The Tiger Lillies, DakhaBakhra, Sofa Surfers, Ioan Pop and Grupul Iza are only some of the artists that will delight the TIFF 2013 audience.
On June 3, at The Students Culture Club, TIFF viewers will enjoy a one of a kind show by The Tiger Lillies. The avant-garde and provocative trio mixing cabaret, vaudeville, musical and street performance has the reputation of a cult band and a eclectic following: Mel Brooks, Terry Gilliam, Marylin Manson. „The godfathers of Brechtian punk cabaret” have been touring since 1989. The band, established by Martyn Jacques, an opera performer specialized in the castrato style and a former Soho resident – he used to live right next a brothel, in a world of vice, the main source of inspiration for his future music. Their musical world – „surrealist pornography”, as many critics described it – is the world of the outskirts, of promiscuity and violence.
Eccentric and intense, their shows were presented on all continents, either by themselves or accompanied by various theatre groups. "It's not surprising that their cult following is worldwide – a Tiger Lillies gig is a journey into wild emotion that passes right through melodrama and out the other side into bizarre beauty”, wrotes „Evening Standard”. The band released over 30 EPs: „Brothel to the Cemetery”, „Farmyard Filth”, „Ad Nauseam”, „Shockheaded Peter” – winner of two Olivier awards in 2002 or „The Gorey End”, a 2003 Grammy nominee.
The three musicians are Martyn Jacques (vocal, accordion, piano, guitar, harmonic, ukulele and banjo), Adrian Huge (drum, percussion and backing vocals) and Adrian Stout (bass, Theremin and backing vocals). The band was also featured in a documentary Drunken Sailor (2007) by Sergei Bodrov, nominated to Oscar for Mongol.
Another special event will take place at The Students Culture Club on June 4: the special screening of Earth (1930) by Ukrainian director Alexander Dovzhenko (1894 - 1956), accompanied live by DakhaBrakha. Together with Arsenal and Ivan, the film belongs to the "Ukrainian trilogy" which was heavily criticized by the Soviets for its realism which was undermining the revolutionary ideas but which was, later on, acclaimed by the film critics, Dovzhenko being considered one of the most influential directors of that era.
The screening will be accompanied live by DakhaBrakha, the most famous and respected Ukrainian band today (they had over 300 international concerts). Established in 2004, at Kiev's Contemporary Art Centre by avant-garde theatre director Vladislav Troițki, DakhaBrakha defines its style as "ethnic chaos". The essence of its music comes from Ukrainian folklore with jazz, trance and world music influences. The result is an original and fascinating show warmly received on some the biggest festival stages of the world. DahkaBrakha released four albums and performed at The Royal Shakespeare Barbican Theatre in London, for „Macbeth”.
On June 5, at Hotel Continental, will take place the concert of the indie band Sofa Surfers. The show will be preceded by a screening with Train of Thoughts, a visual essay about the world's biggest subway stations directed by Timo Novotny and edited on Sofa Surfers music. Famous for their mixture of rock, electro, trip-hop, dub and acid jazz, with touches of R&B and soul, the four Sofa Surfers members debuted to international acclaim with the album „Tranzit” (1997), which included the song „The Plan” one of the musical hits of that year. Since then, the band was been constantly on tour and released another 7 albums. The most recent release, from 2012, is „Superluminal”.
Traditional Romanian music aficionados will be awarded a special night, on June 2, at The Students Culture Club thanks to Ioan Pop and Grupul Iza who will play for them after the screening of Balkan Melodie (2012) by Stefan Schwietert, the story of Marcel Cellier, who came to Eastern Europe to find lesser known musicians and rhythms and thus discovered Gheorghe Zamfir, promoting him internationally. The documentary also features the much beloved Maramureș artists Ioan Pop and Grupul Iza.
Atfer the Closing Ceremony, on June 8, at Euphoria Music Hall, TIFF audiences will get back to the lights, lasers and smoke of the 80s and 90s disco fashion thanks to Discoteca, a new musical concept which brings those hits back to life. The special Guest star of the evening is none other than Marina Voica. Recently launched in various Romanian clubs and featuring stars such as Silvia Dumitrescu, Marina Voica, Class or Dj Boroș, Discoteca DJ has already become a household name.
Price per ticket: 30 lei. Tickets can be purchased in advance on www.biletmaster.ro. For June 8th, a limited number of tickes (100) are available on sale for 100 lei each on www.biletmaster.ro.
