Miha Hawlina , continued

Traja Brizani

But after a while, he went to play around Europe with some commercial groups. He was also a leader of a commercial group. Under socialism, there was a time when normally-employed workers were paid very badly. He studied to be a dentist, but he left his studies in the third year because at that time, a dentist, highly-educated and everything, would make maybe $150 per month. So he went abroad and he earned money with music. He was paid maybe twenty times more than he could have made as a dentist. But really, he was a musician, not a dentist. He plays every kind of music, he knows every style. Then he met me. My obsession was not money, or some commercial music, anymore - maybe when I was a teenager I wanted to be a pop star or something. (laughter) But soon I saw that I didn't like this kind of life - it's not about music, it's all about promotion, marketing - your smile, your clothes. I didn't like this kind of stuff. My obsession was to find a sound, a funk group. So that's how Amala started.

Traja had two groups - Amadeus, which was commercial pop, and one that was Latin jazz - The Brizani Project. We always mixed this popular music with jazz and Latin elements. He wanted to express himself as a bass player. There were three gypsies in the band, and I said to them, "why do you play Cuban music?" I feel Cuban music is one of the best in the world, but if you want to compare with them, to be like them, you have to be oriented with them. You have to go to Cuba or Brazil, and learn, and learn. You need to be there. You can't play that music here in Slovenia, just like that. There was a year when a Cuban guy, a percussion player, came to Slovenia - and he could play with us, because he knows everything about percussion, and he was a musician. It was, in the beginning, a bit heavy for him to play with us, because the rhythms are different. It was hard, but he was flexible. These musicians who play Latin here in Slovenia, they learned many patterns. And if it's not like it's written, then they're not satisfied or something. So you began to focus more on the gypsy music. But what is bad was, when we first started to play gypsy music, we lost almost all the gypsy musicians. Traja openly said that he is a gypsy, here in Slovenia - he is a fighting person - "I am a gypsy, I have my rights". Traja was a part of solving these problems with gypsies, the social problems. I think he has more experience with gypsies than some Slovenian politicians. So he can say that this policy is not good, or something. So he's active in that. He's not really a politician, he's a musician. But he's a big fighter. He wants to be like this. He knows the problems with being a gypsy. And as a fighter, he could be sometimes, I don't know -

Aggressive?

Maybe, but also in a bad mood or something - angry and frustrated. So this is a bad part of this person who is musically, for me, very clean. I'm not interested in these politics, I'm interested in the music. I'm really sorry because I would like to have more gypsy musicians in this group. If we have some great event, something bigger, then we maybe can import them from Macedonia or somewhere. We have some connections. Traja and I found very good musicians there. They can really improve our sound. They can bring into this group something very interesting. And also, we can be an influence on their own development, because they need to play some other music too, to be better. So this is an idea for our further work. And we'll see. But it's also political, because every musician from Kosovo and Macedonia - not so much from Croatia, but there are not so many gypsies in Croatia - but in Kosovo and Macedonia, maybe half the population are gypsies. They live there, they are part of everyday life, but in Croatia, it's a bit the same as in Slovenia. They aren't a part of the life. But in Macedonia, they teach at the academy, or in the high school - some of them work as journalists, doctors... but here almost none of them have finished the academy.

What do they do here?

They do kind of low-level jobs. I think the normal Slovenian wants to see gypsies as if they are part of a ghetto, doing these things like asking for money, begging... Traja would like to be an example, to show that gypsies can do something. But it's very heavy for him, I think. He feels very sorry for his brother, who finished the academy for classical music, and who also played in symphonic orchestra of Ljubljana for many years. But never at full employment. He was always a guest musician. He played during the whole season, for five or six years. Then a young Slovenian guy was hired as the permanent guy. Traja's brother wasn't really a fighter.

Not motivated?

