This is another story of COVID blessings.

El Pony Pisador‘s management team found me via Folk Alliance, and asked if I’d like to arrange an interview while the band was in Kansas City for Folk Alliance 2024. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend in person this year, but definitely I wanted to talk with them. Marta and I emailed back and forth, trying to navigate travel schedules & time differences. And then I found myself home for two weeks with the dreaded C-word. My schedule was free! And I wasn’t at FAI, but I knew amazing people who were! I reached out to Arielle Silver, president of FAR-West. She just happened to have recorded this video:

And then – AND THEN! – Arielle messaged me: “I just walked by them. What’s your phone number?” She passed them my contact info, and I talked with their manager, Roc, via Whatsapp to chat with (this is from their website)* Martí Selga, who “plays the recorder, the whistle, the double bass, sings the deep voices and tells fast-paced stories” and Miquel Pérez, who “plays fiddle, percussion, sings voices, sings rubadub with groove and writes the best agricultural polyorcetics treatises.”

*another cool thing about their website: they sell socks & pajamas.

me: so did you get any sleep last night?

Them: yes, yes! We are now getting lunch. We have a funny schedule, you know?

me: how did you decide to come here?

Them: you mean the festival? Ah, okay. We were in touch with someone from folk alliance this morning who said you were looking for us.

me: yeah, Arielle!

Them: she gave us your phone number.

Them: We began as 5 friends, young guys that love Irish & sea chanteys & Celtic traditional music; and then the project is getting big, and we find Roc, our manager. When the band became a little more serious, we asked him to try to get more gigs around the world, maybe more international. He found Folk Alliance and did the application to get us there. And now we are in Kansas City, very happy. It’s been so wonderful to know other artists and listen to a lot of different music genres. It’s been really, really fun!

Me: You are the second Catalonian folk group that I’ve spoken with that also loves Irish music (I also interviewed Lauzeta.) What’s the connection?

Martí: for us, it was because of The Lord of the Rings…it all started because we were young and we were huge fans of The Lord of the Rings movie. There’s the Hobbit tavern, the Prancing Pony – our name is El Pony Picador, that means the prancing pony in Spanish. We enjoy tavern music, meant to dance, traditional, so we started learning this kind of tunes and found out that the most similar to the music we listened to in the movies were Irish music. So we took it from there, and then we also found out about sea chanteys, and we started singing – the five of us – singing a cappella, doing harmonies. We loved that. Our purpose has been to learn the different folk and root music of different parts of the world we most enjoy or are curious about.

Me: that’s great. So I’ve been listening to OCELLS today, which means “Birds” in Catalan, correct?

Them: yeah!

Me: I love La Guerra des L’Emus – the war of the Emu- I love that one so much, and The Scarecrow. There’s a very ::shudder:: scarecrow feel to it. Well done! You say you want to pursue other roots music that interests you. What interests you? What do you think you might like to do next?

Them: I can tell you a couple!

Me: yeah?

Them: for example, particularly as a guy with a mandolin, we are so into Scandinavian folk music. That’s something we would really love to try. Ramon, our guitar player, is really big into Hawaiian folk music, so that’s also something we would like to try. And we are the Renaissance & Medieval music guys, so I think that’s a way we’d like to explore a bit more, yeah.

Also them: We also like to mix roots music and folk music with other styles, with some classical music, or renaissance – (here they conversed on the correct English term) – elements, or resources. And maybe even some contemporary stuff, like we’ve been thinking of making some sort of Irish Reel, or other more modern genres, so that it’s a pattern for the guitar or mandolin, it doesn’t have to be like a drum set, in a funky classical term. You can just take the resources and put them into the instruments that we play. So that’s something we’re interested in.

Me: Yeah, I like what you’re saying, especially for mandolin: there’s so much potential for percussion. It can be very much a percussion instrument. So have you seen anything so far that made you think, “That must be really American”?

