The Paraguayan folk dancers ensemble Tekoete has won the world’s largest dance festival for the second year running. Tekoete is a troupe from Fernando de la Mora, a city in Paraguay’s Central Department. The group took first place in the Senior International Popular Dance category at the Joinville Dance Festival in Brazil. Organisers confirmed the result, giving Tekoete back-to-back titles and placing Paraguayan folk dance before one of the largest international audiences the art form reaches.
A song written in exile
Tekoete performed “El canto de mi selva” (“The Song of My Forest”), a piece composed by Herminio Giménez, one of the most celebrated figures in Paraguayan music. According to accounts of his life, Giménez wrote the piece around 1937. He travelled through forest trails near Chirigüelo, close to Cerro Corá in northern Paraguay, after going into exile in Brazil following a coup in his home country.
His widow later recalled that he was struck by the sound of birds waking at dawn as he crossed the forest with his companions. He then set out to capture that chorus in music. Giménez lived from 1905 to 1991 and is regarded alongside José Asunción Flores and Agustín Barrios as one of the foundational figures of Paraguayan music.
“The theme we chose to present this year is ‘El canto de mi selva’, a masterwork by maestro Herminio Giménez, in which he expresses all the beauty of the forest, where one can appreciate, hear, and feel the fallen leaves of the trees,” said Cynthia Echagüe, the choreographer who leads the ensemble. She added that the piece gives voice to the wind, to the waterfalls of the Aquidabán river, and above all to birdsong, which she described as the true protagonist of the work.
Costumes inspired by native birds
Echagüe and fellow choreographer Ángel Ovelar designed the costumes. They drew on birds native to Paraguay, including the bellbird, the cardinal, the pitogüé, and the blue and red macaw. They also included two further species known locally as the chiricoé and the pájaro choguy. Echagüe and Ovelar directed more than 45 dancers for the Joinville performance. Paraguayan Folk Dancers “Tekoete” began as a project among former students of Echagüe’s dance academy. It has since grown into a company dedicated to promoting Paraguayan folk dance alongside jazz, classical, and Spanish dance.
The 2026 title builds directly on Tekoete’s victory the previous year, when the ensemble won the same category with “Ñande Paraguay” (Our Paraguay). That piece celebrated national identity through well-known Paraguayan works, including “India”, “Recuerdos de Ypacaraí”, “Pájaro Campana”, “La Galopera” and the traditional “Danza de las Botellas”. Together, the two victories give Tekoete consecutive first-place finishes, a distinction the group highlights as a bicampeonato, or back-to-back championship.
The Joinville Dance Festival: a world stage for Tekoete
Now in its 43rd edition, the Joinville Dance Festival takes place in the city of Joinville, in the southern Brazilian state of Santa Catarina, from 20 July to 1 August. Ballet teacher Carlos Tafur and artist Albertina Tuma founded the festival in 1983. Since 2005, Guinness World Records has recognised it as the largest dance festival in the world based on the number of participants it attracts each year.
This year’s edition is its biggest yet. Organisers expect more than 16,500 participants and around 350,000 spectators over 13 days. Dancers from six countries outside Brazil are taking part. Many people in Paraguay see Tekoete’s success as a sign of the country’s growing international profile in folk dance while also reinforcing the group’s standing as a cultural ambassador abroad.
For more information, find Tekoete on Instagram.
