Enjoy a Bulgarian dance workshop and cultural presentation with Dr. Gergana Panova, an evening potluck dinner, and then dance to live music with Vassil and Maria Bebelekovi and the Kafana Therapy Band!

“She is a great teacher with a warm and exuberant personality, with a vast knowledge of Bulgarian folklore — including very contemporary folklore.”

—Yves Monreau, on Gergana Panova. Yves hosted her twice in Montreal for the annual Lazarovden Folk Festival.

Schedule
3:30 pm: Doors open. Warm up dances
4:00 – 6:15: Dance Workshop and Culture Corner
6:15 – 7:15: Potluck Dinner.
7:30 – 8:00: Teaching by Gergana and Requests
8:00 – 10:30: Live music by Vassil and Maria Bebelekovi and the Kafana Therapy Band. The Kafana Therapy band is Linda Green, Randall Kirschman, Mark Jenkins and Arlene Imagawa, all long-time students of Vassil and Maria! Tips appreciated.

For the potluck dinner please bring your favorite dish for 8-10 hungry dancers. Refrigerator available at the venue but no oven. Punch, plates, and utensils provided.

Admission
$25 all day or $15 afternoon, $15 evening

Dr. Gergana Panova-Tekath

Dr. Gergana Panova-Tekath was born in Sofia, Bulgaria. From 1988 to 1993, she danced with the Filip Kutev Bulgarian National Folk Ensemble. She studied dance ethnology in Bulgaria and obtained her Ph.D. in dance from Dortmund University (Germany).

She regularly commutes between Bulgaria, where she heads the Ethnochoreology Department at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, and Germany, where she is Professor of Dance at Folkwang University in Essen.

She has published numerous articles and has written two books on various aspects of Bulgarian traditional dance. Besides organizing annual summer seminars in Bulgaria, Gergana has taught workshops in many countries: Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Israel, Norway, Netherlands, Belgium, Brazil, Argentina and North America.

She graduated in Dance Pedagogy, Ethnochoreology, Choreography and Direction (Bulgaria), and Kinetography and Communicative Sciences (Germany) and has completed a Doctorate with “Summa cum laude” and awarded the prize “Dissertation 2004” from the Technical University of Dortmund (Germany) in the area of Cultural Philosophy. The title of her thesis is “Dance after Perestroika. The Communication between Eastern and Western Europe through the Bulgarian Folkdances.” Gergana qualified in Ethnochoreology and Communication in 2011 in Sofia.

She performed as a solo dancer and choreographer at the National Ensemble for Folksongs and Folkdances (Philip Koutev) in Sofia from 1988 to 1994, was a Choreographer for different Bulgarian and international Theater Projects, was a Senior Fellow and Associate Professor for Ethnochoreology at the Institute for Art Studies at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences in Sofia, and has lectured at the Technical University of Dortmund, the Humboldt University, Berlin, the University in Zurich, the University of Music, Vienna, and the New Bulgarian University, Sofia.

Starting in 1994, she has conducted over 300 seminars and summer academies in folk dances in Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Holland, Israel, Japan, Norway, Switzerland, and the United States.

Gergana has published over 50 Articles and two books about dancing, nonverbal communication, ethnology, etcetera in Bulgarian, German, English, and Russian.
–phantomranch.net