Idan Raichel: Mi'Ma'amakim

I've got Tali to thank for introducing me to The Idan Raichel Project. Idan Raichel is an Israeli keyboardist and vocalist who works with many other artists on his "project," mixing Middle Eastern, Ethiopian, and other styles of music.

I love the sound of the whole album, but my favorite track just happens (surprise!) to be in waltz time, at a zippy 180 bpm: Mi'Ma'amakim (Out of the Depths). (Download from Amazon, eMusic, or iTunes; hear a sample; see a video). It has gorgeous Hebrew lyrics, interspersed with parts of an Ethiopian song called Nanu Nanu Ney (for which I'm unfortunately unable to find lyrics or translation).

Of course, at nearly 6 minutes long, it needs a bit of editing so you don't die dancing to it. After (regretfully) hacking it up a bit, I got it down to about 3:30. I removed a duplicate verse and associated chorus, one of the three consecutive choruses at the end, some of the bridge, and some of the intro. The cuts were trickier than I expected: while the song seems to have a pretty consistent sound, the background vocals and instrumentation are actually changing enough to make it easy to introduce discontinuities if you're not careful. Anyway, I got Bob to play it at Faster Polka this week and it worked pretty well. The lyrics on the verses anticipate the beat a lot, so you have to be careful to follow the bass and percussion there, but overall it's good, and fun practice for fast waltzing.

Idan Raichel's Wikipedia page says there's actually a whole album titled "Mi'Ma'amakim," but I haven't been able to track down any other info about it.

An excerpt from the translation of the lyrics:
Who is it that calls to you tonight, listen
Who sings aloud under your window
Who stakes his soul just for you to be happy
Who'll lend his hand to build you a home
Who'll lay his life down under your footsteps
Who like the earth at your feet shall live on
Who'll love you better than all of your lovers
Who'll save you from the rage of the storm
Out of the depths

West Coast Swing

i5 : Ladidi Ladida (116 bpm)
I first heard this song at the Decadance spring show 2004. It made an impression on me both because Decadance does compelling choreographies and because it's a catchy song. The lyrics aren't particularly interesting, but the song has a good beat -- clear triple steps -- and some interesting background instrumentation, which I can't identify.

Rachel Stevens : Sweet Dreams My LA Ex (130 bpm)
Another catchy pop song. It's bouncier than "Ladidi Ladida," but also has nice percussion. Having never danced to the version I have, I only just realized that it's too fast for a comfortable west coast swing dance, especially given that it's 3:30 minutes long. I'd recommend slowing it down by at least 6% and cutting the second verse-chorus pair, which is about a minute of music. The resulting length is around 2:40, which is a good length for the still-fast adjusted tempo (120-123 bpm depending how much you slow it down)

J. Geils Band : Centerfold (114 bpm)
Also bouncy, but a much more comfortable tempo for dancing. My edited version is almost a minute shorter than the original, but I forget what I cut. It took me a while to find this song after I first heard and liked it. I originally mis-heard the word "centerfold" as "semaphore" (multi-threading on the brain, perhaps?) and couldn't figure out what the song was about. The actual lyrics are cute, though.

Lisa Ekdahl : Vem Vet (126 bpm)
Hmm this song is on the fast side as well. It's the most mellow of this lot, with a jazzy feel; the trumpet at the beginning and end are particularly nice. In fact, it might be better as just a regular triple-count swing (lindy hop). I've never heard it played anywhere, but presumably it has been danced to because I got it from someone else's dance music collection. Anyway, it's a lovely little Swedish swing.

Joss Stone : Tell Me 'Bout It (110 bpm)
I think it's fun to have a bit of fresh, popular music in a dance set, and this song was a big hit on the radio last year. Not only do the tempo and beat seem like a natural fit for west coast swing, but it also has an attitude that works well in my mind for this style of dance. Dancing as a follow, it makes me want to almost strut the two forward steps of a sugar push :).

Trailer Park Trio

The Trailer Park Trio is billed as the largest trio in the world, with 5 members. Because everybody knows that bigger is better when it comes to trios. In this case it certainly seems to work, because their whole self-titled album is great, and it's all danceable. They play a lot of classic swing songs from the 20's - 40's and have a great sound. A good three quarters of the entire album is actually available to stream or download on their site, so you can check it all out (and then buy the CD anyway). Some of my favorite tracks are "King of the Road," "Reet, Petite & Gone," and "Nagasaki." There are a few blues songs as well: "If I Had You," "Red Light," and "Someday You'll Be Sorry."

Jim Smith, the lead singer and tenor guitar player, also has some solo albums called "Same Old New Hair" and "Bad Then... Worse Now." I love his voice, guitar playing, and even whistling, but I only have a few tracks from these albums. (Some good ones are "Half Moon Eyes" and "I Double Dare You.") I can't find any information about them anywhere online, though. If you're in the Philadelphia area, I guess just look for him at a live gig or something and get the CDs that way.

A Yiddish Tango

For a little April Fool's Day silliness, I thought I'd share a tango. The Klezmer Conservatory Band sings "Ikh Hob Dikh Tsufil Lib," which is a Yiddish version of "I Love You Much Too Much." They actually switch into English for part of the song, but it's the incongruous juxtaposition of the Yiddish and a tango that really tickles me. You can hear the full track on last.fm, or buy it on Amazon. (Their regular klezmer stuff is also excellent, and highly recommended.)

