A few years ago the TUMBAITO salsa formation released an album with Bulgarian pop songs from the golden decades of the genre – the 1960s, 70s and early 80s. The collection was named after the band and the concert version still has its great success. The musicians say they are constantly enriching their repertoire with old hits, most of those being completely unknown for the young Bulgarian generation. They have their Latin versions in the repertoire of TUMBAITO. Kalin Veliov, the band’s founder back in 2007 and famous percussionist has specialized with the Latin section of the Rotterdam Conservatory.

He gives us details on the new series:

“We will have concerts with this repertoire every month and performers from those times will be our guests. I do hope that I will be able to convince Margret Nikolova to take part in some of the concerts. She attended the opening night and sang Ropotamo of composer Atanas Boyadzhiev with the lyrics of Radoy Ralin. It was an amazing experience – the lady was aged over 80, but she was so vital that she received standing applause. We will add more songs in the preparation process. The initial concert was on Wednesday, March 29. The audience will also hear Netarpenie /Impatience/ of Atanas Boyadzhiev, sung for a first time in the 1960s by Rossitsa Nikolova. We will also perform Urok po Tanci /A Dancing Lesson/ of legendary actor and singer Stefan Voronov, alongside Edna Devoika me Popita /A Girl Asked Me/ of Boyan Ivanov. We have two of our own compositions and several Cuban pieces too. The different thing is that these concerts take place in a theatre hall – the City Mark Art Center on Madrid Blvd – a modern facility with great sound.”

What is it to perform songs that have touched the hearts of generations?

“It is a true challenge. The songs were recorded with the typical for the time sound – Bel Canto Vibrato and with that singing manner of the first pop stars during the period. Of course, these are our TUMBAITO versions and singer Martin Tashev has great voice skills. He is a trumpet player from the Big Band of the BNR – a true professional with very good breathing technique. Our style is quite simple and the pieces are nice for listening. We add a part of vocal improvisation which is really typical for the style – the band sings first as back vocals and later on the singer improvises with our own lyrics, or with the original. Famous trumpet player Misho Yosifov and pianist Milen Kukosharov are also part of the band; they are in charge of the arrangements. We also have onboard Boris Taslev – the only Latin bass player in Bulgaria, who plays the specific for this music baby bass. Milen Petrov /trumpet/ and Dimitar Stoev /trombone/ are the rest of the brass section. Hristo Ganev plays the congas and I play the timbales – we form the rhythm section. We will have several concerts by the start of the summer and then we continue through the autumn. This year TUMBAITO celebrates its 10^th anniversary. Our first concert was at Studio 1 of the BNR and was broadcast via satellite across several European countries. We would like to mark the event in the end of the year with a concert and a new song of our own. These are the plans for the moment and we hope we can follow the schedule, as everyone in the band is a really wanted professional and it’s hard to get together for rehearsals. However, the occasion is worth it.”

English version: Zhivko Stanchev