In Music: Bela Karoli

In Music :: Stand Up Straight for Bela Karoli
Interviewed by Lisa Gedgaudas

Since the release of Bela Karoli’s CD Furnished Rooms this past October, Karoli
connoisseurs have come out of the woodwork to stock-up and fill their skirts with a sound
brand new to the scene. It’s calming enough to toss into your mother’s car, and sexy enough
to have a man over for dinner with. There’s a consistent and underlining hum to the album
that keeps you warm throughout, while the echoes of strings, tones, beats, glocks, and
musical mechanics reconfigure one’s heart beats - setting them in new motion.
Behind the album lies a fearless line-up heralded as Denver’s own Jazzy-Pop-Throbs:
Bela Karoli. Standing upright on bass is leader of the pack Julie Davis, a woman who
somehow pulls her bow in perfect time with your pulse. Julie walks with grace, balancing
a career as a full-time tutor and a voice in the crowd. While Carrie Beeder isn’t busy
teaching music, playing in the SACRA Chamber Orchestra, or in two local string
quartets, she holds up Karoli’s stage-left, juggling strings with the perfect hints,
warnings and melodic whispers on her cello or violin. Brigid McAuliffe, a full-time grad
student, fills the air with the exquisite sighs of accordion and her ever-sustaining backup
vocals.

Originally, Julie’s one-woman act, Bluebook, had its first show at The Walnut Room in early
2006. She played with only her upright bass, and a tiny machine that trickled pre-recorded
backbeats and harmonic curves – driving the audience into penitence; hungry to hear
more. It was there that she met Sarah Levine, her future booker, and Randall Frazier, the
Walnut’s sound technician, both of whom would ultimately help formulate, produce and
record what we now know as the alternative super-group, Bela Karoli.

How would you explain the genre that you have created?
J: It’s hard…how do we classify this? I end up explaining the
line-up to support the idea of what it sounds like.
B: New media has no established genre for this but everyone needs us to classify it.
C: In the end I have to tell people what it’s not…My explanation becomes jazzy/bluesy
vocals, then I stop and say, it’s not jazz.
J: Your grandmother would like it.
B: She would get down.

Let’s be honest. When you have influences that include, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis,
Radiohead, Bob Dylan, PJ Harvey, Beirut, Cat Power, Sparklehorse, Igor Stravinsky, Mark
Feldman, John Zorn & Andrew Bird, you’re bound to understand how, in their words,
“Retro-Future-Chamber-Pop” makes sense as musical classification.

How was working with Producer Randall Frazier at Helmet Room to record
this album?
J: Randall and I have both done home studio so it was an easy transition from me. He
has now created and invested in his own space for this.
C: He’s put so much time, effort, and thought into our album and it shows.
B: It was my first real intensive experience in a studio and we were under the gun.
The energy is hard to find and can sometimes feel a little sterile.
J: It was like a testing ground for all of us.

I’m interested in your album art; it’s simplistic but seems to make you look closer.
How did it come about?
J: The bee that is on the cover, I found it in the back of my house and had to do something
with it so I ended up taking a picture of it. It was the first photograph I had taken and
as time went on I just kept collecting things. Dave, my husband and I started talking about
the aesthetic and…” (This was the moment Julie spilled her drink on herself.) ”…the songs
are like little telescopes on these little moments, like little rooms.”

You have had great success so far in the local music scene this past year, who’s on your team?
J: Ian Cooke, my hero, is one of the hardest working, inventive, and talented musicians in this
town. I’m also very inspired by The Wheel and Born in the Flood and how professional
they are on stage. Erin Roberts from Porlolo is such a gifted songwriter and the boys in Everything
Absent or Distorted are like our boy cheerleading squad. There are so many we wish we
could name here, we adore and have had so much support from Joe Sampson, Paper Bird
and Bad Weather California, and recently went on tour with Gregory Alan Isakov.
C: These people have musical integrity and heart and should be honored by the community.
J: What’s so alarming about the music scene is that everyone is so supportive to each other.

What can we expect to see next for Bela Karoli?
J: We are happily pressing more albums since we’ve run out…and I’ve written more new
songs that we have included in our sets. We also have James Han Dupler playing piano with us
live. Touring right now is hard because of our jobs, but we are considering a small tour in June
and we look forward to building a new record.

What are some things you have learned about the music industry?
J: I want to pour myself into it but it takes so much energy to do this. I run my own
business and I’d love to faze out of that and continue with the music…but everyone
is making music and it’s an industry that takes more that it can sometimes give back.
We don’t want to sacrifice our musical integrity to play and make money.

Who is the real Bela Karoli?
J: Hah, he’s a famous Hungarian Gymnastics coach who brought both the United States and
Romanian Olympic teams to medal success, but spelled his name Bela Karolyi. He trained
girls like Nadia Comaneci and Mary Lou Retton in the 80’s. He’s very iconic and I’ve
always wanted to wear leotards. Some people remember his name well, including a woman
that waited outside of the KGNU studios after we did a radio show just to ask, “Do you know who he is?”and it turned out she was once his neighbor.
B: I think someday we should have Bela Karolyi open for Bela Karoli.
J: We need gymnasts at our shows.

All said and done, these are three women anyone should stand up straight for, or if they are lucky
enough, sit down with. With great rigor, there is always a time and place for the passion of music, and Bela Karoli will always be found in the thick of it.

Get yourself some Bela Karoli:
March, 26 2008 at Oriental Theater: Creative Music Works Presents

www.BelaKaroli.com
www.MySpace.com/BelaKaroli

Article Courtesy of:
www.ColoradoMusicBuzz.com