XHEMALI BERISHA ET SKAROS

Music from Albania and Kosovo

Xhemali Berisha : chant, luth çifteli
Gilles Torrent : clarinette, voix
Erida Bega : violon, voix
Yasemin Yilmaz : harpe
Sylvain Fournier : tambourin, tambour de terre cuite, voix

Founded in October 1982 by Gilles Torrent, the Skaros group has covered a lot of terrain in terms of the different traditional Greek and Albanian repertoires. Having accompanied prestigious Greek singers on a range of tours - such as Stellos Bellos, Savvas Siatras and Christos Zotos, as well as singers like Paraskevi Anghelou (Greece) and Natasha Bega (Albania) – Skaros has now been collaborating regularly for several years with Xhemali Berisha, the renowned singer and dancer from Kosovo. During the time of former Yugoslavia, Xhemali was the artistic director of the national folk ensemble of Kosovo with whom he performed at numerous international festivals. The programme this evening will include polyphonic songs from southern Albania, songs from the north and Kosovo, as well as Greek and Albanian instrumentals.