The All-Russian musical holiday-festival “Soul of Bayan” starts with competitive auditions on November 2 and 3.
Everyone will be able to attend competitive auditions on November 2 and 3 at ODO from 10:00 and plunge into the world of musical masterpieces
The main prize, a unique concert button accordion worth more than 1 million rubles, will be fought by the winners of the 1st degree and the winners of the Grand Prix of the festival 2018-2022.
The superfinal will feature the winners of the regional stages from the Moscow, Leningrad, Rostov, Samara, Sverdlovsk regions, Krasnodar, Perm and Khabarovsk Territories, the Republics of Khakassia, Crimea, North Ossetia-Alania, and for the first time performers from the new regions of Russia – Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions.
On the eve of the organizer and ideological inspirer of the holiday, Honored Artist of Russia Sergey Voitenko gave a press conference – the musician spoke about the history and idea of the festival, the geography of participants and competitive rounds, the program of the super finals and the gala concert, as well as the preservation of national traditions and the popularization of professional and amateur music creativity.
Initially, the festival “Soul of Bayan” originated in the Samara region as a regional festival.
In 2018, at the initiative of the Governor of the Samara Region Dmitry Azarov, the first festival “The Soul of Bayan” was organized and held, which received wide recognition and love from the residents of the Samara Region. Subsequently, the festival was supported at the federal level, it received the status of an All-Russian festival under the motto “The soul of the button accordion is the soul of Russia.”
With his project, Sergei Voitenko wanted to confess his love for his small homeland, where 125 years ago master Chulkov created a button accordion – an instrument that determined the fate of a musician for many years.
In 2022, the festival reached the all-Russian level, with almost 3,000 performing musicians, dancers, singers, reciters, circus performers, children and adults, professionals and amateurs, soloists and musical groups taking part in it. Next year, a gala concert is planned to be held in the hall of the Kremlin Palace, Sergei Voitenko shared his plans.
According to him, this festival is needed throughout the country and, above all, the regions, the outback. After all, there are now a lot of problems, there are no longer enough professional accordion players. “10-15 years ago we had several musicians in one village, and now there is one musician for several villages – here he accompanies grandmothers, here he works with children, this is already becoming a piece of history,” the musician admits.
This is how the idea of creating this festival arose – to preserve the layer of folk culture, otherwise entire genres – the same choirs of grandmothers – may simply disappear in Russian villages.
The name “Soul of the button accordion” is also not accidental – many genres come to life around this instrument: instrumental art, choreography, folk songs, circus art and artistic word. In addition, button accordion, accordion, accordion are single-family instruments, so they also take part in the festival.
The festival also impresses with a variety of genres: the button accordion participates in symphonic music, in rock, pop, folk compositions, and in many other variations.
The main criterion for participation in the festival is a bright concert number, because the result of the competition should be a gala concert, a super concert divertissement, where each number will light the eyes of the audience and remain in their hearts. To do this, Sergey Voitenko personally participates in the work of the jury and selects the most talented, bright and amazing performers from all over the country.
In 2022, artists from the DPR and LPR, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions took part in the festival for the first time. At the qualifying stage, they performed online, and they will arrive in Samara for full-time participation.
The organizers of the festival have many far-reaching plans, and one of them is to make the button accordion popular among musicians of the middle age group, while there are fewer participants from 30 to 50 years old, the festival is designed to fill this gap. There are also plans to introduce a new nomination “Bayan Symbol” for those who have done a lot to popularize the instrument.
“I am very grateful to everyone who supported us, and above all to the governor of the Samara region Dmitry Igorevich Azarov, who is very kind to our roots, to musical culture, to preserving the history of musical instruments and folk traditions,” Sergei Voitenko said.
For the province, “The Soul of Bayan” has a special cultural value – because it was thanks to this festival that a lot of new talented musicians and creative teams were discovered in the region. “During its holding, starting from 2018, we have discovered a huge number of new names – these are wonderful nuggets, people with unique talent. The festival is also an opportunity for professional communication between creative teams. For our region, this will be a great event in the year of cultural heritage of the peoples of Russia. This is very symbolic, “said Irina Kalyagina, Acting Minister of Culture of the Samara Region.
Speaking at a press conference, Alexander Zhuravsky, Deputy Head of the Russian Presidential Administration for Public Projects, assured that the state has supported and will continue to support such important projects as the Soul of the Bayan festival, because all art, even symphonic art, is nourished by folk roots. Therefore, it is very important to support projects that bring together different generations and national schools of performing arts. Russia is a multiethnic, multicultural country, and the cultural code that unites different national and religious traditions is best manifested in art.
Director General of the Presidential Fund for Cultural Initiatives Roman Karmanov noted that the festival has one more important component – in addition to uniqueness, scope, coverage, people’s involvement – there is also a passionate leader. It is impossible to imagine a person more in love with the instrument and at the same time the strongest propagandist of this instrument. This, in his opinion, determines the success of the festival, and the Department is always ready to support bright, breakthrough projects that have a direct impact on the development of Russian culture.