May It Fill Your Soul is a film about Bulgarian traditional music, about the pain of emigration and the promise of immigration, and about a family with a century-long musical history. Bulgaria's astonishingly rich village music traditions include strong women's singing, musical instruments with roots its millennia-old pastoral lifestyle and its 500-year history in the Ottoman Empire, and its lively dancing in additive meters of 5, 7, 9, and 11 beats to the measure. These practices are presented through the lens of a musical family trained during Bulgaria's communist regime (1944-1989) to represent the best that Bulgaria had to offer the world, but who made the wrenching decision in the post-communist period to immigrate to the United States for the sake of their daughters' futures. From that vantage point they have been able to teach their art to, and "fill the souls" of, singers, dancers, musicians, and audiences all over the world.
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Part one of this two-part epic follows the life and deeds of Boris I – a strong historic personality, which completes his mission to the full and at the end of his life receives holy orders.
This is an epic screen presentation showing the creation, the consolidation and the power of First Bulgarian Kingdom and the first Bulgarian ruler Khan Asparuh. This is the first part of the film trilogy about the events before the creation of the Bulgarian state in the middle of the VII century. Volga Bulgaria is straining under the attacks of the Khazars. Following the testament of his father, the sons of Khan Kubrat looking for a new home for their tribes. The youngest of them - Asparukh, wander 20 years in search of "land forever" for his people and reaches the mouth of the Danube. The film is narrated by captured Byzantine chronicler Belisarius, which should Asparukh in his journeys. Byzantine witnessed the heroic efforts of the Bulgarians to win the land south of the Danube and to create their new country.
This is an epic screen presentation showing the creation, the consolidation and the power of First Bulgarian Kingdom and the first Bulgarian ruler Khan Asparuh. The second part of the great historical epic - "The Migration" - tells about the long journey to the land of the Bulgarians of today's Bulgaria. Here the young Khan Asparukh laid the foundations of the new state. The authors adhere to the established historical versions for this event. The film builds on the impressive mass scenes and the convincing served psychological characteristics of the main characters. The image of Asparoukh is a natural center of the story, in which many minor persons recreate the environment of the Khan. Romantic exalted, Asparukh is shown as capable leader of the people, consistently implement his own ideas.
The last part of the epic "Khan Asparukh" - "Land Forever" is an impressive finish to scale narrative, created for the nationwide celebration of 13 century anniversary of the Bulgarian state. The authors collected in final chord all storylines, culminating in the political strengthening of the young Bulgarian state. In the center of the film epic again is the image of Khan Asparukh - a lofty romantic hero who embodies the virtues and energy of his people.
A feud develops between a taverna with bouzoukia and a club next door that plays modern music.
In the summer of 1961, a group of young Italian anthropologists made a clandestine journey through Spain, in order to record popular songs that supported anti-Franco resistance. As a result of their work, they were prosecuted and their recordings were censored. Sixty years later, and guided by Emilio Jona, aged 92, the last living member of that group of travellers, we recover the unpublished recordings and reconstruct the journey, today, across an emotional and political landscape, regaining historical memories through these songs, as relevant today as they were then.
When the rain ends, life sprouts from the earth. A fruit grows and becomes the apple that gives life to the cider. Then comes the time of harvest, toasting and celebrating love. A story about the cycle of life and death, of the struggle for survival. Where the passage of time is marked by the course of nature, music and dance.
Before the Liberation, during the years of the exiled Bulgarian revolutionaries in Romania, the Major and the Prime Minister once shared the same ideals, the same home, and even the same woman. Today, the Major orchestrates a conspiracy to overthrow the government led by his former friend, the Prime Minister. The head of state must be assassinated, and the Prince – dethroned. The woman is part of the plot, but she will try to prevent the fratricide.
A trip through the diversity of black and native Peruvian music. Character-driven film, one where the characters are integral to the nation itself. This movie delves into music and musicians, yet it's not strictly a musical; rather, it's a tapestry of seemingly disparate personal narratives woven together in a country also striving to define itself and sketch its identity
Toyoda Toshiaki went to Sado Island and filmed musician Koshiro Hino and Kodo, the local Taiko Performing Arts Ensemble, while they performed music composed especially for Shiver.
The Shipibo-Konibo people of Peruvian Amazon decorate their pottery, jewelry, textiles, and body art with complex geometric patterns called kené. These patterns also have corresponding songs, called icaros, which are integral to the Shipibo way of life. This documentary explores these unique art forms, and one Shipibo family's efforts to safeguard the tradition.
Most likely made for the large Neapolitan immigrant population in the States, Roberto Leone Roberti’s love poem to Naples more than captures the heartache of the countless émigrés who were forced by economic circumstances to leave their homeland.
On the shores of the Gulf of Finland, the ancient Finno-Ugric peoples originated a singing tradition of mysterious power called the Regilaul. These songs are the roots of Estonia’s renowned singing culture. Based on the continuous repetition of eight-syllable verses, they produce a haunting sound able to connect the fleeting present with the eternal circle of life. Against the stunning setting of modern Estonia, this film explores how Regi songs still fire the imagination today, weaving together people and nature through song.
What is tradition? This is the question posed by yodeller and food researcher Meinrad Koch from Canton Appenzell. In search of an answer, he embarks on a journey.
At the end of the 18th century in Bulgaria under Ottoman slavery, a young woman leaves home and family to become leader of a guerrilla gang.
For the first time, traditional Burmese singers Khing Zin Shwe and Shwe Shwe Khaing are recording an album that introduces people around the world to the Maha Gita (Great Songs), which have been sung in South Asia for 700 years. They also introduce viewers to life in Myanmar, a Buddhist country of great beauty.
An intimate documentary portrait of world-class improvisational and traditional pianist Mike Garson as he tours, performs, and teaches.
A documentary on the surviving syncretic pagan midwinter customs of the British Isles, focusing on nine ritual celebrations ranging from the Moray Firth in the north, the Somerset Levels in the south, Humberside in the east, and County Kerry in the west. Featuring music by the Albion Band and narration by John Tams.
A film pioneer, Binka Zhelyazkova was at the forefront of political cinema under Bulgaria's Communist dictatorship. Though she remained faithful to the communist ideals she became an avid critic of the regime and brought upon herself the wrath of its censorship. As a result four of her nine films were shelved and released to the public only after the fall of the regime in 1989, and Binka Zhelyazkova became known as the bad girl of Bulgarian cinema. A provocative portrait that reveals the pressures and complexities that arise when art is made under totalitarianism.