On March 14, conductor Ingrid Roose brings Veljo Tormis' “Forgotten Peoples” to the Paris Philharmonic concert hall. Three parts of the cycle will reach the French audience: Izhorian Epic, Votic Wedding Songs and Ingrian Evenings. There will be as many as 80 French academy and chamber choir singers on the stage singing in the languages of the Votic, Izhorian and Ingrian Finns dialect.

The concert will reach the Estonian audience in the European Capital of Culture Tartu 2024 program next summer at the Estonian National Museum.

"When I started working in Paris, I knew right away that I wanted to introduce our rich choral music. Performing Tormis's "Forgotten Peoples" in Paris was one of the first ideas I proposed, and it was immediately approved. The Finno-Ugric culture and peoples are still waiting to be discovered in France and there is great interest in it. Repetitive motifs in both text and music have a meditative effect, and the traditional content connects us to a time thousands of years ago. For the choir, this cycle is a very special experience in addition to the classical large-form repertoire, and they are fascinated by it!" describes Ingrid Roose.

Alyona Movko-Mägi has created a video and lighting design for the concert that conveys Finno-Ugric culture and traditions. "When creating the video design, I was focusing on how the Finno-Ugric people are presented in Estonian visual culture. The audience will experience both sonically and visually special and peculiar world view of the ancient peoples. To create the animation, I used Kaljo Põllu's graphic elements, which accompany the cycle of Izhorian Epic. Votic Wedding Songs and Ingrian Evenings are accompanied by visuals created on the basis of material from the Estonian film archive and selected frames from Lennart Meri's films," says Alyona Movko-Mägi. "The extensive visual language of Finno-Ugric mythology, symbolism and folk costumes has inspired me a lot lately. The interesting architecture of the Paris Philharmonic Hall sparked the idea of using video mapping at the concert. This will create a special atmosphere and melt the audience into Tormis's composition."

During the week of the concert (March 13-19, 2023), Rein Maran's photo exhibition "Hõimude hällimail" / Cradle of Tribes will be exhibited at the Paris Philharmonic Concert Hall.

On the website of the Paris Philharmonic, during the week of the concert, an excerpt from the film "One and Only" made for the opening of the Veljo Tormis Virtual Center will be presented with French subtitles.

In 2019, Ingrid Roose received the 1st prize at the 9th International Young Conductors Competition in Paris and a special prize from the Paris Orchestra (Orchestre de Paris) choir, which was a concert with the choir in the 2020/2021 season. Since 2021, Roose has been working with Marc Korovitch as a choirmaster of the choir. The Paris Orchestra Choir is an internationally renown choir busy with performances outside of France.

What makes the upcoming concert special is that the production is significantly supported by Estonian private capital. This is the first project of the Estonian culture export fund created by Kultuuripartnerluse SA, which is supported by the Baltic private capital fund BaltCap.

According to BaltCap investment manager Marek Andres Kauts, Veljo Tormis's choral music of the Finno-Ugric peoples along the Baltic Sea is a great opportunity to make our new Nordic country sound bright in old Europe. "When an outstanding young conductor Ingrid Roose plans such a concert at the Paris Philharmonic, BaltCap can only be happy to play a part in its success," says Kauts.

The concert is organized by the Paris Orchestra (Orchestre de Paris) and supported by the Estonian National Museum and the Estonian Embassy in Paris.