Shell National Folkloric Festival
Encyclopedia
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
festival
Festival
A festival or gala is an event, usually and ordinarily staged by a local community, which centers on and celebrates some unique aspect of that community and the Festival....
held in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
. Sponsored by the Shell Group of Companies
Royal Dutch Shell
Royal Dutch Shell plc , commonly known as Shell, is a global oil and gas company headquartered in The Hague, Netherlands and with its registered office in London, United Kingdom. It is the fifth-largest company in the world according to a composite measure by Forbes magazine and one of the six...
with a grant of $50,000, the first Shell National Folkloric Festival was held at the Concert Hall during the opening celebrations of the Sydney Opera House
Sydney Opera House
The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in the Australian city of Sydney. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, finally opening in 1973 after a long gestation starting with his competition-winning design in 1957...
in 1973.
In 1975 one thousand performers, representing 30 ethnic groups living in Australia, performed folk music
Folk music
Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....
, song
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
and dance
Folk dance
The term folk dance describes dances that share some or all of the following attributes:*They are dances performed at social functions by people with little or no professional training, often to traditional music or music based on traditional music....
at the Opera House, and by 1987 this had grown to 1400 performers representing 41 different ethnic groups
One of its first producer-directors was Victor Carell (Victor Thomas Cioccarelli), who with his wife Beth Dean (a notable Australian ballerina and choreographer) auditioned ethnic groups in Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, Adelaide
Adelaide
Adelaide is the capital city of South Australia and the fifth-largest city in Australia. Adelaide has an estimated population of more than 1.2 million...
. Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
, and Wollongong for the festival.
From 1979 to 1994, Guillermo Keys-Arenas
Guillermo Keys-Arenas
Guillermo Keys-Arenas — was a dancer and choreographer. He is remembered for his eight-year association with Ballet Folklorico de Mexico for which he was artistic coordinator and ballet master, but also for his contribution to dance in Australia.- Biography :Guillermo Keys-Arenas was born in El...
was the major artistic director of the annual event. The festivals were held in Sydney at first but later were held in Melbourne
Melbourne
Melbourne is the capital and most populous city in the state of Victoria, and the second most populous city in Australia. The Melbourne City Centre is the hub of the greater metropolitan area and the Census statistical division—of which "Melbourne" is the common name. As of June 2009, the greater...
, Perth
Perth, Western Australia
Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia and the fourth most populous city in Australia. The Perth metropolitan area has an estimated population of almost 1,700,000....
, Adelaide, Darwin
Darwin, Northern Territory
Darwin is the capital city of the Northern Territory, Australia. Situated on the Timor Sea, Darwin has a population of 127,500, making it by far the largest and most populated city in the sparsely populated Northern Territory, but the least populous of all Australia's capital cities...
and Brisbane
Brisbane
Brisbane is the capital and most populous city in the Australian state of Queensland and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of over 2 million, and the South East Queensland urban conurbation, centred around Brisbane, encompasses a population of...
.
Performing Groups
Between 1973–1975 performers representing ethnic groups from Australia, Austria, Armenia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Latvia, Lebanon, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Scotland, Sweden, and Ukraine, performed at the Festival.Groups which performed at the Festival included:
- Boyan Ukrainian Choir, with Basil Matyash as conductor
- Daina Sydney Lithuanian Choir, with Zita Belkutė and Bronius Kiveris as conductors
- Grandinele Lithuanian National Dancing Group, with Ginta Viliunas as a featured dancer
- Hnat Khotkevych Ukrainian Bandurist EnsembleHnat Khotkevych Ukrainian Bandurist EnsembleThe Hnat Khotkevych Ukrainian Bandurist Ensemble is a vocal and instrumental Ukrainian folkloric performing ensemble in Sydney, Australia. It was founded in June 1964 by bandurist Hryhory Bazhul and since May 1971 was directed by Peter Deriashnyj.-Origins:...
, with Hryhory Bazhul and later Peter DeriashnyjPeter DeriashnyjPeter Deriashnyj, is a Ukrainian Australian bandurist, composer of secular and sacred music, and choral conductor. He specializes in the Kharkiv style of bandura playing, but also plays folk and rock guitar....
as artistic directors - Oplenac Folklore Dancing Group (Yugoslavia), with Vera Djuric as director
- Syrenka Polish Ensemble, with Josef Walczak as artistic director
- Punjabi Bhangra Group of NSW (India), with Sardool Singh as director
- Virmalised Folk Dancing Group (Estonia), with Annelie Sildnik as director
- Ukrainian National Ballet, with Natalia Tyrawsky as artistic director