Ethnically and Culturally Inspired Music
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Els Berros de la Cort is the band that embodies the intriguing paradoxes of Catalan music and life: the medieval world is still part of the everyday; the raw and edgy sits beside the modern and stylish; their roots are both in the soil of that singular land, but also enriched by the wider world it’s cultivated over millennia.
"Los nòstres vices e pecats" (Our vices and sins), their third release, brings to life the repertoire of the Catalan and Occitan troubadour. Gluttony and lust are the themes in the album’s eleven different tracks, two of the most common sins, both in the Middle Ages and today.
All of the lyrics have been taken from medieval Catalan manuscripts like the 14th-century Llibre de Sent Soví – the oldest preserved cookery treatise written in Catalan – and Speculum al foder, a medieval sex manual which is the first European treatise to include a whole section on sex positions.
Studying ancient songs and methods, and using the instruments from that earlier time, Els Berros de la Cort share with today’s audiences what they’ve retrieved from the work of 12th to 14th-century writers. Arrangements combine a rich and forgotten musical heritage in tune with popular music of today. Employing double reed wind instruments, string instruments, percussion, chorus, and voices, the powerful unison creates a wild, impacting experience.
ELS BERROS DE LA CORT are:
Jordi Batallé: percussions
Jordi Comas “Peligru”: tarota and sac de gemecs
Elda Daunis: tarota, hurdy-gurdy, and vocals
Marc Daunis: gralla, sac de gemecs, biniou, cornamuse du centre, hurdy-gurdy, and vocals
Xus Jiménez: percussions
Alba Logan: gralla, tarota, and sac de gemecs
David Picazo: mandola
"Our vices and sins"
Els Berros de la Cort have a mastery of the instruments of a medieval band – shawms, bagpipes, hurdy-gurdy, drums, and more. But their medieval is now, more a place of bars, brawls, and back-alleyways than courts, church, and cloisters. Geoff Speed & friends - Folkscene (BBC Radio Merseyside)
The new album is a step forward. They’ve certainly worked a lot on the actual music for this one, in both material and treatment. It’s strong and interesting in melody playing, and ingenious but natural in arrangement. Rather than historical reconstructions, they play instruments that have long histories but are used today in Catalan folk music. No medievalist exercise, it’s music for today, and succeeds with no overt modernizing features that would date it. Andrew Cronshaw - fRoots nº 349
If instead of folk music we were talking about rock, this would undoubtedly be psychedelia of the most progressive kind, highly generous in spaces conceived for the enjoyment of music. (...) This is one of the most rigorously “modern” records released in recent months. Gernot Dudda - Efe Eme
"Los nòstres vices e pecats" (Our vices and sins), their third release, brings to life the repertoire of the Catalan and Occitan troubadour. Gluttony and lust are the themes in the album’s eleven different tracks, two of the most common sins, both in the Middle Ages and today.
All of the lyrics have been taken from medieval Catalan manuscripts like the 14th-century Llibre de Sent Soví – the oldest preserved cookery treatise written in Catalan – and Speculum al foder, a medieval sex manual which is the first European treatise to include a whole section on sex positions.
Studying ancient songs and methods, and using the instruments from that earlier time, Els Berros de la Cort share with today’s audiences what they’ve retrieved from the work of 12th to 14th-century writers. Arrangements combine a rich and forgotten musical heritage in tune with popular music of today. Employing double reed wind instruments, string instruments, percussion, chorus, and voices, the powerful unison creates a wild, impacting experience.
ELS BERROS DE LA CORT are:
Jordi Batallé: percussions
Jordi Comas “Peligru”: tarota and sac de gemecs
Elda Daunis: tarota, hurdy-gurdy, and vocals
Marc Daunis: gralla, sac de gemecs, biniou, cornamuse du centre, hurdy-gurdy, and vocals
Xus Jiménez: percussions
Alba Logan: gralla, tarota, and sac de gemecs
David Picazo: mandola
"Our vices and sins"
Els Berros de la Cort have a mastery of the instruments of a medieval band – shawms, bagpipes, hurdy-gurdy, drums, and more. But their medieval is now, more a place of bars, brawls, and back-alleyways than courts, church, and cloisters. Geoff Speed & friends - Folkscene (BBC Radio Merseyside)
The new album is a step forward. They’ve certainly worked a lot on the actual music for this one, in both material and treatment. It’s strong and interesting in melody playing, and ingenious but natural in arrangement. Rather than historical reconstructions, they play instruments that have long histories but are used today in Catalan folk music. No medievalist exercise, it’s music for today, and succeeds with no overt modernizing features that would date it. Andrew Cronshaw - fRoots nº 349
If instead of folk music we were talking about rock, this would undoubtedly be psychedelia of the most progressive kind, highly generous in spaces conceived for the enjoyment of music. (...) This is one of the most rigorously “modern” records released in recent months. Gernot Dudda - Efe Eme
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