Order by email from Kees or Martin.
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Honor Your Binkie was never really composed. It merely took shape as the songwriter used his belcanto and his sehtar to try to keep his infant daughter from crying and whining.
When President George W. Bush visited Martin Bier's home town of Greenville, North Carolina, Martin Bier obliged by writing an alternative version of Hail To The Chief. The main objective of the song is to inform young Americans in Greenville about who their president is and what he is all about. Reverence for the subject matter demands, of course, a majestic rhythm and a major key.
Bigotry and violence towards bald men was first reported about in the Old Testament, in 2Kings 2:23&24 to be precise, when the prophet Elisha was its victim. This newly composed psalm recounts the incident and derives important moral consequences from it.
A mere two lines from a centuries old religious tract form the body of text for Infidelitry. The music is not in a major or minor key, but instead employs the "neutral third." The third note of the scale, Ep, is right in between Eb and E. In a similar way the sixth note of the scale, Ap, is right in between Ab and A. The scale is mindful of the Persian dastgah Sehgah, but in the extensive soloing between cantations the high C is approached through chromatic steps. This is something that is done mostly in Arabic music.
Secular Calvinism in Contemporary Holland is a translation into English of a pre WW2 Dutch ballad. This innovative and sophisticated new musical arrangement uses the same, Sehgah inspired, scale as the previous song on the CD. Persian scales have always been thought to not allow for chord based, harmonic accompaniments. However, in this innovative arrangement the sehtar is used mostly for such a chord based, harmonic accompaniment to the main melody.
In 1980s America, instead of becoming street musicians, they dropped out, got PhD's in physics and obtained academic positions at renowned North American Universities on different ends of the continent. They married American wives and got divorced again.
As they were heading for their midlife crises they felt a strong desire to tune in, and reengage the muse once again. So they reunited and picked up where they left off in the 70s. In the late 90s they produced the BierDoel Cassette and the BierDoelCD . During this period they also got married again.
Kees specializes in wind instruments and has played the recorder and the church organ for a long time before discovering the Persian ney, which gets most of his attention nowadays.
The ney is one of the oldest musical instruments on the planet. If you think of a flute as a sophisticated way of whistling, then the ney is a sophisticated way of hissing. Neys have been found in the tombs of 5000 year old mummies in Egypt, who tend to play rather poorly. The Persian ney has a unique embouchure. Unlike the flute, or Arabic neys, the airflow is not controlled with the lips. Instead, the top of the instrument is inserted inside the mouth between the front teeth and the airstream is directed with the tongue against the palate. This gives the ney a unique sound which suits Martin's unique songs as well as it fits the Medieval Persian poets like Molavi and Hafez at which it is usually wielded.
Kees has studied with the most renowned Iranian masters of the ney. Around his hometown of Vancouver, Canada, he performs regularly in the traditional Persian style. He builds his own neys and he imports neys from Iran. He also has a website devoted to the instrument and its playing.
Martin plays plucked string instruments. He played guitar for many years, but a quest to go beyond the twelve-tone chromatic scale and the desire to own an instrument that is sufficiently small to allow for convenient air travel drove him to the sehtar. The sehtar was the favored instrument of Sufi mystics and in the course of almost a thousand years extensive theory and repertoire has been created. The melancholy sound of this instrument appears to be well suited to the metaphysical spleen expressed in Martin's lyrics.
Teachers gave up on Martin Bier a long time ago and, in the isolated swamplands of Eastern North Carolina, he taught himself how to play the sehtar. Little stickers on the neck of the instrument tell him where to find what notes. His techniques and harmonies are a blend of Western and Persian playing. Purists of Western and Persian music have labelled him a "heretic." But his odd tunes and peculiar lyrics have also spawned fascination among a small assembly of devoted followers. He is presently constructing a website to instruct sehtar novices into his way of playing.
