site.btaOver 6,000 participants Expected at National Folk Art Festival in Koprivshtitsa on Friday

Over 6,000 participants from nearly 800 groups are expected to take part in the 13th edition of the National Folk Art Festival in Koprivshtitsa, which will begin on Friday, August 8, and will continue until August 10, the festival’s organizers said.

This year's edition is under the auspices of former president Rosen Plevneliev. The official opening ceremony of the festival will be on Saturday, August 9. Koprivshtitsa Mayor Maria Toromanova, Culture Minister Marian Bachev, Regional Governor of Sofia Silvia Arnautskaya, and Deputy Culture Minister Ashot Kazaryan  are expected to attend.

The main organizers of the forum are the Ministry of Culture, the Municipality of Koprivshtitsa, the Sofia Regional Administration, and the Institute of Ethnology and Folklore Studies with the Ethnographic Museum at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (IEFSEM-BAS).

The main media partners of the event are the Bulgarian News  Agency, Bulgarian National Television, and Bulgarian National Radio.

The National Festival of Folk Art in Koprivshtitsa will feature bearers and heirs of local intangible cultural heritage such as singers, musicians, dancers, storytellers of folk tales, legends, and anecdotes, and other verbal forms, as well as groups of folk customs from all regions of the country representing local traditions. Performers whose repertoire consists of works based on adapted folklore are not allowed to participate.

The national festival has two stages: regional selection in all regions of the country and a national stage in Koprivshtitsa. IEFSEM-BAS experts participate in the selection of participants. The selection committees monitor the performances of the performers during the two stages of the forum, select the performers for the national stage, and award medals to the best performers at the forum.

The participants in the festival will present their regional programmes over several hours on six stages in the Voivodenets area. A final concert with a one-hour programme will close the festival on Sunday, August 10. 

Friday, August 8, is the first day of the event, with representatives from Pernik taking to the first central stage. The second stage will feature participants from the cities of Sliven and Yambol with a total of six hours of performances, while the fifth stage will feature performances from Plovdiv and Haskovo. The sixth stage will be occupied by representatives from Lovech and Veliko Tarnovo.

On Saturday, August 9, the official opening of the festival will take place on the central stage. Eight groups and performers from all over the country will take part. Singer Nelina Orashova will perform at the ceremony, and Valya Balkanska will be a special guest. The Ivan Terziev Youth Koledari Group from Yambol will present a typical Yambol koledari buenek, while the women's group from the village of Satovcha, Blagoevgrad region, will perform Visoko multipart singing,  which is included in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage . Nikolay Todorov from Sofia will perform a traditional song, the Lazarus group from the Napredak-Yuper community centre will perform a Nestinarstvo fire-dancing rite, and the Bistritsa Babi from the village of Bistritsa, Sofia region, will sing a harvest song.

The opening programme will also include an authentic wedding custom from the village of Zdravets, Varna region, as well as the dance ensemble Surbenitsa from the village of Sofronievo, Vratsa region. After the grand opening on the main stage, the programme will continue with groups from the Sofia region.

Stara Zagora and Burgas will perform on the second stage, while at the same time the third stage is expected to welcome representatives from five regions: Montana, Pleven, Vidin, Vratsa, and Shumen. The fourth stage will feature performances by representatives from Dobrich and Silistra.

The fifth stage will feature groups from Pazardzhik and Blagoevgrad, while the sixth stage will host groups from Varna, Razgrad, and Ruse. Sunday, August 10, is the final day, which will end with a one-hour closing concert on the main stage.

Before that, performers from Gabrovo and Targovishte will perform on the second stage, groups from Smolyan on the fourth stage, representatives from Kyustendil and Kardzhali on the fifth stage, and groups from Sofia on the sixth stage.