Not just another Gypsy band

Every night in Prague, musicians are carting instruments to bars, cafés and concert halls. For local club- and concertgoers, the question is whether the music they hear on any given evening will be just another tragically hip misfit of sonic expression or in fact something more memorable.

Despite a local epidemic of tonal mimicry, there is one ongoing Prague music event that stands out against this background of white noise: The Roma band Gitans never fails to nail their sound, central to its time and place.

The cavernous basement space of PopoCaféPetl, with its brick walls and finely tuned sound system, has been hosting Gitans and their loyal audience nearly every week since 2007. Dressed as sharp as the lilting edge of their sound, the band members can be found every Sunday evening tuning up and joking onstage. They may be casual in their warm-up banter, but as soon as the show starts, Gitans' no-nonsense Roma rhythms drive people to the soon-overcrowded dance floor. Dancing or not, it's clear that everyone within earshot is getting a serious recharge of their musical batteries.

According to Gitans founder Milan Bingác Demeter, the current flows both ways. "Playing in PopoCaféPetl every Sunday is giving us lots of energy," he says. "We never play the same; we always put the emotions we have at the moment into it. Every week, new music ideas are created, and the week after that, the ideas are taken further. Our music develops this way. The home scene is very important for us."

Away from their resident gig, in the birthplace of Liszt and Bartók, where Roma music has historically been given its due more than almost anywhere else, Gitans passed a massive stage litmus test in 2009. At last year's Sziget Festival, Europe's annual Woodstock on the Hungarian Danube, Gitans rocked the festival's 2,000-person capacity Roma venue. And it wasn't only the festival crowd that got excited. Upon exiting the stage, Gitans found Sziget's management eagerly waiting with a contract for a return appearance in 2010.

"The reason is because we put our heart and soul into it," Demeter says when asked why the band elicits such positive responses. Their debut CD, Viva Romale, independently produced in 2005, barely two months after the band was formed, affirms the bands' intense focus. On first listen, what stands out about their signature sound is tightly syncopated rhythms on drums and electric bass, and percussive Spanish guitar. On top of this are cool vocals and burning violin riffs, adequate to cut through any Prague winter fog (mental or otherwise).

On the CD, there are tracks that point to the band's Roma-pop inclinations - no surprise, given that many of Gitans' players are veterans of other Czech Roma acts such as Triny, Kale, Bengas and Ida Kelarova's Romano Rat. Most of the time, though, on CD or onstage, there is a jazz-like precision-meets-soulful-abandon elevating their sound.

But Gitans is definitely not a Django Reinhardt/Stéphane Grappelli clone. "The basis of our music is Czechoslovak traditional Gypsy music, with influences of Balkan, Latino and world music," Demeter says.

For three years running, experiencing Gitans' dynamic progress unfold every week in real time has been one of Prague's lesser-known musical joys. Talking about the future, Demeter is as upbeat as Gitans' sound when he says, "Another CD certainly is in order. As well, we would like to play all the possible regional festivals, tour internationally, show our culture and give the joy of our music to the people."

Darrell Jónsson can be reached at
features@praguepost.com