Dance Festival

One of the benefits of living in the Czech Republic is that we are often surprised and delighted by the free cultural events that take place in our little city. Last week Zlín hosted an international dance festival which included dance troupes from as far away as China, but was heavily tilted toward performances from the central European region. 

Many of the dancers sang as they performed, and were accompanied by traditional instruments. One of our favorite regional instruments is the cimbál, a large, concert version of the hammered dulcimer (see the nearby picture of the seated man playing this lovely and ancient instrument). We were also surprised to see that one of the dance routines looked very much like an ancestor of the American square dance.

We were unable to create a video of these dances, so here are a couple of You Tube performances that are very representative of what we saw. Traditional Moravian music with cimbál:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzrZN7phBZc . Traditional Bohemian dancing/singing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTg-UqrH62I .