Laulupidu 2007

As I'm going to be in Tallinn this weekend, I figured I'd wait until next week to put up photos and stories about the city itself (although you can still see my Tallinn photos on Picasa.) Instead, I'm going to tell you about the coolest thing I did the last time I was in Tallinn, last weekend.

Laulupidu is the children's music festival, held once every five years in Tallinn. I was lucky enough to happen to be in Tallinn on the very day of the festival, so of course I had to go.

The first thing we saw after exiting the bus was this monstrous amphitheater.




My initial reaction was to turn and see what all the people under the arch were looking at. I soon realized that they were the attraction. Over 20,000 of Estonia's youth were up there singing at certain points. School choirs, church choirs, and even Estonia's national youth choir. All singing Estonian national songs in unison to an orchestral accompaniment. Photos cannot do this justice, so I urge you to watch some of the videos posted here. It does a little better job than photos can do, but still not as effective as being blasted with over twenty thousand voices at once (not to mention all the 100,000+ attendees' singing.)




The crowd was a fairly eclectic one. Young, old, Estonian, and foreign. When they weren't singing, the performers mixed in with the crowd, still donning their traditional attire or group outfits. I was amazed with the speed and efficiency with with which tens of thousands of children and young adults exited the stage and a new group took their place. We're talking only a few minutes, enough time for one orchestral or instrumental folk song, for 10,000 or more kids to leave and be replaced by a new crowd. Amazing.

Before the final songs, the crowd was addressed by Estonia's president, Toomas Hendrik Ilves. I, of course, couldn't understand what he was saying, but from what I gathered from Estonian friends, it was about keeping Estonia's national identity strong for the world to see. I know I saw a lot of their national identity that day, and hopefully this post will help convey it to at least a few people in other parts of the world.

The occupation of Estonia by German and Russian forces briefly put an end to this sacred event, but it is back in full force now, and I feel very fortunate to have been a part of something so significant and moving.