site.btaChoir Conductor Georgi Petkov Tells of Musicians' Perseverance during the Pandemic and a Labour-of-Love Project with Cuban Jazz Musician

 Photo: Georgi Petkov

Sofia, July 5 (BTA) - One of the things Georgi Petkov, composer
and conductor of the Grammy-winning New Bulgarian Voices folk
choir, boasts of achieving despite the coronavirus pandemic is
the Beyond the Notes collaborative project with Cuban jazz
musician Roberto Fonseca. In the project that is due to premiere
 in Sofia in July, Bulgarian folk music meets Cuban jazz.

"The pandemic was a major stress for us all and this has
affected all areas of life. But as long as one is healthy and
able to work, they should never be held back by hardships and
challenges. They can always find new ways of creating," Petkov
said in a BTA interview.

Being a choir conductor, the bad news for him during the
pandemic came when he was told that no technology made it
possible to have synchronized singing online. "The only option
was to edit together vocals recorded in the same rhythm. But
that was no choir singing. We also had to find a way to rehearse
 and record, while observing the COVID safety measures. That was
 a tall order in the short time we had between lockdowns," says
Petkov.
 
But they did it, and Beyond the Notes came through - also thanks
 to Jazz Plus and the support of the Culture Programme of Sofia
City Hall.

Petkov says: "We have been working with Jazz Plus on the idea
[for a collaborative project with Fonseca] since last summer and
 the plan was to have the premiere in Sofia in December 2020,
but unfortunately the Cuban colleagues did not get a permission
to leave their country and fly to Bulgaria for rehearsals and
the premiere. Then there was a new lockdown in the autumn. We
did not give up, went ahead, each working on their side of the
ocean. Just before the lockdown we managed to record the vocals
with New Bulgarian Voices. The girls had to sing with their
masks on and that shows in the video we made during the
recording."

The project started off without in-person rehearsals. The music
was written and the pieces recorded separately in Cuba and in
Sofia. Then Petkov's compositions were put together with
Fonseca's. "The result was more than encouraging as it showed
the kind of creative rapport we have with Roberto Fonseca,"
Petkov says.

Work in the months that followed was mostly expanding the
project with new composition ideas for mixing Cuban jazz with
Bulgarian folk songs and folk-jazz motives into a coherent
whole, says Petkov.

The project so far includes music for five compositions and
Petkov says he can't wait to hear them performed live by the
choir and the Cuban musicians a day before the July 8 concert at
 Sofia Live Club. It will be there that Fonseca and New
Bulgarian Voices will be meeting for the first time in person,
post-pandemic.

"It is quite likely that something new might come out during the
 rehearsals in the last moment. Roberto Fonseca is an
outstanding musician and can always surprise us," Petkov says.

Beyond the Notes is produced by Jazz Plus and Montuno
Productions. Jazz Plus already has experience with producing
such collaborative projects and one of them, Estruna, of
flamenco singer Arcangel and New Bulgarian Voices, won a Latin
Grammy Award for Best Flamenco Album in 2018.
 
The choir

New Bulgarian Voices is the youngest most established choir in
Bulgaria, says its conductor. It was created by Petkov in 2012
with New Bulgarian University (NBU) and all singers - aged 25
and 26 - have studied singing and been part of NBU's folk jazz
formation or Evridika Vocal Trio.

The choir has had tens of concerts in Bulgaria, Serbia and
Turkey - and some 30 concerts in Spain alone. It has performed
with world-famous musicians: Theodosii Spassov, Arcangel,
Antonio Forcione, Dani de Moron, Agustin Diassera, Ricardo
Moreno, Jose Manuel Posada, to mention but a few.

Beyond the Notes's future

"The future of the project depends on the global COVID
situation," says Petkov. "The pandemic did not kill our
enthusiasm to do something new and interesting. We worked on
both sides of the ocean hoping that a time will come to perform
in concert. Roberto Fonseca is a cosmopolitan artist and that
perfectly matches the way I create. I strongly hope that one day
 we will perform our music on the other side of the ocean.

For now, New Bulgarian Voices and Roberto Fonseca have been
invited to perform at the new edition of the Jazz in Marciac
festival in France, which is taking place from July 24 to August
 4, 2021. LN/