NY Roma-Gypsy Film Fest ’09: Gypsy Caravan

Life on the road is a fact of life for musicians of all genres, not just Roma artists. Yet, when the World Music Institute put together the Gypsy Caravan Tour of “five bands from four countries speaking nine languages” it posed some obvious logistical challenges. However, as documented in Jasmine Dellal’s documentary, Gypsy Caravan: When the Road Bends (trailer here), the resulting headaches apparently were confined to the producers and promoters, with a spirit of camaraderie prevailing among the musicians, which makes it a fitting film to close the NY Roma-Gypsy Film Festival on Friday evening.

Over the course of their American tour, the Caravan ensembles learned to mix their diverse styles from three European countries and the original Roma homeland, India, into a new fusion of Roma music. Having been officially awarded the title: “Queen of Gypsy Music,” Macedonian Esma Redzepova was arguably the senior member of the tour. She was joined by the Romanian groups, Fanfare Ciocarlia, a brass band with a hint of klezmer, and Taraf de Haïdouks (Band of Brigands), a somewhat jazz-influenced string and accordion band, led at the time by the distinguished violinist Nicolae Neascu. Antonio El Pipa’s Ensemble also added to the tour’s diversity representing Roma-rooted flamenco music, eventually collaborating with the Indian company Maharaja for some quite distinctive Spanish-Indian flamenco—world music indeed.

If there was any backstage drama, Dellal declined to show it. Instead, she focuses on the music, which is what the tour was all about anyway. There are some great musical sequences, including vintage groovy 1960’s television footage of Redzepova. Sadly, the charming Neascu, who seemed to greatly enjoy his late-in-life popularity, passed away shortly after returning from the Caravan tour. As a result, probably the most emotional scenes in Caravan come as his fellow musicians pay their respects during his memorial.

In filming Caravan, Dellal attained the services of both an aspiring documentarian and an acclaimed master. George Eli whose debut film Searching for the 4th Nail again previews at this year’s NY Roma-Gypsy FF on Wednesday, provided translation services and on-screen commentary. Remarkably, Dellal’s primary cinematographer was the celebrated Albert Maysles of Grey Gardens and Gimme Shelter fame.

Caravan does indeed look and sound great. It is a spirited film that has become a closing night tradition for the festival. It wraps up the NY Roma-Gypsy Film Fest this Friday (10/9) at Mehanata Bulgarian Bar, concluding a full week of screenings.

NY Roma-Gypsy Film Fest ’09: Holocaust documentaries

Steven Spielberg’s Schindler’s List was undeniably a landmark film, but it was predated by several other significant films primarily documenting the Jewish Holocaust experience, like Alain Resnais’s Night and Fog, Claude Lanzmann’s Shoah, and NBC’s Holocaust miniseries. However, films examining the Sinti-Roma Holocaust experience have yet to penetrate the public’s consciousness to a comparable degree, which is why the NY Roma-Gypsy Film Festival always dedicates a significant portion of their programming to this important subject.

Produced in 1989 for the BBC’s Inside Report, George Case’s The Forgotten Holocaust (which screened last night) still holds up remarkably well, despite the Communist era travel restrictions and resulting access limitations faced by the filmmakers. Its early narration reaffirms the extraordinarily unique nature of the Jewish Holocaust, asserting that also observing the Roma experience does not diminish the former. Rather, it only compounds the guilt of the National Socialists.

Forgotten remains an important film document thanks to the testimony it recorded from survivors, many of whom are most likely no longer with us. Particularly memorable are the experiences of two assimilated Sinti brothers who were summarily discharged from the German military and shipped directly to Auschwitz. Forgotten’s historical consultant Prof. Michael Stewart also gave an informative address following the screening, sharing further stories of Sinti survivors.

Screening Tuesday (10/6), Alexandra Isles’s Porraimos takes its name from the Romany word for “devouring,” which some have adopted as an equivalent term for “Shoah.” It also provides an informative overview of the 1938-1945 period, during which time at least 600,000 Roma and Sinti individuals were murdered by the National Socialists. Isles emphasizes the twisted interest in eugenics shared by Menegele and his protégés that motivated scores of senselessly cruel experiments. The evil doctor evidently had a particular obsession with the Romany people, despite as Isles points out, his own dark, somewhat Roma looking features.

