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Written in Folk Roots issue 38, 1986


OSKORRI
Hau Hermosurie!
Elkar ELK78 (1985)

GANBARA
Banan-Banan
Elkar ELK113 (1985)

AMAIA ZUBIRIA & PASCAL GAIGNE
Egun Argi Hartan
Elkar ELK97 (1985)

BENITO LERTXUNDI
Gaueko Ele Ixilen Baladak
Elkar ELK81 (1985)

ANTONIO BRESCHI
Bezulari
Elkar ELK101 (1985)

Here's a bunch of releases from the Basque label Elkar (which has been advertising in F.R. lately, so see the ads for information as to how to get hold of them). All are worth a listen, but the most notable, I reckon, are those by two bands, Oskorri and Ganbara, and a duo, Amaia Zubiria and Pascal Gaigne.

      The last Oskorri album I reviewed was on the German label Folk Freak, and showed a band drawing on the sounds of the European folk revival to interpret new and traditional Basque material and make strong statements regarding national awareness and pride, while producing music melodic and witty enough to satisfy the non-Basque. That there is now a native Basque label for this release is in itself a sign of progress.
      Hau Hermosurie! ('What A Beauty!') features, as before, an ethnic/mainstream instrumental blend, and such items as a new Basque sword dance tune, a song about sheer hell in a Paris office job, another about the fiddler lounging in Ibiza and missing a gig, variations on a Navarran bagpipe tune, a perhaps unhelpfully bitter twisting of the Lord's Prayer, and themes for a cartoon film and a TV puppet show. (I'll try to forget about the presumably crowd-pleasing union of Clementine with Kalinka as album closer). Philosophically the band is in the spirit of Runrig; in sound it's nearer to Malicorne or perhaps Makám és Kolinda. The sleeve, in the grand Morris On/XTC tradition of dressing-up, contains, together with multilingual translations of the lyrics, a combined poster and calendar for 1985 (in Basque, of course).

      Ganbara isn't as overtly political as Oskorri, nor, yet, as distinctive. It does have a fine singer, Maria Eugenia Etxeberria. Side one is mainly slightly limp folk-soft-rock. Side two is much better, opening with an energetic and much more solid traditional instrumental featuring crumhorns and the like, fiddle, flute, Appalachian dulcimer, guitars, synths and rhythm section. The improvement is maintained to the end of the album, covering a straight pop song, a traditional ballad, and the title track, Banan-Banan ('One By One').

      Another ballad, in fact what seems to be a Basque version of The Bonny Hind, appears on the album by singer Amaia Zubiria and guitarist Pascal Gaigne. Amaia's voice is light at the top end, husky at the bottom, elegantly controlled. Gaigne uses acoustic and electric guitars and guitar-synth, as well as bandoneon, with imagination and fine technique. Session musicians add sax, clarinets, bass, piano and whatever "eskusoinua" means. (2009 note: it means recording engineering). Material is virtually all traditional in source. A very musicianly album.

      None of the foregoing artists exhibits the ailment of bursting into portentous speech, which seems to be part of a Celtic Twilight, or Mists of Antiquity, syndrome. Two who do, Benito Lertxundi and Antonio Breschi, seem to have caught it from each other, since they feature on each other's albums and share a number of session musicians. The complete syndrome seems more advanced in Breschi.
      Lertxundi has a very pleasant voice, and Gaueco Ele Ixilen Baladak is a very accomplished album. Most of his songs are about love and poetry and dreams and stuff, one is traditional, and one says he wishes he felt like Leonard Cohen, and encourages the women of the Basque country and of Ireland to fight the future with songs, sleeping in the grass harp's shadow, and their sons will be Bretons. Perhaps it loses in the translation.
      Antonio Breschi isn't Basque, he's from Florence. The publicity blurb suggests he is the Keith Jarrett of folk. He's certainly made a lot of albums, the first few with a band called Whisky Trail, and most having Irish references. Some of his musicians are Irish, he seems to have heard Alan Stivell, and probably Andreas Vollenweider. Like Keith Jarrett, he plays the piano. All tunes are comp. Breschi. In a sleeve note Benito Lertxundi asks, "Could he be a Druid, lost on the crossroads back in the night of time, when the Atlantic grew ... ?"

      A mixed bunch of records, then, with a bottom line of extreme competence in musicianship, production and packaging, indicating healthy developments in a beautiful and exciting country with a living tradition many of whose features have connections in Britain.

     
© 1986 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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