Iva Bittova

Describing the music of Iva Bittova to someone not familiar with it is like describing an abstract painting to a blind person. Iva Bittova, the Czech avant-garde violinist and singer, has synthesized the classic folk and gypsy music of the tiny Moravian villages where she grew up.

"I say this is my own folk music," Bittova says, "Some people say it's alternative music, or avant-garde music, but it's my own folklore. I get my inspiration from nature and from when I was a child and listened to a lot of folk music from the East, like Balkan, Romanian, and Hungarian. My father played classical music, so I also listened to that, but I especially like authentic folklore" — but really authentic.

Her vocal and instrumental technique is formidable, but what is most impressive is the imaginativeness of her excursions. When she plays a familiar piece, the Yiddish theater song that Joan Baez made famous as "Dona, Dona," it is so transmuted as to be virtually unrecognizable.

"It is very hard to have a category for this music, because it is not usual. Most of the inspiration is from nature, silence, and my children." —Courtesy Calabash Music