Them: About being here in Kansas city, you mean? The first thing that surprised us is that we asked two people what to do in Kansas City. And both of them said, “Barbecue.” Okay, we like to eat! We went to barbecue, and we ate a lot…

Also them: and there was something else – it would sound like I’m bragging a lot, being from Barcelona and stuff – but we went to a chicken place; it wasn’t actually great, but they say, “this is an old house! It’s nearly 200 years old!” And I was like, all my neighborhood in Barcelona is more than 200 years old! And we live just next to the Roman ruins, so…yeah, that’s fun!

Me: I think that’s funny, too. When I went outside the United States, the only place I went is Istanbul, and there’s some very thousands-of-years-old things in between modern buildings. Everything’s all mixed together. I look at that and think, “Ah, America. We’re babies!”

Them: On the other side, you have a lot of very, very beautiful national parks. I think it’s such a very beautiful treasure that you have. First time we went to the States we went to the Shenandoah National Park –

Me: that’s by me!

Them: We really love it, absolutely.

Me: and I’ll tell ya, while you’re in Kansas City…you’re surrounded by music right now; you’re at a Folk conference. But if you have a chance, find out where you can go see some Kansas City blues.

Them: we actually did! It was not exactly blues; it was more like a jam session, a jazz-bluesy jam session. On Monday, we went to The Blue Room, and we absolutely loved it. The quality standards were so high. Everyone was so much more talented than you would expect.

Me: that’s one thing I think is particularly American: we’re very defensive about what kind…just like with barbecue, what kind of barbecue it is, what kind of Blues it is.

Them (knowingly): yeah, for sure!

Me: so amongst the other acts that you’ve seen, did you see anything inspirational so far?

Them (in unison): Yeah. (separately): If you want, we can give each one an example. We met a band that’s called Acoustic Nomads, and they have as one of the members a cuatro player; it’s from Venezuela, a four-stringed guitar from Venezuela. They are so good, the four of them. It was like a bluegrassy sound, but with influences of…I think they did one Peruvian song?

Also them: Peruvian song, yeah

Them: a mix of different folks. That’s what we love most.

Other them: we like an American continent connection: to listen to music from Central America, then South America, then North America – you can actually tie them all. And another band that was really inspiring for us was…I can give you two examples. One was Mitzune, which is a Japanese-sounding band based in Berlin, and they are absolutely great. You could not expect how great it is. With Shamisens, a kind of Japanese banjo, also voices, also percussionists, a double bass and the two shamisens, was really awesome. And then there was this other band called Spring of…Sprig of That? They do kind of progressive bluegrass with sitar/guitars, cello, violin AND! Indian Tabla, which was the surprise, cause who would feel the Indian tabla on this kind of music? And wow…

Them: the best thing of all of that is we had the chance to play with them. Lots of jams everywhere – yesterday at every corner of the hotel was like a little group of people playing.

Miquel: and also I am now learning how to play hurdy-gurdy, and I’ve met a hurdy-gurdy player from Ukraine, and it’s great because I could actually go to her and say, “Can we keep in touch? Can you help me to find a good repertoire?” Sometimes when you’re trying to get deep into folk music from a country you don’t speak the language, it gets difficult. But when you have the contact, and you can ask, “can you recommend me the first tunes I should approach to get deep inside of that culture?” And the person can help. And this is something that’s been happening here because you can also meet some…those Norwegian guys – Okay, give me some help with the Norwegian repertoire, and they can and they will, cause they love it.

Please follow this very entertaining band from Spain: Follow them at https://www.facebook.com/elponypisador.yarr. Also, their website is an adventure. Get some socks.

Yarr!

debora Ewing writes, paints, and screams at the stars because the world is still screwed up. She improves what she can with music collaboration, peer review for Consilience Science-Based Poetry Journal, and book design at Igneus Press. Find her art and word everywhere, including Jerry Jazz Musician, Shot Glass Journal, Beyond Words Literary Magazine, Cholla Needles, and Dodging the Rain. Follow her on “X” and Instagram @DebsValidation, and into seedy pool halls but probably not dark alleys.