Les Mystère Des Voix Bulgares - Ethno-folk enigmas from the Black Sea

According to an ancient legend, when God was handing out lands to the peoples of the world he forgot about the Bulgarians, so some of them went to point this out to Him. Since by then it was too late and nothing was left, the Lord granted them a small corner of Paradise, wild and untouched, where the sun rises in the morning over the Black Sea and sets in the evening behind the peaks of Rila and Pirin, the stars so close you could touch them. Here, over the centuries, women were trained to sing, with a method and discipline so rigorous that it has kept intact, through time, that precious treasure chest of ancient sounds, born from the lyre of Orpheus and still alive today in the Mystery of the Bulgarian Voices.

Early twentieth century, socialism and Filip Kutev

The long Turkish domination of Bulgaria and the conversion to Christianity left indelible marks on religion, ceramics, the sciences, cuisine and customs. As for music, which concerns us most closely here, asymmetrical patterns, diaphony and irregular rhythms are a clear legacy of ancient blends - Saxon, Thracian, Slavic and Iranian. Liberation from the Ottomans in 1878 allowed new, essentially vocal, forms of art music to emerge, excelling in the male field towards the end of the nineteenth century with Dobri Hristov (1874-1941) and Panajot Pipkov (1871-1942), until Georgi Atanasov (1881-1931) introduced the use of instruments and wrote the first symphony for Melodrama. After the end of the World War, however, a tendency developed to break free from established canons, in favor of productions as up to date as possible with European trends: around the turn of the 1920s-1930s, for instance, the pianist and teacher Pancho Vladigerov (1899-1978) combined classical and folk elements in violin sonatas, establishing himself, in the view of many, as the most important Bulgarian composer of any era (as well as a founding member of the Bulgarian Contemporary Music Society); a few decades later, meanwhile, the bass Nikola Guzelev (1936-2014) made his way in opera alongside Raina Kabaivanska (1934) and Guena Dimitrova (1941-2005), two of the finest second-generation sopranos of our time.

Markets, fairs and weddings are the main occasions for socializing and exchange, with festivals playing a particularly decisive role in this regard: notable are those of Burgas and the “rose festival” in Kazanlak, which are open to foreign artists, but above all the “Koprivshtitsa”, which every five years gathers thousands of enthusiasts on the hills of the town of the same name, in a genuine spirit of spontaneity and sharing.

When Filip Kutev and his wife Maria Kuteva founded the first state-sponsored ensemble in 1951 (the “State Ensemble For Folk Songs And Dance”, more commonly known as the “Filip Kutev Ensemble”), the rise of socialism had just set in motion, following the Soviet model, a series of restrictions aimed at safeguarding cultural identity and internal cohesion, such as the public suppression of any expression of Roma minority culture and the banning of Turkish, Vlach and foreign influences in general, deemed dangerous. Under the watchful eye of the Party, censorship allowed for a couple of privileged exceptions, considered “uncontaminated” and authentic: village-style performances, carried out by entertainers with no professional training, and stage-oriented productions, performed by amateur companies who reworked dances and rituals from the recent pre-1950s past. Although amateur in nature, these kolektivi were backed by the nationalist movement “Hudozhestvena Samodeinost” (literally “Everyone creates art”) and led by choreographers trained at the specialist schools of Pleven, Kotel and Shiroka Laka, with the aim of preserving local folklore and showcasing it at community events sanctioned by the government.

The pioneering Kutev, as mentioned, drew inspiration from the Pyatnitsky Russian Folk Chorus (which from 1910 onward cyclically rotated eighteen peasants/musicians drawn from the Moscow countryside) and ushered in the era of Bulgarian revival, creating an orchestra that was merely the flagship of a much broader Balkan system (no fewer than fourteen such ensembles were active in the country's major urban centres). The ambitious composer combed the country far and wide in search of the finest voices, with the idea of modernizing the traditional monophonic songs along Western lines by adding tempo changes and dynamic four- or five-part harmonies designed to showcase vocal qualities: thus the heritage of the six main regional divisions (Rhodope, the Shope area, Thrace, Pirin-Macedonia, Northern Bulgaria and Dobrudzha) was transformed into a sophisticated theatrical space. His craftsman friends Katsarov and Drakev built him custom violas and cellos to make up for the lack of string instruments in that section, not to mention the colourful gaida (bagpipe), tupan (bass drum), tambura (a kind of long-necked mandolin), gadulka (an upright fiddle) and kaval (wooden flute), the five mainstays of local instrumentation, often supplemented by the duduk (another type of flute) and the tarambuke (drum).

