This is Rumania

This is Rumania
Parliament, PLP 119
New York, 1960

We've seen it all before; when the first word in the subtitle spells "authentic", it's most likely far from it. In the case of This is Rumania it's really not that far but yet far enough. The recordings were probably made in Romania (Rumania, as it used to be spelled) but were not made by the people of the land but by their stars and professionals. It is not folk music as the sleeve claims, but professional entertainment. In comparison with an authentic record (such as Folk Music of Rumania on Folkways, with recordings made by Bela Bartok) we hear some of the same melodies and rhythms but they are orchestrated and arranged. And unlike on the Bela Bartok one, the singers have of course perfect pitch here. As we've seen before too on so many records found in the thrift stores I've been writing about, two of the four solo vocal performers on This is Rumania have the first name Maria. I have quite a collection of singers named Maria, and it grows unproportionally fast. One of the Marias is the singer Maria Tanase, she is not new in my collection, but the other one, Maria Lataretu (1911-1972) I had never heard of before. That is not to say she wasn't a celebrity, she was, she has her own Wikipedia page if may use that as a criterion for famous. Maria Lataretu is the singer on the sample from the record I selected. The title La Vitai La Rasarit is translated on the sleeve as "I was looking eastwards..." and on the label as "I looked to the sunrise".

Boogie Woogie

Pete Johnson/Albert Ammons – 8 to the Bar
Two Piano Boogie Woogie for Dancing
Victor Records P-69, RCA Victor, 1941

Sixth Avenue is a street that probably exists in every city in every English speaking country, yet seeing the title Sixth Avenue Express on a jazz record you just know it's Sixth Avenue in New York City. I mentioned last week the purchase of this 78 rpm 4-record set by Pete Johnson and Albert Ammons. It contains eight sides with boogie woogie piano music, issued as a dance album. And danceable they are, from the slow moving walking-speed Walkin' the Boogie, to the fast pace subway train-speed of Sixth Avenue Express, all make your fingers snap and your toes tap. Pete Johnson and Albert Ammons are two of the three (with Meade Lux Lewis) great boogie woogie pianists, a craze that started in 1938 with a concert by Ammons and Johnson and lasted through the early 1940s. You can listen to Sixth Avenue Express below and download it here.

78 Discs

Wilmoth Houdini – Calypsos
Decca Album No. 78
Made in the U.S.A.
Recorded 9/11/1939 in New York 

Decca Album No. 78, inside

Decca Album No. 78, back

When I look for records at thrift stores I always check out the 78 discs but hardly ever do I come home with one. Hardly ever do I find a title I'm interested in and if I do it's usually in such a bad condition that I have to leave it behind. Often I don't even bother to look at those records without a protective sleeve. I am amazed how some (bloggers) still come up with so many treasures and baffled by the posts on (for example) Excavated Shellac. Where the heck do all those records come from? I've been looking for them discs for over a decade but gathered only about a 100 of them: an album with Latvian (classical) discs, some interesting C&W (Hank Williams, Lester Flatt, Roy Acuff, a/o), and I only found one blues disc ever (Tampa Red). Yesterday however I picked up some nice discs, one by Carmen Miranda, and a 4 disc album by Pete Johnson and Albert Ammons. I leave that for next week as I forward now the nicest album of my modest 78 collection: Decca Album No. 78.

The full title of it is Decca Presents A Special Collection of the World-Famous Music of Trinidad by Wilmoth Houdini and His Royal Calypso Orchestra. It's a beautifully packaged  three disc album. Half of the six songs on it deal with some current events of 1939, the year it was recorded. I love that about Calypso music, how their songs are so often narratives on topics that were talked about by the people in the streets. To share with you here I selected The Welcome of Their Majesties, which talks about the first ever visit of British Royalty to the U.S.

Trémolos

La Familia Santiago – Trémolos y Alabanzas
Grabaciones Genesis, GR-LP-3

Cristóbal Santiago, San José, Puerto Rico, 1972

Trémolos y Alabanzas is only the third record to appear on the Puerto Rican label Genesis. I wonder how many records Cristóbal Santiago ended up producing before the label would go belly up. Father Cristóbal Santiago recorded this record with his wife Rosa Viruet de Santiago, and their children Milagros, Wifredo, Altagracia, and Rosita. There are also appearances Raffi Amaro and Los Embajadores de Luz on this record. On the photo (above) the four children all look to be about the same age, I wonder what they're doing these days, 40 years after performing in church with their father. Do they still play mandolin? Do they still perform in church? The record is signed and dedicated to Hector Graciani and his fiance Doria Encarna, there's an address and phone number on the label, but whatever I type into a search box I don't get any results that link to this record. I like it when musicians have absolutely no presence on the internet; everything I write here about the Santiago family will be a first. And I can do no better than to make a few assumptions.  

There's something about Christian records that makes me want to revert irony, sarcasm, or even ridicule, when discussing the music. But you gotta believe me that this is something about me, and not about them, the Santiago family. It's me, raised a Christian, and no matter how well I realize the hypocrisy of it all, there remains more than just a little bit of a Christian in me. 

Below you'll find the title track of the record that was written by Cristóbal Santiago.

Legend of the Jivaro

Yma Sumac – Legend of the Jivaro
Capitol Records T770, 1957
Conducted by Moises Vivanco

A shrunken head speaks to the imagination. It represents the fear for the most unruly tribes of the world. Like the big human cooking pots from Africa, cannibalism in New Guinea, shrunken heads became part of the folklore of the Western world. The custom of shrunken heads was practiced by the tribes of the northeastern Amazon forest, including areas of Peru. I've seen a shrunken head once in a museum and that image certainly became etched in my brain. A year ago I found a postcard with a shrunken head image on it at a thrift store and now I own a record with a shrunken head on it. It is Legend of the Jivaro by Yma Sumac. If it's a real shrunken head hanging in front of Yma Sumac I do not know. The use of the word authenticity in the first sentence of the liner notes is usually a red flag. The claims made in the first paragraph of this text is that Sumac learned the songs from the notorious headhunters and that her voice is accompanied by "exotic native instrumental settings". The latter is certainly not true as the instrumentation is mostly the common western orchestra, occasionally embellished with some pan flutes or conga drums. Sumac herself was considered by many a hoax in the day (the 1950s) as it was rumored that she was a certain Amy Camus (Yma Sumac spelled backwards) who was born in Brooklyn. But her persona was authentic, she was born as Zoila Augusta Emperatriz Chávarri del Castillo in Peru, and by the Peruvian government officially considered an Inca princess with direct ancestry to Atuhualpa. Hoax or not, she certainly had a magnificent voice that could reach up to five octaves. I selected two songs of hers to share with you today: Wanka (The Seven Winds), from the Legend of the Jivaro album, and Chuncho from Inca Taqui (Chants of the Incas). At the same time I was preparing this post I also painted Sumac's portrait to include in my Top 100 blog:
 http://berrystop100.blogspot.com/

The song Chuncho is found on my list The 100 Greatest Recordings Ever at #41.