MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             


CD REVIEW

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger

Buy through MusicWeb for 12.00 postage paid World-wide.

Musicweb Purchase button

 

 

 

 

Buy through MusicWeb for 12.00 postage paid.

Musicweb Purchase button

 

 

 

Music of the Tatra Mountains – Ginek Wilczek’s Bukowina Band
March, ozwodna, krzesany, zielona [3:18]
2 ozwodne, ballad, drobny, krzesany, ozwodna, zielona (sung wierchowe) [8:29]
March, ozwodna, sung wierchowa, 2 ozwodne [5:33]
Wierchowa, 2 ozwodne, krzesany, wierchowa, ozwodna, Brigands' tune [8:30]
Brigands' march, ballad, the Brigands' dance sequence, "Oh, Suzannah" [7:36]
wierchowa, ozwodna, ballad [4:11]
Ballad "Krywaniu" [2:05]
Goralski dance sequence: 2 ozwodne, ballad, march, wierchowa, 4 krzesane, zielona [8:40]
Spisz tune, krzesany, 2 ozwodne, 2 Spisz tunes [7:41]
3 wierchowe [2:03]
March, ozwodna, krzesany, Spisz czardasz [8:14]
2 ballads, krzesany, zielona [5:22]
Ginek Wilczek’s Bukowina Band
rec. at Dom Ludowy, Bukowina, Poland on 9 September 1994.
NIMBUS NI 5464 [71:48]
 
Music of the Tatra Mountains –The Trebunia Family Band
2 wierchowe, ozwodna, 2 krzesane, 2 drobne [6:00]
4 Sabalowe, 2 ozwodne [5:16]
Goralski dance sequence: wierchowa, drobny, 3 krzesane, zielona* [4:20]
Waltz, Slovak tune, Spisz tunes [6:08]
2 wierchowe, 3 krzesane, drobny, ballad, ozwodna, wierchowa [7:08]
Krzesany, drobny-Sabalowa, krakowiak, 2 polkas [5:21]
Ozwodne, ozwodna, 2 Spisz tunes, 4 tunes for the Brigands' dance [9:43]
Polka, Goralski dance sequence: 2 ozwodne, 4 krzesane, drobne, 2 krzesane, zielona
[8:21]
4 wedding polkas, 3 Spisz tunes, ozwodna, 4 tunes from Spisz [11:57]
2 wierchowe, 2 ozwodne, Sabalowa, 2 drobne, zielona II, 2 wierchowe [7:53]
(*'green tune' = ozwodna played at the end of the dance sequence)
rec. at Dom Kultury, Poronin, Poland on 7 September 1994
NIMBUS NI 5437 [72:07]
 
Experience Classicsonline

 

This is the music of the Tatra Highlands and it bears the mark of field trip sessions such as those organised by Alan Lomax. The recording circumstances were convivial and informal and consisted of a music session familiar to the musicians. Food and drink were served and authentic costume worn not for parading ethnicity or for the propagation of folkloric superficiality but rather because the musicians wanted to. The location for the first session was the Dom Ludowy in Bukowina with its attractive wooden construction – again a building well known to all the musicians. The food, drink and music incited spontaneous dancing. Similarly The Trebunia Family Band were recorded in the Dom Kultury in Poronin where its first violin Władysław Trebunia teaches

The specifics of ‘Gorale’ music are attended to in the excellent and extensive booklet notes for both these issues. Ginek Wilczek, the shepherd fiddler – his surname is Vlček in Czech or ‘Little Wolf’ in English - plays the first violin or prym whilst there is a sekund I and sekund II and bass; three fiddles and a small three stringed bass in other words. The first violin takes the melody whilst the supporting fiddles provide the harmony and also double the melodic line. In this recording there are a couple of songs in which a second prym is employed  - the scale is the Lydian mode. These flattened sevenths are omnipresent and give the music a distinctive sound. This kind of music is ceremonial, or impromptu, and feasts on dance patterns – circle and brigands’ dances, polkas, waltzes, and the specific tunes have their own nuances depending on who plays.

