BRUCE SAGAN
With Friends

Side A (for cassette only)

1. Bob och Lauras 40-årsvals (©Bruce Sagan) (3:49)

I composed this waltz for my good friends Bob and Laura Stein on the occasion of their 40th anniversary. I was at the dance in their honor and was feeling bad that, because of things happening in my own life, I hadn't gotten them a present or even a card. But then Brian Bishop, a fiddler playing in the group before I was to perform, announced that they were going to play a tune that he had composed for their 25th anniversary. So the light bulb went on, I went into a back room where I wouldn't be disturbed, and this piece flowed out of me as if it had already been written.

2. Freds Festvals (©Bruce Sagan) (3:48)

This waltz is a celebration of the birthday of my fiddling partner from the Berkeley Bay Area, Fred Bialy. Fred and I play Scandinavian music together, but this tune came out sounding more Scottish than anything else. In any event, I hope I captured some of Fred's sweetness in it. The title is also a pun since ``fred'' means ``peace'' in Swedish.

3. David och Sandras Bröllopsmarsch (©Bruce Sagan) (3:32)

Ever since David Bilides and I lived together while we were both in the Boston area, we have been fast friends. So when he got married to Sandra Dean, I just had to write them a bridal march. When Joe Finn (another of my favorite fiddlers) and I got together to practice it for the wedding, Joe made a couple of crucial suggestions. First, he pointed out that using a simple scale to connect the two B parts would add to the power of the tune. Then he noted that if we sped it up that it would also make a nice schottis, and that is the version you hear here.

4. William and Lucy (©Bruce Sagan) (2:54)

This schottis also started its life out as something different, namely as the tune for a Morris dance that I wrote in honor of the pair named in the title. Lucy and I dance together with Ann Arbor Morris and her husband William was a math postdoc with me. Again, the title is a bit of a play on words since William and Nancy is a traditional Morris dance.

5. Inspirationen (©Bruce Sagan) (2:09)

This is one of the few pieces I've written based on pure emotion rather than for friends. The title means ``inspiration'' and I was inspired by a beautiful day one year during Scandinavian Week at Buffalo Gap. I had just finished a music class and the sun sparkling off the lake filled me with this melody. It is in the style of a Bingsjö polska (polska being the most popular traditional dance form in Sweden) although at a speed that is meant more for listening than for dancing.

6. Brad och Beths Bröllopspolska (©Bruce Sagan) (3:19)

Brad Battey is the fiddler that I play with most these days. So it was my pleasure to write a polska for his marriage to Beth. This one is in the style of the music from Rättvik with its majestic lines. And it seemed fitting that Brad and I play it as a duo on the album.

7. Balkanpolska (©Ola Bäckström, STIM)/Dajcovo (trad. Bulgarian) (?)

Ola Bäckström hails from the town of Ore in the province of Dalarna and is one of the great Swedish fiddlers and tunesmiths. There are many polskas that are in almost the same rhythm as a Bulgarian dajÇovo and this one has a particularly eastern feel. We medley it with a traditional Bulgarian tune that I learned from my fellow gûdulka player and teacher, Nikolay Kolev. Note the lovely tambura solo by Nan.

8. Rûcenitsa (©Atanas Vulcev) (?)

This is a composition of Atanas Vulcev's, my primary gûdulka teacher. It is in the florid new school style for which he is famous. Bulgarian rhythms are best counted in quicks (Q) and slows (S), worth two and three beats, respectively. So a rûcenitsa is in 7, broken down as QQS, although the whole thing goes by rather quickly!

Side B (for cassette only)

9. Radomirska Bavna Melodia (trad. Bulgarian)/Kopanitsa (© Atanas Vulcev) (?)

Here is another pair of tunes I learned from Atanas when I lived and studied with him at his apartment in Sofia. Both the slow song and the Kopanitsa (QQSQQ) are in Shope style. And the former gives the gûdulka a chance to take an extended solo.

10. Pravo (©Atanas Vulcev) (?)

Many pravos have an initial melody with 10 bars. Atanas, being fond of playing with the listeners' ears, uses an unusual first ending to make things even more interesting.

11. Lale Li Si (trad. Bulgaria)/Pajduskos (©Atanas Vulcev/©Todor Prasenov) (?)

In this slow song, Chris gets to shine on his kaval while Nan and I tremolo along. It is a song from Dobrudzha, popularized by the great singer, Verka Siderova. The dance part is actually medley of two pajduskos, the first from Atanas and the other coming from a gûdulka tutor book written by Tudor Prasenov.

