How the V Interregional Harmonica Festival took place in Ustye
Last weekend, the shimmering sounds of the harmonica reached the most remote corners of the agrotown Ustye. Over the five years of its existence, the interregional harmonica festival "Gagarin Meetings" has significantly expanded the geography of its participants. This year, there were 45 of them. The youngest is 17 years old. They came from various cities in Belarus and Russia. Some of them are professionals, others are amateurs.
One of the participants traveled over a thousand kilometers to showcase her creativity at the competition. Valentina Telei came from the Russian city of Cheboksary. It was her first time in the Orsha region, but she loves to visit Belarus. She enjoys the hospitality and openness of her Slavic brothers, our well-kept cities, wonderful nature, and unique culture. Valentina has been participating in various creative competitions across Russia for over 20 years. She also learned about the "Gagarin Meetings" festival in Ustye and decided to participate as well.
With heartfelt warmth, the administrator of the ensemble "Shevle" from Moscow Grigory Vakku spoke about the Orsha land. The ensemble is only five years old, but its creativity is known far beyond the borders of the Moscow region. Now they have come to conquer Belarus with their art. The youngest participant of the festival from the Russian city of Odintsovo Mikhail Limонов met the leader of the folk music ensemble "Gagarin Musical" Aleksey Simash (the organizer of this event) last year at the "Slavic Bazaar in Vitebsk" and this year came to Ustye with his Tula harmonica.
The festival began with a small rally at the monument to the fallen soldiers from the Great Patriotic War, the symbolic moment of which was the performance of the legendary song "Katyusha" by all the participants of the event. Then there was a traditional procession, followed by the competition itself. It was judged by a jury that included the artistic director of the GUK "Orsha District Culture Center 'Victory'" Svetlana Gnedkova, a singer and poetess from the city of Glubokoe Valentina Petrovskaya, a bayan player and harmonist, a teacher at the DSI of the town of Kokanovo Nikolai Vorobyov, the director of the enterprise "Ustye" of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus Dmitry Batyukov, and the director of the GUK "ORCK 'Victory'" Alexander Gaveiko. Based on the results of the competition, the jury members of the festival selected the best performers in each nomination. Thus, the first places were distributed as follows: in the nomination "Ensembles" – the folk culture club "Birulki" (Staraia Russa, Novgorod region), "We Sing About the Harmonica" – Ludmila Zhdanovich (Tolchin district), "We Read About the Harmonica" – Vera Kuranakova (Babynichskaya rural library), "Craft and Harmonica" – Natalia Degtyareva (TCSON of the Orsha district), "Harmonicist" – Mikhail Limонов (Odintsovo, Moscow region).
There were also exhibitions, trade rows at the festival, and even the Orsha bikers from the "Boomerang" club came to visit. The celebration concluded with a gala concert featuring the folk ensemble "Gagarin Musical", the folk ensemble "Native Melodies", and the show group "Alliance".
Anastasia TUROK.
Photo by the author.