BONJOUR L'ESTONIE

Children get a taste of Estonian culture

YOUNGSTERS at a junior school in St Neots were in for a treat yesterday morning when an Estonian pop star dropped by to belt out a few numbers.

Singing sensation Hannah - full name Hannah Ild - stopped off at Crosshall Junior School in Eaton Ford as part of a series of visits she is currently making to schools across the country.

The 28-year-old, from Estonian capital Tallinn, is hoping to make her name in the UK after ruling the charts in her homeland for the past decade.

The songstress, who now lives in London, has also teamed up with the Estonian Embassy to promote Estonian culture. Tallinn has been made the European Culture Capital for 2011.

Hannah performed four songs to the children, spoke about Estonia and encouraged them to look after the planet.

She said: "The school was absolutely lovely. All together there were about 480 kids and they were amazing."

Hannah said the youngsters gave her a very warm welcome - and she gave the school a book about Estonia.

The Bedwetters

Bedwetters is a rock band from small town of Pärnu, that flew into a spotlight in autumn 2007 when they caused a fuss winning the MTV New Sound of Europe award in Munich beating bands like Klaxons and Sunrise Avenue on the way.

Bedwetters was the first band from Estonia to win an MTV award, ever.

Tracks 1. Intro 8. Source of Inspiration 2. Nightlight On-Off 9. Break the Silence 3. Like a Deck of Cards 10. General Townsafe 4. Someone Worthless 11. Dark Circus 5. Long. Some. Distance 12. Dead End 6. So Long Nanny! 13. Mighty Heaven 7. Every Once in a While 14. Just in Case

Estonia to decide in March

Andreas Schacht

The Estonian national broadcaster, ERR, announced today that their national final for the 2010 Eurovision Song Contest - the so-called Eesti Laul - will take place on the 6th of March next year.

The format of Eesti Laul has been used for the first time in 2009 with great success as its winner Urban Symphony managed to qualify for the final of the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest where the group reached a respectable 6th place. ERR, Estonia's public national broadcaster, now decided to use that format again for the 2010 edition of the contest which will take place next May in Oslo, Norway.

Songs for Eesti Laul can be entered until the 7th of January and a jury will then pick 10 songs that will be performed in the final in March.

The winner of Eesti Laul will be decided by a mixture of jury vote and televote.

Estonia managed to win the Eurovision Song Contest in 2001 with the song Everybody performed by Tanel Padar, Dave Benton & 2XL. However, the Baltic country failed to qualify for the final of the Eurovision Song Contest every year between 2004 and 2008. That unlucky spell was only broken this year when Urban Symphony's Rändajad convinced the juries and the televoters in the participating countries and gave the country its best placing since 2002.

Rock makes its debut at Tallinn’s Nokia Concert Hall

By Ella Karapetyan

TALLINN - Music has been a part of people’s lives since the time civilization began; it’s a part of most every culture. Music helps people to feel connected to each other and provokes different emotions. Music is around us all, and keeps on growing, growing to new ideas and feelings that captures its listeners.

Music is not only a combination of pleasant sounds, but an art which reflects life. It reflects people’s ideas and emotions. In this world of ours, filled with conflicts, tragedies, joys and hopes, music strives to speak to people about what is most important, urgent and poignant.
To many people in many cultures music is an important part of their way of life. Greek and ancient Indian philosophers defined music as tones ordered horizontally as melodies, and vertically as harmonies.

However, 20th-century composer John Cage thought that any sound can be music, saying, for example, “There is no noise, only sound.” According to musicologist Jean-Jacques Nattiez, the border between music and noise is always culturally defined - which implies that, even within a single society, this border does not always pass through the same place; in short, there is rarely a consensus... By all accounts there is no ‘single’ and ‘intercultural’ universal concept defining what music might be, except that it is ‘sound through time.’

Hannah hits the streets

A freesheet dedicated to Estonian pop star Hannah Ild will appear on London's streets for one day only, despite it being called The Daily Hannah

Just when the great London freesheet war seemed about to end, with the demise of Rupert Murdoch's London Paper and Lord Rothermere's rival London Lite seen as likely to follow, a new pretender hits the capital on Thursday.

