Dimash Qudaibergen: A Different Genre

In this post, I am looking at Dimash’s presentation and emotional impact on each song and his ability to tell his story.

Dimash always infuses each song he sings with just the right amount of passion and emotion, especially when it’s a love song but when its a song taken from the folk stories of his homeland he taps into a deep well of powerful emotions that is purely about his love for his fellow Kinsman and his beloved Kazakhstan and that is reflected in the the powerful delivery of his story.

The two songs I’ve selected today go much deeper than just a love story, they are stories about hardship, war, hopes for peace, and a soldier’s thoughts. I find his delivery of these folk songs to be exquisitely sad in their story telling of his Kazakh history, and so too the depth of emotion he pulls out of himself.

Too much blood has been spilled in the dark history of each Country around the world. Kazakhstan is no different, in this instance Dimash is not inclined to leave the past behind and has breathed new life into the old folk songs of his culture. and created a new folk song for his time, in War & Peace. Some things should never be forgotten. What better way to remind people of the follies of terrible wars past, than to set those stories of folly to powerful music and have them sung by one of the most angelic voices ever to grace the musical world.

He shares such a strong connection with his homeland of Kazakhstan and is so proud to be his Country’s Ambassador on the musical stage that he literally channels every ounce of that love and pride and pours it out on to the stage during this very special performance on his Digital Show.

War & Peace is Dimash’s own musical composition, the lyrics were written by Yao Qian. He sings of the distance and loss of love in the world through lack of the ability to trust each other. This is such a powerful and moving song for the message it sends out. He doesn’t employ his usual vocal acrobatics during this performance, preferring to keep it gentle and story telling, even while delivering this song to perfection, his soaring high notes and his powerhouse belt are not present very often and he uses that power sparingly. Where he does go into his belting voice, it is perfectly timed to better tell his story of war and loss of peace and the desolation that war leaves us dealing with for many generations afterwards, but still he does not remain there instead bringing us back down to the softer breathier tone he uses to tell his story.

I am totally awestruck by the composition itself, it is such a clever piece of music, it’s power is in the gentle sound of mixed strings, building in intensity to bring in the sound of drums beating out the war cry to the harsher chords struck by the electric guitar, heard in the background later, bringing the inexorable call to march towards yet more war.

He writes music the way he sings, using every note to perfection, every stroke of the bow on a string brings a new layer of intensity to his message. Interestingly, he keeps his voice on a soft breathy chest voice, or his normal singing voice. It is a stark comparison and it works beautifully for its contrast.

For me personally, this is Dimash at his finest when he is performing folk music. His passion for Peace, his hopes for a loving more gentle world for the future, his despair at the hate and mistrust the world is filled with, all portrayed beautifully because of his ability to story tell with such emotional maturity. This song always leaves me spellbound and deeply moved.

The second song I’m featuring today is the hauntingly beautiful Samaltau.

Samaltau is the story of a Kazakh soldier’s thoughts as he is dragged off to war during the 1916 war of Russia.

Watch the first video and feel Dimash’s pure undiluted passion for his story, feel his sadness for his past Kinsman, feel his heartache for the Soldier’s story. Then watch the second video beautifully drawn and produced by DrawnSpirit, to see the story of Samaltau. I was left saddened and speechless. I have no words to describe how I felt after both listening to and watching this song play out its story.

Folk music for me is the base line for every genre of music we know and enjoy today, it is where the story telling came from, it was how we passed down our history to the next generation before we could write or articulate sufficiently that we could portray the hells we had lived through and survived, the joys we had witnessed but could not describe.

Story telling in song is the oldest method of writing. People remember the words of songs as soon as they hear the music, the lyrics come unaided into our memories. We are hardwired to do this. It is how we catalogued historical events for hundreds of years.

I will never forget Samaltau or it’s story. It is forever engraved on my soul. It is all our histories wrapped up in one heart wrenching song, sung by one of the finest storytellers of our time.

For anyone wishing to see more of Dimash’s music please visit his official YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/c/DimashQudaibergen_official

You won’t ever want to leave… I promise.