The pre-2002 Charming Hostess (also known as Charming Hostes… Read Full Bio ↴Early Work:
The pre-2002 Charming Hostess (also known as Charming Hostess Big Band) was a rock band that embraced a genderfuck sensibility (the women often wore mustaches while the men wore dresses). Early Charming Hostess music drew on women's vocal traditions (primarily from Eastern Europe and North Africa), and integrated them with American folk forms both white and black. Charming Hostess was founded in the fertile anarchy of Barrington Co-op (aka Barrington Hall), and nurtured by the West Oakland arts community, along with other coeval bands such as Fibulator and Eskimo. Half of Charming Hostess was also in Idiot Flesh/Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. The final effect was of a hoedown where bodacious babes belted the blues in Bulgarian while a Punk-Klezmer band rocked out in accompaniment.
The genre of this incarnation of ChoHo is described by the band as "Klezmer-Punk/Balkan-Funk". Recordings of Charming Hostess Big Band include "Eat" (Vaccination, 1998) and the more recent "Punch" (ReR, 2005) Charming Hostess Big Band was: Jewlia Eisenberg (voice, direction), Carla Kihlstedt (voice, fiddle), Nina Rolle (voice, accordion), Wes Anderson (drums), Nils Frykdahl (guitar, flute, saxophone, percussion), and Dan Rathbun (bass)."
Jewlia Eisenberg, Marika Hughes, Cynthia Taylor,
Jason Ditzian, Shahzad Ismaily, Ches Smith.
- plus, often Ganda Suthivarakom and/or Pameliya Kursten (all vocals).
Honored guests on 2010 The Bowls Project album include:
Marc Ribot, Jenny Scheinman, Megan Gould, Jessica Troy, Nils Frykdahl, Dawn McCarthy, Ganda Suthivarakom, Boris Martzinovsky, Aaron Kierbel, and Nir Waxman.
Current Work:
The Bowls Project, an album and installation from Charming Hostess released Summer 2010.
The Bowls Project Album:
Based on inscriptions from ancient Babylonian Jewish amulets, The Bowls Project, Tzadik sings of mysticism and magic, angels and demons, and the trials and joys of love and sex. Especially audible are the voices of Talmudic-era women: their work, hopes and dreams. Weaving together Babylonian devotional songs, apocalyptic American folk music and a radical take on ritual power, The Bowls Project marks the deepest and most creative work by Charming Hostess yet.
The Bowls Project Installation & Sound Sculpture:
As a performance installation and interactive sound sculpture that takes place in a 40’ vaulted dome. Featuring new music composed and performed by Jewlia Eisenberg and Charming Hostess, The Bowls Project is based on texts from ancient Babylonian amulets. The culmination of five years of research, The Bowls Project will
run June through August 2010 at Yerba Buena Center for the
Arts. An estimated 15,000 people will visit and interact with
the installation.
The Bowls Project Background:
Bowl amulets were common 1500 years ago in the area
that is now Iraq. Simple bowls were inscribed with a
householder’s secrets and desires and then buried under
the doorway to protect the home. The bowl texts are
about “secrets of the home”: love and intimacy, angels and
demons, and the trials and joys of daily life. Audible in these
texts are the individual voices of women from this period
-their work, hopes, and dreams. These spiraled inscriptions
are among the few existing records of female voices during
the time and place of the Babylonian Talmud.
All Work:
The music primarily springs from three women with an emphasis in the body--voices and vocal percussion, hand claps and heartbeats, sex-breath and silence. The work grows from diaspora consciousness: both Jewish and African. Stylistically, Charming Hostess incorporates doo-wop, Pygmy counterpoint, Balkan harmony and Andalusian melody. Contemporary influences on the band include Meredith Monk and Reinette l'Oranaise. The music often explores existing text and overlays the composer's (Jewlia Eisenberg) own questions of authenticity, montage, and the effect of music on non-verbal languages.
The 2002 CD (Trilectic, Tzadik Records) explored the political/erotic nexus of Walter Benjamin and his Marxist muse, Asja Lacis. The 2004 CD (Sarajevo Blues, Tzadik) sets Bosnian poetry by Semezdin Mehmedinović as a form of love and resistance to the brutalization of war.
Si Veriash La Rana
Charming Hostess Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
If you could see the little mouse sitting in the corner, shelling walnuts and sharing with her sisters!
If you could see the little camel sitting on the dough-board, rolling out filo thinner than hair!
I love you so much!
The lyrics of Charming Hostess's song Si Veriash La Rana describe a scene of domestic work being shared among siblings, where the focus is on the sense of community and love rather than the actual work being done. The first two lines depict a frog frying some fritas (likely a type of Latin American fritter) on a stove and sharing them with her sisters. The image of the frog cooking and sharing food is symbolic of the idea of communal work and solidarity. The next line features a mouse shelling walnuts, again for the purpose of sharing with her sisters. The emphasis is not simply on the act of cooking or shelling, but the act of creating something to be shared with others.
The final line of the lyrics, "I love you so much," is likely a direct address to the sisters, emphasizing the importance of their bond and the love and care that is shared between them. The song celebrates the idea of communal work, where everyone contributes what they can, and the result of that work is shared and enjoyed by all.
Line by Line Meaning
If you could see the little frog sitting on the oven, frying her fritas and sharing with her sisters!
If you could witness the perseverance and hard work of this small frog, who is cooking her own food and sharing with her siblings despite her size and limitations.
If you could see the little mouse sitting in the corner, shelling walnuts and sharing with her sisters!
If you could observe the resourcefulness and generosity of this tiny mouse, who is cracking open walnuts for herself and her sisters with care and kindness.
If you could see the little camel sitting on the dough-board, rolling out filo thinner than hair!
If you could appreciate the skill and precision of this small camel, who is delicately rolling out pastry so thin it resembles hair, with admirable expertise.
I love you so much!
A declaration of affection and admiration.
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
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