KATHMANDU:

People from every walk of life was held spellbound as musicians from three countries — Norway, China and Nepal — wove their magic at the Patan Durbar Square Museum on August 23. The concert organised by the Nepal Music Centre (NMC) in association with the Norwegian Embassy was a part of the weeklong closing programme for participants of the ‘Forde Folk Festival — Talent 2007’.

The Norwegian government has been organising an annual folk festival ‘Forde Folk Festival’ providing a platform for artistes from two countries to participate and showcase their talent in Norway.

This year artistes from Nepal and China had participated in the festival.

Tang Xiaoyuan (duxianqin), Yang Tianzi (flute) and Sha Mo (erhu) presented traditional Chinese music. The most fascinating piece of music was the Horse ride performed by Sha Mo on a unique instrument called erhoo. He produced the sound of a horse running, which amused the audience.

Norwegian participants Nina Fjeldet (violin), Marie Forr Kalpbakken (violin) and Rikke Van Ommeren (accordion) performed Cow tune and Small man, which were peppy and foot tappingly good.

Nepali participants Barta Gandharba (vocal/sarangi), Rubin Krishna Shrestha (flute) and Sanskriti Shrestha (tabala/ madal) presented an instrumental piece titled Festival.

Though all the performances received huge rounds of applause, it was the fusion, in which all the participants performed traditional music of all three countries together, that was really appreciated by all. The fusion piece consisted of the Mangal Dhun of Nepal and received maximum cheer from the older generation who had turned up for the concert.