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Get your dancing shoes on for Raya Brass Band's Balkan soul

There are two kinds of people who come to discover music from the Balkans: Those who were born into the southeastern European region or were brought up with the rhythmically complex, brassy tunes of the area - and "young, hipster-y people," according to Ben Syversen, who was among the latter.

Raya Brass Band (Photo by Joel Barhamand)
Raya Brass Band (Photo by Joel Barhamand)Read more

There are two kinds of people who come to discover music from the Balkans: Those who were born into the southeastern European region or were brought up with the rhythmically complex, brassy tunes of the area - and "young, hipster-y people," according to Ben Syversen, who was among the latter.

It's one of the first things you wonder about a group of Americans who play this kind of music that's so not American - how did that happen?

Syversen, who plays trumpet in the Brooklyn five-piece Raya Brass Band - at Johnny Brenda's on Sunday with kindred souls Sandaraa - credits his trip down the Balkan rabbit hole to a friend's simple question: "Hey, you want to play Balkan music?"

He'd never heard of the genre, an instrumental mix of horns and accordion that musically maps Gypsy travels through Greece, Turkey and Serbia. The time signatures, the scales, the way it's performed . . . all unique. That novelty is what caught him.

"The thing that really showed me this was something different was when I actually started playing it and saw people holding hands, dancing in a circle around us," Syversen said. "This is music where the performers and the audience, or the community that you're playing it for, are very connected."

Fusing their own contemporary influences, like jazz for Syversen or punk for other members of the band, the project, formed in 2008, has taken on a life of its own. Jazz riffs here, New Orleans brass-band flavor there.

"Our experiences here in America . . . those have started to filter in," he said. "This starting point that could be kind of unfamiliar to a lot of people is a springboard toward something [that], at this point, I think has a lot of connections and recognizable elements."

In short, it's party music. However, it's not party music in the traditional sense. Sure, the audience will hop on chairs and get a little physical with their dance moves (try to avoid getting hit in the face by a fervent partyer, Syversen warns), but they're not waiting for the bass to drop. Instead, it's a celebration of life, music and culture, regardless of venue.

The band has played festivals, like the Zlatne Uste Golden Festival in Brooklyn, which is how, Syversen says, the aforementioned "young, hipster-y" types find their way into the Balkan music club. They've performed at bars and concert halls and, recently, in Philly at Underground Arts with the West Philadelphia Orchestra, our city's own tip of the Balkan music hat.

They even played a subway car.

It was New Year's Eve and Raya Brass Band had two gigs: one in Brooklyn and one in Manhattan. Taking advantage of both time and cost effectiveness, they jumped on the subway from one gig to the other with their instruments - horns, drums, accordions - strapped to their bodies.

"The train is full of drunken New Year's partyers, so they see us with the horns and everything, and they start chanting, 'Tuba, tuba!' and we end up playing a song on the train car," Syversen recalled.

It's that kind of spirit and energy that Syversen hopes will draw crowds that might be wary of the unknown. Theirs is not a show in which a bunch of guys with instruments stand on a stage, or one the listener would better enjoy having knowledge of the band's discography.

"However we get them to walk through the door is sometimes a mystery to me," Syversen said. "Once they walk through the door and witness the feeling, that's what wins them over."