Gypsy Music (Manele/Chalga)
 

From wikipedia: "Manele can be divided into "classical manele" and "modern manele". The "classical manele" are a Turkish-derived genre performed by lăutari in a lăutărească manner, while the "modern manele" are a mixture of Turkish, Greek and Middle Eastern elements, generally using modern (electronic) instruments and beats."

In my view, manele is something college taught me way too much about. It's usually funny, about weird sexual relationships, and above all else, cheesy and fun at parties.

I can understand a fair bit of Romanian, but once you get into the gyspy (tigan) language, I'm lost. In any case, all my best friends at school were Romanian. Don't ask me how that happened, it's still a mystery to me. It has something to do with the combination of Macroeconomics 101 and being blond.

Bulgarians call it chalga, and that is also good. Any search for chalga or manele will yield plentiful results on the youtube. But beware.

Without further ado, I will post a few of my favorite manele tracks, for your listening pleasure.

The first guy you should get to know is Liviu Pustu. He is a legend.



The song is a Romeo & Juliet theme, and the title means: You are Romanian, and I am a gyspy. Basically the chorus outlines the fact that gypsy men are looked down upon by Romanian women. She's smart and well-dressed, he's kinda dumb and unattractive. Their parents won't let them marry, but he'll love her until he dies, etc. One of my favorite manele tracks of all time.

"Dragostea nu are lege!" - Love has no law! What a nice message.

Another famous dude is Liviu Guta.



This song is about being sore after 4 days and 4 nights of crazy sex.

Here's a great track by Hotline. Not sure if it's real manele, but it rocks.

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This song is about how all the girls in the world are the same, but Romanian girls are very special and the best in bed.

Anyway, enjoy! I'm sure I'm the only person on MB that would listen to this kind of crapped on crap but I can at least expose you. It's definitely better when a) drunk b) with Romanians c) playing poker.

Manele and chalga are new words to me, misspoptart, so thanks for introducing me to them. The music clips were fun; I listened to them this morning while I was getting dressed for work. That´s about the sexiest thing that happens in my house these days ! Are all Romanian songs about love, sex and beautiful dancing girls? - because that´s how it looks in the Romanian House thread too.

Oddly enough, your first clip reminded me immediately of a song by Amr Diab. Although he is from Iraq, this clip also features a dancing girl, so maybe it´s not too irrelevant to post here. Do you notice a similarity, or am I just imagining it ?

Hey Rostasi, thanks for dropping by :) I actually don't know any classical manele, so feel free to post a selection. That Victor Gore track is already turning me on, and it actually sounds a bit Moldovan. I'll have to do a bit of research on this lovely man. :)

Hahaha this made me laugh out loud. I'm glad manele added a bit of risque to your normal routine. Yeah, I just turned on the translations for 4 zile 4 nopte (one of the songs I posted above), and proceeded to laugh harder, the song lyrics are just too funny. "After you can't take it anymore I'll take you to a doctor," etc. Yeah, not all Romanian songs are like this of course, because there are also little kids involved in the music scene over there. But you'd be hard pressed to find some Romanian music that doesn't have beautiful dancing girls. :)

There is definitely a similarity in terms of their voices. It is said that gypsy people originally emigrated from the Middle East/India, so of course there's some influences in their music. Thanks for posting that clip, I liked it!

^ Thanks for the kind comment, Miss P. :)

Yes, as the gypsies moved from India and into Europe, they must´ve picked up a real mix of influences. When I have time I might investigate a bit more, because at the moment, between you and rostasi, I feel really out of my depth.

Rostasi, I also liked your Victor Gore clip very much, especially the sound of the plucked string instrument that accompanies the accordian. Any idea what it might be ?

This remark had me puzzled though; I wonder what rembetika is, and what reputation it has.

The Gypsies left Northern India some 1000+ years ago, passing through the middle east and into Europe. The most travelled entered the UK some 500 years ago.
For a really good understanding of the music of the Gypsies and how it developed take a look at Latcho Drom (Safe/good Journey)

Having trouble trying to post the youtube for the entire series of 10.
Anyway here's an episode from the journey of the Rom in Spain;

Better still I've found the entire film that will allow me to use here;



This film depicts the journey of the Romany Gypsies and the development of their music from India to France.

Great! Thanks right-track. I'll watch it on my next day off :)

Thanks for the answers, rostasi, - and for picking up that little spelling mistake of mine!

The film is absolutely fabulous, right-track.The music and the performances are captivating, with the music much wilder than I expected after the watered-down West-European gypsy music I´ve previously heard. Thanks for introducing me to a genuine musical and visual delight. I watched about a third of the movie last night - to the point where they take a boat and leave what could be the biblical era behind them; the gypsies sure have a long way to go if they´re ever going to catch up with misspoptart´s modern-day clips !

Manele/chalga is the type of music I can't stand.

Sorry to hear that. You must be Serbian? :D

If we're into Serbia, do not forget about their verion of such a music, called turbofolk. The lyrics are as "complex" as in previous genres, but there's also one big issue with that. I mean, many of those Serbian songs were deeply connected with nationalism during the civil war in former Yugoslavia in 90s. Unfortunatelly, I can't tell you more right now due to the very late time, but I'll back to that plot soon.

Excellent. I await your contributions.

The most symptomatic sign of nationalistic and xenofobic disposition of turbofolk was the relationship between famous singer Svetlana "Ceca" Ražnatović and Serbian warlord, leader of paramilitary group, Željko "Arkan" Ražnatović.In some way it determined the lyrics of many turbofolk songs, reffering to struggle with Croats and Bosniaks - sometimes they were very severe and harsh. Maybe they weren't "cruel" or "brutal", but it was enough to encourage some "patriots" to make war crimes.

To be honest, neither Croats nor Bosniaks were better with that. On the other side of frontline "Thompson" rock band was very popular. Initially they sung about the independence of Croatia and the need of resistance from Serbia. But later their lyrics also were quite equivocal - kill any Serbian.

War is never black and white, it's a multitude of greyness. Nobody is 100% good or bad. But music may erase the bad view of our deeds and over-recount the cruelness of our enemies. We need to have it into account.

*coughs*

Need some more recs Misspoptart or anyone else from this thread.

Really goregous version of Ederlezi, a balkan gypsy classic, popularized by Goran Bregovic through his band Bijelo Dugme and their version called Djurdjevdan



And of course by the version used in Kusturica's classic "The time of the gypsies"

Btw, I realize this thread is for a particular type of gypsy music that is NOT very related to the above posted, but there are no other Gypsy music threads so...

Kalyi Jag - 2 szám Shej Sabina ÉS E Shukar Shej (A szép lány)

Titi Robin & Gulabi Sapera - Katchur Kahn

Ljiljana Buttler - Ciganine Sviraj, Sviraj

Šaban Bajramović-Kerta mange daje

^that rules

Angelo Debarre - Maneges




Joscho Stephan, Olli Soikkeli and Stephan Berger - Lulu Swing