In 3 weeks, at Thursday 13 April 2017 the 11th edition of Liet International will take place in Kautokeino, in the north of Norway. Home of the Sámi and the Sámi Grand Prix. The latter having send their winner to Liet International since the beginning of the festival in 2002. And winning as much as four times! Both the Samisk musikkfestival, as organisers of the Sámi Grand Prix, and the board of foundation Liet International are very pleased about this cooperation and are looking forward to the event.
On 13 April 8 acts from 8 different regions in Europe will perform their song in as many different regional and minority languages. With several languages that are represented at this years edition for the very first time. This are:
- Ella Marie Hætta Isaksen, winner of the Sámi Grand Prix 2016.
- Aafke Zuidersma, winner of Liet 2016, the Frisian song festival.
- Zaman, this band performs in Bashkir, a Turkic language.
- Màiri Anna NicUalraig singing in Scottish Gaelic.
- Ruben Semmoh & Romeo Sumter singing in Sranan Tongo.
- Nikita Ilyin singing in Udmurt, a Uralic language.*
- Ukan singing in Breton.
- La Schlapp Sauvage singing in Lëtzebuergesch.
The song festival for regional and minority languages Liet International is a Frisian (north of the Netherlands) initiative and was organised for the first time in the capital of Friesland, Ljouwert/Leeuwarden in 2002. Since 2006, the festival travels around Europe and since 2008, under the patronage of the Council of Europe. Liet International attracts each year a lot of media-attention – from BBC to Al Jazeera – and grew to one of the biggest events for the promotion of minority languages. In 2014, the latest edition of Liet International took place in Oldenburg, in the north of Germany.
The Sámi parliament in Norway is the biggest financial contributor of this festival. The organisers are very pleased with this!
*Due to passport-troubles singer Nikita Ilyin is replaced by Pavel Aleksandrov, he is the author of the song Nikita was going to participate with.
