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18.4.04
She was wearing a xanthous dress that clung to her knees and thighs, thought nothing of tugging at it, smoothing it out, flattening it, bunching it up as though a sculpture of catchpenny silk busts before moving up to her hair, the brunette languishing in her whilst a blonde was dying to get out.
We filched Tandoori chicken filets from a streetside vendor near Levist V?ljas, searching, for instance, for whatever came with applesauce and French fries.
At the pub of choice, we wandered through the front gates and down the stone staircase into a cesspool of wealthy cosmonauts dancing to hypnotic background music blaring too loud, we thought, for conversation, until met by a member of Estonia?s cigar club, The Churchill Society, and taken into an inner sanctuary where we were able to lounge, stretch our feet, bone-tired from walking the eleven miles to get there.
There was always the surfeit stuttering of seemingly benign and careful conversations with the hosts and other assorted strangers, women like chocolates in a box, wandering in and wandering out of the room, whom we stared at surreptitiously, pulling hat brims down as low as they would perch without cutting off the circulation to the brain. It was a yawn-invoking ceremony of false sincerity and if we?d have been animations, we?d have been drawn holding tin buckets underneath our chins and vomiting those same Tandoori chicken filets, well, masticated and stomach enzyme-laden chunks of them, forward and downward in a fit of projectile protest of screaming boredom.
We cannot converse as we are still waiting for Albert to arrive. Albert had gone out on his own private binge the night before, or so we?d been led to believe. He?d been whispering bruxisms in his sleep like ?Four fighter planes from the Belgian Air Force arrived at the Zokniai airfield near the city of Siauliai in northern Lithuania? and curling up into a ball on the floor, crippled with alchohol poisoning, he claimed, spitting up blood on the polished wooden flooring.
*****
In the Shot out Eye, Pavel, who'd had too many Absinthe shots, was ready to throw himself off the Cechuv most until we persuaded him otherwise with a seranade in a capella, pulled along in a construction dumpster with wheels underneath it, Pavel, who'd lost enough weight he was wearing a Czech Pioneer uniform of light blue shirt, dark blue pants with a red scarve he'd purchased from an antiquities and nostalgia dealer who had a secret collection of such uniforms in the basement room, and was waving crutches at passersby in a threatening manner calling out to women that he could hear voices between their legs as they walked past.
That kind of behavior, of course, wasn't going to get him very far. He claimed a mental disease of banality had already swept the city, automotons converted by a holy sepulchre and he was a vavasor appointed by the baron to remedy the situation. Women, he acknowledged, as always, were at the root of the problem:
"Left our own, we'd never get off our sofas. They say behind every great man is a woman and that is accurate because it is the female driving him forward with not-so-subtle threats and blackmail, withholding precious activities until the male has earned the money, provided for the Queen of the house. King of his own Castle. Pttw. He is but a surrogate of the Queen's desire and it is only the intoxicating lure of the holy vagina that allows him to delusion himself into believing it is any way other. Mistress and Slave is how this new world devolves. These automotons addicted to the masochism of greed and drive and yearning for material goods!"
Pavel was a spirited drinker. When, over a few weeks time he began to spend more and more time at the sofa as though it were an instrument and he a classical composer, poised and prepared to begin composing once again until the hand tremors and increased blood pressure raised concern among us after one particularly defeating home visit. Pavel was urged to see Dr. Koloshnik, of course, who advised him to drink less.
