Mari Kalkun is on a mission. Her aim: to bring the unique cultural heritage of Võrumaa, the region of south Estonia where she grew up: "to. the. world. – I mean, the big world." In the five months before we meet, Mari has been touring in nine countries, including Canada and South Korea, spreading the word about her home. "And now," she smiles, "is the moment when people are actually getting interested."

Mari has been described as both the "sorceress of traditional Estonian music," and a "jewel in the crown of the rich Estonian scene." The "mesmerizing Estonian forest folk" of her 2018 album "lmamõtsan" earned itself a place among The Guardian's best of the year in the world music category. Her most recent record "Stories of 'Stonia," has also received glowing reviews in the international press.

It's no surprise then, that when the organizers of Tartu 2024 European Capital of Culture were looking for outstanding artists and musicians from Southern Estonia, to be cultural ambassadors for the region, Mari's name was near the top of their list.  

"I've always believed in the force and power of culture. I mean, the whole idea of having states as such – it's all about culture," she says. And, when it comes to Estonian culture in particular, music plays a fundamental role. "Singing is one of the most essential things about being Estonian," says Mari, whether that's choir singing or ancient Runo songs (Regilaul in Estonian), which have "risen back to life" in recent years.

Then, of course, there are the song festivals.

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"Song Festivals have become an essential part of our identity and it's also one of the few things nowadays that still unites everyone, no matter what their political background. During the festival, that's not important. It's just important that we share something in common."

And Mari ought to know.

Last summer, backed by a choir of 30,000 young singers, she performed her song "Sata-Sata!" at the XIII Estonian Youth Song and Dance Festival. There were 51,000 people in the crowd at the Tallinn Song Festival Grounds that day, plus another 200,000 watching on TV. That's a pretty impressive turnout considering Estonia's total population is only around 1.4 million.

But what made the inclusion of "Sata-Sata!" in the celebrations even more special is that the song's lyrics, about sailing around the world and growing wiser on the way, are not sung in Estonian –  they're actually in Mari's native Võro.

There are only around 75,000 Võro speakers in the world, earning the language a place on UNESCO's endangered list. And, while the Võro community is making progress in their efforts to remedy the situation, it's still not fully recognized as an independent language under Estonian law – a problem shared with speakers of another south Estonian regional language – Seto.

"Independent language status is crucial for Seto and Võro in order to raise the prestige of the languages," head of the Elders Council of the Seto Congress Rein Järvelill said in 2023. In other words, it's "an indispensable prerequisite for their survival." And that makes the work of people like Mari, who are helping to keep these regional languages alive through their art and music, even more important.

"I took part in a wedding in summer," Mari tells me, "where we had two singing groups of Seto women and Võro women." For three straight days, they sang traditional songs from their respective regions, improvising the words around melodies and structures that, in one form or another, date back centuries.

"So, it's a living tradition," Mari says. "And this is a really rare thing. It's a tradition that has almost faded, but then it bursts to life and younger people, like me or my generation, we are actually giving it a new life. It's not only stage music – it's really in people."

"I think that's what makes Estonia so special – that we have retained those differences and unique local cultures in every region," she says. "It's like in nature – the more species you have or the more variety, then the stronger it is. The same thing goes for Estonia."

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The first time I saw Mari perform live was in Narva, the predominantly Russian-speaking town on Estonia's eastern border. It was May 2022 and Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine was painfully fresh.

At the last minute, the annual Tallinn Music Week festival moved to Narva for the day, bringing a start-studded cast of Estonia's top musicians to the city to perform. It was a cultural show of force, a celebration of European values and above all an assertion that Estonia is not where Europe ends, but where it begins.

Mari played her song "Somewhere There's War" that day. She'd written it on February 25, a day after Russia's full-scale invasion began, recording it just over a week later at her home studio in Võrumaa. 70 years earlier, that same room and house had been occupied by soldiers from the Soviet army.

"I didn't find it easy, but I felt a strong need to," Mari says, when I ask how she was able to create music at a time when it seemed like the whole world was falling apart. "Actually, it was with Anna," she explains, referring to her good friend, the movie director Anna Hints, who, thanks to her multi-award winning documentary movie "Smoke Sauna Sisterhood," has also been on a journey to take Võrumaa to the big world.

"We share the same roots, (we're) both strong personalities, creative women from Võrumaa," Mari says, adding that they share a common path in exploring those roots. "But also taking it beyond (that), exploring contemporary problems, contemporary questions and contemporary art basically. But the base is the roots – (that's) where we gain the power, the knowledge and everything."

