Song and dance workshop in Esso
In 1999, Erich Kasten organized the workshop Indigenous Worldviews of the Peoples of Kamchatka in Esso, central Kamchatka, with the support of Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin. The Even ensemble Nulgur staged a performance entitled Voices from the North – Traces of Shamans with which it later went on tour in Germany.
In the following year, another workshop was organized in Esso, entitled Children of the North – Cultural Exercises, and was supported by Franckesche Stiftungen zu Halle/Saale. Discussions with local educators and artists were centred on how to use song and dance more prominently in cultural work with young people. The results have been published in the edited volume Deti Severa.
During the workshop, a festival of dance was organized with the participation of various groups of children and adolescents from Kamchatka. Apart from the ensemble Or’yakan from Anavgai, the ensemble Shkolnye gody from Palana performed there for the first time.