Mandolins, Marimbas, and Bulgarian Folk Music

Today's cross-cultural adventure explores Bulgarian folk music played on instruments from Italy and Central America.

The first piece is by Diko Iliev, who composed music based on folk dances from northwestern Bulgaria. This dance is a  Daichovo Horo titled Bilka.  Daichovo has an odd rhythm: quick-quick-quick-slow. The accent is on the first beat, but the fourth is the longest. For you music theorists out there the top number in the time signature is a nine.  Balkan music is well-known for its irregular rhythms with a combination of quick-slow beats. 

Here's the traditional orchestration for brass band to use as a frame of reference:



The next video is the same piece played by the group Prima Visione, and arranged for mandolin orchestra.  The mandolin is an instrument most commonly associated with Italian music; this is quite an unusual combination.  This version of Bilka has a quieter, gentler sound than the brass band.



The marimba is a a percussion instrument related to the xylophone.  It is commonly associated with the folk music of the indigenous Maya people of the Yucatan in Mexico and the country of Guatemala.

Now things really start to get interesting. This video is of the Via Nova Percussion Group playing Bulgarian horo on several marimbas. Horo is a generic name for a folk dance from Bulgaria, in this case this one is a Pravo Horo.



The second set features three Bulgarian folk dances: Lesnoto, Kopanitsa, and Pravo. The first two have odd time signatures; Lesnoto is in 7/8 (pineapple-apple-apple) and Kopanitsa in 11/8 (quick-quick-slow-quick quick).  The Pravo can either be in 2/4 or 6/8, this version is in 6/8.  If you look off to the side, you'll see the tupan player.  The tupan is a double-headed drum used throughout the Balkans.  He is the all-important rhythm section and keeps everyone else in line :)



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

Having a Blast With Diko Iliev: a short biography of the composer with lots of music!

Daichovo, Plain or Fancy: Take Your Pick (Several versions of a Bulgarian folk dance)

Variations on a Theme by Petko Stainov (a contemporary of Diko Iliev who also used folk motifs in his music). In this post, you'll hear different versions of his piece, Rachenitsa, along with some folk music from Guatemala.


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Springtime Music by Diko Iliev

Today's post has a springtime theme with music by the Bulgarian composer Diko Iliev (1898-1984).
His works were based on folk dances from northwestern Bulgaria and arranged for brass orchestras. 

Although many people are familiar with his most famous piece, Dunavsko Horo, he wrote numerous other compositions which are not as well known.

The first is titled Пробуждане на Пролетта (Springtime Awakening.)  Although I like the scenery in this video, however, the "please purchase" annotation is a distraction.  My guess is that although many YouTubers are looking to make money from their videos, they are a bit more discreet about it.

By the way, I find commercials very annoying, and always skip though them when I can. The advertising business would go bankrupt the if the world were made up of people like me.



The next piece is Proletno Horo (Springtime Dance).  After a long, hard winter, everyone wants to dance outside.  The artwork is very appealing as well, it captures the essence of a Bulgarian village scene.  If anyone knows who the artist is, please let me know in the "comments" section!



Same artwork, but a different piece of music this time, Maisko Utro, or May Morning. Iliev might have been inspired by a quote from William Shakespeare when he composed this piece: No doubt they rose up early to observe The rite of May; and, hearing our intent, Came here in grace of our solemnity.

I like spring because it's so colorful, and after the cold and dreariness of winter, it's good to see the trees dressed with beautiful blossoms and everything in brilliant hues.



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

Dreaming of Spring in the Middle of Winter (a blog post written during the cold, snowy and harsh winter of 2010-2011).  If you like Bulgarian folk songs about flowers, this is for you!

Having a Blast with Diko Iliev ( a short bio of Diko Iliev with lots of music).

A Celebration for Diko Iliev's Birthday (more music  and lots of scenery from the town of Oryahovo, where the composer spent a good portion of his life).


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Two Variations on a Macedonian Folk Dance: Bufcansko

One of my favorite folk dances is Bufcansko, from the Republic of Macedonia. The first variation is the one most commonly performed by recreational folk dance groups. It was one of the first dances I learned in Balkan class many years ago. If you listen closely to the music you can hear the clarinet played in the upper register. Some people consider the clarinet an "instrument of torture", but I happen to like it, and even took lessons many years ago.

The video mentions that the dance is from Yugoslavia, a country that no longer exists since it split up into individual republics during the 1990's. Macedonia declared its independence in 1991.



The second video is a performance by a childrens' folk ensemble from Macedonia. Bufcansko is a women's dance (here it's done by a group of girls). They add a bounciness to the dance that is more pronounced than in the previous video, and they are a joy to watch. The instrumentation is different as well, it has a uniquely Macedonian sound in which you can hear the kaval (open-ended flute) the gaida (bagpipe) and the tambura.  The tambura is a string instrument, related to the mandolin. It's also popular in the Pirin region of Bulgaria, which shares a border with Macedonia.



