Library of Congress showcases online Homegrown 2021 Concert Series
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The American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress is proud to partner with the Embassy of Canada and the Québec Government Office in Washington to support the online presentation of 2021 Homegrown at Home Concert Series recorded at home by the artists, starting March 10 at noon (Eastern U.S. Time Zone), initially on the AFC Facebook page and then permanently on the Library of Congress YouTube channel and website.
For this concert Élisabeth Moquin, Thierry Clouette, and Élisabeth Giroux came together in 2015 to create this exciting group É.T.É., signifying the group’s first initials but also the French word for summer.
The series kicks off on March 10 with É.T.É., who play traditional and contemporary francophone music from Québec.
A contemporary and dynamic vision of traditional Québec music, combining influences from folk, jazz, progressive rock, and classical music on fiddle, cello, bouzouki, voice, foot-tapping, and step dancing is offered by the trio. Together they create daring and refined arrangements of pieces from the traditional Québec and Acadian repertoires. They also compose original pieces that contribute to the continuation of francophone musical traditions in Canada.
The series continues on March 24 with separate concert videos by two groups from the Republic of Georgia. Ialoni Ensemble, whose video will premiere at noon, is a women’s group performing ecclesiastical, folk, and city music in traditional Georgian polyphony.
Ranina Quartet, who premieres at 12:30, is a male group performing a similar repertoire. Both groups are highly skilled and widely acclaimed performers.
Ialoni has been the recipient of several prestigious prizes, including 1st place in the “Women’s Folk Ensemble Category” at the National State Folklore Center Competition (2016), as well as both the Grand Prix in the Traditional Chant Category, and the first place and gold medal in the “Georgian Traditional Song” category at the Tbilisi Competition of Choral Music.
The Ranina Quartet is a new ensemble, but the individual members have been performing with other award-winning groups for many years and regularly performs in Tbilisi, as well as at international festivals, and gives master-classes and concerts for international tourists and choirs.
Committed to popularizing good quality music as a form of social outreach, Ranina’s members are thrilled to sing in nursing homes, kindergartens, public schools, penitentiaries, and other venues where they can bring their music to vulnerable members of society. The Ranina Concert video also includes English-language narration by musicologist John Graham, which will help those of us who don’t speak Georgian to understand the themes of each song.
The next concert day is April 7, which again features two separate videos, this time with performers from Finland. The American Folklife Center is proud to co-sponsor both concerts with the Embassy of Finland.
Another concert would be held on April 21, and continue every other Wednesday into September, but the details are still not known.