So You Think You Know Laulupidu & Tantsupidu — Lachlan (Australia)

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Okay, so it’s been a hot minute. The year is wrapping up and wow, I can’t believe two semesters have already flown by. Honestly, it’s a lot to take in. I was reflecting back on my first article I wrote back in November on Estonian karaoke songs and decided that, being a “folklorist” who has now read far too much on UNESCO Cultural Policy for my own good, I want to introduce you all to a little thing called Laulupidu and Tantsupidu, the flip side of the music scene here. Perhaps you might say a shift from the vernacular to the analytic? Translating these gets kind of hard because they also have their equivalents in Latvia and Lithuania, but they basically translate to ‘The Song and Dance Festival’. And when I say ‘The’ I mean ‘THE’ with emphasis, but because there is also a Youth Song and Dance Festival, I’m going to call that the ‘Youth’ one and the main Festival ‘LP’ (Laulupidu) and ‘TP’ (Tantsupidu) for efficiency’s sake, and being an Aussie we like to shorten things because we don’t have time to faff about – also Estonian’s say this too.

Sydney Virmalised, photo credit: Liam Black

But some context first…

Since September I’ve been dancing with a ‘rahvatants’ folk dance group called Leigarid, they’re kind of a big deal in the Estonian heritage ‘pärimustants’ (heritage dance) and the folklore scene. Many members of the group are involved across several aspects of performance, not just dancing, but making folk dresses, performing music, choreographing dances, researching dances and also publishing academic papers on ethnomusicology, choreography etc. Originally founded in 1969, the folk ensemble was assembled to perform traditional dance and music for tourists at the Open Air Museum, which I highly recommend visiting! Every summer Leigarid still performs here during the summer period and it’s often one’s initiation to have ‘done a summer’ at the Sassi-Jaani farm to become a ‘rebased’ or fox (aka freshman). The group has many sub-groups and intergenerational family members including a kids group that formed in the 1980s. Now with over 5,000 performances under their belt, they’ve performed all across Europe and abroad to the USA, Japan, Turkmenistan, Mexico, South Korea, and more. I won’t lie, I’m pretty chuffed to have joined a group so active and influential in the folk dance scene here.

Leigarid practice, photo credits from left to right: Lachlan Bell, Egon Elbre, Leigarid

So since joining my Tartu group in September, I’ve been joining basically every Monday and Wednesday for sweat-inducing sessions. And hear me out, I come from an Estonian folk dance group back in Sydney called ‘Virmalised’ and have danced with them since I was 10, but my god, this is another world. I’ve probably lost 20 kilograms since joining Leigarid and am grateful for the motivation it has given me to get out and about. When I signed up for folk dancing here I had several goals in mind: be immersed in Estonian language (tick), meet new people and make friends (tick), get fitter (tick), get jacked (working on it) and learn the culture (tick). It’s an incredibly efficient sport in my opinion for all of these reasons and more.

Austraalia Virmalised, photo credit: Virmalised – Sydney Estonian Folk Dancers

To put this all into perspective too and connect it back to LP and TP, our Tartu group has nearly 60 members alone, and Leigarid has at least 190 members, alumni and active included. In the broader Tartu region, I could find at least 126 known dance groups, spread across children, youth, young women, older women and mixed. As far as I know there are no male-only groups in Tartu. We found out in April that all 10 groups from Leigarid made it to perform at the upcoming Tantsupidu session, and as one of the 108 dance groups representing ‘Tartu linn’ and ‘Tartu-Voore’, it validated so much of the work and the sweat our groups have put in. It also made me humble to the fact that so many groups did not get to make it to this year’s festival, and how competitive folk dancing is.

Performance at Leigarid Toropi Simman held at Tallinn, 14th March – celebrating Estonian language day and the birthday of Kristjan Torop

But what exactly is Laulupidu and Tantsupidu? What’s the big fuss?

Laulupidu (LP) and Tantsupidu (TP) is undeniably an important part of Estonia’s cultural expression and identity on the world stage. These two festivals, alongside the Latvian and Lithuanian counterparts, are among the largest choral and folk dance celebrations in the world, which bring in tens of thousands of performers and even more attendees.

The origins of the Song Festival (no dancing just yet!) actually started here in Tartu, back in 1869 when the first event was held featuring 46 male choirs, four brass bands, and over 800 singers, drawing nearly 15,000 attendees. For comparison, the population of Tartu 15 years prior in 1854 was ~13,000, so, yeah, it was kind of a big deal already by then. This was all during a time known as the “National Awakening” that brought forward a push for an appreciation in Estonian culture through art, singing, dance, folklore and craft. The first four of the five Song Festivals happened here in Tartu until 1896, when it moved to Tallinn and has stayed there since. The movement similarly inspired the Finns in 1881, when the Finnish Society for Culture and Education (Kansanvalistusseura) was founded to provide opportunities for artistic expression, and organised the Jyväskylä festival, still going today, based on the Estonian Laulupidu tradition.

