პავლეური

ვასილ წიკლაური

Born in 1926 in Gudamaqari, Vasil was eighty-seven years old at the time of recording. Vasil never attended a day of school in his life, and worked as a shepherd until his retirement around the time of the fall of the Soviet Union.

He is known throughout the hills as a singer of old songs, and today mostly plays self-composed shairis¹ on his panduri.² He lives in the beautiful village of Pavleuri with his son and daughter-in-law, in a house perched above the Aragvi River.³

¹The world shairi means a short poetic verse. The practice of shairoba was found in the northeast highlands of Georgia, where two singers would alternate improvisational comical verses, often above the drone of other singers at the table.

²A three-stringed, fretted lute common in all regions of northeastern Georgia. The instrument is most frequently used to accompany ballad singing. Read more about the panduri here.

³The major river of the eastern Georgian highlands of Khevsureti, Pshavi and Mtiuleti. The 112 kilometer long Aragvi was dammed in Zhinvali in 1986, forming the Zhinvali Reservoir which provides power to much of Georgia. The river eventually flows into the Mtkvari at Mtskheta.