Pianist Giorgi Mikadze, local and foreign artists gearing up for Black Sea Arena show

Music enthusiasts spending their summer on the Georgian seaside will be treated to a concert bringing together the country’s folk music with contemporary genres and sounds early next month.

Led by United States-based jazz pianist Giorgi Mikadze, the event will bring together Georgian folk singers and local and foreign musical artists under Project VOISA.

Branded a project "state importance” by organisers, the concert will fittingly be held on the stage of Black Sea Arena, Georgia’s major modern performance venue in Shekvetili resort town.

Mikadze, in his capacity as musical director of the project, will be flanked on the stage by the folk song ensemble Basiani.

Other performers will include Roni Eytan on harmonica, Shachar Elnatan on guitar, Antoine Katz on bass, Dito Sakandelidze and Fernando Saci on percussion and Zachary Mullings on drums. American DJ and producer Raydar Ellis will act as the master of ceremonies.

The eclectic selection of artists for the performance reflects the diverse range of musical tracks produced under the VOISA project, which debuted in 2016 at New York’s ShapeShifter Lab venue.

The compositions involve works created on themes relevant to Georgia, such as Zezva and Mzia, a piece dedicated to the 2001 archaeological finding of the earliest known evidence of hominids outside Africa at its discovery.

Other tracks include Biba, a composition based on musical motifs of the Svaneti highland province of Georgia and Azamati, themed on the north-western Abkhazia region.

Mikadze will lead the concert at the Black Sea Arena as musical director. Photo: Giorgi Mikadze artist Facebook page.

The largest concert of the project so far took place at the Beijing Concert Hall last year, with the Black Sea Arena event set to become its first showcase in Georgia.

It will be hosted to mark the centennial of the First Democratic Republic of Georgia, celebrated throughout this year as a homage to the 1918-1921 independent state.

A graduate of the Berklee College of Music, Mikadze was selected to work as guest professor for the five-week Summer Performance Program of the institution in 2017.

The pianist also joined esteemed musical artists including drummer Jack DeJohnette for the Mikrojazz project exploring microtonality in jazz genre, last year.

In addition, Mikadze became the first Georgian artist to sign with globally renowned musical instrument company Yamaha last year, as he concluded this year by launching a crowdfunding campaign to release his debut album.