But who would be so foolhardy to launch in this dark hour? How about Hannah Ild, "Estonia's biggest star", who is launching herself in Britain with a unique marketing strategy involving a newspaper called "The Daily Hannah".

Ild is using the paper to promote a new single called Shadow on the Wall. As far as marketing wheezes go, launching a one-off paper with a distribution of 50,000 is pretty ballsy for someone whose claims to fame include being runner up in Estonia's competition to find a Eurovision Song Contest entrant.

Still, according to her PR people she has a "music dream team" from 19 Management behind her; if they can make a modest success of Will Young, the UK should be crackable for the young Ild. So, back to The Daily Hannah. How to fill pages of content about an unknown songstress from the Baltics? Easy.

Estonia ready to host large international conferences

The most modern conference hall in the Nordic and Baltic countries will be opened in the heart of Tallinn, the capital city of Estonia, today. The new hall will be capable of accommodating large international conferences of up to 1,830 delegates.

The soon-to-be-opened facilities that bear the name of Nokia Concert Hall will be opened in Tallinn’s new entertainment and lifestyle center, Solaris, and will not only be used for conferences but also for high-profile concerts and theatre performances. The first conference bookings, as well as the first international red carpet events, for this new facility have already been made, with the European Film Academy Awards, the top event of European film industry, for example taking place in Solaris in 2010.

According to Peeter Rebane, chairman of the management board of Solaris, the conference center truly is a state-of-the-art facility with a unique concept unprecedented in Estonia or anywhere in the Baltics. Rebane said, “The top-quality sound [and] light and video technique of the multi-functional conference facilities makes it the best-equipped performance hall in the region,” emphasising that the new conference facilities enable Tallinn to finally accommodate large international conferences.

Estonia can also rock!

by Antonio Díaz  

For most of the people in Finland, talking about Estonia has to do with cheap booze, fun in the ferries, a short week end to escape from the routine in a spa-hotel or the similarities and differences between both languages. But since the country regained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, a lot of things have changed. Many young promoters, producers and artists are working hard to emulate the success of Finland and bring Estonian music to a new level. Will they succeed? 

Tanel Padar is probably the most famous musician in Estonia, after winning the Eurovision Song Contest in 2001. He is also a usual visitor in Finland, with his band The Sun, having played last year in some big venues like in Q-Stock festival in Oulu.  He is even represented in Finland by some of the biggest promotion companies like LiveNation and ProPromotion. But even being the biggest artist in Estonia, the same than for many other Estonian artists and bands, he has not had yet a big international breakthrough.  Why is that? It seems to be the million dollar question in the Estonian music scene.

For Juko-Mart Kõlar, project manager at Music Export Estonia (the equivalent of Music Export Finland in the Baltic state), the reason is that “there has not been a public support for music export activities. The roots of the idea of selling Estonian music abroad date back to the late 1990´s or the first years of the 21st century, while in Finland the free market economy and capitalist system has had its influence on the general way of thinking. Our whole system changed radically in the 1990´s and for our bands/musicians the transfer has been difficult.”  

International festival of sacred music

by Niamh

The International Festival of Sacred Music will take place until 3rd October this month in Tallinn. Masterly performances, a variety of concert programmes, a considerable increase of interest in Orthodox culture in the contemporary world make this festival a great event on a European scale.  The festival hosts church and monastery choirs, secular choirs that have Orthodox repertoire, and children’s choirs of high masterly execution. For more information about the daily programme or for tickets email : zoya@viivomuusika.ee. For more information on the International Festival of Orthodox Sacred Music click here

"Less is More" acoustic tour at Nokia Kontserdimaja - Solaris

08-11-2009 --- 19:00 hours

“Marillon” as the first rock band to perform in Nokia Concert Hall

World-wide known English band “Marillon” will perform on November 8 in Tallinn, being the first rock band, which shall go on stage of Nokia Concert Hall to be open in new Solaris Centre. “Marillon” will perform in Tallinn with their acoustic concert program within the framework of tour "Less is More“, whereby the selected compositions of the band shall be presented.

“Our band shall make a brilliant display of our works from the earliest to the last, and the compositions shall be presented in a new acoustic sounding" said the band guitarist Steve Rothery, according to whose words a part of these compositions was never presented in acoustic way, and a new arrangement and colouring shall be given to them. "We also look forward to the moment, when we perform for the audience in intimate atmosphere", he added.

