John Zorn and The Cracow Klezmer Band
Balan: Book Of Angels Volume 5

Klezmer is the outcome of the fusion of the Hebrew words kley and zemer, and ultimately means making music. Klezmer is the instrumental folk music, but also not, of the Jews of Eastern Europe. And it is precisely in Krakow, Poland, that John Zorn, who has become the most passionate experimenter of the mix between klezmer music and jazz, discovers the Cracow Klezmer Band. In 2006, he composes for them the fifth volume of the Book Of Angels called Balan. The Krakow klezmer band consists of four members: Jaroslaw Bester on bayan (Russian button accordion), Jaroslaw Tyrala on violin, Oleg Dyyak on percussion, and Wojciech Front on double bass, who on this album are joined by other musicians responsible for adding vocals and electronics to the mix.

So, don't expect the electric twists of Secret Chief 3 here, the field of experimentation is entirely different. Take the purely klezmer setup and drug it with Zornian madness. "Zuriel" is a nervous and folk dance, where the violin and bayan soar in sharp flights, with a drop of contaminating electronics sneaking in, screeching in the ears. Right from the first notes of "Suria", the twisted side of Zorn freely makes itself heard, with the double bass gradually coming in, followed by synthetic sobs and watery percussion, and Jorgos Skolias becomes the Yamatsuka Eye of folk, with unsettling vocal counterpoints, whispered beneath a beautiful melody supported by the bayan, until it turns into a truly sick song at the end.

The speed and madness of the brilliant "Kadosh" are splendid, where frantic violins clash with irritating synths and a taut accordion to form a piece of authentic extreme classical music, symphonies like razor blades. "Jehoel" is an unsettling ballad for bayan, where suggestions of darkness creep in, creating tensions at the edge of tolerance. The jazz side takes shape in the obsessive double bass line of "Aniel", inviting a crazy dance, where the free forms of the solo instruments make the steps impossible, in a nervous and powerful crescendo.

"Hey klezmorim, good guys! I'll offer you a drink, play a cheerful song to take away the sadness! play a cheerful song play a sad song; the flute groans, the violin moans, everything around seems to cry!"