Being also a DJ I have to write something on music. One of the first things that ’suprised’ me more or less was hearing some song I recently discovered while I was still back in Holland. I am talking about some songs from the Bucovina Club series by German DJ Shantel, these Balkan beats on steroids with Gypsy horns was blasting out of the loudspeakers of one of the record shops on Istiklal (Ada Müzik if I remember correctly). I was suprised because in Holland I played this music and it’s totally new to the audience. But after a while I figured out gypsy music has quite a position here in music culture, and the Turks love it. As always the music of the Roma is influences by the region where they reside. Instruments change, their place within local culture is always different. The Roma where already in Constantinople since 1050 and have from there spread to the Balkans, eastern Europe and all the way to France and Spain influencing Jazz (Django Reinhardt) and Flamenco.
In Turkey, Gypsy music plays a prominent part in the nightlife, for instance the Fasıl music, gypsy music played with clarinet, darbuka and violin. Selim Sesler is a good introduction to this, he is always playing a few days a week in one of the bars (Tuesdays on the rooftop of Araf, Balo Sokak) around Beyoğlu. I had a chance to see him in Babylon recently.
Babylon, the pop-temple of İstanbul, is also at least once a year host to Shantel, he will be there again the 11th of November.
But Gypsy music is on the rise in mainstream culture. Basement Jaxx has released a compilation of Balkan and Gypsy tracks “Gypsy Beats and Balkan Bangers” (a bit of a Bucovina Club rip-off). And bands like Gogol Bordello from NYC are getting well known. I can name all the names on the Bucovina compilations 1 & 2 but that would be too obvious. Instead something else that could placed in this trend is Russendisko, a returning evening (and 2 compilation albums) at Kaffee Burger in Berlin: eine Tanzveranstaltung, die der osteuropäischen Musik zwischen Zigeuner-Punk, Balalaika-Rock’n’Roll und Klezmer-Ska gewidmet ist. roughly translated: An evening to dance on Eastern European music, from gypsy punk to Balaika Rock’n'Roll and Klezmer-Ska.
