Latvia’s beach volleyballers poised to advance

Latvia’s beach volleyballers are off to a great start at London in the preliminary round of 24 teams playing in 6 groups. Both pairs won their first two games and are in a good position to advance to the next round.

Ruslans Sorokins (b. 1982) and Aleksandrs Samoilovs (b. 1985) are ranked 13th and defeated 7th-seeded Poland in three sets after losing the first. They had a much easier time with South Africa winning in two. They now face the 4th ranked duo from the USA on August 1. That should be a treat for Latvian fans in Canada and the United States because the game will be televised. It starts at 4:30pm local time or 11:30am Eastern.

Meanwhile 14th ranked Martins Plavins (b. 1985) and Janis Smedins (b. 1987) also came through big disposing of an 8th-ranked German pair in three sets and Venezuela in two. They face the 5th-seeded Dutch a day later on August 2.

The preliminary round will finish on August 2. The top two teams in each of the six groups advance.  They are joined by the top two third place teams. The remaining four third place teams then compete for the final two places. From that point on it’s winner takes all as the sixteen qualifiers drop to eight, then to four and then to the two finalists.

Samoilovs and Plavins played together going into the 2008 Beijing Olympics where they beat the heavily favoured Americans in the preliminary round and then made it to the round of 16 before losing. Plavins and Smedins won bronze in the 2010 European championships.

As for other action, Latvian fans have to bide their time as the bulk of their athletes have yet to compete. Not so in neighbouring Lithuania which is basking in glory at the surprise 100m breaststroke gold win by 15 year old teenager Ruta Meilulyte. Now based in Britain, she stunned the sporting world and catapulted to instant fame. Basketball-crazy Lithuanians momentarily forgot about their team which stumbled in a opening loss to Argentina but then defeated Nigeria and could still go far. Like Latvia, Estonia also hopes to pull in a few medals but there’s nothing to report yet.

Latvia does not have a tradition of excellence in any summer discipline so predicting medals is difficult. One group to watch is the team of four Latvian BMXers. Led by Beijing gold medalist Maris Strombergs who is still considered an elite cyclist, they will compete from August 8-10.

The Games are over for a number of Latvia’s athletes. Road cyclist Aleksejs Saramotins finished 56th, Dimitrijs Trefilovs finished 38th in men’s gymnastics, Konstantins Ovchinnikovs lost to a Brazilian in judo, Matiss Burgis made it to the second round of table tennis before bowing out and Uldis Kalnins, who, despite coming in 2nd in his 100m freestyle swimming heat, placed 30th overall and did not advance.

Fairies of Latvian music present sweet sounds on debut mini-album

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While only seven women are seen in official band photos such as this, Sus Dungo in fact consists of eight performers. (Publicity photo)

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Sus Dungo’s debut mini-album, Rasā pēdas, includes eight tracks.

For me, part of the fun of listening to Sus Dungo’s debut mini-album, Rasā pēdas, is the memory of using social media to track down band member Kate Pāvula at a vintage fair in Rīga this summer.

With the album not yet available in stores, Twitter was the way to locate her, chat for a bit and get my hands on the compact disc. Even without that personal connection, the album is pure joy.

Sus Dungo has carved out a niche in the Latvian music scene with its dūdiņroks or “fairy rock” style that fits in well with Rīga’s new hipster community. While the term dūdiņroks might suggest light or even saccharine fare, that’s not what the band offers. Sus Dungo lays down intricate tracks that pull the listener through each song. Yet it is music sweet enough that, after hearing it, one feels good and wanting more.

Sus Dungo began in late 2007 as a duet between Pāvula and Diāna (Sus) Čepurnaja. The band now includes eight young women: Anneli Arro on djembé, cajon drum and shakers; Marika Arro on bass guitar; Elizabete Balčus on flute and metallophone; Čepurnaja on voice, acoustic guitar and banjo; Liene Dravniece on accordeon and voice; Elizabeta Angelika Lāce on harp; Pāvula on voice and violin; and Marta Trofimova on electric guitar and ukelele. Careful media consumers might jump to point out that in photos and music videos only seven performers can be counted, but Pāvula confirmed in an email that Sus Dungo does in fact total eight. Čepurnaja has been studying abroad and that is why she is not always visible.

(Balčus also has recorded on her own. Her six-track EP Wooden Horse was released late last year. For more information, visit elizabetebalcus.com.)

Categorizing the band’s dūdiņroks music can prove difficult. Accordeon, harp and flute often dominate the music, while the voices at times feature strong solos, at other times something akin to a small choir. Sus Dungo’s profile on the music website ReverbNation suggests the band sounds like artists such as Björk, Katzenjammer, or Florence and the Machine. However, the Latvian group is neither as odd as Iceland’s Björk, nor as raucous as Norway’s Katzenjammer, nor as clarion as England’s Florence and the Machine.

