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Music

`I had to play Brahms, Schubert, Bach and Schumann, but none of them fascinated me enough to go and buy their albums.' - Eithne Ní Bhraonáin (Enya)

My new favourite band is this wonderful Finnish band called Värttinä. They sing Finnish folk-rock with amazing vocals. They're my first exposure to Finnish music, and I don't know how typical they are, but their stuff sounds a little akin to Celtic music and a lot akin to Balkan (yes, Balkan, not Baltic) folk music, especially Bulgarian or Yugoslav women's folk music. There are also hints of Jazz in it. It's amazing stuff. The singing is really fast and energetic, and the lyrics have a lot of alliteration and internal rhyme. I don't know if I'd have this reaction if I could understand the words, but some of it sounds like Irish mouth music. If I could take only one CD with me to a desert island (this is a desert island equipped with AC power and a good stereo system, mind you!), it might well be one of theirs.

I've got three of their albums, Vihma (their latest), Aitara, and Seleniko, and my life isn't complete yet 'cause I haven't heard the others. :-)

Some Värttinä links:

Värttinä information at the Ultimate Band List (www.ubl.com). This includes links to RealAudio clips.
A description of Värttinä at the Edmonton Folk Music Festival pages
Various reviews (not all that flattering) of their albums at rootsworld.com. There's also a review of them by John Cho. I like his phrase `wall of estrogen'. :-)

I like folk music of various kinds, especially Celtic folk music. I also like Western classical and `New Age'. Favourite musicians and groups of mine include:

Folk and folk rock
- Värttinä
- Gordon Bok
- Fred Small (a Boston local!)
- Ani DiFranco totally rules!
Folk rock / Celtic rock
- Clannad
- Tempest (not much information at this page, but you can see what their logo looks like)
  Tempest are based in San Francisco. They do a lot of Celtic Rock (admirably sung by their lead guitarist Leif Sorbye, who is not Irish :-) and rock versions of traditional songs of the British Isles, but they also come up with some interesting and fresh combinations of musical traditions, such as the title track on their album Surfing to Mecca, which I heartily recommend.
- The Chieftans
- Steeleye Span
- The Pogues
- Boiled in Lead
Classical
- Bach (of course - especially his organ music)
- Mozart
`New Age' / electronic
- Enya
- Vangelis
- Dead Can Dance

And Heidi has introduced me to Alanis Morissette.

Some other resources related to the kinds of music I like include:

Celtic music on the Internet, maintained by Gerard Manning at Stanford
Gale Storm Latzko maintains a page of Celtic and folk music links, as well as maintaining the Tempest page listed above. She also seems to like kangaroos. :-)
Shanachie Records publish a lot of folk music, especially (but not exclusively) Celtic, and they have their catalogue online.
Music from the Hearts of Space is a radio programme carried on many NPR stations (although I haven't found it in the Boston area) that plays what they call `spacemusic'. They've branched out into selling CDs and tapes, as well.
Roaring Jelly is a Bostonarea contra dance band; my friend Donna plays fiddle for them and maintains their Web page. (See also my dance page.) `Roaring jelly' is an archaic term for dynamite.
My friend David Wald had a selfproclaimed `Absolutely worthless calendar of New England folk concerts' which was actually quite useful at one point, but since the most recent entry is April 1996 I think it's starting to live up to its name. :-) It has some information about other sources of information, though.
The Bodhrán Page has lots of information about the drum that is `the heartbeat of Irish music'.

Jay Sekora <js@aq.org>
last modified 1999.01.03