Local musician sings like a true Balkan

Mary Sherhart went to the now-shuttered Lincoln High School in Wallingford, but in a former life she must have been a Balkan troubadour.

Few folk revivalists sing with such authentic heart and soul. You'll know what I mean as soon as you hear her billowing, willowy voice with Balkan Cabaret.

The group performs at 8 p.m. tomorrow at the Porta Greek Taverna, 2245 Eastlake Ave. E., Seattle ($7; 206-860-0284). The group is composed of Sherhart; Joe Finn (violin and clarinet); Michael Lawson (accordion, vocals); Rich Thomas (bass, vocals) and Steve Ramsey (guitar, tambura, bugarija). Percussionist David Bilides joins them tomorrow, as well.

Balkan Cabaret got started a year-and-a-half ago, when two members of the Bay Area group Nisava moved to the Northwest. The new group's debut CD, "Nostalgic Café Songs From the Balkans," is a winner. But hearing them live, at Porta, is part of the fun. Sometimes whole tables of guests leap to their feet with their arms up when they recognize a song. It's probably as close as you're going to get in Seattle to a tavern in Sofia.

Balkan Cabaret performs an urban cabaret repertoire called Stari Gradski, or "Old Town," that cuts across Bulgarian, Bosnian, Croatian, Macedonian and Serbian cultural lines. Sometimes rousing and rowdy, but more often sentimental and achingly beautiful, these are the kind of songs that wedding crowds break out with the brandy, late at night.

"I didn't used to like these old-town songs," says Sherhart, whose Christmas production of Croatian composer Tomislav Uhlik's "Joyous Nativity: A Croatian Cantata" was one of the highlights of 2001. "But a few years ago, some Bulgarian friends asked me to sing at their wedding, and their parents liked this old, cafe style. When I saw those old couples dancing, something clicked. I thought, 'This is not some esoteric song from a village, it's universal.' It's kind of like country and western music — about loving and losing — and it changed my attitude."

Sherhart has been making such Eastern European musical discoveries since she was a troubled teenager. That's when she first heard Koleda, a Seattle folk-dance troupe that included Mark Morris.

"I went to see this show at the Moore Theatre," she recalls, "and it was like I was hit by lightning. It was a complete epiphany. I joined the group, and it really saved my life."

That was in the early '70s. Sherhart soon became choir director of the venerable Balkan dance group Vela Luka, then started her own choir, Vecerinka. In 1983, she went to Bulgaria for 15 months, learning the language and conducting amateur ethnomusicology surveys in the villages.

On one occasion, she was invited to sing at a huge concert on the shores of the Black Sea, commemorating the establishment of Bulgaria's first television music channel. (This was during the Soviet era.) "It really was an unforgettable experience," she says. "It was broadcast live and then re-broadcast all over the country."

Balkan history is a scroll of pain, and the music reflects it. This is, after all, the region where Muslim and Christian cultures have collided for centuries. One genre, called Sevdah, represented on the album by "U dul basti," sounds like the plaintive cry of the blues. "Duvni mi Vetre" and "Bolna lezam" come from Gypsy tradition. Interestingly, because this is an urban music, Argentine tango is part of the repertoire, as well.

"People cry when I sing the slow songs," she says. "I like to open up peoples' chests and take out their heart and massage it for a while and put it back in. I think that life is pretty tough. What I like to do is help people put their troubles on hold."

Paul de Barros: 206-464-3247 or pdebarros@seattletimes.com.