Biography

The Oktet Suha ...

... was founded in 1981. The singers are mainly from the community Neuhaus/Suha in the southeast of Carinthia.

Art-director

First art director and singer was Bertej Logar from the beginning until 1988. For one season Otto Wutte cooperated as singer and band leader. He was followed by prof. Matevž Fabijan from Kranj/SLO, who has been the art-director of the octet since 1989. In 2007 Edi Oraže took over for about 10 years, followed by prof. Francka Šenk since spring 2017 up to end of 2019. In 2020 finally Iztok Kocen, conductor, composer and musician from Ljubljana became the current artistic director oft he Oktet Suha.

Iztok Kocen

Two main aims

The group pursues two main aims: on the one hand to revive old, nearly forgotten Carinthian folk-songs, and on the other hand to enrich the Carinthian music scene by modern interpretations of poems by well-known Slovene speaking Carinthian poets like Milka Hartman, Anita Hudl, Herman Germ, Gustav Januš and others. Many of these songs were written by Bertej Logar, who was the first leader of the octet until 1988. For one year the octet was then conducted by the music teacher Otto Wutte. Apart from folksongs the octet´s repertoire also contains music from different epochs and international folk-songs - all of them in their original languages - spiritual songs and negro-sprirituals.

1300 performances

The Oktet Suha has performed about 1300 times in Carinthia and Austria, in several European countries as well as in the USA, Ukraina, Australia and Argentina. The annual Festival Suha at Neuhaus-castle, the participation in international festivals and choire competitions, the concert tours as well as the highlight of the European Award for Folk an Art 1997 and the Silver award 2006 of the Republik of Slovenia are some of the most interesting and most beautiful highlights in the history of the octet. A very important aspect of Oktet Suha´s activities is to support the peaceful coexistance of the German and the Slovene speaking ethnic group in Carinthia. On the grounds of these activities many new friendships have been made.

The 30th anniversary ...

Oktet Suha has celebrated in autumn 2011 with two big events. The concert with friends in Neuhaus-Suha was a great social event with several choirs and groups. The artistic highlight undoubtedly was the jubilee gala concert in Bleiburg-Pliberk with a great audience of more than 500 visitors.