Heritage & Future: Reclaiming Roots

From Scotland's Travellers to Transylvanian Roma: the art of survival

Petr Dorůžka
András Lelkes, by Péter Böszörményi
Sam Lee
Anna Mašátová, by Tomáš Moudrý

Chaired by Petr Dorůžka (Czech Republic), freelance;
with András Lelkes (Hungary), Hangvető;
Sam Lee (UK), The Nest Collective;
Anna Mašátová (Czech Republic), AMPromotions

Sam Lee‘s focus on the Traveller community reveals a brave statement: these are the values that should be respected! But does talent always come with courage? Hungary‘s táncház movement in the 70's was one of these cases. We still feel its impact, but only the locals remember the clandestine travels to villages in Transylvania, where Gypsies, Hungarians and Romanians still played old time music. These field trips were monitored by the secret police of dictator Ceaușescu. He planned his version of North Korean policy to transfer village population to urban areas. Muzsikás‘s Daniel Hamár remembers a meeting after a concert in Germany, when a Romanian secret agent warned him: “Never cross our border again.” For a new generation of Czech musicians it took 40 more years to rediscover their roots. Why? Let‘s explore the tricky links between past dictatorships and future trends.

Petr Dorůžka is awarded the WOMEX 17 Professional Excellence Award.