The group was originally named by Raoul Weiss and Lóránd Boros for concerts held between 2006 and 2008 at Café Aux Anges (a concert venue in Cluj-Napoca, Romania managed by Raoul Weiss), following the widespread use of this phrase in the English-speaking folk community in Budapest and in Hungarian diaspora, e.g. in Bob Cohen's online contributions to the study and promotion of this peculiar music.

Mezőség is the name for the mostly rural hilly area of central Transylvania that lies between the cities of Cluj-Napoca, Turda, Târgu-Mureş, Bistriţa, Beclean, and Gherla.

Until the second half of the 20th century, most of the (approximately) 300 Hungarian, Romanian, German and mixed communities of the Mezőség region had their own distinct bands; during the second half of the 20th century, the introduction of mass-culture habits in that rural area stripped the traditional audiences away from those musicians, and with it the revenue derived from providing music for social festivities (weddings, traditional holidays, etc.).

They were rediscovered in the 1970s by ethno-musicology and the newborn Táncház movement, which provided them a new, mostly urban, public in cities of the former Hungarian Kingdom (such as Budapest, Debrecen, and Cluj).

But this is precisely where the distinction lies: within the táncház-revival, little or no emphasis has been laid on artistic personalities among vernacular musicians: in spite of growing integration into an international and commercial performing pattern (nowadays, vernacular folk musicians from Transylvania tend to earn more from non-traditional performances, held in cities, or in summer camps organized in rural locations of the area, but generally not for locals), their (mostly improvised) management tended to treat them as ethnological “hold-outs,” which is partly in keeping with the idea some of those musicians have of themselves, but ultimately risks freezing their reputation and activity within the diminutive frame of a relatively small group of folk aficionados, which is unable to sustain a number of events and/or a level of remuneration sufficient to guarantee the future of those bands and, therefore, the survival of their musical traditions.

In other words: under-marketing the artists for the sake of authenticity might prove to bring the opposite result: seeing even more folk musicians migrate towards mass-market genres, or abandoning music altogether for more gainful occupations.

This is why the creators of the Palatka Gypsy Band “brand”, Raoul Weiss and Lóránd Boros, decided to switch to a more realistic management approach, marketing the band by contemporary means to deliver its music to a broader public: advertising through designed posters, multilingual presentation texts, website[2] etc., introducing the individual musicians with all the attributes of professional performing artists (artistic and civil name, photographs) – and educating the musicians as to modern practices of show-business (written contracts, regular fees, etc.).

In the early 2000s, after the death of Marci and Béla, Florin, already a star of the folk scene, inherited the throne of the Codoba fiddle dynasty.

Having learnt Romani and Romanian at home, long stays in Hungary during his youth and, later on, an intensive concert routine there, gave him the occasion to become (unlike his fellow musicians) fluent in Hungarian as well.

His higher educational level allowed him to develop a keen understanding of the values contained in the cultural heritage of his family and village community, so that Florin can reasonably be described as a folk purist.

He already performed in Australia (http://www.kulcha.com.au/0601/index.html), Canada, Finland, the Baltic States, Germany, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Serbia and Slovakia.

Seniority (a very important value in Gypsy communities) allows him to share the leadership with his nephew; it is generally admitted that, whereas Florin is the leader in the city and the outside world, Lőrincz is the boss at home in Pălatca.

For some of the concerts held at Aux Anges, he shared this position with Ignat “Náci” Matingo, a more versatile fiddler, now prímás in the other Palatka band.

In recognition of his expertise, each year he is a kontra instructor at the Mezőség Summer Camp organized by the Kallós Zoltán Foundation (http://www.kallos.org.ro/joomla/) in Răscruci (Hungarian: Válaszút), whereas the fiddle play is generally taught by Florin (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-K2qrfXhqQ).

After the bass-player Martin “Puki” Covaci retired due to hand paralysis, he remained the only musician left from the mythical band that Marci and Béla Codoba led until the end of the 1990s.