Charming Hostess is a band that grew out of the

avant-rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments with the basic elements of the genre. Artists aim to liberate and innovate, with ...

scene of

Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...

, in the mid-1990s.

Current work

The music of Charming Hostess primarily springs from three women with an emphasis in the body—voices and vocal percussion, handclaps and heartbeats, sex-breath and silence. The work grows from

diaspora A diaspora ( ) is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of origin. Historically, the word was used first in reference to the dispersion of Greeks in the Hellenic world, and later Jews after ...

consciousness: both Jewish and African. Stylistically, Charming Hostess incorporates

doo-wop Doo-wop (also spelled doowop and doo wop) is a genre of rhythm and blues music that originated in African-American communities during the 1940s, mainly in the large cities of the United States, including New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Chica ...

Pygmy In anthropology, pygmy peoples are ethnic groups whose average height is unusually short. The term pygmyism is used to describe the phenotype of endemic short stature (as opposed to disproportionate dwarfism occurring in isolated cases in a pop ...

counterpoint In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more musical lines (or voices) which are harmonically interdependent yet independent in rhythm and melodic contour. It has been most commonly identified in the European classical tradi ...

, Balkan harmony and Andalusian melody. Contemporary influences on the band include

Meredith Monk Meredith Jane Monk (born November 20, 1942) is an American composer, performer, director, vocalist, filmmaker, and choreographer. From the 1960s onwards, Monk has created multi-disciplinary works which combine music, theatre, and dance, recording ...

and Reinette l'Oranaise. The music often explores existing text and overlays the composer's (

Jewlia Eisenberg Jewlia Eisenberg (1970/1 – March 11, 2021) was an American singer, composer, bassist, educator, and cantor. As founder and bandleader of Charming Hostess she coined the term "Nerdy-Sexy-Commie-Girly" to describe her genre of music which spans ...

) own questions of authenticity, montage, and the effect of music on non-verbal languages. The Bowls Project Album (Release Summer 2010): Based on inscriptions from ancient

Babylonia Babylonia (; Akkadian: , ''māt Akkadī'') was an ancient Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Syria). It emerged as an Amorite-ruled state c. ...

n Jewish

amulet An amulet, also known as a good luck charm or phylactery, is an object believed to confer protection upon its possessor. The word "amulet" comes from the Latin word amuletum, which Pliny's ''Natural History'' describes as "an object that protects ...

s, ''The Bowls Project'', as Charming Hostess. (

Tzadik Records Tzadik Records is a record label in New York City that specializes in avant-garde and experimental music. The label was established by composer and saxophonist John Zorn in 1995. He is the executive producer of all Tzadik releases. Tzadik is a n ...

, Radical Jewish Culture, 2010) sings of mysticism and magic, angels and demons, and the trials and joys of love and sex. Especially audible are the voices of

Talmudic The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the cente ...

-era women: their work, hopes and dreams. Weaving together Babylonian devotional songs, apocalyptic American folk music and a radical take on ritual power. Honored guests on 2010 ''The Bowls Project'' album include:

Marc Ribot Marc Ribot (; born May 21, 1954) is an American guitarist and composer. His work has touched on many styles, including no wave, free jazz, rock, and Cuban music. Ribot is also known for collaborating with other musicians, most notably Tom Wait ...

Jenny Scheinman Jenny Scheinman is a jazz violinist. She has produced several critically acclaimed solo albums, including ''12 Songs'', named one of the Top Ten Albums of 2005 by ''The New York Times''. She has played with Linda Perry, Norah Jones, Nels Cline, ...

, Megan Gould, Jessica Troy,

Nils Frykdahl Nils Frykdahl is an American musician, most known for his work with the bands Sleepytime Gorilla Museum and Idiot Flesh. He is also a member of the bands Free Salamander Exhibit, Faun Fables, and Darling Freakhead, and used to be a member of Char ...

Dawn McCarthy Faun Fables is an American band based in Oakland, California. Faun Fables is a concept and vehicle for Dawn McCarthy, who was inspired to write the original material while traveling after leaving the New York City music scene in 1997. Faun Fable ...

, Ganda Suthivarakom, Boris Martzinovsky, Aaron Kierbel, and Nir Waxman. The Bowls Project Installation & Sound Sculpture: As a performance installation and interactive sound sculpture that takes place in a 40’

Catalan vault The Catalan vault ( ca, volta catalana), also called thin-tile vault, Catalan turn, Catalan arch, boveda ceiling (Spanish ''bóveda'' 'vault'), or timbrel vault, is a type of low brickwork arch forming a vaulted ceiling that often supports a floor ...

designed by architect Michael Ramage. 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'' was exhibited at

Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) is a multi-disciplinary contemporary arts center in San Francisco, California, United States. Located in Yerba Buena Gardens, YBCA features visual art, performance, and film/video that celebrates local, natio ...

