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iTunes_cover_Hotel Victoria

Hotel VIctoria

A musician’s life is a beautiful, crazy life, just like a ‘loco lindo’!


The tango which gives name to this album dates from 1906 and comes from the hands of pianist Feliciano Latasa, who named it after the famous Grand Hotel Victoria in Buenos Aires.
This famous hotel was the meeting point from many musicians and artists who were trying their luck in the big city. Who played the night before a great tango craze and one day were going to make it. The hotel is a guiding light to a traveling musician.

‘Hotel Victoria’ Duo Carel Kraayenhof – Juan Pablo Dobal.

The hotel is a guiding light in the sea of the travelling musicians. There are times in our lives that we live ‘from a suitcase’, as we move from one hotel to the other. How many evenings and nights don’t end after the concert in the dressing room of a theatre or in the hotel bar, where the bandoneón is pulled out of its case and the old hotel piano is opened once again…
And that you wake up and have forgotten where you are…
A musicians life is a crazy beautiful life, that of a ‘loco lindo’!

Hotel Victoria and Te vas milonga were arranged by pianist Horacio Salgán for his duo with guitarist Ubaldo de Lío, and get a new facelift with the sounds of the bandoneón.
Enny was written by Carel for the 80th birthday of his mother. Often her house is his overnight place after concerts in the south of the Netherlands: the best B&B of the south!
Ñata blanca (White nose) is a wild cat , which knocked on Carel’s door in the assumption that he runs a hotel for cats (actually there are two other cats living in his house); after an unfortunate meeting with a rat trap one of his forelegs had to be amputated, but soon he was staggering along through the fields as if nothing had happened: as if he was dancing a zamba, which also is counted in threes…Hence this homage to a brave cat ; dedicated to Carel’s brother Jaap, also a cat lover.
Carel composed Charlotte for his sister in law from Groningen When a courtyard was named after her, acknowledging her continuous efforts in realizing wheelchair friendly apartments in the centre of the city.
Opera 79 was composed by Carel for tango dancers Arjan & Marianne, who, for many years, run their lovely tango academy De Plantage in Amsterdam. Who thinks that Carel has a wide experience in composing operas is misguided: the title refers to the home address of Arjan & Marianne.
Frieda’s milonga was created as a result of the extraordinary meeting with Frieda Menco (90), who recounted to Carel how she managed to survive Auschwitz and how she dedicated her long life to world peace. This, by meeting many young people throughout the world and speaking to them about discrimination.
Vamos a chayar, La equívoca and Luna de arrabal are much loved piano solos of Carlos García, which are now accompanied by the Argentine ‘box’, the bandoneón.
Loco lindo (Genius madman – was inspired by a self-portrait of visual artist Maurizio Cattelan and was written by Carel in 2012 for the Dutch television broadcast Art Tracks.
Taking as a starting point the folk music of the North-East of Argentina, Juan Pablo wrote the song Sudamérica (here in an instrumental version), which describes his continent. Storing great wealth and trapped between two oceans, South America became the prey of the colonist powers Spain and Portugal, causing great suffering to the ‘Indigenous’ and African peoples.
Aire de cueca, ‘An air of cueca’ is inspired by the cueca rhythm and dance, which has its origin in the Argentine mid-west region of Cuyo, close to the Andes mountain range. (When a Brazilian friend heard the title of this song she laughed her head off: in Brazil ‘cueca’ means ‘men’s underwear’.)
Across Juan Pablo’s native city, Buenos Aires, lies Uruguay, home of the candombe. This is a percussion based music genre, which has been mainly developed among the Afro-Uruguayan population of the capital Montevideo. Candombe sin esclavos was dedicated by Juan Pablo to Nelson Mandela, hence the title ‘Candombe without slaves’.

Kraayenhof en Dobal

Carel Kraayenhof en Juan Pablo Dobal

1. Vamos a chayar (vidala chayera) – Atuto Mercau Soria 2:33
2. La equívoca (chacarera) – Ariel Ramirez 2:12
3. Enny (valsecito) – Carel Kraayenhof 2:38
4. Sudamérica (canción litoraleña) – Juan Pablo Dobal 3:28
5. Aire de cueca – Juan Pablo Dobal 3:00
6. Charlotte (balada)* – Carel Kraayenhof 2:27
7. Te vas milonga (milonga) – Abel Fleury 2:00
8. La carbonera (chacarera)** – Hermanos Ábalos 2:22

9. Hotel Victoria (tango) – Feliciano Latasa 3:36
10. Ñata blanca (aire de zamba) – Carel Kraayenhof 3:40
11. Loco lindo (milonga) – Carel Kraayenhof 2:06
12. Luna de arrabal (vals criollo) – Julio Cesar Sanders 2:37
13. Frieda’s milonga (milonga campera) – Carel Kraayenhof 3:58
14. Opera 79 (milonga) – Carel Kraayenhof 2:25
15. Candombe sin esclavos – Juan Pablo Dobal 2:45
16. Adiós Nonino (tango)* – Astor Piazzolla 4:14

Guest musicians:
Jaap Branderhorst – double bass (13,14)
Bert Vos – violin (14)
Enrique Firpi – percussion (15)

Arrangements:
1, 2, 7, 9, 12: Kraayenhof / Dobal
4, 5, 15: Juan Pablo Dobal
3, 6, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16: Carel Kraayenhof
* solo bandoneón
** solo improvisation piano

Recorded on location in Splendor, Amsterdam
Engineering, mix & mastering: Hans Bedeker, Highland Music Production
Assistant engineers: Rimmert van Lummel, Dennis Krijnen
Producer: Carel Kraayenhof
Photography & graphic design: Rob Becker Beeldverhaal
Executive producer: Thirza Lourens
(p) & © VOF Bando Dreams
Publisher compositions Kraayenhof: Canyengue Music

Carel 140826- 0053

Carel Kraayenhof about Hotel Victoria:

“There are nice aspects about travelling, but people often don’t realize that about 80% of life of a musician consists of travelling and rehearsing. We go from city to city, at times I compare ourselves to sailors. The actual concert is often just a piece of the puzzle, exactly the piece which is, for the audience, an evening out. Grab a bite to eat or a drink before or after the concert… it is actually better that they don’t even realize that. For the musicians it is a strange combination of passion, work and hobby; that is the life of an artist.” During these travel times, the hotel is often their second home. On this new album Kraayenhof also makes an ode to his mother. “Nowadays she is kind of a bed & breakfast for me. When I have to play in the south of country I say over at her place, and then she joins me to the concerts.”

 

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