The “Kutev Ensemble” made its debut at the Sofia Opera House in 1952, employing unusual formal structures; curiosity and beauty, however, went hand in hand in shaping its extraordinary success: the method immediately found followers, to the point that it was swiftly replicated by a myriad of similar ensembles of varying size (generally made up of twelve to twenty-five musicians), who proved highly popular with audiences well beyond Eastern Europe.

The path to the development of ensemble performances was now clear: the father of choral music and composer of symphonic works, Mass pastorals and film scores, Kutev left behind many of his insights on a 1955 LP credited to the “Ensemble Of The Bulgarian Republic” titled “Music Of Bulgaria”, which contains several masterpieces that have since become traditional (“Polegnala E Tedora”/“Theodora Is Dozing”, “Vetcheryai Rado”/“Come To Supper Tonight, Rada” and “Prez Gora Varvyaha”/“They're Going Across The Forest”), although it should be noted that the credits from that period are often confusing and scattered. In any case, a few months later, at Kutev's own behest, the “Bulgarian State Television Female Choir” was born, an a cappella women's choir initially conceived for state radio and television (respectively Bălgarskoto Nacionalno Radio and Bălgarska Nacionalna Televizija).

The Mystery of the Bulgarian Voices

The name “Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares” only became official in 1987, when the Swiss Marcel Cellier, as we shall see further on, claimed credit for the success of the project (hence the French name) — but for ease of reading, we will start calling the group “The Mystery Of The Bulgarian Voices” right away. So, back in 1952, following on from that excellent precedent, the newly formed Choir sought out singers from villages and fields who had received no formal training, yet carried within them extraordinary vocal range and quality, like the marks of a land shaken by history. It was precisely there, in those small rural communities, that time seemed to stand still, and that heritage we mentioned, steeped in history, had put down roots for eternity. The chosen singers underwent intensive training in traditional practices, featuring elements unfamiliar to our geographic and listening latitudes, save to a few dedicated philologists or avant-garde researchers, such as the American Alan Lomax (who at the time, together with Diego Carpitella from Reggio Calabria, gathered a vast array of sound recordings in Abruzzo and southern Italy) or indeed the aforementioned Marcel Cellier, an ethnomusicologist from Zurich (as well as an organist) who had earlier introduced the wider public to Romanian flautist Gheorghe Zamfir (the one behind the main theme of “Once Upon a Time in America”, to be clear), before forever tying his personal and artistic fate to the Bulgarian Voices. In the 1960s, in fact, Cellier hosted a weekly programme on Radio Suisse Romande called “From The Black Sea To The Baltic”, through which he broadcast mystical and arcane recordings from across the entire Danube region, born of Tartar asceticism but also of Roma rhapsody or the Albanian tradition of the Vlora school. The songs are built on atypical morphology and syntax, with recognizable defining traits:

1) diaphony, that is, a set of different sounds which, although combined together, the human ear perceives as distinct;

2) dissonances, namely multiple sounds producing an estranging effect, more or less pronounced depending on the tonal distance used (seconds, fourths and fifths being particularly common intervals in this case);

3) modal scales and odd time signatures with various tetrachordal or pentachordal segments, highly popular during the Middle Ages and in Gregorian chant;

4) drone and pedal tone, whereby a note or chord is sustained continuously during performance, differing from one another in duration (both techniques are extremely ancient in use, but in modern times some interesting examples can be found in “The Velvet Underground And Nico”, “Dolphin Dance” by Herbie Hancock or “Superstition” by Stevie Wonder.

5) altered rhythms (seven, nine and eleven eighths) where not all the bars are the same length

6) counterpoint (one note against another, punctum contra punctum), used to connect more or less independent melodies to one another.

These and other seemingly uncontrollable variables find a miraculous fusion in the magic of improvisation, when the twenty-four women, decked out in their dazzling green, red and orange costumes — each aged between twenty and seventy — take their places on stage in a wedge or semicircle formation in front of their conductor, the highly skilled Dora Hristova, who has held the role for more than thirty years now, in charge since 1988 and a teacher at the Plovdiv Academy of Music and Dance. At the start of each song, Hristova plays a small chord on the piano, and the Choir is then ready to come in: the delicate process by which the individual traits of each singer merge into a single fluid whole happens naturally, never forced or mechanical, and the results are in fact accessible even to an audience with little familiarity with Bulgarian. Audiences are left mesmerized by such vocal trances and by an astonishingly varied core repertoire made up of short pieces (generally lasting three to four minutes), closer to folk than to classical music, reworked by talented musicians: Filip Kutev himself first and foremost, but also Kiril Stefanov, Petar Lyondev and, above all, Nikolaj Kaufman, who more than anyone else managed to capture the evocative power and extraordinary expressive depth of the choral arrangement and elevate it to the highest art form, just as the Party ideologues had urged.

