Koko, London
Those looking to book bands for the summer festivals should take note. If you want guaranteed crowd-pleasers, check out the gypsy musicians of the Balkans. Romania's Fanfare Ciocarlia and Serbia's Boban & Marko Markovic Orchestra may consist of (mostly) middle-aged men playing nothing but brass and percussion, but they packed out this venue with a young, wildly enthusiastic crowd. And they did so by playing the music they have performed for years at parties and festivals across eastern Europe: traditional songs mixed with a dash of cabaret, western jazz and pop. Both bands clearly relished the idea of competing at what was billed as a Balkan Brass Battle to decide the best musicians.
They began by trading trumpet solos and boasts in broken English, before tossing a coin to decide who should begin. Fanfare, sporting hats and red shirts, opened with a blend of gypsy dance styles and the Pink Panther theme, slickly matching trumpet and saxophone solos against tuba bass lines. Then came the Markovic Orchestra led by trumpet hero Boban and his son Marko, blasting through Hava Nagila. So it went on, with each band playing one or two songs before the other hit back.
Fanfare showed their jazz influences with a dash of Ellington, and relied more on musicianship than showmanship, while the crowd-pleasing Markovic Orchestra veered from jazz to audience sing-along, Turkish influences and James Brown. Sadly, there was no deciding vote; instead, the two bands shook hands and joined together for a finale that included the remarkable sound of 20 gypsy brass players and five percussionists tackling the James Bond theme, with Marko Markovic adding an inspired trumpet solo.