Martenitsa - Bulgarian Dance Party

After a long pause, we invite you to celebrate Spring Bulgarian-style with a dance party, featuring live music by Orkestar Bez Ime, Mila Vocal Ensemble and Makam Baklava, hosted by the Bulgarian School of Minnesota – “Saints Cyril and Methodius”! What started as a small underground gathering of Balkan music-obsessed fans and the local Bulgarian community has grown into a massive Balkan dance party featuring music from Bulgaria, Macedonia, and surrounding areas.

Martenitsa is a musical celebration of the coming of spring and the holiday of Baba Marta (baba meaning “grandma,” and Marta a derivative of the word for “March”) Traditional folklore depicts Baba Marta as a temperamental old woman whose moods are as changeable as March weather. On March 1st, it is customary to exchange and wear Martenitsa—tokens of good health, luck and vitality. Wearing the red and white yarns of the Martenitsa symbolizes the hope that Baba Marta will smile and grant us an early spring. As we Minnesotans know, the end of winter can never come soon enough.

Full dining will be available via our Uptown Lobby restaurant.

Parking is available across the street at

About the musicians:

OBI (Orkestar Bez Ime, meaning “orchestra without a name” in Bulgarian), was formed

in 2002 to recreate the sounds of the village with a presentation as festive as the music

itself. Focusing on Eastern Europe and music of the Rom (“Gypsy”) people, OBI’s

repertoire reaches from Albania to Ukraine, with plenty of stops in between. Orkestar

Bez Ime is a winner of the 2011-2012 McKnight Artist Fellowships for Performing

Musicians administered by MacPhail Center for Music and a recipient of a 2012

Minnesota Emerging Composers Award from the American Composers Forum.

Twin Cities-based Mila Vocal Ensemble nourishes the human spirit with songs and stories of

everyday life, collected from the folk traditions of Eastern Europe and Russia. With powerful

voices, meticulous precision, and breathtaking harmonies, Mila evokes a primal response that is

at once transporting and relevant.

Makam Baklava is a Minnesota-based Turkish and Balkan band, playing truly sweet songs --

like their namesake -- from that region. With a rotating cast of musicians (bass, cello, clarinet,

guitar, oud, percussion, saz, violin, and vocals) Makam Baklava performs Azeri, Bulgarian,

Macedonian, and Turkish folk and art songs.

OBI

Host or Publisher Granada Theater Minneapolis