Returning to Cellier, it was he who brought the group to wider media attention in 1975, releasing on his newly founded small independent label “Disques Cellier” the LP Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares, a summa-compilation of Bulgarian music showcasing both older works by the Kutev Ensemble and truly astonishing original performances by the Choir, reminding us once again, if further proof were needed, that the human voice is the richest and most versatile instrument available. The album was the result of fifteen years of relentless research; during the Cold War, Cellier had in fact travelled extensively around Eastern Europe with his wife Catherine, and many of the recordings were made by him personally in the field using a bulky Telefunken recorder, while others came from the vast archives of Radio Sofia, earning him the Grand Prix Du Disque. Among the finest tracks are certainly “Pilentze Pee”/“Pilentze Sings”, which opens the album showcasing the full depth of the ensemble's cohesion, “Erghen Diado”/“Old Bachelor” (with guttural percussive effects and verses in 7/8), and the sprawling, irregular rhythms of “Sableyalo Mi Agontze”/“The Bleating Lamb” and “Kalimankou Denkou”/“The Evening Gathering”, which continually overturn the listener's mood.

Also worth appreciating is the kaval on “Pritouritze Planinata”/“Song From The Thracian Plain”, with its brief wind interludes and melismatic solo, the euphoric “Svatba”/“The Wedding”, the hypnotic violin-like gadulka on “Brei Yvane”/“Dancing Song” and the updated version of “Polegnala e Tedora” (the story of a young woman who, dozing beneath a tree, dreams of her beloved and is woken by the wind blowing a branch to the ground).

The lyrics, meanwhile, move between the sacred and the profane, delving into everyday life and touching on themes such as sowing, harvest and household economy, Easter, Christmas and other festive occasions, and the joys and sorrows of existence. Closing out the track list are the litany “Messetschinko Lio Greilivko”/“Love Song From Mountains”, “Strati Na Angelaki Doumasche”/“Hajduk Song” and the de profundis “Polegnala e Pschenitza”, with dark tones as wrenching as the most contrite of blues. A highly composite microcosm in perfect balance between antiquity and universal novelty, which someone aptly described as “familiar and foreign at the same time, like being held by a mother who isn't your own”.

In short, an early, refined example of world music that won the favour of all those stars who, in the Seventies, were starting to feel suffocated within the narrow confines of pop: Frank Zappa, George Harrison and Jerry Garcia of Grateful Dead made it one of their favourite listens, and in 1977 the Voyager probe, on its interstellar mission, deposited in space a copper-and-gold “Golden Record” (to be left for any aliens as a memento of humanity's passage) engraved with photographs of Earth's inhabitants, our position in the solar system, etc., and, among the various tracks, “Izlel Ye Delyo Hadyutin”/“Delyo Has Become A Hajduk” sung by Valya Balkanska, one of the Voices.

Peter Murphy, Ivo Watts-Russell, and 4AD

On our planet, however, the group's fame definitively takes off on a global scale about a decade later, with a hand from the former leader of Bauhaus, Peter Murphy, who, having by then permanently relocated to Turkey, brings along a third- or fourth-generation audio cassette upon returning to Blackwing Studios in London to record his first solo album, “Should The World Fail To Fall Apart” (1985), and at the end of the sessions plays it for Ivo Watts-Russell. “Fantastic, I was immediately enraptured,” recalls Ivo, the boss of 4AD. “I was helping Pete out with the record when, at the end of the first day of rehearsals, he handed me the tape, adding 'We're going to listen to this every night.' I was very tired, having been standing at the mixing desk for hours, but I said 'Fine', and as soon as I got home I put it in the player. Well, I'll tell you, my knees literally buckled with emotion — you can't play me a piece of music like that and expect me to forget it... the song was “Prȉtourȉtze Planinata”, so the next day I asked him 'What the hell is this, Pete?'. He told me it had been given to him by an Australian dancer friend of his; we managed to contact him and found out it came from something called The Mystery of the Bulgarian Voices, or something like that. So I did the most obvious thing for me — I went to the record shop on Charing Cross Road that had a pretty big ethno/world section and found a copy of the Disques Cellier release. It was a defining moment in my life and my career; I thought that if those few notes had moved me so much, they would move a lot of other people too. I tracked Cellier down by phone in Switzerland and asked him to sell me the licence: he was a positive, spirited man full of plans, we met in my office and reached an agreement straight away. Believe me, I was already working with the best: Elizabeth Fraser, Lisa Gerrard, Gordon Sharp... but bringing in something non-English with that same open-throated technique was something I'd never done before, it was truly exciting.” Nothing so strange or traumatic after all, since Peter Gabriel had already theorised his Real World, Brian Eno had brought synthesisers to Russia, and David Byrne had given himself over to the pleasures of Brazil.

