Editing Rustavi Ensemble

{{short description|Folk music ensemble}}
{{no footnotes|date=May 2019}}
[[Image:The Rustavi Choir performs Gurian songs.JPG|thumb|250px|right| The Rustavi Choir performing Gurian songs, 2005.]]

The '''Rustavi Ensemble''', or the '''Georgian State Academic Ensemble''', is a [[Georgia (country)|Georgian]] [[Music of Georgia (country)|folk music]] [[Musical ensemble|ensemble]] that was created in 1968 by [[Anzor Erkomaishvili]], a singer and [[folklorist]] from a distinguished Georgian musical lineage that goes back seven generations. Since its formation Rustavi has successfully toured more than 50 countries around the world.

==Overview==
Songs and dances for work and war, spectacular costumes, the unique Georgian style of [[polyphonic]] singing and rich voices characterize the Rustavi Choir. Their sacred [[hymn]]s with their overlapping, continuously moving [[harmonies]] are spellbinding. Rustavi is also performing a high-quality comprising national and diverse [[traditional dance]]s. Excellent costumes, brilliant performance, and elaborate choreography.

Erkomaishvili's vision was to break through ethnic boundaries of regional styles while performing ethnographically authentic music from all of Georgia. The Rustavi's performance style synthesizes the powerful, rough-hewn sound characteristic of the traditional regional folk choirs with a newer, cleaner, more finely-honed aesthetic whose orientation is towards concert presentation – nowadays on an increasingly international scale.

While striving to preserve, and in some cases recreate, authentic [[voicing (music)|voicings]] and vocal [[timbre]]s, the Rustavi singers have simplified the complex [[musical scale|scales]] used by the earlier [[choir]]s in order to create firmer, more brilliant harmonies. The use of a smaller number of singers for certain songs has also helped to clarify their musical structure.

==Awards==
The [[UNESCO]] [[Pacha Prize]] has been awarded in 2001 to the Rustavi State Academic Ensemble of Singing and Dancing for the safeguarding and promotion of Georgian polyphonic singing in the Republic of Georgia.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.unesco.org/bpi/eng/unescopress/2001/01-114e.shtml|title=UNESCO culture prizes awarded|date=9 October 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121009024527/http://www.unesco.org/bpi/eng/unescopress/2001/01-114e.shtml|archive-date=2012-10-09}}</ref>

==Recordings==
In 1998, the group recorded the CD Mirangula under the name '''Rustavi Folk Choir''', which has allowed for a wider appreciation of their music outside Georgia. This CD included the folk love song [[Tsintskaro]] which has had some popularity globally. The compilation record ''Georgian Voices'' sought to emulate the success of ''[[Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares]]'' by recording what could be sold to the Western world as a male version of the popular [[Bulgarian State Television Female Vocal Choir]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=GEORGIA: Georgian Voices - The Rustavi Choir |url=https://www.200worldalbums.com/post/georgia-georgian-voices-the-rustavi-choir |access-date=11 October 2023 |website=|date=30 December 2021 }}</ref>

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20090102042955/http://www.ensemblerustavi.com/eng/ Rustavi Ensemble Official Site]
*[http://www.singers.com/world/rustavi.html Informationen über Rustavi choir]
*[http://www.georgianweb.com/music/music.html Rustavi choir] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170920033401/http://www.georgianweb.com/music/music.html |date=2017-09-20 }}

{{Authority control}}
[[Category:Choirs from Georgia (country)]]
[[Category:A cappella musical groups]]
[[Category:Musical groups from Georgia (country)]]
[[Category:Musical groups established in 1968]]
[[Category:Rustavi]]
[[Category:Soviet performing ensembles]]
[[Category:1968 establishments in the Soviet Union]]


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