Vesselina Kasarova/ Krassimir Kyurkchiyski: BULGARIAN SOUL

This CD is a compilation of 14 Bulgarian folk songs arranged by the composer Krassimir Kyurkchiyski for a solo mezzo soprano voice and chorus.

Krassimir Kyurkchiyski (1936 - ) is a Bulgarian composer who studied under Pancho Vladigerov in Sofia and under Dmitri Shostakovich in Moscow. He composes in wide ranging classical music genres including cantatas, ballets, symphonies; and is known for his use of asymmetrical folk rhythms in his orchestrations.

Vesselina Kasarova (1965 - ) may have been naturalized as a Swiss and now lives in that modern alpine country, but her soul evidently remains that of an uncomplicated girl from the Central Bulgarian town of Stara Zagora. What an astounding combination we have in this singer. A dark, strong, and colorful Slavic voice with refined classical touch. A superb singer in perfect control of her voice, and yet she always sounds spontaneous. Her ability to make every sung note sounds like a spontaneous expression of the thought originating in her head at that very moment is truly uncanny. Every note you hear is, of course, written down and planned, but somehow when she sings them they sound like original ad lib! With this wonderful quality, this CD isn’t so much a compilation of songs as it is a compilation of tales told by a very engaging story-teller.

If you are interested in an engrossing evening of tales from Bulgaria told in such a way that you can close your eyes and smell the local flowers, see the girls in soukman dress, and the Bulgarian countryside, then this CD is a must buy. It’s arrangement is not really traditional, but the original folk melody is enhanced rather than violated by the added accompaniment and counterpoints (with one noted exception, that is). The mesmerizing Kasarova is also superbly supported by the Chorus, pianist, and the orchestra. And Maestro Kyurkchiyski (no worries, mates, I can’t pronounce that name either...) is a true gem of a composer!

Vesselina Kasarova (mezzo soprano soloist), Ermila Schweizer-Sekulinova (piano)
Vania Moneva & The Cosmic Voices of Bulgaria, Tzanko Dimitrov Delibozov & The Sofia Soloists Chamber Orchestra
TRACKS:
1. Dilmano, Dilbero
2. Kalimanku, Denku
3. Day mi, Bozhe, krila lebedovi (Give Me, God, Wings of the Swan)
4. Zablyalo mi e agantse (A Little Lamb Was Bleating)
This is quite a daring opening of the CD with the first 4 tracks going from one emotion to another in what seems a chronicles of a personal life experience.
Dilmano, Dilbero is a rousing dance song probably sung a lot at play ground by hyperactive school kids. The lyric doesn’t really tell much story, being a sort of amusing short dialog with one kid asking Dilmano how to plant the pepper properly, and the other kid replying with the instruction to push the seed deep into the ground. It is a fun song with Kasarova’s gorgeous mezzo voice leading part of the chorus in the main melody, while the rest of the chorus divide into 3 accompanying contrast melodies.... cutting in at irregular meter and fluctuating/modulating in some of the coolest dissonance I’ve ever heard. It is probably a song that would cause native Bulgarians to recall their childhood innocence.

With track 2, Kalimanku, Denku, we progress to a song of yearning for love. Do you recall that compliment that Jack Nicholson’s character pays to Helen Hunt’s character after having insulted her in the film ’As Good As It Gets’? He says, ’You make me want to be a better man.’ That wish to be more worthy of someone you love is an essence in this song, though presented in a more genuine manner here than what you get in the movie (and there is no smirk afterward). The wonderfully soulful solo by Kasarova is beautifully supported by the very sensitive string players of the Sofia Soloists Chamber Orchestra. A lot of singers would be happy to sound as soulful as their lead viola player, I say!

Track 3, Day mi, Bozhe, krila lebedovi is a solemn song. Give me, God, the wings of the swan, that I may fly over the mountain. The swan, of course, is the symbol of freedom. In this case the expatriate singer is praying for the freedom to fly home to her family. A Bulgarian Orthodox family at that, as the arrangement makes this piece sounds right at home in church (there’s even a church bell chiming in it). It isn’t a religious song per se. Being Orthodox is more a cultural identity to Bulgarian folks, I think. A beautifully serene and dignified song of yearning with the solo voice soaring above the chorus, while occasionally blending with it.