Rasā pēdas begins with the dreamy “Atspulgs” (Reflection), which starts out with the sounds of accordeon and harp. As the track builds, the ebb and flow of the song is a good introduction to Sus Dungo’s style.

Next is the mini-album’s title track “Rasā pēdas” (Footprints in the Dew), followed by the jazzy “SQP,” featuring bird sounds and Balčus playing the flute. “Mier loul” (Sea Song), the title of which is in the Livonian language, is a simple instrumental highlighting Lāce’s harp. “Tēta darzā” (Dad’s Garden) speaks of the sanctuary that is a father’s garden.

My favorite track is “Jasmīna lietus” (Jasmine Rain), perhaps because it is one of the tracks not previously heard as a single or YouTube video.

The mini-album concludes with “Balle ar Viegli,” with lyrics drawn from the work of poet Imants Ziedonis. The song muses about a beautiful dance here on earth and the thought that it is a reflection of an even more beautiful one going on in heaven. The song was recorded with members of the Viegli Fund, an effort by Prāta Vētra’s Renārs Kaupers and other Latvian creative types to support projects that reveal the country’s beauty.

My only “complaint” about the CD is its length. The eight tracks amount to just 35 minutes of listening. Of course, the recording is billed as a mini-album and not a full-fledged release, but I am left wanting more of Sus Dungo.

For more on Sus Dungo, visit the band’s website at susdungo.lv, its Facebook page or its page on the draugiem.lv social network.

A pleasant half-hour video of the band performing at the Piens Club in Rīga can be viewed on Vimeo. The concert includes both covers and Sus Dungo’s original songs. Videos may also be found on Sus Dungo’s YouTube channel.

Rasā pēdas should soon be available in Rīga stores and online through eKase.lv, according to Pāvula.

Details

Rasā pēdas

Sus Dungo

Sus Dungo,  2012

Track listing:

Atspulgs

Rasā pēdas

SQP

Mier loul

Tēta dārzā

Jasmīna lietus

Laiks

Balle ar Viegli

Andris Straumanis is a special correspondent for and a co-founder of Latvians Online. From 2000–2012 he was editor of the website.

Who will bring home Olympic medals for Latvia?

Since regaining independence, Latvian athletes have brought home medals from every Summer Olympics. In 1992 at Barcelona it was a silver in canoeing by Ivans Klementjevs, a silver in pistol shooting by Afanisijs Kuzmins and a bronze by Dainis Ozols in the individual men’s cycling road race.

Four years later Klementjevs repeated with a silver at Atlanta. Igors Vihrovs won Latvia’s first ever gold at Sydney in 2000 in gymnastics while teammates Aigars Fadejevs added a silver in the men’s 50km walk and Vesvolods Zelonijs picked up a bronze in judo.

Latvia’s biggest haul came at Athens in 2004 with four silvers. Jevgenijs Sapronenko came second in the pole vault, Vadims Vasilevskis followed in the javelin, Jelena Rublevska in the women’s pentathlon, a single day event consisting of sharp-shooting, fencing, swimming, equestrianism and cross-country running, and Viktors Scerbatihs in weigthlifting. Maris Strombergs picked up a BMX gold in 2008 at Beijing, Ainars Kovals scored a silver in the javelin while Scerbatihs added a bronze in the men’s super heavyweight weightlifting class.

Coming into London, Latvia has a record of 3 gold, 11 silver and 4 bronze medals. The total includes a silver in Los Angeles in 1932 as well as a silver and a bronze in Berlin in 1936. Latvian athletes first participated in the 1912 Games under the Tsarist flag and were members of Soviet teams during occupation. Janis Konrads won a swimming gold for Australia in 1960, his sister Ilze won a silver in the same Games while Aldis Berzins was on the 1984 USA gold medal volleyball team.

Latvia has 48 athletes in London and they will be competing in wrestling, judo, table tennis, the pentathlon, swimming, beach volleyball, canoeing, weightlifting, athletics, gymnastics, BMX cycling and road cycling.

While Latvia has few contenders, previous games show that medals can come from unexpected quarters. However Maris Strombergs, the BMX winner at Beijing is considered a medal contender. Two pairs are entered in the men’s beach volleyball. They are ranked 13th and 14th coming into the Games and could surprise.

Of note is sharpshooter Kuzmins who is at the age of 65 is in his 9th Summer Olympics. Kuzmins made his debut under the Soviet flag at the 1976 Games in Montreal. He only missed the 1984 games in Los Angeles due to a tit-for-tat Soviet bloc boycott following the West’s boycott of the 1980 Games in Moscow in retaliation for the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He is not the oldest participant in London. The oldest is a Japanese equestrianist at 71.

As a footnote, Sanita Puspurs, a recent immigrant from Latvia, will be competing for Ireland in single women’s rowing.

While bigger countries fret over their medal totals, for Latvia it will be pulling in a few medals and not being skunked. But then again, 80 of the 205 nations participating at London have never won any Olympic medal at either the Winter or Summer Games.