Estonia celebrates independence with first ‘digital’ song festival

TALLINN - On August 20, Estonia celebrated its 19th anniversary of restoration of independence, as flags were raised throughout the country. Estonia, which is also called ‘E-Stonia’ and is known to the world for its technical prowess, this year kicked the tradition up a few octaves with a digital music festival that linked singers all over the world.
This time the largest event combined two Estonian passions - choir music and high-tech gadgetry - into a countrywide singing event. Thousands of people across the country took part in a landmark virtual choir festival, gathering in front of big screens to sing the small Baltic state’s cherished anthems.

Organizers said crowds massed at over a hundred open-air locations to perform eight songs under the baton of conductors - one per song - beamed from a real concert venue in Poltsamaa, in central Estonia.
The event honored the 19th anniversary of the country’s post-Soviet independence, brought on by several years of non-violent events known as the ‘Singing Revolution.’ Choirs and individual singers from 100 locations across the Baltic nation connected online with crooners (and conductors) at the main venue - Friendship Park - in the central Estonian town of Poltsamaa. The event streamed live on Estonian television and the Internet, while a live feed projected the goings-on onto large screens in public venues nationwide as singers performed eight national classics.

The Estonian singalong is being dubbed the ‘world’s first’ digital song fest. Spectators gathered around a projection screen in Toila, Estonia for the world’s first ever digital song festival.
Artur Talvik, from the festival’s organization, said that the festival was also created with the objective to link the old tradition of the song festivals and the latest innovations in telecommunications, because both fields are really important in Estonian daily life.

“The festival was organized to combine the two things that have made a name for Estonia globally - IT innovation and a long tradition of song festivals,” said Talvik. As Talvik stressed, “the idea might have sounded crazy, but I quickly got a plan to use digital means to make it happen.”
Estonia and its fellow Baltic States, Latvia and Lithuania, are home to a vibrant choral tradition stretching back more than a century.

Meanwhile, a private gathering of the August 20th Club, an association of 61 members from the Estonian Supreme Council who voted for independence in 1991, was held in the parliament building in Tallinn.
According to a spokesman from the president’s office, President Toomas Hendrik Ilves hosted a reception for 700 Estonian political and cultural figures in the rose garden of his official residence in Tallinn. “As of today, Estonia has been re-independent for 19 years, and it is not too early to say that Estonia has completed the first phase in its development. Estonia has done well. One of the mantras we repeated as we restored statehood - that history must not repeat itself, that we must not repeat the mistakes of the last period of independence - no longer has the same importance it once did,” said Ilves.

“In the 1930s, Estonia’s leaders chose isolation. It was believed that developments in Europe and the world did not affect us. Independence was equated with burying one’s head in the sand and autarky. It was believed that openness, criticism and a free press would interfere with wise leadership rather than encouraging debate about the country’s possible development paths. It was believed that culture and state were completely separate things,” said Ilves in his opening speech.

“In the century before last, our goal was to become a nation. Twice in the last century, our goal was to become a sovereign state.

The restoration of Estonian independence and rebuilding of statehood proceeded on different grounds. First of all, and perhaps unexpectedly, it was the creative community who carried aloft the flame of freedom. In the Letter of Forty Intellectuals in 1980, literati and artists took great risks to express their concern about the continued survival of the Estonian people and language. Eight years later, at the congress of creative unions, they publicly aired their grievances over all of the aspects of the occupation and lack of democracy,” the president added.

“In our era of re-independence, which has lasted close to a generation, we have learned from our previous unfortunate experiences. They have served as our roadmap for doing things differently, for doing things right,” he said.
Let us be honest: in everything pertaining to freedom of speech, transparent governance and engagement with budding civil society, Estonia has achieved much more than nearly all of the other formerly captive nations. In some areas we have achieved even more than the countries and societies that were fortunate to live in a democratic society immediately after World War II, expressed Ilves.

He went on to note that “Every year on the 20th of August, we gather here to reaffirm the fact that the restoration of Estonian independence was not some service performed by a small group of people or a particular politician. It was the will of the people, an endeavor inspired and celebrated in song and verse by our literati and intelligentsia, all of you.”
The television channel Kanal 2 and telecommunications firm Elion joined the broadcast ‘Singing Together,’ a mixed choir concert from Poltsamaa. A live feed was projected onto large screens in public venues around the country, allowing local audiences to sing along. At some venues, such as Tallinn’s Freedom Square, additional choir groups added voices to the performance.

The organizers said that the event brought together from 10,000 to 100,000 singers.
The festival was composed of eight typical Estonian songs that are always present in the traditional song festivals in the country. Mass choral gatherings in the late 1980s formed the bedrock of the three Baltic countries’ freedom drive, which became known as the ‘Singing Revolution.’

“Most people don’t think about singing when they think about revolution. But song was the weapon of choice when Estonians sought to free themselves from decades of Soviet occupation. ‘The Singing Revolution’ is an inspiring account of one nation’s dramatic rebirth. It is also an evocation of humankind’s irrepressible drive for freedom and self-determination,” said James Tusty, the filmmaker of the “Singing Revolution” film.

“First occupied by the Soviets in 1939, then by the Nazis, and then by the Soviets again for another 50 years, Estonia lived through decades of terror. By the end of World War II, more than one-quarter of the population had been deported to Siberia, been executed, or had fled the country. Music sustained the Estonian people during those years, and was such a crucial part of their struggle for freedom that their successful bid for independence is known as the ‘Singing Revolution,’” he added.

“The Singing Revolution is the first film to tell this historically vital tale. This is a story that has not been told outside Estonia,” said Tusty, who is of Estonian descent. “We felt it was time the rest of the world knew of the amazing events that happened here.”