"Utterly useless..." he muttered dispiritedly from his table in the train station cafe at Nadrazi Holesovice, 1974 km
and approximately 30 hours from Moscow, I noted to myself after a disinterested and quick study of the yellowing timetables. "I can sense my stomach producing less of the enzyme so more and more unmodified alcohol is getting into the bloodstream. I can't complain, really. With my pension, the purer the alchohol getting into my bloodstream, the quicker I'm unconscious, the less I spend...quite logically, some sort of newer, cheaper paradise..." All around us, the filthy laborers, dressed in
Petr Vostok, degree in Economy at the University of Economics in Prague. Lives in Hradec Kr?lov?. Loves to eat enormous quantities of sausages and drink beer. He and the rest of us were brought to the Holesovice state police station on Frantiska Krizika street in Prague 7 where they waited for an hour while the police tried to decide what to do with us. Later on, Ludv?k Meinz, our solicitor who graduated from the Faculty of Philosophy and History of the Charles University arrived. He claimed to have been the head of a Kosovar drug gang. The first time we'd been at his apartment he only too happily displayed the evidence that he had placed orders for light infantry weapons and rocket systems. Did we question what a small-time dealer would be doing with rockets? Of course. He was straightforward about it as well. He said he'd had them left over from the days of shipping them to the KLA. He claimed he'd been extradited from Norway, where he had escaped from prison in 1997 while serving a 14-year sentence for heroin trafficking. Now reformed, he sought Jesus. So he claimed. We all had another shot of Slivovice, Ludvik mentions that he might have a gig for us in Plzen. "Jesus loves jazz!" he exclaimed suddenly. "and Jesus has told me privately, that you are the band we should retain for the big party in Plzen next month! I want you to be one of the groups at the Jazz Na Ulici festival!
Well, Plzen was a city on the tip of Albert's brewer's atlas, having freed the world forever from the scourge of dark beers. And Albert, who knew the entire story, was only too happy to interrupt and recite all about bottom fermentation, excitedly retelling that it began with a riot in Plzen in 1842 and how the town's disgruntled burghers, having been served up spoiled beer once too often, smashed up beer barrels on the town square and demanded the town's leaders do something.
"Here it is: pale, golden-hued, highly hopped, bottom-fermented beer..." he began to recite piously, holding his glass up to the light. "And what exactly IS bottom fermenting you wondered? Well, I'll tell you. You need lager yeast, which tends to collect at the bottom of the fermenter and then you've got to recall that lager is fermented and then stored for 30 days or longer close to the freezing point. Whilst all this is going on, the beer mellows and the flavors become smoother. Then you've got the sulfur components developed during fermentation beginning to disipate. If you had a larger bathroom, I could demonstrate if you'd allow us to stay here a few months..."
"Big deal," Ludv?k spat back dutifully. "I've got other friends who could do it. You can't swing a cat without hitting a brewer around here. And lest you think brewing beer and jazz are such a strange combination here, I even know one who performed with Frantisek Uhlir and his group at the Plzen, Duba and Liberec jazz festivals and at several clubs in Prague, as well as tutoring at a week long workshop in Frydlant - so it isn't as though I'm hard up for talent. I just thought it might be unique, this little trio of strange foreigners...
*****
There was a first-class arranger his father had known; Bedrich "Fricek" Weiss, who was deported to the concentration camp Ter?zin, where he led the Ghetto Swingers. In 1944 he, together with his father, was transported to Auschwitz and directly to the gas chamber.
According to ancient traditions, one member of the Stehlik and Treustatt family of Cenkov was an excellent practitioner of astronomy and astrology. He is said to have been in frequent touch with the renowned astronomer Tychon de Brahe. At the invitation of Stehlik, the master visited Pilsen several times.
The Pilsener had, according to the same tradition, his own observatory in Saska street. There, he also established a gold-producing kitchen, in which he performed several attempts to produce gold. A certain alchemist called Skot from Prague made him try it. (Could that be the very Alessandro Scotto who came to Prague on August 14, 1590?) Stehlik?s experiments failed and he found out the Prague alchemist had tricked him.
Another Pilsen alchemist lived in the Rihovsky house that used to stand at the corner of nowaday?s Presovska street and the square of the Republic. The school keeper Beringer, whose father, a hat maker, used to live in the house all his life, remembered his father?s narration about a mysterious alchemy workroom. The same evidence was witnessed by a toy maker who had his shop in the house:
Many years ago, a man came to the town ? god only knows from where ? and established himself in the Rihovsky house. He married a rich burgher daughter, who died soon after.
He then lived alone as an odd bird. He shared his huge flat with his old servant only and never called visitors in.