in 2010. The Bowls Project Background: Bowl amulets also known as

Incantation bowls An incantation bowl, also known as a demon bowl, devil-trap bowl, or magic bowl, is a form of early protective magic found in what is now Iraq and Iran. Produced in the Middle East during late antiquity from the sixth to eighth centuries, particu ...

were common 1500 years ago in the area that is now

Iraq Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–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. The 2002 CD ''Trilectic'' (

) explored the political/erotic nexus of

Walter Benjamin Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (; ; 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940) was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic and essayist. An eclectic thinker, combining elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, and Jewish mys ...

and his

Marxist Marxism is a Left-wing politics, left-wing to Far-left politics, far-left method of socioeconomic analysis that uses a Materialism, materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to understand S ...

muse,

Asja Lācis Anna "Asja" Lācis (née Liepiņa; russian: Анна 'Ася' Эрнестовна Лацис, ; german: Asja Lazis; October 19, 1891 – November 21, 1979) was a Latvian actress and theatre director. Biography A Bolshevik, in the twenties s ...

. The 2004 CD ''

Sarajevo Blues ''Sarajevo Blues'' is a book of poetry first published in 1992 during the siege of Sarajevo by Semezdin Mehmedinović. Mr. Mehmedinović's book was translated into English by Ammiel Alcalay in 1998. Mehmedinović's text was translated into musi ...

'' (Tzadik) sets Bosnian poetry by

Semezdin Mehmedinović Semezdin Mehmedinović (born 1960 in Kiseljak is a Bosnian writer and magazine editor. After studying Librarianship and Comparative Literature in Sarajevo, he worked as an editor of "Lica" and "Valter" magazines, which served as a voice of opposi ...

as a form of love and resistance to the brutalization of war. Their self-described genre is “Nerdy-Sexy-Commie-Girly”. Charming Hostess is

, Marika Hughes, Cynthia Taylor and often Ganda Suthivarakom and Pameliya Kursten (all vocals).

Early work

The pre-2002 Charming Hostess (also known as Charming Hostess Big Band) was a rock band that embraced a

genderfuck A gender bender is a person who dresses up and acts like the opposite sex. Bending expected gender roles may also be called a genderfuck. Gender bending may be political, stemming from the early identity politics movements of the 1960s and 19 ...

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 Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...

and

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

) and integrated them with American folk forms both white and black. Charming Hostess was founded in the fertile

anarchy Anarchy is a society without a government. It may also refer to a society or group of people that entirely rejects a set hierarchy. ''Anarchy'' was first used in English in 1539, meaning "an absence of government". Pierre-Joseph Proudhon adopted ...

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 Idiot Flesh was an American experimental rock band formed in Oakland, California, in 1985, initially working under the name Acid Rain. Their work was characterized by its "rock against rock" slogan, and defied classification with its incorpora ...

Sleepytime Gorilla Museum Sleepytime Gorilla Museum (often abbreviated to SGM) was an American experimental rock band, formed in 1999 in Oakland, California. The band fused classical, industrial, and art-rock themes throughout their music. They were known to perform elabo ...

. The final effect was of a hoedown where bodacious babes belted the blues in Bulgarian while a

punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

klezmer Klezmer ( yi, קלעזמער or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for l ...

band rocked out in accompaniment. The genre of this incarnation of ChoHo is described by the band as “

Klezmer Klezmer ( yi, קלעזמער or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for l ...

Punk Punk or punks may refer to: Genres, subculture, and related aspects * Punk rock, a music genre originating in the 1970s associated with various subgenres * Punk subculture, a subculture associated with punk rock, or aspects of the subculture s ...

Balkan The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...

Funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the m ...

”. Recordings of Charming Hostess Big Band include ''Eat'' (Vaccination, 1998) and ''Punch'' (ReR, 2005). Charming Hostess Big Band was:

(voice, direction),

Carla Kihlstedt Carla Kihlstedt (born 1971) is an American composer, violinist, vocalist, and multi-instrumentalist, originally from Lancaster, Pennsylvania and currently working from a home studio on Cape Cod. She is a founding member of Tin Hat Trio (1997, ...

(voice, fiddle), Nina Rolle (voice, accordion), Wes Anderson (drums),

(guitar, flute, saxophone, percussion), and Dan Rathbun (bass).

References

* Hooper, Joseph. "Monk, Eisenberg and Banhart: Oh Me, Oh My, They're So Unusual", ''The New York Observer'', December 2, 2002. * Cowley, Julian. "Soundcheck: Jewlia Eisenberg Trilectic", ''The Wire''. March 2002. * Weisberg, Rob. "Transpacific Sound Paradise",-2:19:30, WFMU, New York, NY, June 5, 2010.

External links

Charming Hostess official website
* *
BBC interview with Charming Hostess Founder/Composer Jewlia Eisenberg 2010 Transpacific Sound Paradise Interview with Charming Hostess Founder/Composer Jewlia Eisenberg, WFMU, NY, NY.
{{Authority control Dark cabaret musicians Gypsy punk Musical groups established in 1999 Tzadik Records artists American experimental musical groups 1999 establishments in California