On February 25, 2022, Anna and Mari made a new Runo song for Ukraine, "expressing our compassion and that we are actually with them or feeling with them. There was so much negativity coming from everywhere, from the media, from real-life stuff, all the war things. This is the only way to fight it – with positivity."

"Why we admire Ukrainians so much is not because of their weapons," Mari says. "It's mainly because of their soul and their character – it seems to be so strong. This is the main thing actually. Whatever happens, you stay strong in your mind. And it's culture – songs and films, that shape our minds."

And it wouldn't be long before things started to change even closer to home. "When the Nursipalu news came, also for three or four months, I basically couldn't work because all my attention was occupied with that thing."

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"That thing" is the Estonian government's controversial decision to expand the boundaries of a military training ground located in Nursipalu, at the very heart of Võrumaa. Currently, the facility spans almost 3,000 hectares and is used for training exercises by both Estonian Defense Forces (EDF) and NATO personnel. As a knock-on effect of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and the changing security situation in the region, however, the training ground is now set to be enlarged to around three times that size.

While no one doubts the need for Estonia to boost its security, the perceived lack of clarity over the planning procedure, along with the adverse impact on local residents, led to an angry response from many living in the region. Some have had to give up their homes, while for those who remain, traditional ways of life will also be significantly affected, not least due to the associated increase in noise pollution.

And so, it's not just the Võro language that is in danger. The very place from which some of that traditional music emerged in the first place, the silence between the notes, is felt to be under threat too. "The silence plays an extremely important part in my music and in being able to create," Mari tells me. "One of the reasons why I moved back there to my ancestors' home, is that I have this peaceful environment. I could choose any other place in the world, but this is the place. And this is my home – it's just my home." 

Last April, the first ever Võro Congress was held. Its goal was for the Võro people to achieve self-recognition as an indigenous people. "In this way we will be able to legally keep our land fertile and poison-free," said Võro-language writer Kauksi Ülle, who was one of the main organizers. After the congress, locals formed a human chain to protest against the expansion, in what was a nod to the 1989 pan-Baltic protests that spearheaded Estonia's march to re-independence. Then, there was a concert, which Mari headlined.

"So yeah, 'arts of survival' is definitely a very good title," says Mari. "It was already relevant before but lately it really feels that so many things are not about maintaining, but simply surviving. Things that we always thought of as something that we have, or we took for granted, more and more we are going to need to fight for them."

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It was October 2023 when I spoke to Mari at a café in Aparaaditehas, a former widget factory on the outskirts of Tartu. The next day, she was due to perform in a special show to introduce the full program for the city's capital of culture year.

Dress rehearsals were in full swing, final touches being added and there was a real sense that after all the years of preparation, this capital of culture thing was finally happening. A Tartu 2024 volunteer waiting by the door reminded us politely that Mari would be needed on stage any minute for a soundcheck.

But talking to Mari, it's clear that for her, the artistic concept underpinning Tartu's capital of culture year is about as far removed as it gets from all this rushing around. "I think a lot of the 'arts of survival' has become again about very simple things – community, slower life," Mari tells me. "A life more in tune with nature or being able to spend more time in nature. Those are all things that south Estonia offers to people."

It's an understanding reflected in "Aigu Om!" the festival Mari is organizing as part of Tartu 2024's main program. The name means "There is time, take your time" in Võro, and the aim is to explore "traditional ways of slowing down from different cultures." Forest experts and musicians from as far away as Japan are coming to Võrumaa especially for "Aigu Om!" "to find similar ground and make connections."

Perhaps they'll encounter the silence Mari holds so dear, or discover the spirit of Võrumaa, which, she tells me, undoubtedly lies in the smoke sauna. "I hope they can experience these things and maybe also find space and time to actually think," Mari says – to think about the problems we all face and consider whether our lives are really set up in the right way.

But above all, "Aigu Om!" will be a celebration of everything that makes traditional life in Võrumaa worth sharing with the rest of the world.

It's a whole week of "food, sauna, forest and music," Mari says. "All the important things?" I ask. "Yeah," she smiles, "the most important things."

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The Aigu Om! Festival takes place in Voru County from July 15-21 and is part of the Tartu 2024 main programme.

Mari Kalkun will be performing at Tallinn Music Week in April and also has several other live shows in Estonia and elsewhere throughout the summer.

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