So, in 1986 Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares was reissued and distributed across Europe on the 4AD label, with Nonesuch in the US and Philips in the rest of the world completing the rollout: no non-English-speaking vocal group had ever sold 100,000 copies in Britain and 500,000 in the United States, but thanks to heavy airplay of the promotional single “Polegnala e Tedora” on Radio 4 and other mainstream channels, that changed radically. For NPR America it is the 78th greatest album by women of all time; promoters now compete to secure their live performances and, should they be unavailable, anything with the words “Mystery” or “Bulgaria” in its name would do, such was the pull exerted by the former Radio and Television Choir, which, to avoid any confusion, has from then on called itself “Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares”, the only officially authorised group after winning a number of legal disputes against other copycats from Plovdiv, Tolbouchine and Pirin, who sought easy glory on the market through unauthorised use of the name.

It marks the beginning of a dizzying rise under the guidance of Dora Hristova (promoted to lead the Choir that very year); moreover, it is the only group to cross national borders with any regularity, racking up a total of 1,250 live performances in the most prestigious halls of Europe, Australia, the United States and Japan (often joined on stage, or backstage, by a male quartet).

“Mir Stanke Le” and “Schopska Pesen” were added to the CD edition: a prelude to the second volume, Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares vol. II, released in 1988, which won a Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Recording, featuring seventeen further songs from the oral tradition, again performed a cappella and enhanced by a number of soloists brought to the fore (Nadejda Chwoineva, Radka Aleksova and Kalinka Valcheva) who break down every taboo in terms of harmonic language. Here too, it's impossible to give an exhaustive description of the songs in words without careful, analytical listening to grasp every single nuance. “Stani Mi, Maytcho”/“Get Up, My Daughter” and “Messetchinko Lio Greilivko”/“You, Little Moon” leap between keys in perfect vibrato, while “More Zajeni Se Ghiouro”/“Ghiouro Marries” and “Tche Da Ti Kupim Bela Seitsa”/“I'm Going To Buy You Some Silk” (both set to music by Krasimir Kyurkchyiski) dwell on the theme of marriage with a piercing reverence somewhere between Gregorian chant and a nightingale's serenade (“Hey, Ghiouro is getting married/ a nightingale sings/a little bird sings”, as the lyrics translate; the latter enriches the soundtrack of the film “Only Yesterday” by Japan's Isao Takahata, co-founder of Studio Ghibli alongside Hayao Miyazaki). Still on the subject of weddings, but more agitated, is “Bezrodna Nevesta”/“Young Childless Wife”, while “Atmadja Duma Strachilu”, in a shadowy diminuendo, is a revolutionary song that is, to say the least, sui generis. “Spis Li, Milke Le”/“If You're Sleeping, Milke” and “Izpoved”/“Confession” probe the intimate sphere of emotion with nasal sobbing and sudden rises and falls; less acrobatic and more linear are the shopske odes “Dve Tourlaski Pesen”/“Teasing” and “Trenke, Todorke”.

As with the previous bestseller, the tracks on this album were also drawn from Cellier's catalogue: old recordings from the late Seventies, likewise remastered by 4AD, with the exception of “Ovdoviala Lissitchkatka”/“The Fox Has Lost His Cubs”, which dates back to 1957 and is credited to the Yvan Kirev Orchestra.

The track list, finally, draws on a few additions from fellow Bulgarian artists: the gem “Dragana I Slavei”/“Dragana's Song” (one of the most famous in the entire Balkan repertoire) carries echoes of Kutev, “Di-Li-Do” and “Ei Mori Roujke” are contributed by the Pirin Ensemble, and the overture “Kaval Sviri”/“The Flute Plays” by their colleagues from Plovdiv (it later becomes the main theme of “Xena: Warrior Princess”, a fight-fantasy show very popular in the US, albeit with lyrics slightly altered by Joseph LoDuca).

The most attentive fans notice how the Westernisation process begun with Watts-Russell smooths away many of the rough edges, with melodies that seem to progressively lose that ancestral freshness and authenticity: the approach becomes gradually less demanding and, if one can put it that way, more pop-oriented, but overall, make no mistake, Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares vol. II remains a majestic work, as Kate Bush realises when, in 1989, she insists on having them by her side, “impressed by such an intense level of creativity”. The invitation is accepted by long-serving soloists Stoyanka Boneva, Yanka Rupkina and Eva Georgieva, who, outside their work with the Choir, have been running a parallel project since 1975 under the name Trio Bulgarka. The three already boast a handful of decent LPs of folk songs — “The Forest Is Crying/Lament For Indie Vojvode” from 1988, “Bulgarka Folk Trio” from 1989 and “Bulgarka Vocal Trio” from 1990 — and on the English singer's album “Sensual World” they lend their voices to the tracks “Deeper Understanding”, “Never Be Mine” and “Rocket's Tail”, while Lisa Gerrard, in an interview with the New York Times, drives the point home further: “If there's anyone who has been profoundly changed by their ways, it's me.” And indeed “Cantara” and “The Host Of Seraphim”, but also “Ocean” and “Avatar” by the very earliest Dead Can Dance, follow the same magical path, and later on the Voices would also have the chance to collaborate with the Australian artist.

