Dantchev:Domain Album Say It
Release Date 1.5.2020
Label Glomama Music (GLOMAMA002)
“A glimpse into Dantchev’s heart and soul bringing a longing for the listener to experience this music live.” (Songlines, UK)
“A wide palette of beautiful chants, supported by exceptionally beautiful instrumental arrangements. Sometimes cinematic, sometimes rock-hard, sometimes dreamy, but always very melodic.” (Rootstime, BE)
“The freshness and boundlessness of the music is also emphasised by the band whose instrumentation is exceptional.” (Kansanmusiikki, FI)
Dantchev:Domain have been awarded the Finnish Folk Album of the Year 2020 for their debut album Say It. The group of Helsinki musicians lead by Finnish-Bulgarian vocalist and composer Anna Dantchev make up for a unique and intriguing instrumentation - voice, brass, percussion and guitar that contributes to their cinematic and groovy sound influenced by Bulgarian singing and rhythms. The record reached the top 50 of the Roots Music Report Top World Music Albums 2020.
“Say It” is a cry to be courageous and express yourself, partly connected to the fact that Dantchev published the record at 44 years old. During her varied musical career in Bulgarian music and Soul bands there was always a longing to make her own music, but hesitation to put herself into a box. The album is about her life – themes of motherhood, birth and death, and about finding your path, especially when it is as multifaceted as Dantchev’s life has been.
Dantchev hails from Haapavesi in Northern Finland, one of the centers of flourishing Finnish folk music. The local folk revival was partly driven by her father, a Bulgarian musician, teacher and ethnomusicologist, and co-founder of the Haapavesi folk music festival. Dantchev’s family connections to Bulgarian music go back to her great-grandmother, a professional lamenter from Etropole in the Balkan mountains, and her father’s home Plovdiv, a rich musical city with a view of the impressive Rodopi mountains. Growing up in this mix of musical influences, Bulgarian traditional music and Finnish pelimanni music, Dantchev spent her childhood summers at Haapavesi Folk Festival learning celtic music and English as a language of storytelling, as we also hear on the album.
Paired with the musicians’ influences of jazz, rock and soul, the strong connection to Bulgarian music is evident: Whether in ‘Oh Male’ (Oh mother!), a song about finding your own path and harmony sung in a vibrato style native to the Shopluk area, Boy Oh Boy, that combines Finnish polska with the Bulgarian dance daychovo horo, both in 9/8, where she sings about chasing false goals like money or fame, or the calm and beautiful Molitva na Baba, “a prayer for grandmother”, a melody that came to Anna after the passing of her Bulgarian grandmother.
The band, established in 2019 consists of experienced musicians from different genres, such as trombonist Erno Haukkala of Alamaailman Vasarat and Compañía Kaari & Roni Martin, guitarist and tuba player Kenneth Ojutkangas of Sointi Jazz Orchestra, drummer Antti-Pekka Rissanen and percussionist Joao Luis. Dantchev:Domain is currently working on its second album.
Musicians:
Anna Dantchev (FI/BG), vocal and tupan-drum
Erno Haukkala (FI), trombone and sousaphone Kenneth Ojutkangas (FI/US), guitar and tuba Antti-Pekka Rissanen (FI), drums
Joao Luis (PT), vibraphone and percussion
Contact:
Label / Management: hello@glomamamusic.com UK Agency: Miguel Santos info@redorange.org.uk
article posted by:Anna Dantchev, Anna Dantchev / Bulgarian Voice from Finland / DANTCHEV:DOMAIN