FolkLife 2013 — Sunday

Ooops, I’m posting this too late! On Saturday night, I ended up at a friends house and played music far into the night… then in the morning it was a mad rush to get to FolkLife–and my phone battery died. At any rate, here’s what all transpired!

3pm — Not on the online schedule, we checked out the Tom Lehrer sing-a-long! Some of the most snarky, sarcastic songs you’ve heard. Written ahead of their time.

4pm — Bulgarian showcase. Too much going on to mention it all. I was most impressed by Vladimir Mollov’s accordion awesomness. He started so very quietly, and then controlled our emotions like robots the rest of the performance with his mastery of dynamics and intonation. And it was pretty cool that Xti got to play darbuka with him! And we were all enthralled by the Bulgarian voices of Dunava.

7pm — Headed over to the Center House (now called the Armory??) for dancing into the night with Kef, Kafana Republik, more enrapturing Vladimir Mollov, and many others.

10pm — Afterparty time at the Sarajevo Lounge. Got to jam out and dance with so many folks from various Balkan bands in the area. This is a great, friendly community.

Kocani

Tonight, I went to see Kocani. They quieted down, so we bought another ticket. And then we decided to buy one more. Because they are that good. One of the amazing traditions that is surprisingly missing from American rock music, is to keep tipping the musicians so that they’ll stay and keep rocking!! What a concept. And I was so happy to do it, because Kocani is one of the best brass bands in the world.

And tomorrow, I go to Vancouver to see them again, and again! Am I living in a simulation? I feel like I’m about to flip this game.

p.s. sorry for my site being down over the past few days. I freaked out, thinking I had been hacked, but turns out it was a false alarm. At any rate, things seem to be back to normal now… mostly…