How Does Musical Fusion Arise?
Come listen to a conversation between ethnomusicologist Jana Belišová and cellist Roman Harvan about the Angrusori music project, which managed to unite the seemingly incompatible: traditional Roma music with alternative music.
March 21, 2024, at 9:00 AM
Faculty of Arts, Comenius University
Gondova 2, Bratislava
3rd floor, Room G309
Angrusori released the album Live at Tou in 2021 under the British label Hudson Records, for which they received the Radio_Head Awards a year later in the World Music / Folk category. The Guardian named it Album of the Month, and it garnered positive reviews in other music magazines such as The Wire, Jazzquad, and Muzikalia. Last year, the Angrusori project performed live at the prestigious Cheltenham Jazz Festival in the UK, where they are returning these days to play the following concerts:
17/1 London - Grand Junction, UK
https://grandjunction.org.uk/e...
18/1 Birmingham - MAC, UK
https://macbirmingham.co.uk/ev...
19/1 Manchester - Band on the Wall, UK
https://bandonthewall.org/even...
20/1 Glasgow - Celtic Connections, Pavilion Theatre - with DakhaBrakha
https://www.celticconnections....
On January 16, 2024, Angrusori will perform at the cultural center Ogna Scene in Norway, which is one of the most beautiful concert halls in the country. The snow-covered village of Ogna has been home to many famous artists, and its distinctive landscape has inspired several renowned painters (Nikolai Ulfsten, Kitty Kielland). It is also the home of the award-winning poet, children’s book author, essayist, and literary scholar Helge Torvund.
8 July 2023 at 8.15 pm POHODA festival Trenčín
10 July 2023 at 7.00 pm The Central Slovakia Cultural Centre Banská Bystrica
11 July 2023 Dominican Cultural Center Košice
12 July 2023 workshop & concert at the Poštárka housing estate in Bardejov
12 July 2023 BAŠTA in Bardejov
The Cheltenham Jazz Festival is one of the most popular jazz festivals in the UK, attracting over 20,000 music fans. It celebrates all genres of jazz, featuring a mix of international jazz icons, emerging artists, and unique festival performances. The festival aims to reach the widest possible audience, showcasing top global musicians as well as lesser-known musical groups that are highly regarded for their musical quality. Angrusori will perform here on April 30, 2023.
Angrusori review is out now!
Just a moment after the end of the concert in Stavanger's Tou:
https://www.aftenbladet.no/kul...
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Tour 2
26 July, 2022 at 6:00 p.m.
Tou Scene, Stavanger, Norway
https://www.touofficial.com/pr...
28 July, 2022 at 4:30 p.m.
Olavsfest, Trondheim, Norway
https://olavsfest.no/arrangeme...
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Petr Dorůžka wrote about Angrusori in the Czech cultural magazine Uni:
"Our best violin improviser participates in a much wider range of activities than Czech audience just can see. She created the Angrusori project together with Roma artists from Slovakia and the Norwegian group Kitchen Orchestra. This May, they had concerts in Bratislava, Žilina and Košice, following there will be a tour in Norway and Britain."
The whole article: https://www.magazinuni.cz/hudb...
"The story behind Angrusori goes all the way back to 2010 actually, and involves the two cultural factories Tabacka (in Kosice, Slovakia), and Tou (in Stavanger). The two venues collaborate through the great European organisation Trans Europe Halles https://teh.net/. Lukas Berberich (who then worked for Tabacka) came up to Stavanger for a TEH-seminar at Tou and I met him over a few beers in the evening, and I think that's the first time he suggested we should do something with Stavanger musicians and Roma musicians from the Kosice area." musician Petter Frost Fadnes states in an interview for 15questions. His words are complemented by Nils Henrik Asheim: "Actually, I was not at all sure that the project would create a good match. I was asked to lead the process probably because I previously had done cross-genre collaborations and also treated repertoire from other traditions than my own in a successful way. But this had mostly involved musicians, who, although from different traditions, would still have a comparably similar conservatory background. In the case of Angrusori, so much was different. Social conditions, language, the musical practice. I foresaw that the people of this band very likely would have completely divergent ideas of what it is to be on stage and play a concert. I was afraid we were being naive in imagining a "cultural meeting".
So, what convinced me to participate, was that the project was very well organised and prepared, and that I could sense a genuine engagement and energy – especially from Jana Belisova who shared with us her research material and opened up the wonderful Roma music to us. Still, I could not even remotely imagine how the thing would work, I was not able to prepare a single note or sound before travelling to Kosice and starting the first workshop, beginning to communicate and sit down on a common floor to somehow try and make music together."
