Briefly in english

The group VIIRKAT comes from Hämeenlinna, Finland. VIIRKAT is one of the groups in organisation of Hämeenlinnan Karjala-Seura (Hämeenlinna Carelia Association) in which belongs almost 100 dancers in 8 groups from he age scale on 3-65 years.

Dancers on the group VIIRKAT are between the ages of 18 and 27. Most of them have been dancing almost all their lives, and as a group already for 14 years since the group was established in 1988. Many dancers from the group have educated themselves in the field of folklore, and taken part in teaching folkdance to younger groups.

    Over the years VIIRKAT has travelled all     over Finland performing and participating     in different kind of festivals. Every spring     we've participated in a state-wide folklore     classification, and also gained success. In     the last seven years our group has     achieved the highest level of the classifi-     cation, and this year VIIRKAT was     nominated as "the group of the year".

    Abroad we've visited festivals in     Portugal, Russia, Poland, France,     Denmark and Latvia and made contacts     with the local groups.

Our programs are based on traditional Finnish folkdance and culture, but we also make variations for stage. Our programs include dancing, singing and music (accordion). We tend to make our programs suitable for each situation: In our programs we have small dance-combinations, wide concert programs, and programs which could be described as little stories with a plot.

Music is very important part of the group, and we have lots of songs in our appearances. Close to our hearts are especially Carelian dances and songs, which have the liveliness and expression that describes our group and suites us well.

In our appearances we use traditional Finnish folk costumes (from different parts of Finland) and dresses called "fereesi", a traditional festive dress of carelian women.

Our goal and purpose is to cherish the Finnish folk tradition and keep it vital by the means of dance and music. We also want to delight the audience by offering them a glimpse of the joy and variety of Finnish folk culture and letting them enjoy the rich and lively Finnish folkdance and folk music.