Singing with the
Stars
By Tara Trepanier
While I was preparing a poster presentation with my seventh
graders they insisted we YouTube Tamara, Vrcak, and Adrian
over and over and again. If you haven’t heard yet, these are
the members of the Super Group that represented Macedonia
at the 2008 Eurovision contest. My students, of course, wanted to tell me all about them. I was okay with this as long as
they told me in English. “Tamara is such a beautiful singer!”
“I’m in love with Vrcak!” “You should see Adrian dance!” As
they continued telling me about them, I started getting excited
too. My students told me the group that Macedonia had voted
to represent them at the Eurovision contest in Belgrade was
multi-ethnic. Tamara and Vrcak are ethnic Macedonians and
Adrian is an ethnic Albanian. How cool is that? What a great
group of role models for youth around Macedonia to be excited
about it. It is one thing for us, as foreigners, to try to facilitate
tolerance, understanding, and friendship between the different
ethnic groups that make up the mosaic of Macedonia. But the
impact that a multi-ethnic group like this can have on youth all
over Macedonia, by getting up on stage and singing together,
is in a whole other league.
You know the story about seven degrees of separation… well that happens to me a lot. So, when I found myself
in a recording studio with Tamara, Vrcak, and Adrian one night
a few weeks later, I wasn’t too shocked (though I was a little
star struck). The president of the English Language Teachers’
Association of Macedonia (ELTAM) asked me to sing back-up
as well as help the group with their English pronunciation. I
said I’d be in Skopje the next day and would be happy to help,
but it had been a few years since I sang; I did however have
about fifteen years of choral experience.
The next day a man named Saso called me to set up a
time to meet with the group. He picked me up from the American Corner in Skopje a little after 8:00 p.m. Aryn Bloodworth
had been at my presentation there so she came along too, but
vowed not to sing. After waiting outside a residential apartment for a while, we finally had our first Eurovision sighting!
After some quick introductions, we made our way down to the
basement recording studio. I spoke in my best Macedonian
and Aryn, a bit of Albanian, and to mix it up a bit, Tamara
- pauza
responded with Albanian greetings and Adrian in Macedonian,
reinforcing my opinion of how awesome this group is. There
was a lot of joking and camaraderie among Tamara, Vrcak, and
Adrian, as well as with their music mixer and the man who
had driven us. Aryn and I made ourselves at home. I asked if
Americans were allowed to sing back-up on Eurovision tracks.
(After all, wasn’t I from the wrong continent?) They assured
me it was fine and threw me into the sound booth.
I was more than a bit nervous and didn’t know exactly
what they wanted from me, but I had a good time. They said
something about my voice being the same color as Tamara’s
and they were hoping for something a bit different, but I sang
the chorus repeatedly anyway. I’m not sure it will ever hit
a recording, but it was an interesting experience. After they
released me from the sound booth, Tamara got in and started
singing. Wow! If I’ve ever felt inadequate about my vocal
abilities! She’s got some pipes! At this point, they asked Aryn
and me for help on pronunciation and diction of the English
lyrics—apparently, the final cut of their English version was
due the next day.
After we’d been there for a couple hours, our work
was done except for a few rhymes and rifts they had left to mix.
Adrian offered us rides home. I’m still in awe. It was all a bit
of a dream. A couple of my students have since found out and
are a little more than jealous; I think half of them believe I’m
going to show up one day with the Eurovision crew at school.
However, if that never happens, I’m confident that my students
will have had plenty of television and radio exposure to the
group this spring, as Eurovision-mania hit Macedonia once
again.
Way to go Macedonia… way to choose a multi-ethnic
super group, a group whose members truly have a chance to
step up as positive role models and promote ethnic tolerance
and understanding!