In the course of acoustic tour "Less is More" the band shall perform in the majority of European countries, and in many of them concerts shall take place at churches and theatres, too. The band shall release a CD with the same name this year. When choosing the date of performance in Tallinn, the opportunity to give a concert in the newly built Nokia Concert Hall, the most modern hall in this region, was mainly taken into consideration.

Solaris Centre and Nokia Concert Hall shall be open at the beginning of October, and the performance of “Marillon” with the program “Less is More” shall be the first rock concert in a new hall for 1830 persons. Tickets at the price from 450 kroons are sold at Ticketpro and Piletilevi points of sale.

Buy your ticket here

Urban Symphony: Singing in the rain

Estonian representative at the 54th Eurovision Song Contest, Urban Symphony was on tour for the last days in Estonia. In the meantime they've already had a chance to prove how brave they are!

They started their tour together with Laura (member of Suntribe which represented the country in 2005), Sergio Bastos and Raivo Tafenau on the 7th of August and gave their last concert today on the island of Hiiumaa.

At their concert in Pärnu, there was suddenly a powercut due to the heavy rain and lightning. When they were performing their hit Rändajad, there was a big bang and the amplifier stopped working. This didn't, however, stop the brave girls from singing and they finished the song without it. The audience honored them with long ovations afterwards!

The rest of the tour has been much easier on the young musicians and has been very successful. Recently they also released a new single, called Päikese Poole and will release an album by the end of the year.

Urban Symphony represented Estonia at this year's Eurovison Song Contest with Rändajad and qualified the tiny country for the Final for the first time in history. They ended sixth, giving Estonia its best placing since 2002.

JK Jazz 2009 to mirror the richness of Estonia

AEG

What a country!
Not many countries can boast of their rich musical history like Estonia can. Few nations have the will to survive like Estonia and Estonians do. The global network of Estonians and Estonian communities is unparalleled among nations of the world. Estonia is but one of very few countries with both a President and a Prime Minister.

What a festival!
Next weekend, on August 29 & 30, the JK Jazz 2009 festival will put on display all these amazing attributes of Estonians, the culture, the spirit and the will to succeed.

Amazing jazz music and awesome artwork will be available for everyone to enjoy, presented in the tranquil and idyllic natural setting of Camp Jõekääru. World-class performers from Canada, Estonia and Cuba will deliver some 12 hours of live music over the two-day festival. The line up includes established masters and up-and-coming stars, some making their Canadian debut.

President Toomas Hendrik Ilves and Prime Minister Andrus Ansip of Estonia, as Honourary Patrons of JK Jazz 2009 have both sent greetings and best wishes for the success of the festival. This event, only in its third year of existence has already made great strides in its mission to provide steady, on-going financial support for the capital renovation of Camp Jõekääru’s 50-year old infrastructure.

Jarvi to rejoin Estonian orchestra

Neeme Jarvi, who in May stepped down from his position as the music director of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, will take charge of the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra, where he began his career in 1963 before fleeing Estonia, a former Soviet republic, Agence France-Presse reported.

Mr. Jarvi, who arrived in the United States in 1980, appeared with many American orchestras and is now chief conductor of the Residentie Orkest in The Hague. He is to take over at the Estonian orchestra from the conductor Nikolai Alexeev in 2010.

Madonna performed for nearly 80,000 spectators in Tallinn

Madonna's concert took place in the historic Tallinn Song Festival Grounds - a large outdoor concert site that was originally (in 1959) built for Estonia's nationwide song festivals, but now has hosted many world-famous stars including King of Pop, Michael Jackson and the HIStory World Tour in 1997.

The legendary Estonian song festivals are also still taking place at Tallinn, attracting nowadays also huge numbers of tourists in addition to Estonians themselves. This year's song festival was extremely popular bringing together more than 110,000 people at the beginning of July.

Among the spectators of Madonna's Tallinn concert was also the President of Latvia, Valdis Zatlers, who applauded both the show and the concert site, and expressed regret that Riga does not have such great festival grounds.

