Talas Sunrise
Talas Sunrise is the debut album by the Talas country-folk band Kök Bel, released on cassette in 1995. It is generally counted as the first commercial Iradi country-folk album, and its versions of songs from the American compilation Swift Hooves set the pattern for the genre's bilingual covers.[1]
Background and recording
Kök Bel formed in 1993 and played cafés near Talas Air Base for Iradi and American audiences. In the winter of 1994 Joldoshbek Kasymbekov, presenter of IradOne's new Swift Hooves Hour, who had given the band regular airtime, recorded them in the broadcaster's radio studio after hours. Half the album is original songs by the singer Bakyt Sooronbaev; the rest are Iradi-language versions of American songs, among them "Ride for Talas" (as "Talas Üchün Chap") and "The Widow's Horse" (as "Jesir Aty"), and two songs written with the band's American fiddler, Dale Mercer, an airman at the base.[1]
Music
The band combined acoustic guitar, banjo and fiddle with the bowed kyl-kyak and the komuz, and Sooronbaev sang in the style of the horseback song (ırda). "Ak Boz At" is a traditional song about a grey horse arranged for the full band.[1][2]
Release and legacy
Ak Jol Records, a Talas cassette dealer, released the album in June 1995, and copies sold in the city's bazaars alongside pirated copies of Swift Hooves. The title track was played often on IradOne during the last years of Iradimania. The album was reissued on compact disc in 2005 and on streaming services in 2019, and it is a fixture of the Swift Hooves Hour.[2]
Track listing
| No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Talas Sunrise" | Bakyt Sooronbaev | 3:42 |
| 2. | "Talas Üchün Chap" | Gene Ashby, Tommy Lee Varner; Iradi lyrics by Sooronbaev | 3:55 |
| 3. | "Jorgo Jolu" | Sooronbaev, Talant Asanov | 3:18 |
| 4. | "Kok-Bel Ashuusu" | Sooronbaev | 4:26 |
| 5. | "Jesir Aty" | Hal Westover; Iradi lyrics by Sooronbaev | 5:12 |
| 6. | "Kymyz in the Morning" | Dale Mercer, Sooronbaev | 2:51 |
| 7. | "Base Café Blues" | Mercer | 3:37 |
| 8. | "Ak Boz At" | Traditional; arranged by Kök Bel | 4:04 |
| 9. | "Talaadagy Jyldyz" | Calvin Pruett; Iradi lyrics by Asanov | 3:29 |
| 10. | "Ene Jer" | Sooronbaev | 4:48 |
| Total length: | 39:22 |
Personnel
- Bakyt Sooronbaev – vocals, acoustic guitar
- Talant Asanov – banjo, backing vocals
- Erkin Mamyrov – kyl-kyak, komuz
- Dale Mercer – fiddle, vocals (6, 7)
- Joldoshbek Kasymbekov – production, engineering
References
- ^ Talas State University Press (2018). Steppe Ballads: American Song and Iradi Country-Folk, 1980–2010, pp. 92–118.
- ^ Central Asian Music Review (2019). 'Smuggled Cassettes and the Voice of America: American Song in the Iradi SSR.' Vol. 11, No. 2, pp. 15–38.