After a three-year hiatus, outdoor Romani music festival resumes in Czech town on 16 July
One of the traditional Romani music festivals in the Czech Republic’s Ústecký Region, the Různobarevný festival (Festival of Many Colors) will welcome visitors once more on 16 July 2022 beginning at 12:30 PM. The jubilee 15th staging of the festival is happening as usual under the direction of Romano jasnica, the association in Trmice that has produced it since 2004.
“When we prepared that first year of the festival in 2004 together with Ms Eva Bajgerová, Ms Margita Cichá and Mr Martin Bajger, we never anticipated that over the years it would acquire such great popularity and become a traditional, anticipated cultural event attended by several thousand audience members,” Martin Cichý, one of the festival organizers and a representative of the association, told Romea.cz. While the association is pleased the festival has found its place on the calendar of cultural events, Cichý said the big challenge for the organizers is to increase the level of professionalism of the event as a whole and prepare an attractive variety program for visitors.
This year the association is holding the festival after a three-year hiatus caused in large part by the COVID-19 pandemic. “The festival format remains the same, we literally build it ‘from the ground up’,” Cichý described with a smile.
“Over the course of several days, on the grounds of the park in Trmice, a festival infrastructure will rise that is able to receive as many as 3,000 visitors,” the organizer said. This year’s festival will not differ too much from previous years in terms of the program.
As has become traditional, part of the program is dedicated to children and youth, i.e., the children’s dance ensembles in Romani style that imbue the opening of the festival with the proper atmosphere, naturally also guaranteeing that Romani culture is being handed down from one generation to the next. As in previous years, the festival will present many performers of Romani origin from the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and there will be no lack of beginning music performers who are young and whom the organizers also want to showcase.
Performers at the festival this year will include Tomáš Botló and Drahoslav Bango, Refew, Maťo Kamaro of Slovakia, Cico Band and René Rendy, Ondrej Ferko and Ondra Gizman Jr., while from the bands that are local there will be Duell Trmice, D-familias and Natálie Kucharová, The Roma Band, the finalist of the “Miri Gili” competition, Julius Hudy, and the finalist of the “Ústecký Region Has Talent” (Ústecko má talent) contest, Ines Joniová. “There will be no lack of attractions for children and good refreshments are a must, we are also anticipating a surprise for visitors,” Cichý told Romea.cz.
Czech Television reporter Richard Samko will also be an unmistakable face and figure of the festival, which he will MC, as has become traditional. “Hundreds of festivals take place in the Czech Republic every year,” he told Romea.cz.
“Not all of them have a solid foundation, though, they don’t all enjoy great interest and popularity,” Samko said. “The Festival of Many Colors in Trmice has all of that.”
“What’s more, this festival also has great heart,” Samko said. “I’m not saying this because I have already MC’d the festival for 10 years, but because people and bands come here who make the festival rare and unique.”
“I also say it because even if I weren’t MC’ing the festival, I would be the first visitor in the door,” Samko told Romea.cz, adding “Aven Trmicate!” The festival is produced with the financial support of the Czech Culture Ministry, the Ústecký Regional Authority, and other sponsors.
