Cowpat throwing contest to take place in Belarus for the first time

The event's organizers Uladzimir Shablinski, Yauhen Kalmykou and Alyaksandr Bahdanau got together just before the festival in order to tell why it is worth it to attend "Free Air". 

At first, states Yauhen Kalmykou, this year the festival will be held in a new format for the first time ever - representatives of the new ethno from 5 countries at a time will gather at one stage.

Yauhen Kalmykou: “It is known that the festival has existed for several years but we invented a new format and it will be held in such format for the first time. When a folk-fest is conducted in Belarus, there is a certain stereo-type and a set squad of bands which play at it. I think there is no development in this. So we dared for a creative experiment, the idea of which is to steer up the whole situation in our music”.

According to Alyaksandr Bahdanau, they chose the bands-participants of the fest under the principle "what they liked themselves".

Alyaksandr Bahdanau: “This means, there were no applications for participation, no set criteria of selection. We just got together and decided it should be modern ethno in the first place, with some modern music trends. I think we can make ethno popular only by introducing it into the canvas of modern culture. We recalled all the bands we knew which played such music, and selected those who would be the most appropriate for our format, and would be able to come to us”.

Thus, Bahdanau says that the majority of participants are foreign musicians.

Alyaksandr Bahdanau: “We wanted not only to organize an international festival, but also to show the modern folk-music as it exists now and the way it develops in other countries. As, it seems to me that there is a lack of modern ethno in Belarus at the moment. For example, there is not a single band which would play ethno-electronic music or ethno-hip-hop. So, we selected the bands which play such music and are quite famous.

Thus, the following bands will play at "Free Air": Shazalakazoo from Serbia - a unique duet which play electronic mixes for Balcan folk music; Komba-Bakh from Russia - a band from Kostroma which recorded and published in the Internet 50 albums, each of them includes several songs in Belarusian (several musicians of the band are natives of Belarus); mysterious experimentators Sovijus from Lithuania; DJ WOJCIO from Poland will be responsible for a "Slavonic Disco Dancing"; a DJ cultural project from Ukraine Badian Sauna System. Belarusian part of the festival consists of trance, drive and euphoria from Nagual, pagan energy from Dzivasil, magic experiments from Gurzuf and folk-groove from Morfe Acoustic Band.

It is expected that the festival will be attented by about 1500 people. Tickets for "Free Air" cost Br 20 000, Br 50 000 for entering plus camping, Br 100 000 - entering plus camping plus transportation Minsk-Shabli-Minsk. All the tickets will become 20 000 Br more expensive since August 22.