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

The Bagpipe in Macedonian Folk Music

The Tambura in Bulgarian, Macedonian and Croatian Folk Music

Two Variations on a Romanian Folk Dance, Hora de Mina

Two Variations on a Bulgarian folk dance, Opas

You can also listen to music from two former Yugoslav republics here:

The River of Many Names, Part 5: The Danube in Serbian Folk Music

The River of Many Names, Part 6: The Danube in Croatian Folk Songs

A Taste of Albania at Balkan Music Night 2013

Balkan Music Night is an annual festival which takes place on the third Saturday of March in Concord, Massachusetts.

I have gone to Balkan Music night for the past three years and I am always delighted to watch the dance ensembles perform at this event.  There is also participatory dancing when the costumed groups aren't performing, and there are numerous bands that play for your dancing pleasure.

The performers represented different Balkan countries, such as Bulgaria and Serbia, but the most outstanding ensemble this year was an group of young Albanian dancers from Worcester, Massachusetts,Valle Tona. They had amazing energy and were a total pleasure to watch.

Albania is a country that doesn't make the news very often especially here in the United States. It is a country very different in culture and language than the other countries on the Balkan peninsula. 

First of all, they speak a language that is totally unrelated to Slavic, Latin or Greek.  Secondly, the country has had a history of isolation from the rest of Europe. Thirdly, unlike the other Balkan countries, Islam is the dominant religion, although there is s sizable population of Eastern Orthodox Christians and Roman Catholics.  The dance group Valle Tona is sponsored by St. Mary's Albanian Orthodox Church in Worcester, Massachusetts.

Albanian music is very haunting and beautiful as you can see (and hear) in this video.



The group also performed Valle Kosovare, a lively dance done to pop-folk music.  I didn't record it this year, but here is a Valle Tona video from a church picnic, taken during the summer of 2011.



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

A Romanian Festival with an Albanian Accent

Music is the Strongest Form of Magic: Balkan Music Night 2012

Balkan Music Night 2011: More Balkan March Madness

By the way, if you like trivia, the American author Laura Ingalls Wilder travelled all over Europe and lived for a while in Albania.  She is best known for the series of Little House books, an autobiographical set of novels about her childhood in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and South Dakota. Read more about her here:


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The Colors of Bulgarian Folk Songs

K.D. Brown: Visionary, a photo created with Bulgarian textile cloth

Light in Nature creates the movement of colors.
Robert Delaunay

Today's post was inspired by the Bulgarian National Radio.  They had a program recently on color symbolism in Bulgarian folklore several weeks ago and you can find the link here:

Red is mentioned quite often in Bulgarian folk songs, often in connection with wine.  A powerful, attention getting, and vibrant color (see photo above), red is the color of fire, passion, wine and blood. I've noticed lots of red in Bulgarian folk costumes as well. It is considered a lucky color.

Rusi Kosi is a song about a blonde who has no comb, and no powder for her white face (by the way, white has several meanings in Bulgarian, and in this case a white face is a beautiful face). She wonders when her mother will find her a man to marry who will buy her the comb and the powder. The girl's name is Elena, and she has to bring the red wine and two red apples. The translation comes from Bulgarian by way of German and it's from the Songbook for Nearsighted People, a compilation of international folk song lyrics by Birgitt Karlson.



The full moon rises, red, orange, and then white in the song Izgryala e Mesechinka while the young woman picks a colorful bouquet in the moonlit garden. This is a modern version of a beautiful Bulgarian folk song played on a gadulka and a guitar, and the lady who plays the gadulka, Hristina Beleva, has a very pretty voice.  The dance in the video is a rachenitsa, the national dance of Bulgaria, with the irregular rhythm of 7/8 (apple-apple-pineapple).



The next video is so colorful it will draw you right in. The song is Dunave, Beli Dunave, which means White Danube. Most people associate the Danube with the color blue, maybe because it rhymes so well (in English and in German), however when I actually saw the river, it was a totally different group of colors (more like green, gold, and gray). In the video, however, it looks blue and sometimes white.

I often wondered why there were several Bulgarian folk songs on this topic; until I found out that white can also mean beautiful. White in Bulgarian folklore has a lot of symbolism, according to the Bulgarian National Radio: "the white color also means joy, grandeur and beauty", as well as purity and innocence. 

The River of Many Names is also very colorful, and in addition to the aforementioned colors, it can also be white on foggy days.   In Oriahovo, where the was video was taken, the performers had to wait two hours for the fog to burn off so they could shoot it.  By the way the composer Diko Iliev lived for many years in this town, and the piece Dunavsko Horo composed there. The reason brass music is so popular in northwestern Bulgaria is due to the influence of Diko Iliev.