The sound of the band might be considered rough to ears unaccustomed to the traditions it espouses. The tempo variations are remarkably dynamic, the harmonic backing and intertwining of the sekund parts frequently overwhelming; shrill shouts and whistles announce tempo increases. There’s an especially catchy Brigands’ March [track 5] and ensuing series of dance musics before we end, rather unexpectedly, with Stephen Foster’s Oh Susannah. I’m not sure whether it’s my imagination – or whether the alcohol was beginning to flow – but the later songs do generate an increasing dynamism. There’s an especially fine example of the women singers’ vitality in the ballad Krywaniu [track 7].

The second disc is devoted to the music of The Trebunia Family Band and was recorded at the Dom Kultury, Poronin, a couple of days earlier. The band is slightly smoother in execution than Wilczek’s. The polyphonic singing before the extended dance sequences are highly accomplished, the solo voice and call and response patterns elsewhere equally so. The accelerandi of the sekund fiddles and their slowing on the vocal entry – try track 3 as a prime example – shows how effective such devices can be. And for an example of a truly intoxicating tune go for track six, the drobny Sabalowa – terrific. In fact this band calls on a splendid range of dance tunes, and swinging tempi and its singers, solo or unison, are splendid throughout.

Both bands in fact reflect the vibrancy and vitality of music in the Tatras. The booklet notes are packed full of background and deft musicological information. And I can guarantee that the one thing you won’t hear is a souped up ‘folkloric’ version of, say, John Lennon’s Imagine – as I did from a Slovak band on ‘their’ side of the Tatras, when they saw me coming, in more senses than one.

Jonathan Woolf 
 



 


Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing

 

 


EXPLORE MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL

Making a Donation to MusicWeb

Writing CD reviews for MWI

About MWI
Who we are, where we have come from and how we do it.

Site Map

How to find a review

How to find articles on MusicWeb
Listed in date order

Review Indexes
   By Label
      Select a label and all reviews are listed in Catalogue order
   By Masterwork
            Links from composer names (eg Sibelius) are to resource pages with links to the review indexes for the individual works as well as other resources.

Themed Review pages

Jazz reviews

 

Discographies
   Composer
      Composer surveys
   National
      Unique to MusicWeb -
a comprehensive listing of all LP and CD recordings of given works
.
Prepared by Michael Herman

The Collector’s Guide to Gramophone Company Record Labels 1898 - 1925
Howard Friedman

Book Reviews

Complete Books
We have a number of out of print complete books on-line

Interviews
With Composers, Conductors, Singers, Instumentalists and others
Includes those on the Seen and Heard site

Nostalgia

Nostalgia CD reviews

Records Of The Year
Each reviewer is given the opportunity to select the best of the releases

Monthly Best Buys
Recordings of the Month and Bargains of the Month

Comment
Arthur Butterworth Writes

An occasional column

Phil Scowcroft's Garlands
British Light Music articles

Classical blogs
A listing of Classical Music Blogs external to MusicWeb International

Reviewers Logs
What they have been listening to for pleasure

Announcements

 

Community
Bulletin Board

Give your opinions or seek answers

Reviewers
Past and present

Helpers invited!

Resources
How Did I Miss That?

Currently suspended but there are a lot there with sound clips


Composer Resources

British Composers

British Light Music Composers

Other composers

Film Music (Archive)
Film Music on the Web (Closed in December 2006)

Programme Notes
For concert organizers

External sites
British Music Society
The BBC Proms
Orchestra Sites
Recording Companies & Retailers
Online Music
Agents & Marketing
Publishers
Other links
Newsgroups
Web News sites etc

PotPourri
A pot-pourri of articles

MW Listening Room
MW Office

Advice to Windows Vista users  
Questionnaire    
Site History  
What they say about us
What we say about us!
Where to get help on the Internet
CD orders By Special Request
Graphics archive
Currency Converter
Dictionary
Magazines
Newsfeed  
Web Ring
Translation Service

Rules for potential reviewers :-)
Do Not Go Here!
April Fools




Return to Review Index

Untitled Document


Reviews from previous months
Join the mailing list and receive a hyperlinked weekly update on the discs reviewed. details
We welcome feedback on our reviews. Please use the Bulletin Board
Please paste in the first line of your comments the URL of the review to which you refer.