The highlight of the show was a group of musicians from Saratov, the Kristall-Balalayka. This group was UNBELIEVABLE!  What a gifted group of musicians.

Starting out they played many favorite Russian folk songs. You could tell the great majority of Russians in attendance new the songs quite well. Myself, and I imagine many other American men, simply appreciated there mastery of the varied instruments that were played. The two women singers were as good as any female singers we have here today, and I doubt there are many female performers here who can play there instruments as well as these two ladies.

Two-thirds the way into the show the group stated playing a tune that I thought resembled the song Venus by Shocking Blue. I was thinking to myself how nice it would be if they knew or could play the song. And as a few more notes were played, and a few more, BOOM, they went into it, "My baby she's got it" It was Venus! This group brought the house down with there version of the song. They were better than the original performers! As they played a few more songs that we were more familiar with you could more easily tell how truly good they are.

I understand that they will be staying in Dallas for the remainder of the coming week and then they are going back to Russia. Wanting to know if they might be performing again before they departed, but not expecting it, I was elated to hear that they will be performing two more times, on Monday and Thursday, in Plano and in downtown Dallas. I feel it's same to assume they won't be playing many Russian folk songs at the Hard Rock cafe!!

Anyway there will be a large number of us attending both of these performances. If there are any of you who are in the area, or might want to come here to see them, feel free to e-mail me (nunya@ix.netcom.com)  and join us while we enjoy the music from this unbelievable gifted group of Russian performers.