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Questions and general feedback

Lou Kash 30 Comments

Sometimes I receive e-mails with questions about Czech music. While that’s generally okay and I appreciate your interest in this subject, I thought it might be a good idea to make these questions publicly available in the future. Hence this post. This is the place where you can ask or comment on a topic regarding Czech and Slovak pop and jazz music, if you can’t find a dedicated post for it (yet).
At some future time I might also reactivate the phpbb forum on my web server, as it would be probably the more appropriate place. But first I need to find and install some good anti-spam plug-ins…
Feel free to ask your questions or give general feedback to this blog in the comments to this post. It will have a permanent link in the sidebar, so you can easily access it after it slips off the front page.

Posted in Funky Czech-In, Interlude

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30 Comments

  1. Anonymous

    A hockey team I help-out with will host a team from the Czech Rep. in March. These are youth teams and I am hoping to foster tons of international goodwill. So I wonder if you or your readers might have some suggestions for music to play between periods and between whistles. Sports music in the US is its own lexicon (Gary Glitter for a goal, Pump Up the Jam for everything else…). Would you know of anything readily available that might be good? I have some music already on file (Sto Zivrat, for example, and Plastic People…), but I don’t want unwittingly to play something that would get us into trouble. More importantly, I thought there might be a set of Czech sports-music must-haves that I might look for.

  2. Lou Kash

    Hi Anonymous, well, generally I go with the old saying “no sports” thus I have no idea about ice hockey rites in the first place except that I assume that those guys must have a flair for suffering physical pain, otherwise they wouldn’t be likely doing it…

    Sto zvířat are great, one of the best Czech ska combos. My wife is quite a fan of them, although she understands only very little Czech. As for the Plastic People, I think you can play a really depressive one in case those Czechs get beaten up, so they can suffer a bit more. Or if you have their song Samson, you can play it for them if they would be playing too sleepy; the lyrics go like “Samson! Wake up!” :)

  3. Anonymous

    I was “no sport” myself until dragged into it by my son. “Samson” it is! Maybe I’ll add some vintage Lou Reed just to boost morale.

    For the national anthem, Stravinski.

    Flamengo was a real revelation, by the way. Thanks!

  5. Anonymous

    I wasn’t going to pester you any more, but I see I was too cryptic for my own good (commenting on blogs while half-asleep = bad idea). My train of thought:

    I have to play both the U.S. and Czech Anthems. I already have copies of the Czech Anthem (and will add yours to the list), but wanted to use the Stravinski StarSpangledBanner. But then I thought OH NO, I can’t do that. Images of Russian tanks, tension, international incident. I abandoned the plan and got a copy of some military brass band’s straightforward rendition of the SSB. UNTIL I found that “On May 15, 2002 The National Symphony Orchestra Washington performed [Stravinsky’s] arrangement of The Star-Spangled Banner at a concert dedicated in memory of the victims of 11 September 2001 at the 57th Prague Spring International Music Festival. The concert was under the patronage of the Embassy of the United States of America and U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic, Craig R. Stapleton, was present.” Whether that would absolve me of insensitivity is another matter, but at least I might have been understood by someone able to recognize a flat seventh while standing at center-ice. THAT’s what I meant. Thanks again!

    (ps. a coaches daughter has been enlisted to sing the US anthem a capella. That settles that!)

  6. Eurocovers

    Hello

    It may be a little of topic but I am searching and investigating covers of Eurovision songs. And with the Czech republic entering the Eurovision stage i have been trying to find out details and songs. I found several by the likes of Judita Čeřovská, Hana Zagorova, Yvetta Simonová, Yvetta Blanarovicová and Helena Vondrackova. As for Slovak version I only know 3 by Tatjana Hubinská and Jana Procházková.

    I would love to exchange music and details and try to find out more about Czech and Slovak singers who made these coverversions. So if anyone can help I’d be very thankfull. I’ll gladly share my findings too of course.

    I have a blogspot completely devoted to the subject of Eurocovers at http://www.eurocovers.blogspot.com

  7. Lou Kash

    Hello Eurocovers, there have certainly been many Czech versions of various Eurovision songs, but I don’t know most of the originals in the first place. :)

    For sure I have the Czech version of Poupée De Cire: Vosková panenka by Eva Pilarová from 1966. As far as I can tell it hasn’t been reissued on CD yet.

    If you can point me to a list of those songs in question, I can “czech it out”.

