LAÇO TAYFA & HÜSNÜ ŞENLENDİRİCİ

Laço Tayfa represents a new synthesis within the Turkish Roma (Gypsy) tradition. Under the leardership of clarinetist Hüsnü Şenlendirici, Laço Tayfa brings Turkish regional folk music into dialogue with contemporary world music styles, fired by a driving Roma improvisational style known as “doğaçlama”.

Hüsnü Şenlendirici comes from a family of musicians from the Turkish Aegean coastal town of Bergama, where local Roma musicians play for local inhabitants of different ethnic groups.

Interestingly, in this area Roman musicians play versions of brass band instruments. A typical traditional wedding band consists of clarinet, trumpet, snare drum and a double-headed folk bass drum called “davul”. The Şenlendirici family has consisted of musicians playing clarinet and trumpet for generations, hence the meaning of their last name, “the ones who create celebrations”. Hüsnü's grandfather played trumpet and clarinet, while his father, Ergün, became a highly celebrated trrumpet player who moved out of the regional wedding circuit to join studio, conccert and touring musicians working out of İstanbul.

 After training at the state music conservatory in Istanbul, Hüsnü joined his father in concerts and recording with world music artists such as Okay Temiz, touring Europe and United States. Hüsnü also particapted in local avant-garde experiments, such as the fusing of Roma improvisatory style, Turkish melodies and Western classical and jazz harmonies, as pioneered by Engin Düzyol. While seeking new musical challenges, Hüsnü remanins grounded in local Roma and Turkish urban styles, performing at weddings, with urban singing stars at concerts and on recordings.

For this project with Laço Tayfa, Hüsnü works with tradional folk material from each of the regions of Turkey, using signature Roma tunes as a basis for a new synthesis which incorporates jazz harmonies, riffs and textures with Indian tabla as well as North African and Arabic rhythmic patterns. In this repertoire, Hüsnü also presents sounds from his native region, such as 9/8 meter Roma wedding pieces with driving melodic solos in the Aegean style, the melody of an (zeybek Aegean folk dance form ) known as Harmandalı “ ” with solo clarinet and davul in the manner of a neighborhood wedding and an impassioned interpretation of an Aegean urban folk song, Izmir'in kavakları.

Within traditional treatments of these diverse regional styles Hüsnü embeds new improvisations. Thus the Black Sea piecces maintain the characteristic parallel 4th harmonies, but add suprising twists and silences. The Rumeli (Turkish Balkan) repertoire of Deryalar and Ramize incorporate Roma Macedonian harmonies in 3rds. The Central Anatolian tune from Fidayda is performed in the baðlama style characteristic of its origins, but moves into an electro-baðlama solo which imitates guitar. The musicians joining Hüsnü in Laço Tayfa are from Bergama and İzmir.

The most recent album by the band Hicaz Dolap came out in October 2002 where Laço Tayfa cretaes a unique sound composed of incongruous melodic structures such as the seventies funk improvisations and jazz, belly dancing piece and dark ballads.

Delicate and almost invisible bonus remixes by Mercan Dede adds the quality of a travelogue to Hicaz Dolap. Laço Tayfa continues to perform and tour within Turkey and abroad where they did a concert in May 2002 at Central Park in New York City.

Furthermore, Laço Tayfa was recently heard on Brooklyn Funk Essential's In Buzzbag, a syncretic project bringing hip hop, funk reggae, and rap genres into dialogue with Turkish music and improvisation.

Laço Tayfa :
Nurhat Şensesli (bas),
Volkan Öktem (davul),
Caner Tepecik (klavye),
Mehmet Akatay (perküsyon),
Nuri Lekesizgöz (kanun),
Ergun Hepbildik (keman),
Özkan Alıcı (bağlama),
Hüsnü Şenlendirici (klarneet)

12 July, Monday - Othello Tower - 9.00 pm.