NOTE TO MARTY: Pajdusko and Prasenov should both have an accent which looks like a ``v'' over the s, but it doesn't seem to be printing on this document.

12. Sven och Jorys Bröllopsvals (©Bruce Sagan) (3:01)

Tom Roby and Marjorie Nugent are friends who are interested in both Scandinavian and Balkan dancing. So when they got married, I decided to write them a ``Balkan waltz.'' (You'll have to ask them how they came by the nicknames used in the title.) I thought that if I wrote it in 5 like the previous pajdusko, then there wouldn't be many couples at the wedding able to dance to it. So instead I wrote a tune with 5-bar phrases.

13. Planxty John and Patty (©Bruce Sagan) (4:44)

This one I actually set out to write in Irish style since John Masterson, my colleague in the mathematics department at Michigan State University, has ancestors from the British Isles. That's a mandocello that Chris is playing for the first solo.

14. X Hambo (Thomas Thiger, STIM) (2:46)

I have been fond of Thomas Thiger's tunes ever since I first heard them in his native province of Hälsingland, Sweden. In addition to being a fine fiddler and composer, Thomas is also an avid birder and names most of his pieces after birds and birding activities. (See his composition ``Dubbelbeckasinen,'' meaning ``The Great Snipe,'' on my previous album Spelstundarna.) This one got its moniker after those little x's one puts beside the names of birds one has sighted.

15. Hambo till Sally (©Bruce Sagan) (2:56)

I met my beloved Sally when I gave a workshop in dancing hambo, the national dance of Sweden. So when our first year anniversary rolled around, I couldn't resist composing her one. The only problem was that we couldn't dance it together if I were playing. Now that has been fixed.

Total time: ?

©2002 Bruce Sagan. All rights reserved.

LEAVE SPACE FOR BAR CODE AND LABEL ADDRESS

Bruce Sagan started playing classical violin under his mother's influence when he was a kid. He fell in love with international folk dancing in college and then started to play the music, eventually concentrating on traditions from Scandinavia and the Balkans. Bruce makes regular trips to Europe to work with musicians there and is much sought after as a teacher and performer throughout the US, both on fiddle and gûdulka (Bulgarian rebec). His recording with Andrea Hoag, Spelstundarna, has found critical acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic. Bruce has been music director for various events, including Nordic Fiddles and Feet (formerly Scandinavian Week at Buffalo Gap) and the Stockton Folk Dance Camp. Together with Nan and Chris, Bruce is part of the trio Veselba, which means ``merriment'' in Bulgarian.

Brad Battey started Scandinavian fiddling with Bruce when he was a wee young thing of 12 years old. Now he's taller than Bruce is, but still loves those wonderful Swedish duos. He is also sought after as a contra dance musician, playing with many of the bands in Southeast Michigan, and has just recorded another album with the Ruffwater String Band.

Nan Nelson started playing American folk music as a teenager in Urbana-Champaign where she also met Brad's parents before he was even born! She discovered Russian folk music in the late 70s, playing with the University of Illinois Russian Folk Orchestra and the Balalaika Orchestra of Detroit. Nan and Bruce first met in the late 80s through their mutual interest in Klezmer music. But it was not until 1998 that they started to play together in Veselba, where her talent for plucked strings was applied to the Bulgarian tambura (long-necked lute). The trio's more recent foray into Scandinavian music has given her a chance to develop her bass playing and connect with her own Swedish heritage. She also plays with the groups Ethnic Connection and Klezmer Fusion.

Chris Rietz and Bruce have been good friends since 1981 and, during the times they've lived within driving distance of each other, have been playing music together all that time. Chris enjoys a certain reputation as a guitarist, often in demand as a session player; but what really brought them together was a long-standing love of Bulgarian music. He has been an ardent player of the Bulgarian kaval (end-blown flute) for more than two decades, and continues to be a serious student of the grand Thracian style. More often than not during that period, Chris could be found on the teaching staff of the East European Folklife Center's Balkan Music and Dance Camps, as an instructor for kaval, Bulgarian tambura or directing an ensemble of Bulgarian folk instruments.

Thanks to Sally, Beth, and Deb for love and support; to Ola Bäckström, Thomas Thiger, Atanas Vulcev, and all our teachers for tunes and encouragement; to Bengt Jonsson for help with Swedish as well as fiddling; and to Glenn Brown for being so easy to work with during the recording process.

Thank you for not copying this album. By buying it instead, you are supporting independent musicians and record labels. For bookings or more copies of this recording or my previous one, Spelstundarna, contact me at