Switzerland - The North

 

As we enter another new country I have to admit, I'm not a fan of Switzerland.  Yes they make good chocolate and cheese, accurate watches (I don't wear watches) and have pretty mountain views, but I feel slightly claustrophobic in high mountain landscapes and my mind is too anarchic to get on with the law abiding, punctual and well-behaved Swiss.  Every time I drive through Switzerland, which is quite often, I always have a bad conscience, worrying that I drive 2 miles above the speed limit, accidentally missing a pedestrian crossing, forgetting to signal when crossing a lane, parking slightly off-straight at a car park.  You seem to get pulled over for anything, if not by the police, then by an outraged citizen.  I have had more speed tickets in Switzerland than any other country...

So anyway, luckily this blog is only a virtual journey around the country to listen to some music echoing out of these mountains.  We start our trip in the northern city of Schaffhausen near the source of the river Rhine and with something not exactly traditional Swiss.  Metin Demiral was born here as the son of a Swiss mother and a Turkish/Azeri father.  He spent his childhood between here and the eastern Turkish village of Kars, picking up a lot of musical influences.  In the 1980's he formed a band with his German friend Stefan Bittlinger and they called themselves Café Türk.  Their style was influenced by prog rock such as Pink Floyd, Deep Purple and Santana all infused with Anatolian and Azeri tonalities, as well as aksak time signatures.  They started touring social clubs around Switzerland and Germany frequented by the Turkish 'Gastarbeiter' (guest workers), where they gained something of an underground cult status.  At the end of the 80's young Turks turned towards rap and the band soon stopped and Metin started a night club in Schaffhausen instead.  Last year record label Zel Zele rediscovered the band and cut a compilation of Café Türk's music from back then.  This was their biggest hit at the time and opens the new album.  It's called Haydi Yallah:

Accordionist and flutist Patricia Draeger is originally from Winterthur I believe.  She is considered one of the best accordionists in Europe and plays jazz, folk and collaborates with acts from all over the world.  Her latest project is with some Egyptian musicians calling themselves the Ala Fekra Project (Meaning 'and by the way' in Arabic).  Apparently they released a CD in 2020, but I can't find anywhere to buy it, however their self-titled tune appeared on the Global Sounds of Switzerland CD of the Songlines Magazine issue #163.

Also from Winterthur are metal folk band Eluveitie.  They were formed in 2002 by Chrigel Glanzmann as a studio band with varying personnel, but have since established themselves as a regular band.  This is the Swiss being a bit rebellious.  Here is a track from their 2014 album Origin called Call of the Mountains with some nice mountain scenes in the video:

Brothers Christoph and Georg Kiss were born in Zurich of Hungarian descent.  In 2018 they formed Jazz band Okvsho influenced by the British jazz scene, Brazilian percussion and their Hungarian heritage.  They released their debut album Kamala's Danz last year and this is a track from it called Descobrir together with singer Sreya singing in Portuguese:

Also based in Zurich are Afro-fusion trio Siselabonga.  They combine the west African sounds of Senegalese kora player and vocalist Tarang Cissokho with psychedelic rhythms of guitarist Glauco Cataldo and percussionist Fabio Meier.  Their name came from when the 3 met in Madagascar and while in conversation, somebody passed them by, catching snippets and asked what siselabonga meant.  After a moment's head scratching they realised he meant "Si, c'est bon".  So they adopted that as their name.  Here is the title song from their 2020 EP Warnama:

That's it from northern Switzerland, next we'll be heading deep into the mountains of central Switzerland.  As usual you can follow my virtual ramblings on my tripline map.