Zvonky, a retrospective

I heard that Monogram are playing tonight downtown in Vinohrady, a few blocks from Em’s school at the restaurant, herna-bar, horse-museum U Vodarny. They’re a great band, who we saw (and taped) last month as the opener for Hickory Project – they were a good band for that job. I’m curious about the show tonight, however. Monogram have invited “Zvonky” to play support, and concert listings list the “original lineup” of the group, trumpeting this unusual convergence. My friend Eda is listed on mandolin, so I looked up his current band’s website, and there it was: a whole photographic history of Zvonky from the 1980s through until the current transformation into the present-day Country Cocktail. Check it out – (photos from the Country Cocktail website.)

1976

1980

1981

1982

1980

1984

1990

1995

1999

2000

2005

2008

Elusive Fox

2008-4-15

I heard tell of a Czech version of “fox on the run” (US pop-country song, now a bluegrass standard) by a gent named Vacláv Neckař – all this from a friend who just got together a piece on him that she is airing on Radio Praha. She was giving an idea of some of his songs–having heard them too much editing the sound files–and sang one that was unmistakeably “like a fox.” (This is Rosie, who interviewed me a while back for Radio Praha, and after I loaned her “Limonadovy Joe” went to interview the actress that played the luscivious Tornado Lou, Květa Fialová – see that page HERE )
Back to Neckař; he was the antiheroic “star” of Jiri Menzel’s “Closely Watched Trains” (1968 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, from the eponymous novel by Bohumil Hrabal) and the (front) man of pop (power) trio “Golden Kids.” (it’s not kids as in boys and girls, but as in juvenile goats. Thanks, Czechs! ) Interestingly enough, Vacláv was recently accused of reporting on colleagues to the StB ( the former state security apparatus: http://www.radio.cz/en/news/92777 – the ghosts of communism still haunt…)

For the media-minded of you, here’s a GK hit:

…and a gratuitous though contemporaneous Mannfred Mannnn version of “fox” that is nice (and perhaps sparked a Czech version?):

Sorry for all the tangents – it’s all just to good….

My main point: Anyone know more details on a Neckar (czech-texted) version? (instead of “like a fox,” is the refrain “kolem nas”…? or “jako slon” …? )

I’ll be tuning in to Rosie’s feature once it’s up online, and you can too – after Sunday, head to www.radio.cz and then click through to music features, down the menu on the left side of the page.

Rickyho na ČT 2

A friend emailed me this link to “Na Plovarne s Ricky Skaggsem – An interview with Ricky Skaggs by Marek Eben.”

They must have recorded the segment when Ricky was in town this summer for his show at “Music in the Park”. (see Marek Eben is a musical personality who has been working as a TV “redaktor” / interlocutor for a while. Before coming across him here, I last saw him as one of the hosts of “Stardance,” an instance of the “reality show” where Czech stars are paired with pro dancers and pushed out on the parquet for our amusement.

Here’s his introduction to the interview:

Dobrý Večer.
Když jsme ještě jezdili na Portu, tak se v Portovným žargonu děleli muzikantí na kotlikářem. To by trampy. Pak na hledače nebo pro roky to byli folkáří. A pak na pytlikačí a to byli bluegrassové muzikantí.

Ovšem jsou pydlikáčí a pydlikači. A když za pydlikání dostanete hned dvanáctkrat Americkou Grammy, už to musíme brát vážně. Máme dnes to velké potěšení přivitát na Plovárně absolutné špičku Amerického bluegrassu. Multiinstrumentalistu, spěváka, skladatele, Rickyho Skaggse.

Here’s some English:

When we used to go to Porta, in Porta jargon musicians “děleli na kotlikářem,” [referring--I think-- to the kotlik or pot that tramps used on their rambles.] Those were tramps. Then… This just gets tangled – he is using a lot of funny words…any of the Czechs in the audience care to adda comment below, to explain all this?

I can add a bit of context. Porta is a distinguished festival founded in Ústí nad Labem in 1967; it’s still going strong. The festival’s name comes from the Latin phrase describing its hometown as the “Porta Bohemica,” or “gate to Bohemia.” The event’s original subtitle was “Celostátní festival country western music“…that is, Country-wide festival of…well, country western music. So you see why I’m interested. Eben’s list of folks involved at Porta ends with bluegrassers, the “pytlikače.” Another bit of “jargon” from that Porta scene – something to do with little bags…? Google helps me none here, but I get the sense that this is something like “picker,” an emic term for someone who “picks” a banjo or guitar or mandolin. Inflection can give the word extra emphasis; as Eben says, and Americans too, there a pickers, and there are pickers. When, for their picking, someone wins 12 Grammy awards…you take them seriously. Then he goes on to introduce Ricky and the interview progresses.

I haven’t seen the whole thing yet, but I did notice Eben making what seemed to me a forced smile and some over-nodding as Ricky talks in the first few minutes about music coming from God. Maybe I’m forcing this cynicism on Marek, but at the very least…I can’t imagine he would use similar American-evangelical-style “blessing-from-God” speech to describe his own music-making. Jirka, the colleague who sent me the link to this internet version of the show, stressed that it was about bluegrass and God. I’m curious how he and other Czechs deal with such strenuous testimonies to the sacred aspects of bluegrass musicking?

There’s much more to be done here – now I just have to find a copy of this interview that is not translated over with Czech dubbing…