Martin and Kees appear to make music as one as they flawlessly lead, follow and harmonize. They intuit each other's twists and turns and they seem to have a unique manner of communicating through music. It is a connecting brought about by having gone through many of the same of life's experiences. Both artists know what a Boltzmann distribution looks like. Both artists know what it feels like to step in one of the many dogturds on the Alkmaar sidewalks. And both artists know what it feels like to loose and find partners and motherlands.
All of this has resulted in a unique piece of work called BierDoelCD2!
Our doodoo doin' doggo
is sniffin 'roun' the yard
she wants to do a doodoo
a doodoo and a fart
Sometimes she's constipated
Sometimes she has the runs
Sometimes she's poopin' little
Sometimes she's poopin' tons
She's poopin' in the playlot
She's poopin' in the mall
She poopin' in the churchyard
For Peter and for Paul
Scoot, roll, push and crawl
From the bedroom down the hall
Wah wah wah wah wah wah ........
All the children are distraught (2X)
Cause Elmo turned out to be a fraud
He's made of artificial color (2X)
Two plastic eyes and some quasi educamational holler
Wah wah wah wah wah wah ........
Your binkie is your friend (3X)
Until the very end
Wah wah wah wah wah wah ........
CHORUS:
Beware, little kids throughout this land
of the man, of the man who is president
He hunts, he subliminates, and he shoots
He's drivin' drunk, and he executes
FIRST VERSE
He hands your playlot to some pal
That toys with venture capital
They fill it up with toxic trash
You get cancer, they get cash
CHORUS
SECOND VERSE
At night this little autocrat
Sneaks out to the laundromat
He snatches coins from welfare mums
And shares the loot with golfing chums
CHORUS
BRIDGE
Beware, little children, Watch your back
Cause the man in charge, he's a maniac
He makes billionaires of millionaires
And he makes you choke on dreary prayers
He's sleazy, he's dum, and he's violent
He drugs and he drinks, and he's president
CHORUS
About 3000 years ago
Elisha's hair refused to grow
Yeah, he came from Abel Meholah
And he suffered alopecia
Chrome Dome, Chrome Dome
This prophet in old Israel
Went to the city of Beth-El
Some kids came out in cruel pursuit
They mocked and teased and ridiculed
They yelled: Go Baldy Go Baldy Go!
Elisha turned and faced the crowd
He called on God and cursed them out
Bald Power, Bald Power
And suddenly out of the shrub
Two big female bears turned up
The rascals turned and swiftly flew
But the bears they still killed forty-two
Bald Power, Bald Power
Never, no never
Never make fun
-no fun whatsoever-
Of a man with no hair
Unless you're sure
You 'll outrun a bear
Chrome Dome, Chrome Dome
Bear this in mind
Bald Power, Bald Pride
Hail to the Avenging Bear
Hail to the Bald Eagle
Hail to the Hairless Hunk
Bald Power, Bald Pride
An adulterer may marry only an adulteress or an idolatress
And an adulteress may marry only an adulterer or an idolator
VERSE 1
There are people all around us that don't accept their fate
The toil and they endeavor, they strive and enervate
I say, people be aware with ev'ry single deed
Things will be the way they are decreed
CHORUS
When a dime is what you were meant to be
You'll never reach a quarter
You may study and get a law or a science degree
But it won't get you farther
You imagine that it's you that pulls the strings
But life is just a tug of war
Oh when a dime is what you were destined for
You'll never be a nickle more
VERSE 2
You rarely meet a person who understands our plight
You can be so happy when you're satisfied
Why do you seek happiness so distant and so far
You can get it right from where you are
CHORUS
PARLANDO
Yeah, and that's how it is
And you can stand on your head
That's how it will be
If you were meant for overalls
Then you will never wear a three piece suit
And if you were raised on grits
Then you will never choke on caviar
So just stop these fruitless efforts
Be sensible
Things will stay the same
And that's how it is
Oh when a dime is what you were destined for
You'll never be a nickle more