Ellen Spitaleri writes in the June 11. 2014 The Oregon City News: “Local director builds song bridge to Estonia”
When Lonnie Cline heard the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir sing in 1993, the music spoke to him, and he was hooked.
The article states that the conductor and artistic director of the “Unistus Chamber Choir” Lonnie Cline invites members of the community to “The Estonian Tour concert” on June 15, 2014 to get equaly hooked on the music and say bon voyage with a $10.00 contribution to defray the group’s travel costs as they prepare to attend Laulupidu in Tallinn, Estonia in early July.
The article describes the Estonian Song Festival as colossal, the largest of its kind in the world, held in every five years. Close to 70,000 singers auditioned and 25,000 to 30,000 were chosen to perform in an area of the size of Hollywood Bowl with half a million people in the audience. While performing one can see people almost to the horizon. Cline states that the singing culture in Estonia, a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe is so great that in a population of 1.5 million one in every two sings in a choir, and whoever is left is a member of a folkdance group.
This year the Laulupidu takes place on July 4 th, 5 th, and 6th in Tallinn, which is a Friendship City with Portland. All the music is sung in Estonian, mostly without accompaniment. After two days of intensive rehersals, the 25 members of Unistus will perform in four singing ensembles during the event, including the general choir, a select choir and a female and male choir. Cline also said, that before the Laulupidu, the group will participate in a concert and cultural exchange tour, performing in churches and other venues throughout Estonia.
This marks Cline’s fourth time particiipating in Laulupidu with Unistus. He formed the group in 1999, and in 2000 they began rehearsing together at the Niemeyer Center at Clackamas Community College where Cline was the conductor of classical and choral music for 33 years. He retired from CCC in 2013.
There are 30 members in Unistus, and at least 75 percent of them are former CCC students. The other 25% come from the community, and they audtioned to be part of the choir. The group has performed all over the Portland metro area and beyond, Cline said. The word “unistus” means fantasy or daydream in Estonians and Cline chose it because in 1991 the Estonian people literally sang themselves to freedom from Soviet Russia.
In that year Soviet tanks attempted to stop the progress toward independence, but people, singing forbidden Estonian patriotic songs, acted as human shields to protect radio and TV stations from the Soviet tanks. The tanks turned back, and Estonias were able to realize their dream of freedom without any bloodshed, said Cline. “They were orderd to stop singing, but they did not, and their peaceful singing led to a resolution of conflict, and we want to carry that forward in our own group and repay Estonia for opening our eyes to that”. In fact, the mission statement for the Unistus Chamber Choir is to “exemplify peaceful solutions to prejudice, bigotry, greed, hatred and violence through the art of singing.”