Tracks 2 and 3 sound downright harmonious compared to Track 4, Zabyalo mi e agantse. The melody goes everywhere you wouldn’t expect it to go... unless you’re Bulgarian, perhaps. It’s unexpected twists and turns keep me off guard, which makes the song’s context of grief for the death of a family member an even more jarring experience. Kasarova’s melodic line is practically a vocalization of the various modes of crying...

5. Polegnala e Tudora (Fair Tudora is Sleeping)
6. Rofinka bolna lezhi (Rufinka Lies Ill)
7. Melodiya (Melody)
8. Slantse ogreyalo (The Sun is Shining)
It is merciful that track 5, Polegnala e Tudora brings a change of mood. However, if you are one of those who have heard the songs on this CD sung by other Bulgarian artists/choirs before, abandon all preconceptions now and approach it as if you have never heard the piece before. Maestro Kyurkchiyski really got ...er... original with this arrangement. It is more a variation on the theme of the original song in nature, and if you hadn’t heard the original melody before, it is unlikely that you’ll be able to guess it from this version. Frau Kasarova is only accompanied by a piano (by the very able and sensitive pianist Ermila Schweizer-Sekulinova), and though they start out pretty much singing/playing the same tune, after the first phrase they split off into each their own musing. This track also shows what wide vocal range the singer is capable of, too.

Track 6, Rofinka bolna lezhi is a rather morbid death chant with the droning chorus leading in as if they are spectators narrating the scene, and Kasarova taking up the main melody in a more personal close up shots. The lyric is that of a last conversation between a mother and her dying daughter, who finds the absence of her beloved worse than her own imminent death. This is another Gregorian chant sound-alike piece... though much more personal (the Gregorian chants are much more detached sounding to me).

To continue down the morbid road, Track 7, Melodiya, is as melodic as it is haunting. The name doesn’t give much clue to the fact that it is essentially a vocalization of a tragic parable of the mother who loses her daughter to marriage. The song is carried by only the solo voice accompanied by the strings. The melodic line jumps up and down more than the tracks it follows, and so does the volume. This track is a good condensed lesson in how effectively deployed mezza di voce can render a simple melody so impressively expressive.

Slantse ogreyalo (Track 8) is a welcoming song of celebration of nature (especially coming after all the death and dying in the previous tracks). This tracks features the solo voice singing with a chorus that sometimes goes with her, and sometimes off on their own tangents. I wonder if some of the ...er.. sound effects deployed by their voices aren’t imitation of local birds or other animals. You can almost see the countryside and the animals roaming around listening to this thing.

9. Se ma yad, mamo (I’m So Angry, Mother)
10. Malkata tsvetarka (The Flower Maiden)
11. Vokaliza (Vocalize)
12. Mama Rada dumashe (Mama Was Telling Roda)
Track 9, Se ma yad mamo, is a rather disturbing song... This is the bitter, though not overtly angry reproach of a young woman to her mother for having given her up to marriage at such a young age that the other girls her age are still playing on school playgrounds. A protest that she was forced to give up her innocence prematurely. This is a suppressed kind of anger that might be reflective of the culture dominated by religion (Greek Orthodox), perhaps...

Malkata tsvetarka (Track 10), offers a welcoming change of mood. Set to a poem by Hristo Smirnenski, this thing sounds almost like a Western style art song. It isn’t as much about the flower-gathering girl as it is about her surroundings of the wild Vitosha Mountains. Again, just Kasarova’s lost in her reminiscence of the place accompanied by the piano.

Track 11, Vokaliza.... is exactly what the name implies. A vocal exercise... in this case, done in the style of the melodies from the Rhodope Mountains in Thrace... the home of the mythical Orpheus. They say Orpheus was such a mesmerizing musician that trees and rocks would uproot themselves to follow him around. So my advice is... don’t play this in your garden. Better make sure you have something grounded to hold on to, also, or you might just float off the earth in pursuit of the unearthly voices floating out of the stereo.

Track 12, Mama Rada dumashe is a Hayduk song. Hayduks were Bulgarian freedom fighters that rebelled against the Turks back when Bulgaria was trying to fend off the Ottoman Empire. This is a remarkably ...er.. feminist song for the region, I suppose. Rada actually disobeys her mama and runs off to marry a Hayduk leader.

