Bands of Gypsies
Friday's Wall Street Journal had a nice roundup of the many Roma Gypsy and Gypsy-influenced bands and films infiltrating the artistic mainstream. Previously marginalized, the new Gypsy mystique extends from indie rock groups such as Beirut to the Bastille Opera's production of "Time of the Gypsies" in Paris this summer. And the excellent film "When the Road Bends...Tales of a Gypsy Caravan" documented the American tour of a wide range of Gypsy styles.
Although the Romani people's origins are in India, today their music is usually associated with Roma's Balkan beats. But all Romani seem to have a knack for adapting themselves to local styles. As Nicolae Ionita, a percussionist in Romania's Fanfare Ciocarlia, explains, "I'm sure that Western artists who want to work with us do so because they love Gypsy music....I don't have the impression from our experience that something gets lost in translation. In the worst case, something new and different from both Western and Eastern styles is created. That's the most interesting thing."
Indeed, New York group Gogol Bordello's recent album "Super Taranta!" should be popping up on many a critic's year-end best-of list. Gogol Bordello plays a boisterous mixture of punk rock, Jamaican dub, klezmer, techno, flamenco, hip-hop, and Gypsy folk music from the Carpathian Mountains, all led by towering Kiev-born lead singer Eugene Hutz. The album is a history lesson, political seminar, and wild dance party rolled into one. If you buy no other Gypsy-influenced album this year...