    By the way, since I was a kid I hated “Já půjdu tam a ty tam” by Vondráčková & Korn…

  8. Petr Horcicka aka Petasonic

    Uz jsem si te zalinkoval na blogu.
    Mel jsem par otazek ale radsi si to tady nejdriv vsechno proctu abych se te neptal zbytecne. Pisu cesky protoze moje anglictina je mizerna. Snad rozumis cesky.
    Fuck parada blog :-) danke schön!

  9. Lou Kash

    Ahoj Petasonicu. Česky samozřejmě mluvím. Jak jinak bych mohl shromažďovat všechny ty informace, které pak předávám dál v angličtině, že ano…? Ono i v té češtině toho je poskrovnu. Nejlépe by člověk musel mít přístup ke všem ročníkům Melodie, Gramorevue, R&P apod. (Melodii a R&P jsem sice začátkem 90. let odbíral, žel jsem to ale mezitím všechno vyházel…)

  10. Petr Horcicka aka Petasonic

    Tyjo je skvele ze tenhle tvuj blog ma mimojine velkou informacni hodnotu. Po audioblozich venujicich se hudbe 20.stoleti jsem se potuloval asi po dva roky pak jsem si dal pauzu a kdyz jsem se ted vratil tak jsem byl prekvapen jak se tenhle svet audioblogu rozrostl. Jednim z duvodu proc jsem si zalozil svuj byl i pocit ze bych nemel jen pasivne prijimat ale take prispet svou troskou do mlyna tohoto elektronickeho universa. Nebot diky nemu jsem se seznamil s hudbou krasnou i silenou ze vsech moznych oblasti planety se kterou bych jinak nemel sanci se potkat. Na ceskou hudbu jsem jeste nenarazil. Je dobre ze vyplnujes tohle bile misto na mape. Smekam klobouk a jeste jednou diky.

  12. Lou Kash

    Hi Anonymous, do you mean Beat-Line Supraphon 1968, Supraphon 0130525, with Atlantis, Vulkán, Cardinals, Flamingo, Framus Five, Juventus, Prúdy and Rebels?
    Thanks, I’ve got this one already, as well as the live album from the 2nd Beat Festival.

    The only album from that era that I’m looking for is Supraphon Dance Selection 66-67 (Supraphon SUA 13848) a.k.a. Taneční melodie Supraphonu 1966-67 (Supraphon 043101).
    I’m also looking for one of the 7 inch live EPs from the 2nd Beat Festival, Panton 030204.

  13. Anonymous

    Is there any way that you can give me the lyrics (in Czech and English) of the song Magdaléna of Marta Kubišová?
    I will be grateful this is my e-mail:
    chess_oakland at yahoo.com

  15. tramp

    Hi,
    I just discovered your blog and it is really GREAT!
    Congratulations!
    I´d like to know if there´s a way to search articles in your blog by the name of an artist.
    By the way, for me, one of the best czech jazz/funk connection in the 70´s is “Dobrovolní Nevolníci” by Jazz Sanatorium Ludka Hulana, a version on Roland Kirk´s Voluntered Slavery that appeared on Mini Jazz Klub series. Do you know about any other records from them?
    Thanks.

  16. Lou Kash

    Hi Tramp, thanks for your kind words.

    To search the blog, you can use the Blogger search field at the top left. You can also search via http://blogsearch.google.com where you add “blogurl:http://blog.loukash.com/” (without the quotes) to the search words.

    At a later time I might tag the articles with additional labels to make the search and the sorting more convenient. The labels weren’t available at the time I’ve started the blog and thus they don’t appear automatically on the sidebar anyway. I need to figure out how to update the layout first…

    As for Luděk Hulan, unfortunately there weren’t many recordings in the 1970s before his death in 1979. At first he emigrated to Switzerland in 1968 but he returned only a year later. But from then on he didn’t get many jobs anymore, not to speak of recording opportunities. There’s the live album “Milá společnost” from 1978 (Supraphon 1152309) and I also have another single from 1979, It’s Only A Paper Moon/Bye Bye Blackbird (Supraphon 11152275). I’m not sure if there was anything else, but I’ll check it out.

  17. Anonymous

    Hi, i have a czech record Lp from the byrds 1970 produced by jaromir tuma the name of the record is “vybral a sestavil” i think it translate “delicacy plus assorted”, the back of the record is in czech language with a large comment from jaromir tuma, is a mono stereo, labels CBS, supraphon and Cs Hi Fi Klub.
    I’d like to know how rare is this record.
    Thanks in advance
    Francisco

  18. Lou Kash

    Hi Francisco. I don’t have the Byrds album, but I know that it exists. I can’t really tell you how “rare” it is, as I’m not collecting Czech license albums. However, since it has been probably released originally for members of the Czechoslovak HiFi Club or Gramofonový klub only, and likely never sold in regular record stores, it’s possibly pretty scarce.

