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Bird

10/13/2014

    Why was Charlie Parker known as “Bird?”
    His nickname was “Yardbird,” which evidently is southern slang for chicken – probably because he loved to eat chicken; perhaps because on his way to a gig, the car ran over a chicken and Parker wanted to stop and cook it. (You can go to Google yourself and look all this up.)
    The incomparable (thank goodness!) Kenny G said (according to a website): “Charlie Parker would squeak a lot, and that’s why they called him Bird, because his reed would chirp.”
    But he was Yardbird first and that devolved into Bird, so Kenny G is wrong – but is he?
    A better question than how did Parker earn his nickname is: why did it stick? and as “Bird” rather than “Yardbird?”
    The answer is clear:

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Internet Excursion -- From the Carpathians to the Appalachians

10/4/2014

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          The other night I watched Shadows of our Forgotten Ancestors, a 1964 film from the Soviet Union, directed by Sergei Parajanov. Based on a Ukrainian novel, it had a sort of Romeo and Juliet plot except that, in the spirit of the rough, practical realism which gives Slavic romanticism, even its folk tales, a crude, hard edge, Juliet dies about half way through and Romeo, although heartbroken for life, eventually is enticed into marriage by a sexy, designing young thing.
          I can’t say it was an exquisite film, but it had its beauties. I couldn’t put it better than does (today’s) Wikipedia: “The film also features a detailed portrayal of Ukrainian Hutsul culture, showing not only the harsh Carpathian environment and brutal family rivalries, but also the beauty of Hutsul traditions, music, costumes, and dialect.” (Can’t comment about the dialect, of course.)
          Here are a couple of scenes from the film’s “Christmas” section.

Naturally, I was curious about the Hutsul, and looked them up on Google. You can do the same here, if you are so inclined.

The music in the film was intriguing, similar to Roumanian music, but more primitive, with a more prominent drone. Wikipedia again: “They use unique musical instruments, including the "trembita" (trâmbiţa), a type of alpenhorn of Dacian origin, as well multiple varieties of the fife, or sopilka, that are used to create unique folk melodies and rhythms. Also frequently used are the bagpipe (duda), the Jew harp (drymba), and the hammered dulcimer - tsymbaly.”

Some Hutsul music:

   (Still tangentially sticking to Eastern European folk music, Wikipedia tells us: “One of the main attributes of Hutsul males is their bartok, a small head axe on a long handle.”)
   The Jew’s harp figured prominently in the movie’s music – surprising, at first but, after some thought, not so much, considering how important the drone is in Hutsul music. A short scene from the film of two women animatedly strumming on their Jew’s harps didn’t seem available on You Tube.

        Here is a You Tube clip of a Hutsul drymba (Jew’s harp) player, a shaman as well, from 2011. (The music begins after a 50-second introduction.)

At the end of the Wikipedia Hutsul article there is a list of writers and an artist for whom the Hutsuls were an inspiration. The artist was Teodor Axentowicz, “famous for his portraits and subtle scenes of Hutsul life.” Axentowicz was an Armenia born in Romania. (Wikipedia does not explain how this came about.) On a website devoted to his paintings I was not able to find many of the Hutsul scenes for which he was “famous.” What is obvious is that he liked painting women. Most of the paintings on his website are unremarkable examples of 19th century romanticism à la francaise, for example, here’s a Woman in a Park (at least that’s how I figure Dama w parku must translate).

I found one painting, Kolomyjka, that could have been a scene in Parajanov's movie.

    Sure enough, Googling “Kolomyjka,” I found this, again in Wikipedia: “The kolomyjka is a Hutsul music genre that combines a fast paced folk dance and goofy-rhymed verses.” (I’m a very occasional editor of Wikipedia, although only of unimportant snippets, since I am not an expert on anything. I should go in and change “goofy-rhymed” to “outlandishly rhymed” or something, but right now I can’t be bothered.)
   Most of the other peasant genre scenes on the Axentowicz website don’t really look like they are Hutsul – the costumes are not colorful enough.
   As I was checking a few of them out, I came across this one: Lirnik i dziewczyna, which Google translates (Polish to English) as “Lyrist and Girl.”

The instrument is a hurdy-gurdy. Yes, I know, most people think a hurdy-gurdy is a sort of barrel organ with a monkey on top. No. It is a string instrument whose strings are bowed by a rosined wheel rotated by the performer. I went to You Tube, where there were many hurdy-gurdy videos. I was struck by this one. (Like Axentowicz, I too am an appreciator of romantic late 19th century women, and I fell in love with the second hurdy-gurdiest. Please tell me, that’s her father, in the revolutionary era officer’s cap, yes?)

    The song is a popular old Russian song, The Black Crow. It even comes into the Parajanov film, a Hutsul version of the song accompanying images of crows. (Not in You Tube, sorry. Unless you watch the whole film.)
    It turns out that Russia’s The Black Crow is a version of The Twa Corbies (The Two Ravens), via Sir Walter Scott and Pushkin, who translated Scott’s rendition of the old ballad.
    Here’s a version of the Scottish ballad (which is a more cynical version of the English folksong, The Three Ravens, the one that ends with “God send every gentleman/such hawks, such hounds and such a leman.”)

As I was walking all alane,
I heard twa corbies makin a mane;
The tane unto the ither say,
"Whar sall we gang and dine the-day?"
"In ahint yon auld fail dyke,
I wot there lies a new slain knight;
And nane do ken that he lies there,
But his hawk, his hound an his lady fair."
"His hound is tae the huntin gane,
His hawk tae fetch the wild-fowl hame,
His lady's tain anither mate,
So we may mak oor dinner swate."
"Ye'll sit on his white hause-bane,
And I'll pike oot his bonny blue een;
Wi ae lock o his gowden hair
We'll theek oor nest whan it grows bare."
"Mony a one for him makes mane,
But nane sall ken whar he is gane;
Oer his white banes, whan they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair."

          Steeleye Span. A poor video; a good performance:

While wandering around You Tube, searching for a better version of The Twa Corbies than the above, I happened upon this. The song is Real Old Mountain Dew -- nothing to do with The Twa Corbies.
The performer is Rhiannon Giddens. Giddens is the lead singer of an old-timey banjo band, The Carolina Chocolate Drops. They’re pretty good, but this, this is incredible:

I felt I had come full circle, from the wild music of the Hutsuls in the Carpathians to the wild music of the Appalachians. (The Carpathians, in a way, are Europe’s Appalachians – a long north-south mountain range stretching through different countries - or states - and different cultures.)

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Bird

Internet Excursion -- From the Carpathians to the Appalachians

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