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FOLK (non-Celtic) & ETHNIC
updated: 01/23/2006
The Alexandrov Song & Dance Ensemble of the Soviet Army.
Boris Alexandrov, conducting. [Look, you don’t really want me to type out all 14 cuts on this sucker, do you? Some are familiar chestnuts ("A Birch Tree Stood in a Field", "Kamarinskaya", etc.). Others not so over-done: "We’re the Fine Don Fellows" (no Mafia jokes!), "Poem of the Ukraine", etc. I just dig the hell out of albums like this, and if you do, too, here’s a vivid-sounding, genuine stereo, compilation that runs about 37-38 minutes, and dates from 1978. If you’re really picky, just email me and I’ll send you a complete listing of content]Bulgaria, Music of. Phillipe Koutev cond; Ensemble of the Bulgarian Republic.
[This anthology became a cult hit in the early 70s, when Nonesuch reissued it in bogus stereo. My Source, though, is the original 1959 EMI mono, in mint condition – I’ve loved this stuff for decades! Earthy, vibrato-laden women’s voices that always seem to be keening even when they’re singing about love and sunshine. Hot instrumental cuts, too, with stomping and wailing bagpipes and gypsy fiddles. Hell, you know whether you like this kind of exotic moody music or not, and if you do, this is THE classic collection. High on the TGM (Trotter Goosebump Meter)]RUMANIA! RUMANIA! [
Too many performers to identify and too many weird names to mis-spell; suffice it to say, this is the Real Deal, from an obscure but nice-sounding Artia import, c. 1960. It’s raucous, soulful, haunting, trashy-sounding, and lots more. Great pan-pipe work. And I WISH these people would decide how they want the name of their country spelled, for Chrissakes. In such cases, I’ll just spell it the way it is on the album cover. But this LP and the Bulgarian one together, and you’d have a basic Carpathian Song-and-Dance Library!]
"VIRTUOSO STRINGS OF THE BOLSHOI THEATRE ORCHESTRA"
– One of those great old "Monitor" LPs, some of which were legitimately licensed and some derived from master tapes, or first-generation copies, simply smuggled out of the USSR in a long-standing cash-for-vinyl deal (and why the hell not, as the Soviet government refused to sign international copyright protocols?). Conductor Yuli Reentovich (that’s not a typo; his name really IS "Yuli" not "Yuri") chose a whole cavalry squadron of warhorses, here, including the inevitable bang-up version of the "Sabre Dance", "Flight of the Bumble Bee", and the so-called "Triumphal March" from Peter and the Wolf. Not so commonly encountered are the "Egyptian Folk Dance" by El Shawan Aziz or Istvan Hriatic’s "Dances from the Legend of Ohrid" (nope; I’ve never heard of it, either!). Well, whatever – imagine Mantovani’s orchestra dressed up in Cossack outfits, swilling vodka, and playing on gigantic instruments lined with wolf and bear hides, a string section of reputedly, 110 musicians), and while the strings are cranking out huge tsunamis of plush-yet-gritty tone, various supernumaries rush about the Bolshoi stage, wacking on tambourines, beating the be-jesus out of balalaikas, and belaboring an exotic assortment of drums, bells, shaman-horns, soulful harmonicas! What the hell, it’s great fun and the performances so full of over-the-top gusto they threaten to come off the rails at some of the conductor’s chosen tempi. One either adores this kind of Mother Russia racket or one runs room the room at the first balalaika lick. You know who you are and you’re among friends. Whatever is said on this website stays on this website (except when it gets reposted on 500 others…)]
"Savannah Rhythms": Music of Upper Volta.
Various performers. (Total Time.37:50)THE VUJICSICS ENSEMBLE – Folk music of the Southern Slavs. The Balkan melting pot made audible, with songs in Serbo-Croatian, Turkish, Slovenian, and Lord knows what else. Instruments include a clarinet, a double-bass, 3-4 different kinds of flute and drums, an accordion, fiddles, tambourines from huge to dainty, Pan-pipes, violins and mandolins, nosh-nosh, and trumpappy; everybody who plays, also sings, or at least stomps around in a furious circle, pretending to be crushing the skulls of babies not born on the politically correct side of Mt. Skabrous. Ambiguities abound amid the ironies – how can people so vital and possessed of such primordial sense of honor go forth and terrorize their neighbors and flip the bird contemptuously to every civilized political entity send in to keep them from ripping each other apart? Well, if the best minds of NATO and the UN couldn’t keep these sentimental baboons from slaughtering each other, then let’s not even try; just put on your headphones and listen to some of their war-like and dreamily evocative music.
Titles of the cuts – If you think I’m going to type all this stuff in Slovenian, you’re crazier than a Serb gangster after drinking a half-gallon of plum brandy and snorting a soup bowl full of crack. Politics aside, though, these musicians really cook!