Meanwhile, though, 1989 brings Le Mystère Des Voix Bulgares vol. III, which widens its horizons with contributions from the Trakia Choir, the Tolbuhin Choir and the Rodopi Smolian Choir: as usual, the songs are steeped in great technical skill and tribal echoes, in whose fervour the performers willingly disappear as individuals in favour of the collective. Each track reflects a different facet of everyday life that any of us can easily relate to, with sounds that are never morbid and well suited to their titles — joyful on “Ghel Moma”/“A Beautiful Young Lady Twinkling” and “Sekoi Fali”/“Everyone Admires Mila's Beauty”, sterner and more austere on “Zlato Mori”/“Who Scretched Your Cheek” and “Izlel E Delyo Hai Dutin”/“Delio Has Gone Off To Fight”. “Dva Shopski Dueta” and “Tri Shopski Pesni” are duo and trio reworkings of Macedonian folklore, while “Yo Igra Oro”/“We Have Danced The Round” (music by Kaufman) and “Devojko Mari Hubava”/“Pretty Young Girl” (by Krasimir Kyurkchyiski) settle calmly and contentedly into dissonances less fierce than those on volumes 1 and 2, since the relatively more recent writing (from '73 to '89) makes them more palatable to the average listener.

In short, once the initial disorientation wears off, the fourteen tracks making up the third album flow by clearly and smoothly, even though the hieratic solemnity and latent tragedy of “Sedi Moma”/“A Young Girl Was Sitting In The Garden”, “Aychinko Pilia Chereno”/“Little Rainbow Collored Bird” and “Sedenkarska”/“A Young Woman Singing At Their Evening Work” demand rhythmic excursions and micro-tonal shifts for an effective performance.

The melodic surges of “Shope, Shope” and the playful scherzo “Moma Voda Nossi”/“Young Girl Drawing Water” bring the circle to a close on their most complete work, at least in terms of stylistic variety, with a special mention for the weighty requiem/solo voice piece “Altan Mara”, which, at 7.25 minutes, is their longest track to date.

The Nineties: Angelite, Pipppero and other Voices

Due to disagreements caused by the enormous demand, in 1992 a peaceful split within the group became necessary: Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares continued on as a television choir, while the so-called "Bulgarian Voices Angelite" wing worked for radio — so from here on pay close attention to the naming — though the music on offer is virtually identical. The German label Jaro Medien immediately released A Cathedral Concert, which captured a live show held on 12 June 1988 in the splendid setting of Bremen Cathedral; then, also in 1992, the "Trio Bulgarka" landed in Italy for "Pipppero", the memorable single by Elio e Le Storie Tese that was destined to leave its mark on our charts and change the band's fortunes forever. The Milanese band had, in fact, already released a sparkling debut, "Elio Samaga Hukapan Kariyana Turu" (1989), balanced between satire, sampling and countless references, but never fully understood by the Italian public; with "Italyan, Rum, Casusu, Çitki" (1992), from which "Pipppero" is the second single, they rose from cult heroes to the status of a national phenomenon.

