Preview

Formed by Dave Kelbie in 1995, and originally called The Budapest Cafe Orchestra, Szapora have become legendary for brilliant and mesmerising performances of Gypsy music from all over middle and Eastern Europe. The music is a furious, reckless, passionate mix of doina's from Romania, csardas' from Hungary and hora's from Bulgaria, played with a terrifying energy and technical brilliance that will fill your head and bring you to your feet.

This brilliant septet are made up of five of Britain's finest musicians plus two wonderful singing sisters from Bosnia, Mirella & Tea Hodzic, whose harnonies have been described as 'like blending bitter brown sugar with a melting marshmallow'. Together and individually the band have performed throughout Europe, including the Bath International Festival and the Barbican International Gypsy Festival.

If you love wild, vibrant music played with spectacular skill, then this is for you.

'It's a sound that will instil itself in your bloodstream and stay there forever' - Miles Kington

I left with a grin on my face and rhythm in my feet - The Times

Review

The nightmare logistics of organizing and uniting a geographically-dispersed multiple-line-up band, most of whose members have numerous other musical and career commitments elsewhere, were vividly demonstrated by Szapora - especially as this was the very first gig by this splendid 1995-formed Gypsy music outfit in its new nine-piece incarnation. From the moment they arrived, even before the soundcheck, band members who'd been rehearsing in isolation were intently running through new material together for the first time. In the circumstances, we could certainly forgive them the occasional lapse and moment of uncertainty in a performance that more than lived up to our expectations. This really was a triumphant debut show.

Szapora's material is drawn from all over middle and eastern Europe - including Serbia, Romania, Russia, Hungary, Macedonia, and Bulgaria - and it's universally characterized by the distinctive melodic structures of that region, and driven by the seemingly unquenchable vigour and passion of those often strife-ridden nations (maybe a bit more strife on these shores is what's needed to shake up Britain's often-complacent folk music - now there's a subject for trenchant debate in our website's Visitors' Book!). The fact that five of the band (founder and co-ordinator Dave Kelbie on guitar and mandolin, Welsh folk star Dylan Fowler on guitar, mandocello, clarinet, whistle, and percussion, Paul Maylan on double bass, Luke Goss (no, not that one) on accordion, and Ollie Wilson-Dixon on violin) are British is all the more remarkable: their empathy and understanding of the genre seems uncanny, and entirely authentic. The combined vocals of sisters Téa and Mirella Hodzic (originally from Sarajevo) would raise the hairs on the nape of any sentient being's neck, while the occasional vocals of Mirza Halilovic (guitar and percussion) are equally evocative. Last but by no means least, the astonishing accordion playing of Vanja Krawczyk (flown in from Poland on Thursday) is the beating heart of the band, surely doing for the European/Balkan approach to that fiendish instrument what Flaco Jiminez has done for the American style.

Writing down song titles is something no sane person would attempt at a Szapora gig, but suffice to say that some things started slow, and stayed that way, but rather more things either started slow and got faster, or started fast and got supersonic. A fair number of punters opted for dancing, while the rest of us simply sat and marvelled at the wizardry on stage. At the end of the night, three band members drove back to Abergavenny, while the remainder re-convened in the back bar, where a memorable post-gig session ensued, fuelled by not a few beverages ... Vanja, in particular, was clearly capable of playing non-stop all night - he has (get this) a twenty-piece Polish folk-dance band variously based in London and Poland. Now, how's that for a logistical challenge?