    “Vybral a sestavil” is not the album titel, it translates simply as “selected and compiled by” (Jaromír Tůma who was/is a Supraphon producer). The album itself probably was a “Best Of” compilation, licensed by Supraphon from CBS.

    Whether the album is mono or stereo is visible on the label: after approx. 1967 the cat.no. of all mono records begins with 0 (zero), for stereo records it begins with 1. The sleeve usually lists both numbers, but stereo records often used to have an extra sticker “stereo”.

  19. gottlieb

    Hi!
    I am trying to remember the name of a band I bought a tape of in 1989. It was extremely messy punky music with a male singer who wasn’t really singing but kind of complaining loudly. For some reason I think it was from Brno… anyway, if you could give me some leads that would be great

  20. Lou Kash

    Hi Gottlieb, unfortunately your description is quite vague. There were probably hundreds of releases which might match… :) Besides, I'm definitely not an expert on this kind of “underground” stuff. I always was a big fan of the alternative Brno scene though: Z kopce/Ošklid, Dunaj/Bittová & Fajt, E, Ještě jsme se nedohodli, just to name a few.

  21. Antonio

    Hi, good blog. I’m searching for czech 90’s music scene, bands like The Naked Souls and related, can ou help me? Thanks

  23. gottlieb

    Hey Lou, thanks for the reply, I can’t believe it but I suddenly was able to remember the name of that band: Dvouleta Fama! Is it possible? Does it ring a bel?

  25. Marcin

    Hi
    I have some questions related to Marta Kubisova and Radim Hladik. Have they ever worked together? I found this:
    http://www.nvl.cz/index.php?action=main&subject=29&sessid=1145b02d1679bfbf71c41c79b39e68c0
    The first link (Z KYTICE K.J.ERBENA) seems to be Hladik's composition sung by Kubisova and I think he also plays the guitar there. Do you know more about this? Also, I found this photo from 5th December 1989:
    http://kultura.idnes.cz/foto.asp?c=A080815_173404_hudba_jaz&strana=1&r=hudba&foto=RDD1edc3e_sejmout0033.jpg&
    It shows Kubisova, Hladik and Jaroslav Hutka together on some concert. How did it happen? Does any footage exist? Maybe you know of some other connections between Kubisova and Hladik. I'm curious because I like them both.

  26. Lou Kash

    Hi Marcin
    Yes, apparently they did collaborate. The recording sounds like being from the 1990s.

    The photo from Dec 1989 is from the Lucerna hall, apparently one of her first regular gigs after the long hiatus. It's likely that it has been recorded, but I'm not aware of any official release.

    Other than that, Hladík collaborates with so many different artists, he's a real workaholik… :) Few years ago he even recorded a CD with very good friends of mine, a band from Teplice. Unfortunately, the resulting CD (Kocour – Oldies But Oldies) has been released only privately due to disinterest from record labels, despite the drummer being the one from the currently most popular Czech rock group Kabát…

  27. Marcin

    Thanks. You are right about Radim Hladik, he is really dedicated to the music. Even now, when he is playing with the new line-up of Blue Effect, he is still involved in other musical projects. I think he was playing with Pavol Hammel in the last years.
    There is more information about the recording I posted before:
    http://mluveny.panacek.com/mluvene-slovo-na-gramofonovych-deskach/4047-kytice-199.html
    It seems to be some collection of ballads, which Hladik wrote music to. It features other singers too, including Lesek Semelka. The track from the previous link has some features of other Hladik's composition. The lead melody reminds me of "Triatricet".
    By the way, did you know that Kubisova was Hladik's favourite female singer? At least according to that article:
    http://www.blueeffect.cz/file/3/POP_MUSIC_EXPRES_3-1969_2.jpg
    But it was in 1969, I wonder if he still likes her. Anyway, it would be great if they would collaborate again someday.

  28. Jason

    Hi everyone,
    I'm getting married in the Czech Republic next year. I'm English, my fiancee is Czech…so, we're trying to put together a list of songs for the reception that will appeal to both English and Czech guests.
    Basically what we're looking for is Czech versions of original English song,e.g. Vaclav Neckar's version of Donovan's Jennifer Juniper.
    If anyone can come up with a list we would really appreciate it.
    Many thanks in advance
    Jay and Misa

  30. jeux wii

    Thanks for sharing such nice information here. I want to collect some eighties' songs. Can I get it from somewhere?
    Well it is nice to visit this site.

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