An enormous talent, true love for music and a huge amount of systematic hard work. All this raised the Brno band Gulo ar to the position of acknowledged interprets and mainly: it all enables the band a further growth. Gulo ar get to wilden the audience during impressive concerts and they enraptured music critics to the point that they awarded their previous album Baro drom the prize Andl in the category world music. The prepared new album, which Doug Wimbish from the famous Living Colour supported as the producer, should enable them to reach international level, at least by the sound and the quality of the music itself.Do you actually know what Gulo ar means? The leader and bass player Vladimr Dirda likes explaining it: Gulo ar in the gypsy language means sweet grass, but also sweet dish thats what we would call the cocoa cake our mum used to bake. You probably couldnt invent a better characteristic of the Gulo ar music. Identically savory, airy and full of energy such as a childhood memory, is this mixture of funky, pop and gypsy melody, embellished with the beautiful voice of the singer Irena Horvthov. Although the texts are in gypsy, thanks to Irenas and the other singers feeling, everyone can understand them. This isnt an exuberant clich, hear by yourself.Genius lociAt the beginning of Gulo ar there was more than one interesting factor. The most important is the fact that the whole band is formed by one big family. In the transferred meaning as well as literally. The brothers Vladimr and Pavel Dirda, leader/bass player and music composer/keyboard player, have played together since they are able to play. And as Doug Wimbish highlighted it, it is really apparent in their playing. The brothers invited into the band a few talented cousins, but how do the white members fit into it? Maybe by marrying into the band:-)In the case of Gulo ar the spirit of the place certainly had a strong effect, the Brno hood called the Bronx. All of the members live either in the local Bratislava street or right next to it. It is also where the bands rehearsal room is, which the musicians consider as the bands heart. They dont have to organize rehearsals: whenever they have a free moment they hurry there and rehearse or discuss the music. As they say, music is their life.RootsTo trace up Gulo ars roots, we have to get back rather far into the past. Up to the moment when in the early 80s the brothers Pavel (*1969) and Vladimr (*1967) Dirda listen to their fathers records Jan Dirda, famous gypsy jazz sax player. Apart from jazz they of course also like gypsy folk, with which they start performing at a quite early age in Brno bars. Pretty soon performing in bars isnt enough for Pavel and he starts performing with bands with higher ambitions, at that time he meets Gulo ars future guitar player Druppi.Gulo ars beginning was preceded by the promising course of the band Synergy, founded in 1994. In the band were, apart from Vladimr and Pavel Dirda, the trumpet player Jirka Majzlk and the then fifteen year old singer Irena Horvthov, daughter of the opera singer and guitar player. Irena started at seven to perform with a folk band; at the same time she loved funky since she was little, which showed in the future to be the best preparation for the role of front woman of the modern gypsy band which Gulo ar has become.At the time of Synergy, Vladimr and Pavel managed to collect some experience as the members of the phenomenal singer Ida Kelarov Romano Rat. But their greatest yearning was still to do music totally according to them. When Synergy split up, there were no more obstacles for those plans anymore. In the year 1997 the band named Gulo ar starts rehearsing for the first time. The main project drafter is Vladimr. Although his biggest childhood dream was to drive a tramway, to drive the running funky machine isnt that bad either.Long wayGulo ar never worried about genre classification. We are just trying to play modern gypsy music, they said from the beginning. As a base they took funk, they added a little bit of soul, of jazz and influences from their favorite artists such as George Benson, Stevie Wonder or Prince and they re-fused it according to them into a seductive, strictly contemporary musical shape, in which they dont deny their gypsy roots.They saw their debut in 2000 when their first CD was released symbolically called Paas (We believe). On the sound aspect it doesnt respond to the exigent requirements of the self-critical musicians, it was made amateurishly for financial reasons, and so today the band considers it more like a demo. They consider their real first-fruit the album Baro drom (Long way), awarded at the Academy of pop music as best album in the category World music for the year 2003. The album meant a real breakthrough and Gulo ar could confirm the reputation of a great concert attraction not only in clubs but also as support act of the stars Gipsy Kings and of James Brown himself. The band even managed to get outside of the CZ. They played at various festivals and clubs in Germany, Austria, Slovakia, and Hungary, a document about the band was shot by the Dutch TV station NOS and in Germany they were presented by a radio interview.Thanks to the new album produced by Doug Wimbish, which should be released in February, new miles of interesting music open to Gulo ar. And for the audience it will be an enjoyable adventure to follow their way.
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