site.btaSwiss Bulgarian Choir Plans Concert in Canton of Vaud on February 28

The Swiss Bulgarian Choir will stage a concert in the Romainmotier Priory, canton of Vaud, Switzerland on February 28 at 8 p.m. local time. The news has been reported on Facebook by Kanatitza, a Swiss-Bulgarian association for culture, tradition and education.

The Swiss Bulgarian Choir is a vocal ensemble based in Switzerland that performs Bulgarian folk music. It is known for a repertoire of traditional songs with irregular rhythms, according to infomaniak.events, where tickets for the show in Romainmotier-Envy can also be purchased.

The project for the Swiss Bulgarian Choir dates back to 2011, when Bulgarian singer Desislava “Desi” Stefanova, founder of the London Bulgarian Choir and former soloist and assistant conductor of the Philip Koutev Ensemble in Sofia, held her first workshop in Switzerland. Since then, singers from across the Alpine country, with or without Bulgarian roots, have regularly gathered to explore and interpret this vocal heritage under her guidance.

The choir performs more than eighty Bulgarian folk songs, often polyphonic, incorporating traditional vocal techniques such as ornamentation, vibrato, and the so-called atsane (hiccup) vocal style. Members meet during weekend rehearsals and concerts, at local rehearsals, and more recently remotely, gathering in Switzerland and connecting via Zoom with Desi, who is in London.

From the choir emerged the Swiss Bulgarian Band, a group of singing musicians who play traditional instruments such as the kaval, tupan, and tambura, as well as modern instruments like the accordion, violin, double bass, and darbuka. The band accompanies the choir or performs independently.