Katalena

Katalena stands for a phenomenon on Slovene popular music scene, hence to their unique musical expression and philosophy towards preservation of domestic folk music legacy. Comprising old Slovene folklore music with modern vibes of rock, jazz and ethno, the band revived traditional musical heritage and enriched it with a fresh energy, making them sound new and colourful. If you are yearning for a journey through exquisite Slovene musical past, visiting Katalena concert is a right thing for you.

Background

The band members met quite accidentally in the Slovene countryside village of Črmošnjice in Bela krajina in Summer 2001. Coming from different musical backgrounds - from classic rock (Sfiltrom, Terra mystica, Bast), folk (Terrafolk), blues (Moj boogie band) and trip hop (Melodrom) - its musicians experimented for a week with several old Slovene folk tunes they had discovered in the archives of the Institute of Ethnomusicology. Soon they had grown into a regular music group, gaining quite a lot of attention in a very short time. They made their first public appearance in December 2001 at the Novi rock (New Rock) festival in Ljubljana, and their first individual concert was, to everyone's surprise, completely sold out.

Performances

Katalena played all major festivals and venues in Slovenia, including Novi Rock Festival, Druga Godba Festival, Lent Festival, Rock Otočec, Carniola Festival, Mediterranean Festival, Izola, Trnfest Festival, Zmaj 'ma mlade Festival and Kamfest. In 2009 they sold out the Gallus Hall in Cankarjev dom, Cultural and Congress Centre with special event including 13 ballet dancers, the same year the band did a audio-visual concert as a part of Animateka Festival. For that they contributed music and a crew of individual Slovene animators did a short animated films, based on a specific song, which were screened through the concert.

Katalena has also an enviable list of performances abroad. They played in New York, Switzerland, Hungary, France, Germany, Austria, Italy, France and Croatia.

Members and their solo works

The Katalena line-up didn't change since their beginning and consist of Vesna Zornik (vocal), Polona Janežič (keyboards, backing vocals), Tibor Mihelič (bass, backing vocals), Boštjan Narat (guitar, mandolin, backing vocals), Robert Rebolj (drums, percussion) and Boštjan Gombač (clarinet, flutes, percussion, backing vocals).

As for the members we can say, they are extremely productive even outside Katalena, working on other music projects and solo material. Boštjan Narat made a highly recognisable album as a singer-songwriter in 2010 called Strah je odveč, the same year Vesna Zornik released her tango oriented solo album TangoApasionada. Polona Janežič plays keyboards in Melodrom and Boštjan Gombač, which is undoubtedly one of the most active Slovene musician, was recent years a main performer in cabaret Patty Diphusa - Izpovedi porno dive (Confessions of Porno Diva), a theatre show directed by Ivana Djilas.

Discography

Katalena so far released five studio albums, starting with (Z)godbe in 2002. This début has firmly established their further musical attitude towards modern song covers of Slovene traditional folk music which they continued on the second album Babje leto (2004). The third one Kmečka ohcet (2006) was rather the first truly conceptual one, due to the fact, that all featured songs have lyrical connection to weeding and weeding related themes. With album Cvik cvak! (2008) Katalena reached further into exploring folk heritage and awaken Resian folk music (Resia is Slovene community living in a remote area close to the border in Italy, known by its specific culture, language and folk heritage). On their fifth album Noč čarovnic (2011) the band covered some poems with folk motives of finest Slovene poets, like Dane Zajc and Svetlana Makarovič.

Nevertheless, all albums gained great success from media and public and got extremely positive responses from critics. That established Katalena as one of most recognisable and innovative Slovene band in the past decade.

External links

Gallery

Audiovisual Concert: Katalena Animated (Avdio-vizualni koncert: Animirana Katalena), Katalena concert at Stara Elektrarna - Old Power Station, Animateka Festival, 2009.

Slovene folk band Katalena performing at Križanke during Druga godba Festival in Ljubljana, 2008

Katalena group portrait by Luka Kaše, 2011

Katalena performing at Kino Šiška Centre for Urban Culture, 2013

Katalena group portrait by Ivian Kan Mujezinović, 2014