Brass band fun

Been busy here, but last weekend took some time to watch the Boban i Marko Markovic Orkestar (Boban and Marko Markovic Orchestra) close the Ethnic Arts Festival here. They also opened the Pitchfork festival earlier in the day. This might make you think that they're indie rock, but not even close -- it's a Serbian brass band that plays gypsy music. I don't know if they're assimilated Roma, or ethnic Serbians who play gypsy music, or some combo of the two, but a tremendously fun bunch. Boban and his son Marko both play the trumpet, and Boban also sings quite a lot, backed by four other brass players, a snare drummer, and another drummer who was obviously a local stand-in and had, as my friend put it, Keith Moon aspirations that did not chime with gypsy music so well. I wanted to take one of his cymbals away. The Reader had called the group "acrobatic," and maybe they'd have moved around more on a larger stage, but plenty of fun was provided by Serbian audience members who got up and started dancing. Good times.