“The trip to this festival is one of the most anticipated events for my dancers,” says Viktors Virza, who leads dance groups in Riga.
The author of the festival idea, Ingrīda Luka, believes that one of the factors is the special energy of the windy city.
Nine collectives participated in the “April Drops” festival, a total of around 300 dancers.
As usual, the festival traditionally started with various activities, during which collectives both creatively presented themselves and competed in sports activities, fighting for the traveling prize “The Big Drop”.
This year, the dancers tested their strength in a bowling game and performed various tasks. Collectively, they showed excitement and team spirit.
After the sports morning performance, rehearsals and preparations for the concert took place in the Latvian Society of Liepāja’s house.
I. Luka told that for the concert, each group was invited to submit four dances, one of which had to be a humorous or non-national dance.
The organizers chose three of them, which, taking into account the offered repertoire, were included in the concert program.
V. Virza was in Liepāja with two dance groups: the folk dance ensemble “Rīdzeneks” and the middle generation dance group “Rīdzeneks”.
“We participate regularly, only a few times we haven’t been.
The trip to Liepaja, to this festival, is one of the most anticipated among dancers.
Liepāja is a special city in itself, the dancers are even ready to drive a day earlier and stay longer in order to enjoy both the city and, of course, the atmosphere of the festival.
I remember that we have played sports in the ice rink, orientated ourselves around the city, even in the swimming pool there have been various sports activities. This is, of course, interesting for the dancers and also something challenging, because something like this is not done regularly.”
Since the dancers are hardy and hardened, V. Virza assures with a smile that the power of the evening act – the concert – is enough even after the beginning of the active day.
This time, the traveling prize “Lielais pilisens” was won by the youth dance group “Imanta” led by Aija Konstantis.
V. Virza admits that he wants to win the award and has succeeded on other occasions, but that is not the most important thing at this festival.
“If there was no such award, we would still be driving. The festival of flavors is full of excitement and sportsmanship,”
evaluates V. Virza, thanking the author and artistic director of the festival, I. Lūka, head of the middle generation dance collective “Kvēle”.
“The festival provides dancers with a valuable meeting that we look forward to every year.”
Riga residents arrived in Liepāja already on Friday evening, but went home only on Sunday. In addition to the festival, city guests enjoyed the Restaurant Week offer, visited the theater and even swam in the sea.
The folk dance festival “April drops” was created to strengthen the Song and Dance festival tradition, popularizing the genre of Latvian folk dance and stage dance, bringing together Latvian dance collectives and promoting the exchange of experience and cooperation of their leaders.
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