last night's idea

stand at the horrifying intersection of Cerrillos and St. Francis for 8 hours with a video camera and document it

these are some photos from the internet of the intersection:



Here's a local blog about it.

two of the macedonian songs we'll rehearse tomorrow

I'm in a new Macedonian folk band in Santa Fe-- two voices and a tambura, as well as percussion, and the possibility of tastefully adding accordion, kaval, bass, and more as necessary. I would really love to have a zurna on at least one song. But that's challenging to find in Santa Fe.

We have a whole book of repertoire we're developing, and these are two of the songs we're working on tomorrow. Tamo Daleko Voda Mi Dotece:



I really like this song. I think it's lovely, and it's the first one we've developed a non-traditional higher vocal harmony for. The translation is as follows:

Water was flowing from a well and at the well a "hanuma" (Turkish woman) was bleaching her woven cloth.

A young bachelor approached and asked her,

"Do you sell the cloth and for how much?"

"Even if I sell it I would not sell it to you."

"Do you sell your face, and for how much? I will become a Turk and will convert my religion just to marry you."

"Whether you convert or not, I don't love you."

This is one of the others we just learned. "Se Navali Sar Planina." It's simple, but very traditional and exemplary of Macedonian vocal music:



The translation is:

There were heavy snows on Sar mountain
Three shepards got caught
The first shepard pleaded with it
"Release me, Sar mountain,
I have a wife who will mourn me"
The second shepard pleaded with it
"Release me, Sar mountain
I have a sister who will mourn me"
The third shepard pleaded with it
"Release me Sar mountain
I have a mother who will mourn for me"
The Sar mountain answered,
"A wife mourns for six weeks,
a sister mourns for three years,
but a mother mourns to the grave."

Like I said, it's folk music. Greek and Albanian music are my favorite generally, but I love it all, especially Bulgarian and Macedonian and Turkish and Romani music from a variety of countries. Many songs I know from the Balkans are about war, or sex, or love, or poverty, or struggle, or transience, or communism, or the woods, etc.

I think my absolute favorite music is the traditional vocal music from Northern Greece and Southern Albania called Epirot music (Epirot music is broader than the polyphonic vocal stuff, and often involves clarinet). This is from Southern Albania, and it's just one straightforward version of the music I'm talking about:



I listen to this Albanian radio station a few times each week. It's good when it's folk, but occasionally you'll hear generic autotuned Western-sounding pop music in Albanian. I just discovered the full wealth of Epirot music that exists on the internet. If this particular music interests you, just google "Epirus." Alternatively, I'm always happy to share recordings I have. Just email me.

making bones

I went to Albuquerque today to have lunch with my friend and repentant Weather Underground co-founder Mark Rudd, and my new friend, artist Naomi Natale.

Naomi is the founder of the One Million Bones project. One Million Bones is a fundraising installation responding to the ongoing contemporary genocides and armed conflicts of the world. Naomi is networking with advocacy groups and people across the country to create one million bones that will be installed on the National Mall in Spring of 2013. She receives boxes of homemade bones mailed to her office from across the world, and she also holds daily bone-making workshops in Albuquerque with various groups of people, including school children. Naomi encourages people to sponsor the production of the bones by donating $5 per bone, and she is donating everything she raises to several NGOs that address genocide in various ways.

After conversing for several hours, Mark, Naomi and I made bones. Naomi encourages interested people to host bone-making parties, and after having participated in the activity of bone-making, I think it is an interesting and effective way of inciting dialogue and raising awareness of the issues of genocide, which do largely go ignored in our comparatively comfortable nation.

For the record, I'm still on the fence about art with political goals. I feel like I'll be sitting on this fence for a while drinking tea, contemplating it all. But regardless, I do really like the One Million Bones project, and I appreciate the enthusiasm, intelligence, and passion of Naomi even more.

Here are some blurry cellphone photos of the One Million Bones office and the bones we made.

the bones we made:

the rest:

late night folk in santa fe

three of today's ideas

• Design a deck of tarot cards that symbolically represents American politics and its people, processes, hierarchies, stages, interactions, influences, and obstacles. Use that deck in political consultations
  
  
• Write an interactive play that deconstructs the art world's roles and typically formulaic interactions to be performed with the audience at an art opening
  
  
• Diligently practice smiling at strangers. Document the practice and the interactions. Compare the experiences in different cities and contexts.
  

Balkan Fascination: Creating an Alternative Music Culture in America

this book is going on my reading list now.

I'm going to begin to conduct and compile interviews with people involved in the American Balkan folklore community, and see where they lead me. I think I may post them here as they progress. They will compose part of a publication I will produce in May.

Golden Festival

Last weekend I traveled to New York City for the long Martin Luther King Day weekend to see family, old friends, and to attend the Zlatne Uste Golden Festival in Park Slope, Brooklyn (nevermind that whole escaping Santa Fe necessity...). The festival is an annual two-day festival of Balkan music of every kind imaginable, and it has been going on for 26 years now. This was my first Golden Festival, and after the lovely, and dare I say perfect experience I had there, I'm definitely going to make it a yearly ritual. If we're diligent enough, the new Macedonian folk project I'm involved in now might request to play next year.

All of the 70+ ensembles that perform at Golden Fest are completely unpaid, and all the profit from the festival is donated to charities operating in the Balkans. There were at least two or three thousand people there on Saturday night and the cover the second night was $30-45.

I was very busy dancing during the best moments of the festival, but I do have a few decent-quality cellphone videos of lovely vocal music to share. David Byrne also attended the festival, and he did a much better job of blogging it than I am doing.

When I arrived on the second night of the festival, I was greeted by these lovely singers outside of the Grand Prospect Hall. I was later told that they were the Yale Women's Slavic Chorus:

cellphone video of singing outside of Golden Festival from Alysha Shaw on Vimeo.

This video is of Æ (Ash). They're a Brooklyn-based folk fusion group that gorgeously intertwines Balkan and Appalachian folk music. They're touring intermittently, so check them out if they come your way:

cellphone video of Æ (Ash) at Golden Fest in Brooklyn 1/15/11 from Alysha Shaw on Vimeo.

Post-Golden-Fest, I've been wishing I could go folk dancing every night to gorgeous Greek music like that of Seattle-based Dromeno, who closed the weekend with a cozy afterparty in the lower east side on Sunday night.