Read the full interview:
15 questions | Interview | Angrusori | "Slovakian Roma music is like Lego blocks: It keeps shifting into infinite shapes."
May 19, 2022 International Conference "Ubuntu" and Music Fusion
"Ubuntu" and music fusion - the concept of not only musical reciprocity. Inspirational sources, creative methods and the importance of improvisation
More info and program: https://angrusori.com/activiti...
May 19, 2022 / 2:30 - 4:00 p.m. Workshop with Iva Bittová: Žingora Vocal School - Voices for Joy and Peace / The Žingora Vocal School was founded by a Czech singer and multi-instrumentalist Iva Biitová in the United States to help her students find a way to better open theirself to self-expression.. Through sensitive guidance, he directs joint improvisation and teaches several Romani songs.
Limited number of participants - 25
Venue - room no. 350, Faculty of Arts of Comenius University, Bratislava
Application: https://worldmusicfestival.sk/workshop/?fbclid=IwAR38ChXd7zwmVRi7KG8zIb5g7nIjSpCncVKcsKa1f_hJXEULFjHYL_YzARw
May 17 - 18 A two-day pre-production meeting of musicians in the Moyzes Hall in Bratislava. We also have a working meeting within the international project Angrusori
Nothing can replace the immediacy of live performances, and the precious time for a gathering is approaching, when all the musicians of the Angrusori orchestra will come together on one stage to perform the following concerts:
May 19, 2022, at 8:00 PM
Moyzesova Hall, Bratislava
May 20, 2022, at 7:00 PM
New Synagogue, Žilina
May 21, 2022, at 7:00 PM
Kino Úsmev, Košice
An improvised polylogue featuring members of the Norwegian ensemble Kitchen Orchestra and Czech violinist, singer, and composer Iva Bittová, along with Slovak Roma musicians, began during a workshop in Košice in 2016. The album Live at Tou was recorded during a concert at Tou, a cultural factory in Stavanger, Norway, in April 2017. It was eventually released on the British label Hudson Records in 2021 and was soon named Album of the Month by The Guardian, receiving rave reviews in various music magazines such as The Wire, Jazzquad, and Muzikalia.
“The name of the Angrusori project is derived from a Roma song and translates to 'ring,'” explains project coordinator and expert guarantor Jana Belišová. She adds, “I love the symbolism of the circle, equality, meetings, returns, infinity, fidelity, beauty... and each of you can add what you perceive with the word 'ring.'”
March 30, 2022 The Angrusori music project members (Roman Harvan, Nils Petter Asheim and Petter Frost Fadnes) responded to the Radio_head Award for 2021 in the World Music / Folk category on the FM World Music program.
On March 25, 2022, Angrusori won the Radio_Head Award in the World Music / Folk category.
March 23, 2022 Radio_Head Awards jury meeting in the World Music and Folk category, which was attended by Milan Tesař and Dušan Svíba from the Czech Republic, Johann Kneihs from Austria and Saška Pastorková and Juraj Gonšor from Slovakia. It was also supplemented by Anna Mašátová from the Czech Republic, Marija Vitas from Serbia and DJ Jedi from the USA opinions. Among other things, they talked about the Angrusori project.
15 February 2022 Janka Belišová talks about the Angrusori project in the "How do you like it" show of the Czech Radio Proglas.
9. február 2022 Angrusori porada. Chystáme turné na Slovensku. :-)
7 February 2022 The album Angrusori - Live at Tou is nominated for the Radio_Head Award in the World Music / Folk 2021 category.
6 January 2022 Angrusori project in the morning broadcast of the Czech radio Proglas.
December 2021 ANGRUSORI is in the World Music Chart Europe list of the top 200 albums.
Link: https://www.wmce.de/Year_2021-...
4 October 2021 We had an online meeting where we talked about the upcoming tour in 2022. It will be amazing.
12 May 2021 Jana Belišová, Nils Henrik Asheim and Roman Harvan talked about the Angrusori project on Radio FM.
Link: https://www.rtvs.sk/radio/arch...
7 May 2021 Angrusori: Live at Tou review – Romany songs of birth, death and black comedy
Using tango, flamenco, junkyard jazz and more, the pan-European group turn stories of migration, pain and persecution into something transcendent...
Read the review in The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/mu...
February 2021 We attended a seminar prepared by the EEA Grants Department from the Ministry of Investment, Regional Development and Informatization of the Slovak Republic, which should make it easier for us to orientate ourselves in the rules of project management, reporting and compliance with all necessary requirements.
16 January 2021 The project contract was signed by all parties and thus entered into force. We are very happy! If you want to know more about programmes and projects financed by the EEA Grants in Slovakia, visit www.eeagrants.org.