival. The event started off as a Balkan Brass competition for insiders, but became over time an international event for many to enjoy - with all the good and bad things which Balkan parties with a lot of alcohol involved bring with them. Lets drop right into the middle of it:

BTW, currently it is Cyber August in Serbia, as this is when the real festival is usually taking place. 

We shall stay a little longer there, as, whilst you are, you need to meet father and son Boban and Marco Marković, probably the two most famous Romany trumpeters and band leaders in the Balkans. They won the competition at least 10 times in a row:

 A funny story related to Boban Markovic, who you met previously on our adventure. I was visiting my late friend Gordana, who was a concert organiser and behind many Balkan Band shows in London. She didn’t like that Boban’s sound was heading in a jazzy direction. So, after several glasses of Šlivovica in her sitting room in Kensal Rise, she rang Boban and caught him fishing in his local river… She told him off for playing his traditional music too jazzy, and he should rather listen to the London Gypsy Orchestra, the group I led at the time, who would play this music much better than him. This is not quite true, but form your own opinion:

We are going South, to areas of sunny Serbian music

Lets travel a little further south, towards central Serbia, more precisely to Čačak. And I think it is high time for your to get some hands-on experience. I shall teach you the music to Čačak, a Serbian dance. Here nobody is quite sure if the town was named after the dance or visa versa:

From there, we can travel 50km eastwards, to Kragujevac, In a funny way, Kragujevac seems to be the birthing place of talented accordionists, as during my own (real life) travels through Serbia, every accordionist that I came across would, when asked, told me that they originated from Kragujevac.

I was fortunate enough to play with Zika, alias Živorad Nikolić, in the time before social media and easy videoing.

Ha! On my voyage into the depth of my hard drives, I found a video from my time playing with Zika: Here we are performing a number of famous Serbian pieces, including Ederlezi, Tama Daleko and Ajde Jano and in the village hall of Wood Norton on the 21st March 2008:

I think we can fit in one more destination for today: Niš. I went there in 2008 to celebrate my late friend Gordana’s birthday. Having always had a great but perhaps hidden interest in the gothic, I particularly enjoyed seeing the Skull tower and the chandelier made of bullets:

When I travelled there in 2008, I had hoped to meet a great Serbian Fiddle player called Alexandar Šišić. Sadly, Alexandar died just a few weeks before I arrived, but I would love to celebrate him by sharing some of his great music for us all to enjoy:

Another happy discovery from digging through my old archives. In this video I'm performing a Kolo by Alexandar Šišić. The music is also accompanied by a slide show of me and my fiddle through the years. This recording is unedited as it is from the years before everyone could edit things on their own computer, so you either paid for an expensive studio, or you hoped to play well in the first place :-)