He was motivated, but even though he felt something wrong was going on, he couldn't fight. He just became sad and frustrated. And then he played also pop and jazz - he also played with Slovenian Big Band but he never got into it. I don't think he was a bad drummer or something, he really had the groove, but you can't develop if someone is always putting you in a bad position. Then he went to do some other things, and didn't practice... that was the situation with him. So he left music and he went into business as a picture framer. And now, he is good. Before he was always complaining, but now he is good. You know, there is a problem with Slovenia. We are a small country. We are two million, and maybe 500,000 of the two million are from the South - from Croatia, everywhere. So we feel a bit, maybe -

Invaded?

Yes, like in the future too many of them will come in. I don't want to get into politics. But it's a part of our problems in the group. When we started to play gypsy music, the drummer and the guitar player went away. The children in the school were being told, "Look what your father does, what kind of music does he play?" Before, they played pop, and it was OK. But now... they are also married to Slovenian women, and it was a bit like, "Why did you suddenly change your music?" They felt bad. They felt like, why should we do this when we can have a normal life - And be assimilated. Yes. And maybe I also feel uncomfortable somewhere, if we play in some part, like Gorenjska, where they just listen to polka, and then we come, this Slovenian group, and we're playing Balkan music.

Do you get strange vibes from people when you do that?

Yes. Even though it's not traditional Balkan, we put some jazz, we do something else - but there are some older people who don't understand this. Sometimes they will complain.

Really!

Yes, of course. And some of my colleagues in the Big Band, they complain - when they get drunk or something, on some tour, they get drunk and they complain to me about the music. "What kind of music do you play? You play bad music! This is not our music." Even though in the Big Band we don't play Slovenian music - maybe sometimes some pop - but we play Latin, all kinds of things - and that is not our music! But they tell me, "You play bad music." But I play what is in my heart, for me. I think in America, if I was there, I would play jazz. But here, I met gypsy musicians, so I play with them. In America, in the beginning when jazz started, no white man played jazz!

Right.

But some of them went to listen to jazz, and they started to play jazz - first, they were not so good, but after a while, they were, and it became white music too, not just black music. Then, after many years, for example with Miles Davis, the black and white musicians were mixed together. This is also an issue for Traja - he wants to get a lot of gypsies in the band. And I have seen many, many really good gypsy players with a lot of innovation, they could improvise for like four days and it's not boring. I know many of these musicians. We just have to pull them a bit from their own mentality, or character. They don't need to be educated - they are perfect musicians. They are educated, but their education is different. It's not from a classical music school. But because of this, they feel a bit that they are something less. They don't know so much about playing from the notes - but they practice 7 or 9 or 12 hours a day. Like the greatest jazz performers do. They know how to play in every tonality, every one of these traditional styles. They are better, even, than professional musicians. I feel less of a musician than they are. They are really good. They should be somewhere. They should be more famous.

Why aren't they?

I think one reason is that normally, record companies and promoters, if they find some traditional gypsies who are good, then it's OK. But if they find some gypsy musicians who do something different, some mixture or something, they're not so interested. It's not so "folkloric", and that's what they're interested in. I think maybe distributors of this kind of music or something, they never really listen to the music, I think they're listening to someone's opinions. They need to hear from other people that we are OK. Then they will sell our CDs. If not, we don't have a chance to come in. Here in Slovenia, we have promoters of world music, and jazz music, but they import stuff. To export, to find something good and high-quality in Slovenian music - they're not interested. Jazz promoters are bigger stars than jazz musicians here. You are really something if you are a jazz promoter. You have connections. Miles Davis wrote an autograph on your jacket, or something, so you feel important.

It's a connection to the rest of the world, or something...

But they did a lot for music, I have to say. At the festivals they organize, I can go and listen to the greatest musicians in the world. I'm really pleased with that. But I think they can be more interested in the music that is happening here, in their own country.

How many of the gypsy-style songs that you do are originals, and how many are adaptations?