Interview with Lenna and Piret of Vanilla Ninja

Antonio Díaz   

Having access to the backstage of a festival has its good and bad sides. The bad ones is that you pay for a coffee or a beer more than outside, the good one is that you never know whom you can find sitting close to you. During last Rabarock festival in Estonia, I unexpectedly crossed my way with Lenna and Piret of Vanilla Ninja, one of the most international Estonian bands and did not waste the chance to shoot a few questions at them!

It is not common to catalogue girls who hardly reach 25 years of age as “veteran musicians”, but the young and beautiful girls of Vanilla Ninja can certainly say that they have been around, starting their career at a very tender age. Now, with more clear ideas about the business, but still having fun, they seem to be sure about what they want for their present and their future. I met them just minutes before they went onstage to participate in the project B.D.Ö., the biggest metal band in the world, that condensed many famous Estonian singers gathered together. Full of sympathy and energy, they were eager to answer a few questions about their band and their views on Estonian music scene.

I suppose the weather is not the best one to play today. Have you played before at Rabarock? 
Piret and Lenna: No, actually I think that it is a good experience because the rock fans get a bit scared if they invite us, so now we got invited.

Stereochemistry – Märka!

Antonio Díaz

Stereochemistry is a young new band from Tartu that has just released their debut studio album Märka! after having played together for about 4 years.

Following their musical dream and taking advantage of having reached the finals of Eesti Laul 2009, the Estonian foursome formed by  Holger and Siim on the vocals/guitar, Indrek on the bass and Keio on the drums deliver 11 shots of good rock in a notable first effort to break through the Estonian music scene.

The first couple of tracks, Ainult armastus on ju päriselt meie and Öösiti kõndides, give a good sample of what you are going to find in the rest of the CD: smart lyrics, edgy riffs and pop-rock rhythms easy to follow and dance to. Holger vocal skills suit perfectly on the songs, although maybe it would be nice to notice a bit more of experimentation on his notes, because most of the songs are sung at the same vocal levels, not putting his throat at risk. The orchestration sounds fluent and compact, highlighting the excellent skills of Keio, the drummer, who really pushes the songs higher and higher with his effort, something you can really notice when the band plays on live.

Metsatoll begins recording new album

by zMETALlica

Estonian metal band, Metsatoll, has issued the following update:

"Last week, Metsatöll finished recording the demo version of their 4th album, which was begun earlier, in March. In mid-June, the entire studio was moved from Tallinn to a South-Estonian village of Hargla, where the songs received finishing touches. According to the guys themselves, leaving Tallinn behind meant a complete recovery of creativity, which can never be achieved in a big city."

"Today, the band begins recording their 4th album in the Finnvox studio in Finland. The album is recorded and mixed by perhaps the most legendary Finnish producer Mikko Karmila. Over the years, he has provided his services to such bands as Nightwish, Children of Bodom, Stratovarius, Stone, Peer Günt, Kotiteollisuus, Amorphis, Waltari, Tarot, Timo Kotipelto, Timo Tolkki, Popeda, Sonata Arctica, etc. The album will be all about finished by early December, and will be released to the global distribution networks on 6 March, 2010."

Tallinn's Song and Dance Celebration to be "an Unforgettable Experience" letting Estonians "Breathe as One"

Margus Reinsalu

This summer, Estonia is again holding the nationwide Song and Dance Celebration in Tallinn. Internationally active Estonian entrepreneur and owner of the investment company KC Grupp, Margus Reinsalu -- whose company Tone Tea has concluded an advertising contract with the Spanish GP2 team Racing Engineering to advertise its product, the fitness drink Fat Burner -- takes part in many social projects such as the Song Celebration, which shows his devotion to his native country.

The Song and Dance Celebration is not simply a big festival of singing and dancing but also a way to demonstrate the national spirit. It is definitely an unforgettable experience for anyone who attends it.

This summer, Estonia is again holding the nationwide Song and Dance Celebration in Tallinn. Internationally active Estonian entrepreneur and owner of the investment company KC Grupp, Margus Reinsalu -- whose company Tone Tea has concluded an advertising contract with the Spanish GP2 team Racing Engineering to advertise its product, the fitness drink Fat Burner -- takes part in many social projects such as the Song Celebration, which shows his true devotion to his native country. Margus Reinsalu, whose most exotic pro bono project has been renovating the country's centuries-old Oandu Watermill to help preserve the heritage of the countryside, believes that in order to understand what brings hundreds of thousands locals -- and an increasing number of guests from around the world -- every five years to Tallinn, this unique festival can only be experienced on site.

