Hungarian activity - Erasmus - Diversity makes Union

1. Folk music and
traditional
dance
of Hungary, Estonia, Italy,
Greece, Romania and Portugal
by Emma Farkas (7a)

2. I.Hungarian Folk Music
and Dance
• Hungarian folk music is an important
part of Hungarian culture and identity.
• It includes a wide variety of Central
European styles.
• Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, two
famous composers started to collect folk
music in the first half of the 20th
century.

3. Types of
Hungarian folk
music
There are a lot of ways to
categorize folk music. There are
regional categories, but you can
categorize it where it is used or
how it is performed.

4. Categories of occasion
There are three main categories of the
occasions when folk music is used:
• For important events (weddings,
funerals, work songs, recruitment
songs, traditional Christmas songs)
• Dance melodies
• Songs that we sing without occasions
(love songs, ballads)

5. Folk dance and music
today
Hungarian folk dance is a living tradition. A lot of towns and villages have
folk music and folk dance groups where the people keep the tradition
alive.
There are so called dance houses where everyone can go and professional
folk dancers teach the people group dances.

6. Even the young ones
learn folk dance and
singing
Bokréta Folk dance group – Kalocsa dances

7. II. Estonian Folk Music and
Dance
The Estonian folk music tradition is divided into 2
periods.
• Runic songs in the poetic metre regivärss
(typical in the Baltic-Finnic tradition)
• In the 18th century, rhythmic folksongs started
to replace runic songs

8. Runo songs (regilaul)
Estonian folk songs which can be work songs, ballads and epic legends.
The early studies of runo songs were made by Friedrich Reinhold
Kreutzwald in the 1860s. He used these songs to compose the Estonian
national epic, Kalevipoeg.

9. Estonian folk dance
• Mainly Estonian folk dances
are calm and dignified
• Dances in the Estonian
villages connected to
occassions such as
Midsummer night, weddings
• A lot of dances are connected
to the sea and portray the life
of fishermen
• Every year there are several
song and dance festival to
celebrate Estonian music and
dance. Dancers wear their
national clothing.

10. • Estonian folk dances are still popular. There are dance clubs which
teach dance patterns to people. It is a way of entertainment and
keeps the tradition alive.

11. III. Italian Folk Music
and Dance
Italian folk music is very colorful. Italy became unified in the
1860s, before that there were several small countries and
monarchies in the area. These had different cultures with
different influences: Slavic, Celtic, African, Arabic etc. So Italian
folk culture is very complex but very much alive in every region
of Italy.

12. Regional song and
dance go hand in
hand
• Northern and Central
regions: trallalero and
saltarello
• Southern Italy:
tarantella, work
songs, harvest songs,
religious songs
(especially in Sicily)
• Sardinia: cantu a
tenore, gozo
Cantu a tenore
saltarello
trallalero

13. Typical Italian
musical
instruments

14. Tarantella
• Tarantella is the most known dance of
Italy
• It’s very fast and it’s accompanied by
tambourines
• In the province of Taranto there were
poisonous spiders, tarantulas. When
they bit the people, they fell into a
trance and their dance gave the name
of tarantella.

15. IV. Greek Folk Music
and Dance
• Greek folk songs (Dimotiko) come
from ancient times
• There are two main musical
movements: akritic and klephtic
• Acritic style tells about the of the 9th
century frontier guards of the
Byzantine Empire
• Klephtic style was created by the
kleftes, the heroes hiding in the
mountains who fought against the
Ottoman empire

16. Some Greek styles
• Kantada: this style comes from Kefalonia
island. It’s a romantic serenade sung with
three male voices, accompanied by a guitar
or mandolin
• Nissiotika: this song was born in the Greek
islands. It’s a bit different on every island.
The song is accompanied by violin, lira,
clarinet and a guitar

17. Cretan music (kritika)
• Crete is an island of Greece
• The lyra is the dominant
instrument on the island
• Tabachaniotika is an urban
song type, and there are
rizitika songs

18. Greek dances
• The most well-known Greek dances
are syrtos, kalamatianos and hasapiko
• Greek dances are loved and
performed everywhere
• Syrtos is known all over the world –
it’s a circle dance with lots of dancers

19. V. Romanian Folk and
Dance Music
• Romanian folk music has the same roots as Central European and
Balkan traditional music
• Romanian songs are very melodic
• The most important instruments are the violin, the cimbalom, the
cobza and the wooden flute

20. Doina
• The most known musical
tune is the doina
• It has got free rhythm and
musicians improvize the
tune in a pattern

21. Some traditional
Romanian dances
• Alunelul (from the Oltenie
region)
• Sarba (Moldavia) – danced in a
circle or line
• Invirtita (Transylvania)
• Hora (circle or line dance)

22. Hora dance

23. VI. Portuguese Folk
Music and Dance
• Portugal has a rich history and the country’s music
reflects that
• The most well known folk singing style is FADO
• It was born on the streets of Lisbon in the early 19th
century
• It’s mainly sad and the singer sings about heartbreaks or
sorrows

24. Traditional
musical
instruments
of Portugal
CHINCALHO
BOMBO (DRUM)
ACCORDION

25. Dances
• Every region in Portugal has its own
style of dance and song
• The best examples are vira, chula,
corridinho, malhao and fandango
CHULA
MALHAO
FANDANGO
CORRIDINHO

26. Folklore festivals
(Portuguese people love to sing and dance)

27. Thank you for your
attention!
Thank you for
your attention!
