Dance! (Franz) | Franui | solo

Dance music from the alpine ranges to the Pannonian Plain, from Schubert to Bartók and East-Tyrolean country dances in between, right across all manner of musical styles and eras. What now? Isn’t “Musicbanda Franui”, this 10-piece ensemble from the small village of Innervillgraten (4600 feet above sea level) better known for playing dirges and funeral marches? Haven’t these musicians made their name by squeezing unique versions of Schubert, Brahms, and Mahler from their assortment of traditional instruments?

Well, if Franui have taught us anything, it’s that funeral odes and polkas are really two sides of the same coin. Cemetery and dancefloor are related and well acquainted with each other. With plucked and stringed instruments like the dulcimer, folk harp, and zither, woodwinds, brass, violin and double bass, plus vocals, you cannot only transform songs of the romantic era. You can play a funeral just as well as a gambol. Hint: If you speed up a funeral march up by 300 percent, you arrive at a polka.