Like Hilary Helstein’s recent As Seen Through These Eyes, Porraimos interviews two significant artist-survivors. Karl Stojka, born into a Roman Catholic Roma family, survived Auschwitz to record his experiences on his canvass. Dina Gottliebova Babbit, later a Hollywood animator, speaks of surviving through her artistic skills, painting Roma portraits as part of Mengele’s bizarre research.

Far more specific in scope, Michelle Kelso’s Hidden Sorrows (screening tonight, 10/3) concentrates on the Romanian Roma, giving special attention the survivors’ current living conditions. With little fanfare, the German government and a Swiss banking consortium announced a narrow window for Romanian Roma survivors to claim, not reparations, but humanitarian assistance. Director Kelso documents her efforts to find survivors and help them prove their eligibility for the paltry funds. The figures involved were $770 from the Swiss and $500 from the Germans for years of slave labor in the Transistria concentration camps.

It is disturbing how many wish to minimize, obscure, or even outright deny the events that took place in Transistria and the rest of Nazi-dominated Europe during the Holocaust. One hopes more festivals will program these documentaries championed by the NY Roma Gypsy Film Festival, which continues through Friday (10/9) at the Mehanata Bulgarian Bar.

NY Roma Gypsy FF ‘09: Guca & Maya

As dazzling as Django Reinhardt truly was there is more to the Roma-Sinti musical tradition than just Hot Club-style jazz. Indeed, Roma music is remarkably diverse, varying significantly by region, which is effectively illustrated in several films screening at the 2009 New York Roma Gypsy Film Festival, a refreshingly relaxed fest now in its third year.

Last night, the festival kicked-off with an unscheduled profile of the great flamenco dancer and choreographer Mario Maya. Though often mislabeled Spanish, flamenco is actually an Andalusian music developed by the Spanish Roma “Gitano” population. The innovative Maya integrated aspects of modern dance with the traditional flamenco forms dating back to the 1800’s, resulting in some spectacular performances, including the dramatic “Martinette” produced for Carlos Saura’s Flamenco.

While Maya’s Granada flamenco scene looks like a tightly-knit cooperative community, the Serbian Guča trumpet festival is most definitely a cutting contest. Once a year, the country’s top trumpeters join in serious battle, as captured in Milivoj Ilic’s documentary, Guča: the Serbian Woodstock., an Untold Story (trailer here), which makes a return engagement at the festival this coming Thursday.

The Guča festival showcases the traditional brass band music of western Serbia and the more Roma influenced Sevdah music from the Southern and Eastern provinces (as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina). Since Sevdah music is considered freer and more spontaneous than the western Serbian style, one of member of the festival jury likens the differences between the two forms to the distinction between Dixieland and genuine New Orleans style jazz.

Though not at all jazz, the music of Guča should be readily accessible to jazz ears, particularly those who follow the New Orleans brass band scene or frequently hear Slavic Soul Party at Barbès. Again like jazz, there seem to be definite notions of authenticity regarding the music. An ethnomusicologist who serves as the film’s expert commentator clearly favors the more traditional bands, offering criticism of past champion Boban Marković for diluting his music with commercial elements.

Sports comparisons are particularly apt for Guča because this is certainly not just an exhibition. The Golden Trumpet audience award, the festival jury’s First Trumpet award, and several other prizes are at stake. As documented by Ilic, it seems the bands of the 2005 festival are nearly evenly matched, making it difficult to forecast a winner. As one Guča fan puts it: “Music and sport make a nation.” Indeed, those who excel in each are uniquely capable of making emotional connections with scores of people they will never know. In Ilic’s film, all kinds of connections are apparently made at Guča.

More than anything, Guča looks like a heck of a party. The usually sleepy rural Serbian town attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors (including Miles Davis one year) to dig those crazy sidewise looking Dragačevo trumpets. Ilic nicely conveys that festival spirit, filming revelers passed out on park benches and the hoods of cars. Clearly, the music and carnival atmosphere has had a restorative effect for the troubled country and makes for an enjoyable music documentary. It screens this coming Thursday (10/8), as the NY Roma Gypsy Film Fest continues at Mehanata Bulgarian Bar in Manhattan’s Lower Eastside.