In the beginning, on the first CD, there are only three or four originals, and the others were arrangements of traditional music. We still play some traditional songs. And the Romish people accept the way we play the traditional music, so I'm very happy. We can play everything, from classical to jazz to pop, so it's really a mixture. But we've started to do it in a way that everything comes from the gypsy tradition. You could put everything in it. And the words, there can be also some Slovenian in between, or some English. If the guy from Cuba came, he could also sing in his language. We are really very open. But unfortunately, there are just two of us behind this band - Traja and me. The others play with us, but they're not into the band as much. They play with many groups, more popular stuff. The drummer plays with many commercial singers. But he also studied jazz and he wants to be a better musician. He wants to study these gypsy patterns, these Balkan rhythms. But he needs to study. Traja is the best player in the rhythm section. You need someone who knows, not someone who is just educated. And the gypsies, they hear music better than Slovenians, I can say. Slovenians are like Germans - very organized, but...

Is it hard to find the right Slovenian musicians for the band?

Almost the whole time in his life in Slovenia, Traja lives with this problem. Because he could not pay the real professional musicians. He is always looking for younger ones, younger, younger. But hey need to be educated. And when they become educated, they become professionals. When they are performing with us, the musicians in the audience say, "Hey, this is a good guitar player, let's take him." So that's also our frustration. Traja is angry - he says to them, "Why don't you feel this music like we do?" But I tell him, look, we just have to work. But I must say, it is a problem. There are not so many good musicians in Ljubljana. For our work, we need more of them. So sometimes we are thinking to go abroad. But we have families, we have everything here. I don't know - it's a bit strange. We're also used to a good living - going to seaside, going skiing, you know. A nice life. In Slovenia, the best opportunity you have is to have a nice life. But if you want to do something else, you have to go abroad.

To have a big career?

Yes, something like that. If you are a dentist, you can maybe earn money to survive here, nowadays. You can have a private practice, then earn money and spend it. That's not a problem. But if you want to be a success in some art, you need to go abroad. It's easier, sometimes, for a poet, or a painter, or a dancer, because he is alone. But for a musician in a big group.... We played in some festivals abroad, and always when we played, people said, "Oh you are perfect, super, maybe we will arrange some recordings for you," but then we came back and nothing happened. Maybe a phone call. To organize these things is very hard. So it is part of our ambition - first is the music, and the second is to play abroad, maybe to live abroad.

You said the Romish people accept your music - what is their reaction?

We played about a month ago in Skopje, and in Skopje there is an area, a quarter of the city, named šutka, where gypsies live. This is the center, the roots of Balkan gypsy playing. Everything starts there. It's like Nashville for country music in America. So in our concert there were many people, musicians, coming from this section of the city. And they were really very satisfied with our music. You know, sometimes I feel like I'm stealing the music from them, or something - it's not mine - it's not Slovenian. But the gypsies, the Romish, they are listening to me like I am one of them. And this makes me very happy. It never happened that a gypsy musician told me that something is wrong. I read the book by Miles Davis, one of the biggest musicians in the world. He played with white musicians, and he always had some problems, both with white and with black musicians, because he played with white guys. And he could be very nasty to a white musician if he stole black music -

And pretended it was his.

This is their frustration - they create the music, then the white man comes and steals it and becomes famous, becomes a rich star. But if this would happen with me, I would stop playing this music. If we play traditional music, we don't vandalize it. We really respect the music. And Traja also, he doesn't want to do this. Because he is a gypsy he is really sensitive about this. So the balance works. And now in šutka, we are the number one group. Because there were some musicians, I think Turkish, who did this music with some jazz influences, and they were very popular there. And I think one of these groups is very good. But now the people in šutka say, AMALA!

That's good!

They came to listen to our arrangements of their traditional music and they wanted to hear it again and again. They came on the stage, fifty of them, and were dancing, and asking for more, more... we also made a song, "šutka", a tribute to this place. I feel comfortable with the native gypsies, from the south part, the roots of Macedonia - I don't know, they like me or something. I am one of them, they appreciate me. Traja also calls me - you know this phrase, the Indians called their white friends their "white brothers". Traja calls me this - "white brother". But for me, I don't know - I would really listen to these gypsy musicians - my opinion is that they are really great, and I am not. I'm maybe OK, but not great. But they play it as it should be. And maybe sometime we will play in Skopje and some of these best musicians which I like in gypsy music will come and play to our music. That would be great. And this is enough for me.

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MP3 ( __KB)

Miha and Traja in Maribor

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