13. Proshetna se Momchilitsa (Momchil’s Young Wife)
14. Ya kazhi mi, oblache le byalo (Tell Me, Little White Cloud)
All notion that Kasarova is a soprano pretending to be a mezzo shall be pronounced dead and buried once and for all by her dwelling in the very low vocal line through out Track 13, Proshetna se Momchilitsa. It is harder to sustain a chain of very low notes than the high ones, and yet she shows no strain whatsoever down low while retaining perfect control of her voice. The droning chorus actually sing above her low melody in this piece! This song is the beginning of a long story that starts off with the image of Momchil’s young wife strolling along the market place. The song ends with her encountering a new suitor... a rather brief narrative, really, but the image is vivid.

The closing track, Ya kazhi mi, oblache le byalo is a staple number in Frau Kasarova’s solo concerts. It is an elegantly simple song of a homesick expat who wishes the wispy little white cloud would consent to carry news of her to her parents back at home. After all the dissonance songs that precede it, this melancholy yet hopeful little tune brings the album to a surprisingly peaceful finish. The song’s English name ( Tell Me, Little White Cloud) is also the title of the 2003 Arte-TV documentary, a part of which can be found on Youtube.com at www.youtube.com/watch?v=ab8O49umkcs (the song is the first piece you hear).

Recorded in July 2002 at Bulgaria Concert Hall in Sofia, Bulgaria, this CD won the 2004 ECHO Award for World Music. A prize well deserved, I say. I almost wish I was born a Bulgarian listening to this thing... but then I wouldn’t really have wanted to grow up behind the Iron Curtain. Everyone you hear in this CD did; however, and survived... and their long suffering trait is apparent in the sound of their folk music. If there is such a thing as a medicinal melancholy, this music is it.

1 CD. Booklet contains a fascinating note on the history and tradition of Bulgarian folk music in English, German, and French by Vesselina Kasarova, a note on Bulgarian folk music by Krassimir Kyurkchiyski, short motif on each songs and lyrics in Bulgarian (written in phonetic English alphabet) and English translation.

Some related links:
Les Mystere des Voix Bulgares CD
http://www.bnr.bg/RadioBulgaria/Emission_English/Theme_Folklore/Material/YRupkina.htm (with great mp3 clips of Bulgarian folk songs)
http://www.omda.bg/indexa.htm (Wonderland Bulgaria site. Some cool info on that beautiful country)
http://www.cosmicvoices.net/index.php/music (Cosmic Voices of Bulgaria female choir)

My other reviews of Vesselina Kasarova:

CDs: Suter: Le laudi di San Francesco (1991), French Song Cycles (1995), A Portrait (1996), Lied-Duett/Wir Schwestern zwei, (with E Gruberova) (1996), Mozart Arias (1997), Rossini Arias & Duets (1999), German Lieder (2000), Love Entranced (French Opera Arias) (2002), Bulgarian Soul (2003), The Magic of Kasarova (2004), Bel Canto Duets (With Vargas, Mei, Florez)(2005), Das Bayerische Staatsoper: 1997-2005 (2006), Belle Nuit (2008), Sento brillar (2008).

Opera CDs: Alcina (Munich 2005), Beatrice di Tenda (Vienna 1992), I Capuleti e i Montecchi, La Cenerentola (Munich 2005), La clemenza di Tito (Munich 2006), Dom Sébastien (ROH 2005), La Favorite (Munich 2000), Mitridate (Salzburg 1997), Oberon, Tancredi, Werther

Opera DVDs: Il barbiere di Siviglia (Zürich 2001), La belle Hélène (Zürich 1997), Berlin Opera Night 2003, La clemenza di Tito (Salzburg 2003), La clemenza di Tito (Zürich 2005), La damnation de Faust (Salzburg 1999), Orphée et Eurydice (Munich 2005), Pique Dame/Queen of Spade (Vienna 1992), Il ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria (Zürich 2002), Der Rosenkavalier (Zürich 2004)

Live Performance: Dom Sébastian at Carnegie Hall 2006

Great Music to Play While: Listening