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ROMANI MUSIC AND DANCE, FROM RUSSIA TO THE EAST VILLAGE
April 6, 2009
For Immediate Release
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| The DRAGO Ensemble | Contacts:
Cheryl Sidwell, World Music Folklife Center
(571) 332-4865 kostanadancer@yahoo.com
Cassandra Hartblay, CEC ArtsLink
(212) 643-1985 x17 chartblay@cecartslink.org
The DRAGO Ensemble, a Romani (Gypsy) folk music and dance group, will visit Washington DC and New York City as part of the Open World Cultural Leaders Program.
Four members of the DRAGO Ensemble will travel to the US April 22nd-May 6th to share their unique cultural heritage with folk music and dance lovers here. Their trip is part of a program to encourage cross-cultural communication through the arts. The group, comprised of two musicians and two dancers, performs widely in Russia, and has performed in Finland, Hungary, China, Sweden, Cyprus, and Taiwan, but this will be their first trip to the United States.
While visiting the DC area, the group will teach workshops as part of the Herdeljezi Festival of Gypsy Culture, organized by the World Music Folklife Center. As part of the festival, they will perform an original collaborative work with the Silk Road Dance Company. DRAGO will have the opportunity to meet with Romani folk groups practicing traditions from the Balkans, Turkey, and other regions, and visit cultural institutions, including touring the Kennedy Center for the Arts.
In New York, the group will perform on Tuesday, May 5th at 8pm at DROM, the dynamic East Village performance venue and restaurant that hosted the 2008 NY Gypsy Festival. DROM, which means “journey” or “road” in the Romani language, will be a perfect last stop for DRAGO as their travels in the US come to a close.
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DRAGO will be hosted in the United States by the World Music Folklife Center, with support from the Academy for Educational Development and CEC ArtsLink. Their trip is part of a professional exchange program sponsored by the Open World Leadership Center at the Library of Congress. Open World is a unique, nonpartisan initiative of the U.S. Congress. Open World’s Cultural Leaders Program aims to forge better understanding between the United States and Russia by enabling emerging Russian leaders in the arts to experience America’s cultural and community life, and to work with their American counterparts. Over 13,000 Open World participants have been hosted in all 50 U.S. states since the program's inception in 1999. Support for the cultural program is provided through partnership and funding from the National Endowment for the Arts; the Open World Leadership Center funds the administrative portion of the program.
CEC ArtsLink, through a multi-faceted program of cultural exchange, serves to create and sustain constructive, mutually beneficial relationships in the arts between the United States and Eastern and Central Europe, Russia, Central Asia, and the Caucasus. Working with artists, arts organizations and community-based groups, CEC ArtsLink provides an essential structure for ongoing dialogue, contributing to a culture of openness and trust between nations.
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