Tiny Estonia tunes up for giant national-pride choir

By Anneli Reigas

TALLINN — Twenty-two thousand Estonians will sing together in a single choir when their small Baltic nation hosts a traditional festival that preserved national identity through decades of Soviet occupation.

"Competing for your right to sing at least once in your life in that giant choir during our traditional song festival is an essential part of being Estonian," said Mati Maarits, 50, who has sung in all the festivals except one since 1969.

This year's event called "To Breathe as One" takes place from July 2-5 in Tallinn, including some 37,000 performers -- singers, dancers and musicians from various orchestras -- with many people parading through the capital in traditional costume.

Tens of thousands of Estonians from nearly one thousand choirs competed this past winter to join the giant choir which has been the highlight of the traditional event held regularly since 1869.

"For Estonians singing is a way to express our identity," Maarits said of his homeland, an ex-Soviet state of just 1.3 million which joined the European Union in 2004.

Estonia's giant song festivals were venues of resistance under nearly 50 years of Soviet occupation which ended in August 1991.

Estonian singer Hannah has new single 'Keeping Score'

LONDON - It's over ten years since Hannah's blend of incisive ballads and savvy pop first made its mark in Estonia. She's been a proud flag-bearer for her country, with massive record success on six albums.

Now, for summer 2009, the stakes are raised again and Hannah is in impressive company. The singer, writer and pianist from Tallinn has been composing and recording with some of the most in-demand sidemen in the business.

The roll call includes Steve Robson, co-writer of Take That's 'Shine', James Morrison's 'Undiscovered' and 'The Pieces Don't Fit Anymore', among others; Steve Booker, co-writer and producer of Duffy's 'Mercy' smash and collaborator with Sugababes; Grant Black, who wrote Liberty X's 'Song 4 Lovers' and songs for Holly Valance, Peter Grant et al; and Peter-John Vettese, whose quarter-century-plus in the business includes credits with everyone from Annie Lennox to Carly Simon and Gary Barlow to Robin Gibb.

The first fruit of these fascinating combinations is the single 'Keeping Score', co-written with and produced by Steve Robson, and due out on June 29, 2009 on Snowdog Records.

It's a nimble piece of noughties pop that's also a perfect fit for the clubs, via remixes by Bimbo Jones, Digital Dog and Riffs & Rays, some of the most sought-after DJ-producers of this dance decade. It's a perfect aperitif for Hannah's new album, due in September.

'This is like a new chapter for me,' she says. 'I really didn't understand how this part of the world worked before I moved to London. It's really difficult to be successful somewhere when you're based somewhere else, so for me that was the perfect decision. I hope everything will go in the right direction, because it just feels so right now.'

Protesting this world in sounds of another

The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt has rebelled against different Russian governments throughout his career, composing serialist works when that aesthetic irked the Soviets and religious music when atheism was the official credo.

His Symphony No. 4 (“Los Angeles”), a recent commission from the Los Angeles Philharmonic, is a protest against Vladimir V. Putin, the current Russian prime minister and former president. It received its New York premiere at the Greenwich Village club Le Poisson Rouge on Sunday evening.

Mr. Pärt, who now lives in Berlin, has dedicated the symphony to Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky, a Russian oil oligarch whose political aspirations angered Mr. Putin and who was sent to a Siberian prison after being convicted of fraud and tax evasion in 2005.

Mr. Pärt, who in recent decades has mostly composed mystical works for chorus and small vocal ensemble, wrote, “With my composition, I would like to reach out my hand, extending it to the prisoner, and in his person to all those imprisoned without rights in Russia.”

Jeff Milarsky conducted the Wordless Music Orchestra in this mournful half-hour work on Sunday. Mr. Pärt’s first three symphonies are scored for full orchestra, but the fourth uses only strings, harp and percussion, and highlights the slow, meditative style that he calls “tintinnabulation” and that evokes the pealing of bells.