Fanfare Ciocărlia originate from Zece Prajini, a village located in Moldavia, northeastern Romania. Zece Prajini is entirely populated by Romani families where, traditionally, most of the men in the village worked either as subsistence farmers or at factories in nearby towns. Playing an instrument was a family tradition, taught father to son, and while the village was noted locally for its brass musicians no one living there considered themselves a professional musician.

Fanfare Ciocărlia exist as a brass band of nine to twelve members whose roots are in Austrian and Turkish military marching bands. Fanfare Ciocărlia's instrumental lineup includes trumpets, tenor and baritone horns, tubas, clarinets, saxophones, bass drum and percussion. Their song lyrics are usually either in Romani or Romanian. Their musical style stems primarily from the traditions of Romani and Romanian folk dance music, but they also borrow freely from Turkish, Bulgarian, Serbian and Macedonian musical styles, and they incorporate a number of tunes gleaned from international radio, Hollywood and Bollywood in their broad repertoire as well.