Ekrem and the Gypsy Groovz - Rivers of Happiness

Gypsy Brass, Ethno Jazz

In Vranjska Banja, a Roman-Gypsy village of about 600 families, situated in the border region between Serbia and Kosovo, music is played from generation to generation in order to survive. These people's lives are shaped around music. Their song is a universal explanation of life, their only true passion, their way of remembering and keeping the families together. Gypsy Groovz, the orchestra of Vranjska Banja's Ekrem Sajdic, has been selected as the most authentic live band in the history of the "Golden Brass Summit", a music festival that has taken place in Guca/Serbia for 41 years, being called "Serbian Woodstock". Every year in August, hundreds of thousands of people meet in Guca for the biggest brass party in the world. Dozens of bands try to win the title of the "Golden Trumpet" that guarantees them the best-paid gigs and gypsy weddings in the following year. The clue in the selection of this particular band was the warmth of their music and its ability to transfer emotions into the eruption of positive feelings.

The tunes on "Rivers Of Happiness" are played in a private or improvised style and represent the cheeriest rarity for the music gourmet. When recording this CD the fellows were in a very good mood for being able to incorporate live improvisations by Dusko Goykovich whom they met for the first time. Goykovich who had been dreaming about this for forty years was in a boyish mood and fresh as ever despite his seventy years. At the beginning both parties held back in mutual estimation but during the recording this changed into a creative explosion with laughter and cheering. An old bebop fox when it comes to improvisation, Goykovich very soon found his place in the music profile of the orchestra but stayed loyal to his own way of playing. In the music of Gypsy Groovz you can hear the historical relations to Indian ragas, Sufi trance music, Egyptian and Armenian melodies, Turkish, Bulgarian and Macedonian patterns, the temper of Spanish flamenco, Sardinian and Dalmatian melodic polyphony, Serbian and Romanian love for variation. Ramesh Shotham, the Indian percussion player from Madras, had never met Ekrem's orchestra before but immediately recognized their story and their music as his own - and added a touch of the ancient Gypsies' Indian roots.

Track List:

1. Procvetalo Nebo 04:56
2. Cocek Majka 04:22
3. Igra Prociscenja 02:46
4. Reka Zelja 05:35
5. Cocek Srece 05:58
6. Danguba 04:20
7. Molitva 04:32
8. Cigansko Veselje 04:40
9. Cocek Strasti 06:13
10. Gresnica 03:17
11. Ljubavni Ritam 06:10
12. Srcu Mome Radosti 05:51

*Ljubavni ritam*

Musicians

Trumpets - Ekrem Sajdic, Ninoslav Demirovic, Dzafer Kurtic
Reeds - Aca Raimovic, Srba Raimovic
Tubas - Trajce Asanovic, Dragan Muslic, Aca Baterovic, Jemin Zecirovic, Branislav Sajdic Drums, Percussion - Siristar Kurtic, Nezet Asanovic, Goran Milosevic Guests
Solo Trumpet - Dusko Goykovich
Tabla, Percussion - Ramesh Shotham

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