New kantele repertoire: what to begin with?

The main issue in modern kantele performing in the Republic of Karelia and Finland is the luck of repertoire. The Kantele-GO! project is aimed at diversifying kantele music which includes publications of new scores for kanteles of different types – 5-string kantele, 10-string kantele,  chromatic kantele.

The Kantele-GO! project coordinator Olga Vlasova arranged a series of working meetings with kantele professionals in order to set the criteria for choosing new music compositions to be published. The main directions of kantele music development have been discussed with Pekka Suutari, professor of the University of Eastern Finland and the Kantele-GO! project coordinator, and  experienced kantele teachers Yuri Gladyshev from Kalevala and Nadezhda Drobyshevskaya from Petrozavdosk. The project art director Elena Magnitskaya and the Kantele Ensemble artistic director Vyacheslav Ivanov made important comments on public demand in the field of traditional music. Professional kantele performers Aleksandra Sakharova, Elena Ankhimova, Aleksandr Ivanov, Aleksandr Gorevanov and Irina Shishkanova shared their views on what suits better to both purposes – concert performances and teaching at schools. All agreed on the necessity to set up an expert council to develop the common criteria for kantele music to be published.