Klapa Singing
Klapa singing is traditional a capella polyphonic singing originating in Dalmatia. The tradition of klapa groups and klapa songs as we know them today formed in the mid-19th century, in a time when cultural and musical identities of Dalmatian towns and cities on the coast and islands were being established.
Klapa songs can easily be recognized by their inner musical structure, melody, harmony and lyrical content. The most common forms of klapa songs polyphony are three-part and four-part singing. The lyrics are mostly about love and they range from poetic, cheerful, optimistic and humorous to exaggerated sentimentalism.
Klapa singing was included in the UNESCO World Intangible Heritage List in 2012.
FAROS CANTORS
Along with its rich and diverse cultural history, Hvar Island preserved the best traditions and cultural heritage of the Mediterranean.
The origins of Hvar’s culture and heritage go back to the times of the Ancient Greeks, Romans and Illyrians to the Croats. This cultural richness is expressed across all art forms, among which music holds a special place. Representing this rich cultural and religious heritage of folk musical tradition, unique in the world, the Faros Cantors strive to show if only a part of the rich musical tradition of Hvar Island.
With their continuous activity the Faros Cantors have rescued from oblivion many original melodies, by cherishing primarily the tradition of spontaneous polyphonic klapa singing, as well as the musical heritage of folk and religious character. It’s safe to say that the song “My People” (orig. „Puče moj“) is one of the best examples of folk musical tradition on the entire Adriatic coast.
In the year 2000, the Cantors released an album featuring Lent songs from Stari Grad and Vrbanj titled Following the Cross (orig. Za križen) which was then reissued in 2002 by Arcana, a renowned publishing house from Paris, specializing in ancient music. Arcana translated the song lyrics to five languages, and made it available for purchase in 17 countries. The Following the Cross album also received the highest scores at the Midem Festival in Cannes in 2002 for album quality and performance quality.
The Faros Cantors received recognition from the Town of Stari Grad for 30 years of continuous work and valuable, selfless and extraordinary contribution to the preservation and promotion of Stari Grad’s cultural heritage and authentic technique of singing Dalmatian and religious melodies.
To commemorate their 10th anniversary, the Cantors published the Starogrojčica album featuring old, nearly forgotten Dalmatian songs in their original folk expression. Because these albums feature only a smaller selection of the entire musical heritage of Hvar, as part of a 2008 cultural heritage preservation project, a new Faros Cantors album was recorded titled Kad se Bog čovjeku učini featuring Christmas and Epiphany songs.
Aside from their Croatian performances, the Cantors performed in 20 countries in Europe and America, including recognized world festivals of religious music, of which their performance at the religious music festival Sacred Voices in London in 2000 deserves a special mention.