The oddball collaboration came together in Munich, where ten days before the recording sessions keyboardist Rocco Tanica met conductor Dora Hristova and an ambassador to iron out the details. "The Berlin Wall had already fallen some time before, but they were still subject to very strict controls, so my job was to guarantee a certain sobriety." Georgieva, Rupkina and Boneva, on the other hand, were fresh off the prestigious cameo on Kate Bush's "Sensual World" that we mentioned earlier. "Pipppero", anything but sober, came out on 6 May 1992 and achieved incredible fame, packed as it is with delicious sexual double entendres (Dilmana explains that to grow peppers well, "pipero", you need to plant the seed and really push it into the ground) and numerous eurodance samples — the main one being Snap!'s "I've Got Power", though you can also spot the Beatles' "I Feel Fine" in the guitar part, Afric Simone's "Piranha" in the bass, the Beach Boys' "Barbara Ann" and the fun "Ramaya". The nursery-rhyme lyrics take their cue from the song "Dyulmano, Dyulbero", which in Italian morphs, through assonance, into the catchphrase "più umano, più vero (…e un ballo sincero)" ["more human, more real... and a sincere dance"], while the hilarious spy story told in the video recounts how "after the televised performance of 1 May 1991, Elio e Le Storie Tese, hunted by the government, flee to Bulgaria, where they are held as musical hostages, suspected of being international traffickers of 'Ramaya', the forbidden song. In April 1992, thanks to the intervention of some friendly radio stations, the band members manage to return to Italy under the promise of handing over their own copy of 'Ramaya' to the local authorities. In a dramatic exchange at the Italian-Bulgarian border they receive in return a copy of their national dance, the Pipppero…" Towards the end, Elio, in a hilarious bit, offers to give the Bulgarian government, in exchange for the Pipppero, a whole series of songs he claims are better than "Ramaya", including "Gimme Some" by Jimmy Home, "Disco Inferno" by the Trammps, "Daddy Cool" and "Rasputin" by Boney M., but also "Il Meglio" by the Tavares and "Sandokan" and "Orzowei" by Oliver Onions… Fantastic stuff.

"Pipppero" spent six weeks at number one in Italy, and Balkan appeal grew exponentially — just ask David Bowie, who exactly one month later, on 6 June, married model Iman in Florence, and had "Kalimankou Denkou"/"The Evening Gathering" played instead of the wedding march.

In 1993 the Bulgarka were again with Kate Bush on the album "Red Shoes" ("The Song Of Solomon", "You're The One" and "Why Should I Love You?" — on the latter Prince also appears), then they dropped off the radar for a while as a trio to pursue individual projects: we'll find them here and there in the most disparate guises, such as From Bulgaria With Love — a kind of low-circulation best-of that tries to ride the wave with unlikely remix versions of "Pipppero" and other traditional songs given a funky/new-age makeover (electronic arrangements by Vladimir Ivanoff & Trance Formation) — or the double live album Lale Li Si (Melody, Rhythm And Harmony), a far more compelling set of classic repertoire credited to the "Bulgarian Voices Angelite", conducted by the excellent Vanja Moneva (recorded in March at Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim, Norway, and earning a Grammy nomination).

Also in 1993 came Bulgarian Custom Songs, this time by Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares: it's a compilation of Christmas carols ("Levent Nikola Edin Na Mama"/"Strapping Nikola, Mother's Only Son") and invocations for Saint Lazarus' Day (Lazarovden), which in the Bulgarian calendar precedes Palm Sunday and celebrates, besides the Resurrection of Lazarus of Bethany, women of marriageable age. The theme recurs in many of the songs ("Zhalba Za Lazara"/"Lament For Lazarus", "Lazarski Bouenets"/"On Entering The House", "Lazar Ide, Lazar Sheta"/"Lazar Is Coming, Lazar Is Roaming About", "Malki Momi Lazaritsi"/"Young Girls Lazaritsi"), in a deliberate attempt to compare the two most deeply felt holidays in each respective culture. At Christmas the Catholic Church commemorates the nativity of Christ, yet the deeper meaning of the custom lies in ancient pagan beliefs about the birth of the new Sun. In Bulgaria the round of carolling usually begins at midnight on Christmas Eve and ends at first light, when young men (led by an elder supervisor, called the "Stanenik") go around singing them at the homes of relatives, neighbours and other village friends, leaving as a gift a stick, called a "Gega", as a guarantee of health, fertility and wealth. The solo-voice triptych "The First Song On The Road", "On The Road" and "The Second Song On The Road" opens the feast with minimalist restraint; "Protekla E Mutna Voda"/"Turbid Waters Were Flowing" and "Tsarko Momche Kon Sedlae" dare more, with syncopated rhythms and modal shifts. "Vurba Ima, Vurba Nyama"/"For A Young Bride" and "Pohvali Sa"/"For An Unmarried Young Woman" look at the female world with a twilight mood, and finally worth noting is the angelic "Tebe Poem"/"We Sing A Song For You", with doubled vocal lines, split into a short intro called "For The Hold Host" and the actual piece, "For A Shepherd".

Between December 1993 and July 1994, Ritual was recorded in Sofia, and it can be called an unusual album for Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares, first of all for the presence of two male guests, Daniel Spassov and Vladimir Kouzov, on "Houbava Milka"/"Beautiful Milka", "Koledarska Pesen"/"A Christmas Lad Song" and "Ai Nazdrave"/"Cheers!", and also because the tracklist contains a large number of instrumental pieces, which is notable for a band that over the years built its reputation on astonishing vocal polyphonies.