The dancers wear colorful and elaborate embroidered costumes; this and the brass band music are a treat for the eyes and ears. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the translation for the song, if anyone can tell me where to find it, please post it in the comments section.



The eyes have it in this video, with a very attractive dark-eyed woman who flashes those orbs around  while pouring the wine.  The singer is Daniel Spasov, who co-hosts a weekly folklore show on Bulgarian television, Ide Nashenskata Muzika, along with Milen Ivanov.



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

The "Flavors" of Bulgarian Rachenitsa (parts 1 and 2)

Part 1: About rachenitsa, the national dance of Bulgaria

Part 2  Masculine, Feminine and Flirty (rachenitsa as a courtship dance)

The River of Many Names (parts 2 and 4) features folk songs and dances from Bulgaria about the Danube. It's a very colorful excursion into the world of Bulgarian folk music.

Part 2

Part 4

Modern Versions of Traditional Bulgarian Folk Songs, Part 1  (you will find modern versions of two of today's songs in this post, along with the traditional ones so you can compare them.)



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Two Variations on a Bulgarian Folk Dance: Opas

Today's featured dance will be Opas, from the region of Dobrudja in northeast Bulgaria. Like last week's Romanian dance, Hora de Mina, it has different "flavors" with different music and choreography. Opas is the Dobrudjan variation of the dance Pravo Trakiisko Horo, shown here:



This link goes to Eliznik's Web Page a very informative source on folk dances from Eastern Europe.
If you scroll down and read the last paragraph, it explains the regional differences of Pravo Horo, the most popular dance in Bulgaria.

The version of Opas done in Bulgaria is a relatively easy dance, although the front basket-hold raises the challenge level a little, especially for beginner folk dancers. I happen to like this video because it's part of a series for learning Bulgarian folk dances, and the people wear elaborate embroidered costumes from the different folklore regions.



If you're a regular reader of The Alien Diaries the people in the next video will be familiar to you. The Dunav group from Jerusalem in Israel has a new series of videos featuring dances from the Balkans. I happened upon this when I was doing a search for the version of Opas that's done by recreational folk dance groups here in the States. This one rates 9.5 on a difficulty scale from 1-10; the belt hold makes it especially challenging. An especially difficult element of the dance is the deep knee bends, this is definitely off-limits if you have arthritis :)



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

Two Variations on a Romanian Folk Dance, Hora de Mina
http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2013/03/two-variations-on-romanian-folk-dance.html

Dancing Across Bulgaria: The Pravo and Regional Folk Dance Styles:
http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2012/06/dancing-across-bulgaria-pravo-and.html

More dances from the Bulgarian folklore region of Dobrudja:
http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2012/06/more-stamping-it-out-reka-sborenka-and.html



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Two Variations on a Romanian Folk Dance: Hora de Mina

Today's post is about one of my favorite Romanian folk dances, Hora de Mina.  It translates to dance with hands.

The word mână means "hand" in Romania, my guess is that the correct spelling for this dance is Hora de Mână and that diacritical mark on the first "a" makes it sound like an "i". Spelling "mână"  with an "i" simplifies things for those who are unfamiliar with Romanian diacritical marks.  People who grew up with Spanish (like I did) will recognize the similarity of the word to the Spanish "mano."

Romanian and Spanish are both derived from Latin, however the languages are not very similar...their relationship is more like distant cousins.

This version is the one used by most folk dance groups. As dances go, Hora de Mina is fairly easy; and it's also quite short.  Notice the hand movements that go with the music, and yes, what you hear are bagpipes, they are popular in Romania, too!



The next version of Hora de Mina is somewhat different, and a bit higher on the difficulty scale than the previous one. The backwards step is similar, hand movements are more pronounced, and the hands are held high in one of the figures. There's "ethnic symmetry" in this dance, too, what you do to the right you must also do to the left.  There is also a name for those shouts that you hear, they are a common feature of Romanian folk dances, and they are called strigături.

http://www.eliznik.org.uk/RomaniaMusic/strigaturi.htm



If you enjoyed this you may also like:

Another Country Heard From: The Bagpipe in Romanian Folk Music

http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2011/08/another-country-heard-from-bagpipe-in.html

If you like dances with stamping, this post is for you.  Stamping is not limited to Romanian folk dances, you will see some here from Bulgaria and Serbia as well.

http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2011/06/how-to-stamp-out-your-frustrations-and.html

More variations on a theme:  Dances with a "family resemblance."

http://katleyplanetbg.blogspot.com/2011/03/family-resemblance-theme-and-variations.html


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