He was brewing and preparing medicaments for the poor. But he was also said to keep attempting to produce gold. People thought he was helped by the devil, to whom he had sold his soul. One day, the servant came to the town hall to announce his master was dead. He had found him lying in the work room, strangled, with a strange line across his neck. The line was as if made by fire. The authorities sent a doctor, a scribe, and a catchpole to witness the matter. Indeed, they found the alchemist dead, exactly as the servant had announced. There were many strange jars on the worktable, one of which did contain pure gold. But treasures vividly talked about among the Pilsen citizens were not found anywhere.
The servant was called to witness at the town hall. He said that his master had often spent his nights in the cellar, where he should not have been disturbed by anyone. Often, he carried packets to the cellar with him. He was the only one who had had the keys from the work room.
After the death of the man, his relatives had the cellar examined in search for the treasure. And indeed, they discovered a nook in the wall, in which a coffer was built in. It contained pieces of pure gold, which the family members divided among themselves.
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Have a look at this magazine, Zpravodaj Sl?nsk?ho Jazzclubu
Vladimir-Coka Stojkovi?
udaraljke
Slobodan ?iri?
truba
Milan Milisavljevi?
truba
Branislav Gagi?
eufonium
Milan Jerkov
trombon
Zebby Svabodafone graduated in Art History from the Purkyn? University in Brno
""It was a huge shock, we all had to have a shot of whiskey," said Deputy Barman Roman Berlotz, in response to his colleague's resignation.
Anastasia
Goran Trajkoski
lead vocal, bagpipes, flute
Zlatko Oridjanski
guitar, mandolin, flute, back. vocal
Zoran Spasovski
drums, percussions, keyboards, back. vocal
ANASTASIA is a group from Skopje, Macedonia. Existing for 8 years, it is the most successful group in the country and has become widely known on the international stages.
The music is a unique blend combining the Byzantine past, through Eastern Orthodox church music, with a rich gamut of ethnic rhythms. The instruments played are typical for the area where the group comes from and dwells in, s uch as kaval (flute), gajda (bagpipe), and tapan (drum), but modern technology like computers, samplers, synthesizers, etc. is also used.
ANASTASIA has made numerous music scores for movies, theater performances, and TV programs. Its last album, the original soundtrack for the movie "Before The Rain", bearing Polygram label, has been sold in thousands of copies worldwide. In 1996 ANASTASIA wrote the music for the theater performance "Bachanallia" which had its European tour with a remarkable success. In 1997 ANASTASIA released its new single CD, FACE/BURN, for Third Ear Music, as an announcement for the forthc oming new album which will be released for Polygram France.
"The first fascinating trait of ANASTASIA's music that immediately captures our senses is its radical originality, the surprisingly powerful, profound, and suggestive sound, which directly originates from an abundantly rich mus ical tradition. The first shock of fascination is so strong that it momentarily wakes up our curiosity and unlocks the door of our confidence, thus allowing the young masters from ANASTASIA to lead us to the extraordinary world of sounds. Indeed, there are no regrets for our succumbing to their creative magic since there is not even a shadow of delusion in ANASTASIA's music. Everything that these marvelous artists offer us is primordially sane, unspeakably remote in its roots, virginally fresh, and so genuinely modern. An enormous garmut of both the mental and the musical is a clear sign of an emanation of a magnificent talent.
Following their music, from one piece to another, we do not know what exactly should we ascribe our delight to. Is it the little-known, uniquely beautiful melody? Is it the meek, filigree-like lyricism that mesmerizes us with its genuine sincerity? Or is it the epic, or better still, the mythical power of the sound that almost reaches the heavens? Is it due to the ancient, the mysterious, the ingeniusly beauty of polytonality that flows in ANASTASIA's songs? Could it be th e magical lightness of these times which merge the old age music with the sounds of both the Orient and Europe, thus making them recognize one another and be strangers to each other? Should we ascribe this delight to the rhytm that turns some pieces into four-dimensional sound? There seems to be only one key to this: the perception of this authentic polyrhytmical magic is achieved only through devoting ourselves to the music, by admiring it".
Dusko Dimitrovski (from the cover of "Melourgia")
10:12 AM
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