Press release 12.7.2017
The Kaustinen Folk Music Festival is held for the 50th time this year. One of the events celebrating the anniversary is a wish concert for the fifties. This year's 50th anniversary celebrations are about twenty requests in total, and the final set was put together by the Programme Manager Anne-Mari Hakamäki on the basis of these.
”We tried to make it as diverse as possible,” Hakamäki says. ”Some of the requests were for individual big-name artists, but we wanted as many different requests as possible to be included in the same concert.”
50-year-olds were invited to a wish concert with performers such as Ampron Prunni and The Purple Men, and they will be implemented. Among the songs requested was Elsa, the child of fate, which will be performed at the concert Tallar's and Jesse Kaikurannan presented by. A better waltz by Konsta, which many had hoped for, concludes the performance.
Fifty-year-olds' wish concert Fri 14.7. at 20.30 in Keskipohjanmaa-areena
The strength of Kaustinen kavalkad is its own musical heritage and close teamwork
The Kaustinen cavalcade has existed, like the festival, for 50 years. The first cavalcade in 1968 was a huge success: the crowd could not fit properly into the Kalliopavilion, although four extra performances were organised. The performance was also recorded for Yle radio in the same autumn.
The 1968 cavalcade was taken as a model for this year's cavalcade. At that time, the story was told by two characters, a grandfather and a bride preparing for her wedding, who wanted to get to know the Causis tradition.
”However, it was decided to make a more concert-like performance in the Great Arena, tracing the festival's 50-year history. Even now, the story is told in two parts,” says the maestro who once again composed the music for the cavalcade. Mauno Järvelä. The script was shaped by Antti Huntus, the storyteller behind several cavalcades. Once again, the Central Ostrobothnian arena will see a great array of Kaustisian talent, a large group of musicians, the Wedding Choir and the Wedding Singers, a group of former wedding choir members, a country band, several village bands, etc.
”The cavalcade has always been very much a team effort,” Mauno Järvelä emphasises. He says that in the old days, cavalcades were even created when people would gather in a cabinet and all come up with their ideas; no one really directed it. ”The success is based on our own musical mother tongue, which is deeply rooted and carefully nurtured in Kaustinen. That is the thread of the cavalcade.”
Gala concert Thu 13.7. at 17.30 (Act I), Sun 16.7. at 14.30 (Act II) Keskipohjanmaa-areena
The Bear's Head Festival goes back to the roots of Finnishness
Many of this year's events in Kaustinen are in some way related to the theme of Pidot. One of the most original is the Bears' Night, which lasts between three and four hours, depending on the audience. It is modelled on the Hanseatic Bear Festival, but also includes a Finnish tradition.
”For Finns and Khanty, the birth myth of the bear is almost word for word the same,” says the father of the idea, musician Tuomas Rounakari. ”A little heavenly bear cub asks his creator for permission to come to earth because it looks so beautiful. He chews until the Creator gives in.”
Only then does the mythical story and the content of the bear jubilee take off in different directions among the peoples.
”The Finnish bear feast is a hunting-centric rite, a celebration for men. For the Hants the meaning has remained different, for them it is a rite of rebirth of the bear and very important. In nature it is very playful and joyful, both qualities associated with the bear.”
In addition to Tuomas Rounakar, the Bears' Head will also see a hockey champion Pekko Käppi, guitarist Antti Paalanen and singer Karoliina Kantelinen, known from Värttnine, among others.
”The team is a bit of a dream team for me. I asked for people capable of free improvisation. They have all done solo work on their own and there is a certain hypnotic quality to their work. The accordion may not be the first instrument to be associated with bear heads, but Antti Paalanen's starting point was to prepare the accordion in such a way that no normal sound would emanate from it - an idea I was immediately inspired by,” says Rounakari.
Tuomas Rounakari is a doctoral student at the Sibelius Academy of the Arts, and Bears' Nightingale is his third postgraduate concerto, which was premiered in February 2016.
”At the heart of my own research is the study of trance as a means of expression for the performer. The teacher who guided this concert was a hypnotherapist Kira Gyllenbögel. However, the hypnosis method we used was nothing like the hypnosis mindset on TV, it is all about enhancing the best aspects of your own character and being. Hypnosis is also used as mental coaching in sports. The traditional bear awakening song of the Khanty uses the same techniques as modern hypnosis, it is an integral part of the musical tradition of the northern peoples.”
Poetry will also play a strong role in the twice-annual Bear's Head Festival in Kaustinen - featuring long poems about bear's heads in the Hanseatic forests and a contemporary poet from the forest forests. Yuri Vellemin texts.
”The Bears” Night is neither a performance, nor a ritual, nor a concert, nor theatre,” Rounakari explains. ”But in a way, all these things define it. The Bears' Night is a bit like a wedding - everything at the wedding is primarily for the wedding couple. Here the idea is similar, everyone is there for the bear, not so much the performers for the audience. The audience is expected to be like at a party: you can participate or not, sing or not sing, dance or not dance."
Although it draws on Hanti and Finnish traditions, it does not represent either of them.
”It all takes place in a parallel reality, in a culture that might have existed. Let's try to establish a conscious connection with the mythical bear. In Finnish culture, the bear has a very special role and place. Along with the swan and the sasquatch, it is probably the closest of the mythical animals to us.”
Bear hunts lasting several hours include an intermission. Rounakari regrets that it is not possible to set up a banquet table for the audience during the interval, but the intermission is still an essential part of the show - where games are organised for the audience.
”The Bear's Head Festival goes to the roots of Finnishness in a profound way, and from an angle that surprises a little. Could Finnish holiness be essentially joyful?”
Bear's Head party on Thu 13.7. from 19-22 and Fri 14.7. from 12.30-16.30 in Mauno's macaque
For more information and interview requests:
Information Manager
Tove Djupsjöbacka
p. 040-6585340
press(at)kaustinen.net