Yat-Kha

Yat-Kha is a band from Tuva, led by vocalist/guitarist Albert Kuvezin. Their music is a mixture of Tuvan traditional music and rock, featuring Kuvezin's distinctive kargyraa throat singing style, the kanzat kargyraa.

Yat-Kha
Yat-Kha playing live in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, October 13, 2005
Background information
OriginTuva, Russia
GenresFolk rock, tuvan music, overtone singing, ethnic electronica, heavy metal,
Years active1991–present
Associated actsHuun-Huur-Tu
Websitehttp://www.yat-kha.ru/en/
MembersAlbert Kuvezin and others
Past membersIvan Sokolovsky and many others

Biography

Yat-Kha was founded in Moscow in 1991, as a collaborative project between Kuvezin and Russian avant-garde, electronic composer Ivan Sokolovsky. The project blended traditional Tuvan folk music with post-modern rhythms and electronic effects. Kuvezin and Sokolovsky toured and played festivals, and eventually took the name “Yat-Kha,” which refers to a type of small, Central Asian zither similar to the Mongolian yatga and the Chinese guzheng, which Kuvezin plays in addition to the guitar. In 1993, they released a self-titled album on the General Records label.

After the release of Yat-Kha, Kuvezin and Sokolovsky parted creative ways and Kuvezin went on to release five other albums under the name Yat-Kha with other musicians (and less of an emphasis on electronics), beginning with Yenisei Punk in 1995, with morin khuur player Alexei Saaia (produced by Lu Edmonds). Sokolovsky issued a remastered version of the Yat-Kha album, with additional tracks, under the title Tundra's Ghosts in 1996/97.

Since 2001, they have been performing a live soundtrack to Vsevolod Pudovkin's 1928 silent film Storm Over Asia. They may release a DVD of this version of the film with Reality Film.

In 2010, the project released a new album, Poets and Lighthouses, recorded on the Scottish island of Jura with producer Giles Perring. It reached Number 1 on the World Music Charts Europe (WMCE) in January 2011.

Discography

Albums:

  • Priznak Gryadushchei Byedy (1991)
  • Khanparty (1992)
  • Yat-Kha (1993)
  • Yenisei Punk (1995)
  • Tundra's Ghosts (1996/97) - remastered version of Yat-Kha released by Ivan Sokolovsky)
  • Dalai Beldiri (1999)
  • Aldyn Dashka (2000)
  • Bootleg (2001, live)
  • tuva.rock (2003)
  • Re-Covers (2005)
  • Bootleg 2005 (2005, live)
  • Poets and Lighthouses (2010)

Members

Current

Past

Appearing on Poets and Lighthouses with Albert Kuvezin (Voice, Acoustic Guitar)

  • Simon Edwards (Acoustic Bass Guitar, Double Bass, Marimbula, Mbira, Appalachian Dulcimer)
  • Giles Perring (Acoustic Guitar, Piano, Harmonium, Backing Vocals, Drums, Percussion)
  • Sarah Homer (Clarinet, Bass Clarinet, Recorder)
  • Melanie Pappenheim (Backing Vocals)
  • Lu Edmonds (Cumbus)
  • Neil Cameron (Scottish Small Pipes)

Awards

  • 1991 recognized by Brian Eno, one of the international judges at the first Voices of Asia Festival in Almaty, Kazakhstan
  • 1995 French RFI "Decouvertes Est" prize for Yenisei Punk
  • 1999 German Critic's Prize for Dalai Beldiri
  • 2002 BBC Radio 3 "Award for World Music"
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