K’rimanch’uli is a folk singing style from the Southwestern Georgian regions of Guria and Achara/Adjara on the Black Sea (Manjgaladze, 289) which is not found elsewhere in the Caucasus (Kuzmich, 149). K’rimanch’uli is a type of vocal performance which resembles falsetto yodeling (Gabisonia, 79) and is generally supported by a three voice polyphonic accompaniment (Kuzmich, 149). The four parts of a typical polyphonic Georgian song are the high voice (k’rimanch’uli), a middle voice (which can take several different names including ), a low voice (bani), and a drone (shemkhmobari) (Manjgaladze, 289). The highest vocal melody is k’rimanch’uli and the focus of the song (Manjgaladze, 289). The terminology in Georgian is extensive and somewhat contested, consisting of over 50 words for different vocal ranges (Manjgaladze, 289). K’rimanch’uli does not always use words, but instead often uses vocables (Ninoshvili, 13). These vocables may be in place of standard lyrics or may compliment the lyrics to complete a vocal melody when there are too few syllables in the lyrics for a song (Ninoshvili, 13). The vocables, known as samgherisi in Georgian, in the k’rimanch’uli sung in Guria are considered less important than the melody (Ninoshvili, 82). An important part of k’rimanch’uli is improvisation (Ninoshvili, 68), which may take the form of replacing formal lyrics with vocables (Ninoshvili, 82).
K’rimanch’uli and Georgian polyphonic singing are generally believed to predate the introduction of Christianity to Georgia (Ninoshvili, 15). This belief is difficult to confirm, however there are records from as early as the 11th century which show a notation style for this style of polyphonic singing in Georgia (Kuzmich 151). K’rimanch’uli likely predates the notation system as it has also been passed down through an oral tradition (Gabisonia, 76). The tradition of polyphonic singing and k’rimanch’uli is diverse, being sung during Georgian Orthodox Church services (Kuzmich, 151), sung for the Kings of Georgia (Kuzmich, 152), and sung by peasants and farmers as work music (Manjgaladze, 291). Among the themes for k’rimanch’uli are histories, like that of Khasan-Beg (Ninoshvili 84) and lamentations about the difficulties of peasant life (Ninoshvili, 66). K’rimanch’uli would often be sung by shepherds in the mountains, who could sing together even from opposite sides of a valley (Manjgaladze, 290). There was also a calming quality about k’rimanch’uli, people could sing it to themselves and feel less lonely, scared, or bored (Manjgaladze, 290).
The first ethnographic choir performing k’rimanch’uli was formed in 1885 as part of a resistance movement against the Russian Empire (Kuzmich, 150). The use of k’rimanch’uli as a form of national expression was not a new idea in 1885, as King Erekle II and Patriarch Anton I created a school to teach polyphonic singing in the 18th century after an invasion by Qajar Persia (Kuzmich, 155). Most people who sing k’rimanch’uli did not learn to do so from schools created by the Kings of Georgia, but instead learned it from established singer (Kuzmich 153).
The treatment of k’rimanch’uli singers in Soviet Georgia in the 1930s has been compared to the contemporaneous persecution of bandura players in Ukraine (Kuzmich, 153). K’rimanch’uli singers were transformed by Bolsheviks into “propaganda tools for the Communist regime” (Kuzmich, 153). One of the ways k’rimanch’uli was made into an art form “national in form, socialist in content” was by replacing lyrics to songs people already knew (Ninoshvili, 65). One example of this lyric change is the 1936 “Hoeing Song”, which was identical to a 1909 recording of “O God, Look Down on Me Too” (Ninoshvili, 65). The 1936 rendition was a song glorifying work, in true Soviet fashion and replaced the lyrics heard in the 1909 recording which express the struggles of peasant life in Georgia (Ninoshvili, 66). Changing lyrics to songs was not the only way the Bolsheviks sought to control cultural expression, there were also attempts by the Soviet government to standardize folk music (Ninoshvili 67). The effort to standardize folk music entailed an elimination of the improvisation that was so common in pre-Soviet k’rimanch’uli (Ninoshvili, 67).
The changes made by the Soviet government did not eliminate k’rimanch’uli, although according to Anzor Erkomaishvili, in the 1950s “Georgian folk music was practically forgotten” (Kuzmich, 153). Despite the decline in Georgian folk in the 1950s, the 1960s were an important decade for the genre. In 1961 Anzor Erkomaishvili started the Gordela Ensemble, later professionalized as the Rustavi Ensemble, at Tbilisi State Conservatory (Kuzmich, 153). Erkomaishvili is the tenth generation of k’rimanch’uli singers in his family (Kuzmich 153) and trained with his ensemble in Shvidkaca, Guria where a traditional ensemble still existed (Kuzmich, 153). The Gordela Ensemble was not the only notable group performing Georgian Folk music in the 1960s. There was also Orera (Орэра), named for a vocable common in Western Georgian music (Ninoshvili, 68). Orera was a Soviet pop group inspired by American Pop singing and Jazz instrumentals with influence from Georgian polyphonic singing (Ninoshvili, 68). One of Orera’s most popular songs was “K’rimanch’uli”, named for the singing style, which is featured at the end of the song (Ninoshvili, 70). Orera’s song “K’rimanch’uli” uses traditional elements of Georgian folk music, like modzakhili (“the call to song”) sung acapella and vocables in place of lyrical verses, and mixes it with an upbeat jazz trio of piano, drums, and bass (Ninoshvili, 70). This “modernized” folk music was what the Soviet government wanted national arts to sound like (Ninoshvili, 71), it reflected socialist internationalism through the use of modern American jazz while simultaneously reflecting Georgian national culture (Ninoshvili, 69). According to T’rist’an Sikharulidze, k’rimanch’uli was popular in the form of Georgian work songs internationally (Ninoshvili, 147). Sikharulidze had travelled outside of the Soviet Union as a performer, singing “four-part, vocable- and k’rimanch’uli-rich Gurian work songs,” which Sikharulidze says were widely enjoyed in countries like Italy (Ninoshvili, 147).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScoFKYUMEjU
Bibliography
Gabisonia, Tamaz. “THE NOTION OF POLYPHONY ON THE EXAMPLE OF GEORGIAN FOLK MUSIC.” Cite seer.idt.psu.edu. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.739.2572&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
Kuzmich, Andrea. 2010. “Not a Revival, a Tradition of Revivals: Reinterpreting Georgian Traditional Polyphonic Practices through the Ensemble.” MUSICultures 37: 145-158. https://search.proquest.com/docview/918965396?accountid=13475.
Manjgaladze, Ketevan. “VARIETIES OF KRIMANCHULI (YODEL) IN WEST GEORGIA’S FOLK SONGS.” Citeseerz.ist.psu.edu. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.739.1263&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
Ninoshvili, L. (2010). Singing between the words: The poetics of georgian polyphony (Order No. 3432036). Available from ProQuest Central; ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I; Social Science Premium Collection. (815282313). Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/docview/815282313?accountid=13475