Rowyn's belated St. Patrick's Day Picks

I picked these last week but didn't have time to write them up until today.

Altan : Tommy Bhetty's Waltz (moderate waltz, 145 bpm)
Altan is one of my favourite Celtic bands, and they don't play many waltzes, but this one is lovely. The song was written by Tommy 'Bhetty' Maguire, a fiddler from Kinawley, County Fermanagh, and was in the soundtrack for the movie Good Will Hunting, though not on the official CD release. The whole album, The Red Crow, is also available on eMusic.

Emer Kenny : The Chase (cross-step waltz, 120 bpm)
If you've been to a Jammix or Friday Night Waltz, you've probably heard this played. It's based on a traditional Irish tune, the Foxhunter's Jig, but updated with new-agey vocals and a steady, trance-like beat which makes it very danceable. Unfortunately I couldn't find a good download source, so the link is for the album on Amazon.

Clannad : Caide Sin Do'n Te Sin (cross-step waltz, 120 bpm)
Even though this is the same tempo as "The Chase," it has a much mellower feel. The Gaelic refrain "caide sin do'n te sin nach mbaineann sin do" translates to something like "what is that to anyone else." Apparently the tune is in a 'hexatonic' scale, which has six pitches per octave. Again, no good place to download, so the link is to the CD. You can hear Altan's version of the song, which is very different, on last.fm.

Ronan Hardiman : Siamsa, Cry of the Celts (polkas, 118 and 126 bpm)
Both of these are polkas from the Lord of the Dance soundtrack -- hardly traditional, but Irish-inspired. "Siamsa" is bubbly and infectious and great fun to dance to. The feel of the beat changes a few times (I don't know enough music theory to describe this more accurately), but that's part of what makes it exciting. "Cry of the Celts" is also catchy and energetic, with some nice fiddling. It's the tune Richard Powers plays -- heavily edited, of course -- for the Kerry Polka Sets he often teaches around St. Patrick's Day.

Graham's St. Patrick's Day Picks

In honor of the day, here are some danceable Irish tunes and songs. Beannachtaí na Féile Pádraig!

Niamh Parsons: Blackbirds and Thrushes (fast waltz, 195 bpm)
This is a great waltz, made even more interesting by the phrasing, which switches between 5-bar and 7-bar phrases (there may be some other types in there, too). Some folks might like to slow it down a tad, though.

Fresh Fish: Jessica's / Martin O'Connor's Polkas (136 bpm)
A lovely polka set from a great contra dance band. I was very disappointed when I started trying to find links to it and discovered it's out of print and there's nothing to link to. The piano player's website says to "stay tuned for a possible reissue" of the Turning of the Tide CD. Just wanted to mention these tunes anyway, though.

Nancy Kerr & John Fagan: Dance to Your Daddy (cross-step waltz or polka in 3, 122 bpm)
This is some fantastic fiddling here; it's not often you hear a slip reel (in 12/8, the way a slip jig is in 9/8). It's got a polka feel but is still effectively in 3 for dancing purposes, so take your pick, or alternate. You can hear the full track on last.fm.

Off Kilter: Follow Me Up to Carlow (polka, 149 bpm)
You can decide if you want to leave the trick ending and watch the dancers fumble or not. Fun song, though. I don't see a good place to download their music, so the link is to the CD. You can also hear it if you browse around their site (which has frames, so I can't link directly to anything).

Brave Combo: A Little Bit Irish (waltz, 240 bpm)
As long as they've got a song actually about St. Patrick's Day, we might as well include it, though it's so fast they may have been thinking slow jig rather than waltz. You can hear the song (and lots of others) on their site, and I thought at one point they had free downloads there, too, but I can't find them now.

Editing St. Teresa

Joan Osborne - "St. Teresa"
(Hear it on last.fm, buy it on Amazon or iTunes.)

Rowyn gets the credit for introducing me to this great song, but I'm the one writing about it because I recently used it as practice to learn some basic music editing. (It's 5:20 in the original version, which is a bit much at nearly 170 bpm.)

I'd post my new version here and get feedback on it, but I expect it's not altered enough for someone not to make a copyright fuss about it, so I won't. Talk to me privately if you want to hear it, though. Here's what I did, in case anyone wants some ideas (changes arranged from better to sketchier):

• Removed one verse (2nd) and chorus (1st). That seemed the most expendable part, musically, and it kept the transitions easier.
• Removed first part of the intro, so it starts with the mandolin part. As much as I love the solo (oud? steel guitar?) at the beginning, it seemed easier to do this than to break up the long mandolin section.
• Completely changed the ending. Cut off the last chorus and pasted together a few things after the "tell me" bridge, including the end of the mandolin line and the first few bars that got cut from the beginning. I was trying to get enough stuff there to have a fade out such that you get a little of the falling off a cliff feeling from the dramatic "tell me" line, but not so much that it's an unpleasant end to the dance.

Optional: You could also slow it down about 5% if you want, but I wouldn't do more than that.