February 17, 2017 at 4:18 p.m.
Arts Midwest World Fest comes to a close with Anda Union performance
Arts Midwest World Fest comes to a close with Anda Union performance
By Kayla Thomason-
The nine-member Anda Union ensemble from Inner Mongolia wrapped up the Arts Midwest World Fest, which partnered with Nicolet to bring four international musical performances to the area.
Anda Union has been together for 14 years, has studied music since childhood. During their performance at the college, they played the horse-head fiddle, which is the most important Mongolian instrument; an ikil, a topshur (which is like a two-string lute), a tuva (three-string lute), moadin chor, and the Mongolian versions of the zither, dulcimer, and mouth harp.
Chinggel, one of the members of Anda Union, played the moadin chor, an ancient flute instrument made from a single reed grown only in the Altai mountains of northwestern China.
"There were actually virtually no people who could play it and he managed to find somebody very old who could remember still how to play it and then he practiced and developed that," said Tim Pearce, manager for Anda Union.
Not only is Chinggel one of only a few who can play the instrument, he makes them himself. Also impressively, during the song he performed for the audience, he only took eight breaths.
Two members demonstrated throat singing, which imitates nature.
"A lot of music from indigenous peoples comes from imitating nature and the sounds of wind," Pearce said.
There is a special technique to throat singing.
"It's called throat singing because rather (than how an) opera singer opens the throat, you restrict the throat and make a very resonant base sound and that starts the vibration in the mouth and with your tongue you make a shape and it vibrates into a high-pitched whistle," he said.
Anda Union performed several songs including "The Herdsman," "10,000 Galloping Horses," and "Suho's White Horse."
Pearce also told the audience the sad story of Suho's White Horse. The story is about a Mongolian shepherd boy who raises a white foal and they reach adulthood together. The young man enters his stunning stallion into several races and wins, but the evil ruler covets the horse and wants it. The young man refuses to give up his horse and flees. The evil ruler then kills the horse. The young man is devastated and dreams that his horse has come to him to tell him to use his bones, hide, tendons and hair to make a fiddle and every time he plays it he will remember his horse.
Mongolian music is special, not only for the moving sounds, but for the fact that it is passed down the generations and runs the risk of being lost.
"Mongolian music is an oral tradition, that means their culture is not really written down, there's no buildings, Mongolians don't leave buildings behind because they're nomads," Pearce said. "When a nomad takes down a tent there's a mark in the grass and after a few weeks it's gone so you leave no trace. So really they live in harmony with nature but they don't leave any physical legacy like buildings and their culture is also not written down, so for them now to keep their songs alive is really, really important. Especially with younger generations of Mongolians, it's very important to them that they embrace their tradition of music so it doesn't die out."
Pearce had nothing but praise for the Arts Midwest World Tour .
"What's great about this program is it gives us a chance to go into communities and play to kids who would never ever, ever hear this music and we think that's really, really important," he said. "I think today, more than ever, people need to understand about other people's cultures. We need to come together."
He also said he thought the crowds were enthralled with the music and what the musicians had to teach them.
"It was great, they loved it, it was fantastic, really, really good," he said of the crowd's reaction.
Deb Hunter, teacher at Creative Minds Charter School, and her students were fortunate to see all of the local performances.
"All four were wonderful, each one brought so much of their own culture to share with the audiences," Hunter said.
"Our students always enjoy the outings and concerts," she added. "I have them write 'reflections' after each visit and they are almost always positive. When we return to school we look up the music on Pandora or YouTube and continue to listen to it."
Hunter thinks it is important for the students and community to experience other cultures.
"I think it is so important to expose our students - as well as other community members - to different forms of culture," she said. "Experiences like these give the kids the opportunity to realize that there is a big awesome world out there. They may or may not someday get the chance to travel for leisure or employment and these concerts help open their eyes to something outside of northern Wisconsin and the possibilities beyond."
She thinks Arts Midwest is a wonderful program and is thankful that the students got to experience the music at no cost to the schools other than transportation.
For one of Hunter's students, it was chance to celebrate her own culture.
Third-grader Buyanzaya "Monica" Delgertsogt's parents were born in Mongolia.
She said her family took a trip to Mongolia last summer, and this was not her first time listening to Mongolian music.
Her father likes to play it in the car, she said.
"I was excited and talked about it with my parents," Delgertsogt said.
Hunter thought it was a nice thing for Delgertsogt's classmates to experience.
"It was nice for her classmates to know more about where she came from," she said.
Delgertsogt thought it was important for her peers to experience other cultures.
"I think it's important because we get to learn a little bit about their language, their music, their stories and their culture," she said.
Seda Raspotnik, a fifth-grader at the same school, loved the music.
"I learned about the horses and how the instruments came to be because of the legion of the horses," she said. "I also learned about throat singing and that was really cool. I liked the different instruments and the different language and sounds they made and so I know how their people sound."
Raspotnik said all four concerts were fun and educational.
"I think it's pretty important because we can learn what different people do in their country and how their clothes fit in with their traditions," she said. "I also liked learning how to say some things like 'hello,' 'goodbye,' and 'thank you' in Mongolian. We learned how to say some basic words from the past performances, too."
Jim Nuttall, director of theatre at Nicolet, reflected on all the performances the community was able to enjoy over the last few years via the Arts Midwest program.
"It was a huge success," he said. "Just by looking at the numbers alone, we came close to performing before 20,000 people between all four groups," he said. "People still mention the bands from last year and want to know if we can bring them back. Honestly, it's still sinking in how much of a gift this was from Arts Midwest to our community. We never would have had the resources to get these groups in - it just would not have happened."
Nuttal said the public received the musicians very well, either because they like international music or were curious about another culture, and nearly every performance sold out.
"Different people liked different things - for some it was the showmanship, others took to the melodies, still others liked the unusual instruments," he said.
The program also went over well with the many teachers and students that attended.
"I think the teachers that brought their students got a lot of mileage out of their visits," Nuttall said. "It gave them a chance to do a unit on the country that they came from, and then the kids got to meet someone from that region. I think the stories the teachers had about the kids talking about how they loved listening to the music, or saying hello in a different language was the most gratifying."
For those who witnessed the wonderful performances, it opened many eyes and offered a glimpse into another world.
"It's one thing to see something international on TV, it's a whole different thing to see the real thing, live and in person, playing their music from a country you may have only seen pictures of on TV or in magazines," Nuttall said. "It makes knowing other cultures much more real and immediate. That can last a lifetime."
The 2015-2017 Arts Midwest World Fest tour is supported by National Endowment for the Arts, 3M Foundation, and Anime Twin Cities.
Additional support was provided by the Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China, the Chinese Heritage Foundation Grants Fund of The Minneapolis Foundation for Anda Union, and the Wisconsin Arts Board.
In addition to Anda Union, there were performances by Le Vent du Nord of Canada, Lorraine Klaasen of South Africa and Baladino of Israel as part of Arts Midwest World Fest.
Tickets for Anda Union's public performance, set for 7:30 p.m., Saturday, Feb. 18, at the Nicolet College Theatre, are $15 and can be purchased online at nicoletlive.com or by calling (715) 365-4646.
Kayla Breese may be reached at kayla@rivernews online.com.
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