With Strong Voices

Women in the Georgian Polyphonic Folk Vocal Tradition

My name is Vera Broekhuysen; I am from Boston, have been singing ever since I can remember, and am currently (as of January 2007) in my last year of a Bachelor of Music at the University of Toronto as a History and Theory student. In July of 2006, I travelled to the Caucasus Republic of Georgia. It was my fourth time in the country; three times previously I had participated in singing and language workshops with the Vermont-based group Village Harmony. This time, however, I came alone. I stayed for a month, living with a friend's (Georgian) family in the capital of Tbilisi, studying the Georgian language twice a week. I also often commuted back and forth to Sighnaghi, site of my last stay in the fall of 2003, to meet with older friends, and eventually to spend a week learning how to make carpets in the traditional Georgian style.

During my stay in Georgia, I sought out and found – often in extremely unexpected manners and places – women who regularly sang the traditional folksongs of the country. I recorded these women, interviewed them, and sometimes photographed them, in an attempt to learn more about their participation in the ancient and ongoing singing of Georgian folksongs, both sacred and secular. This site is an exploration of these women's music-making. It is intended both to present their work and my experiences, as fully as I can, and to be a resource for those interested in learning more about the music and Georgian women who sing it. To that end, the site includes portraits of the women, short essays on my observations, some transcriptions, sound examples, and photos. Anyone with further questions, or who simply wants to talk about Georgia, should feel free to contact me at vera.broekhuysen@gmail.com.

My profound thanks go out to each and every one of my informants and friends in Sakartvelo (Georgia). Most especially I owe a debt of gratitude and love to those who do not appear in the profiles I give on these pages. They are Eteri and Avto K'ukhianidze, who hosted, fed, and adopted me; and Julie Kaplan, who translated between English and Georgian whenever I needed it with an ease that I envy, who patiently taught me expressions I'd never have thought to ask for in lessons and found indispensable, and who vented and shared and enthused and kept me sane in our overlapping time there together. Back in Toronto, Alan Gasser and Becca Whitla cheerfully answered all manner of impromptu questions, inspiring new trains of thought; James Kippen supervised my creation of this website and greatly contributed to its layout and operation.

I verbally received informed consent from all of the women I recorded and photographed, and describe and quote here, whilst in Georgia; wherever possible I followed up with a typewritten (in English, to those who understood it) and emailed description of the project, the material concerning them that I use on this site, asked permission to use it, and received an assenting email communication from them in return. My hope is that this site fuels further dialogue and work between myself and them, and any other musicians, Georgian or Western, who find it interesting.