This isn't an identity crisis, since the songs — in particular "Moma Houbava"/"Beautiful Girl" (music by Peter Lyondev) and "Tebe Peem-Za Ovchariya"/"Song For The Shepherd" (Ivan Vulev) — are genuinely consistent with the group's signature sound and very well constructed; rather, we're facing yet another inevitable step in that gradual evolutionary process that is softening the usual dissonances ("Za Mlado Momiche"/"Song For A Young Girl" and "Vurba"/"Willow Tree") towards a level that's less harsh and more intimate. Among the most interesting ideas is the three-part foray into Judeo-Sephardic music, "A Jewish Triptych" (divided by Kaufman into "La Rosa En Floresa", "A Señora Novia" and "Lamenta") and "Zalba Za Lazar" ("Lament For Saint Lazarus"), which easily clear the last linguistic hurdle and set the tone for a series of very short mini-suites on the same theme as the previous LP, namely Christmas ("Nazdrave Ti, Chorbadjiio"/"Cheers To You, Master Of The House") and Saint Lazarus' Day ("Lazarski Bouenets"/"The Lazarus Girls Dance In The Boueneck" and "Mur Stho Sme Se Razigrali"/"Hey, Let's Dance [The Boueneck]").

Worth a special mention is "Bulgarski Einicheski Melodii" (tellingly translated as Bulgarian Ethnic Melodies), another lengthy (about seven minutes) and welcome dive back into the most authentic traditional melodies.

In 1995 Nonesuch released on the American market a box set combining the successful Le Mystère De Voix Bulgares Vol. I and II, followed by a roughly three-year pause that saw the choir away from studio commitments and immersed in an endless string of concerts across every corner of the five continents — impossible to list them all. From Germany to Denmark, from Belgium to Russia, from Canada to India to Mexico: the reception was triumphant everywhere, testament to the credibility of a brand that transcends every dividing line between East and West, antiquity and modernity, highbrow and popular.

Meanwhile the offshoot "Bulgarian Voices Angelite" threw themselves into a campaign supporting Amnesty International Italy, followed by a couple of lively collaborations with the Kodo Drummers of Sado Island and Huun-Huur-Tu of the Republic of Tuva (led by Russian pianist Mikhail Alperin), then in 1996 performed at the National Theatre in Oslo for the Nobel Peace Prize gala (alongside them, Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek, Beninese singer Angelique Kidjo and others).

In 1997 the "Angelite" again took the stage, this time in Moscow's Red Square alongside Luciano Pavarotti, for the city's 850th anniversary; a year later they provided the choral backing on the album "A Christmas In Rome" by the Dublin-based Chieftains.

1998, however, is also the year of Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares vol. IV, the latest chapter in a saga that is anything but stale — if anything, it seems to draw fresh energy from years of experience alongside pop/rock artists (Elio e Le Storie Tese and Kate Bush), jazz acts (Moscow Art Trio) and fusion outfits (the German group Sarband, who blend the Western organ with klezmer and Muslim music). Still featuring harmonic intervals, shifts in register and metallic timbres, it's not the best album in the catalogue, but its broad kaleidoscope proves extremely enticing, with its own distinctive signature still managing to push further westward. The opener "Radke, Mame, Radke", for instance, has an almost hip-hop feel, though it's a shame that the lovely, unruly little flute of "Ovchar I Vjatir" gets somewhat lost in the monotony against a backdrop of ethereal-nonsense vocalizing.

The tracklist includes "Dyulmano, Dyulbero", made famous by Elio (lasting just 1:58), a couple of tried-and-tested schopske odes for duo and sextet ("Shopski Duet" and "Shopski Sextet") of Macedonian origin, and a faithful rendition of "Ghel Moma", which we already covered on volume III. "Sama Li Si Den Zhanala"/"Were You In The Fields Alone?" and "Zapali Se Planinata"/"The Burning Mountain" depict the cycle of nature and pastoral labour, while the four-part set "Horo", "Vito Horo", "Vocalisa I Horo" and "S'Gaida Na Horo" transforms four festive dances into bold cacophony. Lovely are "Traka Traka Stanke", with its accentuated, trip-leaning arrangement, the enchanting "Kuchika Tycha" and "Duda e Bolna", with an Orthodox solemnity close to the group's original style. The only piece that feels slightly out of place is the Arabic-tinged "Tsoninata Majka" (for male voice), which veers towards the Middle East somewhat awkwardly and doesn't seem to be their natural territory.