By 1928, a decade after the end of World War I, dance performances were (finally) included in the Song Festival program, and a connection between the two emerged. Since 1928 the Song Festival component has been held on the same site at the Kadriorg Lauluväljak in Tallinn. The first actual Tantsupidu was held in 1934 as part of the 1st Estonian Games, marking the formal integration of folk dance into the celebration. Since then, these festivals have become significant cultural landmarks, held every five years with a staggered schedule for Youth festivals (Noorte laulu- ja tantsupidu), introduced from 1962. 

And then we get to the 7th November 2003, 134 years later, where the combined pan-Baltic tradition of Estonian, Latvian (Vispārējie latviešu Dziesmu un Deju svētki – since 1873), and Lithuanian (Dainų šventė – since 1924) song and dance festivals were included on the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity, and later merged onto the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2008 as ‘Baltic song and dance celebrations’. Ever since then it’s only gotten larger in scope and scale, and questions linger of course over the representativeness of the celebration and the role it plays in nationalising folk dance traditions. But that’s a discussion over a Prem at the pub.

If you were in Tartu in 2024 during the ‘Capital of Culture’ you may have been lucky to catch a glimpse of the Tartu 2024 Song and Dance Celebration. This one was a particular milestone, being the first-ever combined event, with over 10,000 singers, musicians, and nearly 2,300 dancers performing together performing at the Tähtvere lauluväljak (Singing Grounds). But back to this year’s LP and TP, Iseoma (officially translated as ‘Kinship’), but in my opinion a better translation would be ‘one’s own way of doing things’.

It’ll be happening over the 3rd-6th July across two venues, at Kadriorg lauluväljak for the singing, and Tallinn Kalev Central Stadium for the dancing. There will be approximately 30,000 people singing on the stage, and while performer’s have not been announced yet, if you’re interested, the University of Tartu has its own choirs including the Tartu Üliõpilassegakoor (Tartu University Student Mixed Choir), Tartu Ülikooli Akadeemiline Naiskoor (UT Academic Women’s Choir), Tartu Ülikooli Kammerkoor (UT Chamber Choir) and Tartu Ülikooli Delta Segakoor (UT Delta Mixed Choir). Meanwhile over three days at Kalev Stadium, around 10,000 dancers, all dressed up in their costumes, will flock to the grounds. Our University also will be performing at TP, with Tartu Ülikooli Rahvakunsti Tantsuansambel – TÜRKA (UT Folk Art Ensemble) making the cut too.

Iseoma, this year’s TP theme, tells the story of a family reunion and of distant relatives coming together. Dance groups have been divided across eight regions and the choreography reflects the most distinct styles and traditions of each area. One thing I’m particularly proud of is that my own group based in Sydney, Austraalia Virmalised, will be on the stadium with me, performing for the first time since 2014, and the Brisbane women’s group Folkroos also making it to TP! I always love to see välis-eestlane (foreign-Estonian) representation, especially being 1 of only 8 mixed groups chosen from abroad. Already since October 2023, ‘Austraalia Virmalised’ had started rehearsals with members flying from Adelaide and driving from Canberra and the Central Coast to Sydney. I am endlessly proud of my extended family back home!

Needless to say, LP and TP comes as the culmination of years of work by dancers, folklorists, historians, musicologists, choreographers, dress makers, ethnologists, anthropologists, artists, designers, event managers, cultural policy makers and the tourism sector. This year will be nothing less of a big deal, I mean all tickets for the dance festival are already sold out. Some tickets remain for the Song Festival on the 5th and 6th July (which you can buy here), and in case you get any FOMO from missing out on tickets, don’t fret! You can always participate as a spectator in the Rongkäik (Procession) on the 5th of July, and the whole performance will be recorded and streamed live for you to watch later. And if you do catch the dance bug, there are always some more events to participate in which I’ve curated a list of (for the near & distant future) below:

Estonia:

Latvia:

Lithuania:

Woah, okay, that ended up being a lot longer than I planned. I guess there’s a surprising amount to talk about, and I hope you got to learn something about this very dear thing to me! If there are any folk dance or singing events or festivals that I missed please comment below and let us know! 

Images author’s own unless otherwise noted.

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