Overall, Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares vol. IV is yet another evocative work, though for the time being it seems to mark the end of the story of the Bulgarian Voices. Studio production indeed came to an abrupt halt; but given the group's worth and the enormous acclaim they'd received, countless invitations to events, collaborations and other initiatives followed one after another: the choir toured with Goran Bregovic, with whom it had already collaborated on some historic tracks — such as "Ederlezi" (for the soundtrack of Emir Kusturica's "Time Of The Gypsies") — and in 2000 took part in the Raiuno show "Il Vaticano saluta il mondo", toasting the new millennium, before lending its talents to "Yantra" by Thai-British violinist Vanessa Mae and "Cry Of A Lady" by the Kronos Quartet, in a neo-classical crescendo.

Noteworthy are "Temen Oblak"/"Dark Clouds", written by Christopher Tin in collaboration with the London Symphony Orchestra, and the sumptuous "Shto Li", which can be heard on the soundtrack of the 2005 film "Alone In The Dark", based on the survival-horror video game series of the same name and composed by Frenchman Olivier Deriviere.

Meanwhile the "Angelite", now under the direction of new conductor Georgy Petkov, first released "Balkan Passions" (April 2002), aiming to keep spreading awareness of Balkan cultures (with guests the Greek Maria Farantouri, the Turkish Sezen Aksu and the Fanfare Ciocălria from Moldova), followed by the Christmas-themed "Angel's Christmas", promoted by a tour through Germany and Italy.

BooCheeMish, 2018: the return of the voices

In 2018 came an unexpected twist: after a silence lasting nearly twenty years, Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares released BooCheeMish via Prophecy Records, finally featuring the stellar presence of Lisa Gerrard, free here to unsheathe her remarkable vocal cords as well as co-write, alongside Petar Dundakov, the tracks "Pora Sotunda", "Mani Yanni", "Unison" and "Shanday Ya". "When I met them, I had just moved to London with Brendan Perry and had signed to the same label as them, 4AD. They changed my life, at a time when music was all oriented towards the post-punk of Joy Division and similar stuff. I never really tuned in to that dark, depressed side of the work that Brendan, on the other hand, felt completely at ease with. I was ready to give up, but the Bulgarians were my salvation because I loved their joy and pure light, which hit you straight in the gut."

BooCheeMish necessarily wears a shinier coat than usual, with strings, drum machines and lush percussion, alongside the characteristic intervals that pair so well with the spectral, anguished delivery of the Australian chanteuse, a legitimate daughter of the restless dark era even if, by her own admission, far removed from murky, gloomy atmospheres. But religiosity, folklore and medievalism are in Gerrard's chromosomes, so her baggage blends beautifully with the Choir's ancestral geometries. The razor-sharp "Mome Malenko" (about working the fields, with tam-tam from David Kuckhermann) turns vocal layering into a kind of mantra, while the string quartet on "Stanka" veers instead towards chamber music. "Ganka", driven by a fleeting drum, slowly narcotizes the listener like a thousand-year-old soporific lullaby, while the hypnotic single "Pora Sotunda" surprisingly opens up to sounds that brush against pop, oscillating rhythmically through the curves of the larynx. The sound flows without constraints, guided with absolute precision by Dora Hristova: nearly thirty years have passed since their first appearance, and Elena Bozkhova, the oldest member of the group, is the only living survivor of the original bestselling lineup. "We were happy but never haughty," she recalls with nostalgia. "We never felt like stars, just ordinary people who were told to sing, whether in auditoriums in Los Angeles, in a square in Turin, or barefoot in India. Our voices fell like cosmic rain, we used that open-throat technique which isn't painful, but if you don't know how to use it, it can hurt you."

Today much has changed: with the fall of communism they no longer have a guaranteed salary, but the style has remained unchanged: quarter tones, drone effects and unexpected rhythms: "Sluntse" is a ballad in which the voices soon dissolve and violin and guitar take center stage, ending on a path that veers into jazz; more restrained is "Zobleyalo Agne" ("The Little Lamb", with kaval by Kostadin Genchev), dedicated to one of the most important animals in tradition. The elegant "Mani Yanni" (undoubtedly one of the best) spirals together, with rare pathos, tones rising from the depths to the eardrums; also excellent are "Unison", marked by continuous, engaging handclapping, and the jovial "Tropanitsa", which mixes tropicalismo with an unexpectedly catchy 70s-TV-series tune.

Less effective is SkilleR's artificial beatboxing on the pretentious "Rano Ranila", while the traditional rose-oil dance "Yove" works better, as does the lively "Shandai Ya" (later reissued as an EP), which puts the seal on an energetic, successful comeback, promoted by a triumphant joint European tour with Lisa Gerrard, with a stop on December 9, 2018 at the Auditorium Parco della Musica in Rome, the only Italian date: for those who were there, it was an evening impossible to forget, when, to convey raw emotion, instruments become an almost needless luxury and all it takes is twenty-four voices, plus one more…

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