Today is the anniversary of the birth of Hamilton Lavity Stout in 1929 – a public holiday in the British Virgin Islands. He was the first and longest serving Chief Minister of the British Virgin Islands.
Classic paintings meet modern life…
Today is the birthday, in 1875, of French composer, pianist and conductor, Maurice Ravel. He is often associated with Impressionism along with his elder contemporary Claude Debussy, although both composers rejected the term. In the 1920s and 1930s Ravel was internationally regarded as France’s greatest living composer. His most famous work is undoubtedly Bolero. While on vacation at St Jean-de-Luz, Ravel went to the piano and played a melody with one finger to his friend Gustave Samazeuilh, saying, “Don’t you think this theme has an insistent quality? I’m going to try and repeat it a number of times without any development, gradually increasing the orchestra as best I can. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwLABSm0yYc
Today is Incwala Day in Eswatini (formerly Swaziland). The date is based on ancestral astrology. The Eswatini National Trust Commission gives the date as the fourth day after the full moon nearest the longest day, December 21st. This unique date rule means the festival can take place in December or January.
Incwala is Eswatini’s most important cultural event and celebrates the start of the harvest season. In the run-up to the festival, men journey to the coast of Mozambique to gather water.
It is only after the king eats the first fruit that the people can partake of the harvest. This is why the festival is sometimes called the ‘First Fruits Festival’, but that event takes place on the fourth day and the festival extends over six days, full of rituals and traditions developed over many centuries:
Day 1: Fetching the Lusekwane (sickle bush)
Unmarried male youths set off from the Queen Mother’s village and march 50 kilometres to cut branches of the “lusekwane” under the light of the full moon.
Day 2: Dropping the Lusekwane
The boys place their “lusekwane” branches in the national cattle byre/kraal. The elders weave these branches in between the poles of the “inhlambelo” – the king’s private sanctuary.
Day 3
In the morning, young boys cut branches of the “black imbondvo” (red bushwillow) and these are added to the “inhlambelo”. In the afternoon, the king is receives traditional medicines in his sanctuary.
Day 4: Eating the First Fruits and Throwing the Gourd
The main day and the public holiday: all the key players perform in a spectacular pageant inside the cattle byre; the king and regiments appear in full war-dress.
Day 5: Day of Abstinence
After the spectacle, excitement and noise of the main day, today is set aside to gather breath and reflect upon the year. During the daylight hours, there is no sexual contact, touching water, wearing decorations, sitting on chairs/mats, shaking hands, scratching, singing or dancing.
Day 6: Day of the Log
The regiments march to a forest and return with firewood. The elders prepare a great fire in the center of the cattle byre. On it, certain ritual objects are burnt, signifying the end of the old year, while the key players dance and sing inside the byre. The king remains in seclusion until the next full moon, when the “lusekwane” branches are removed and burnt.
Today is Armed Forces Day in Greece, honoring the Hellenic National Defense General staff, the Hellenic Navy, the Hellenic Army and the Hellenic Air Force.
This day coincides with another religious feast of a great importance in Greece, the Entry of the Most Holy Theotokos into the Temple. The feast is known for the Western Christians as the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. The feast is associated with an event recounted not in the New Testament, but in the apocryphal Protoevangelium of James. According to that text, Mary’s parents, Joachim and Anne, who had been childless, received a heavenly message that they would have a child. In thanksgiving for the gift of their daughter, they brought her, when still a child, to the Temple in Jerusalem to consecrate her to God.
Along with Beethoven’s ‘Ode to Joy’ from his Ninth Symphony, Bolero is one of the most frequent (and enjoyable) pieces played as part of a flash mob. Here the Copenhagen Philharmonic (one of the earliest professional symphony orchestras) invades the Copenhagen Central Station with a great performance. Enjoy.
Another Bolero flash mob today, this one by L’Orchestre national d’Île-de-France at the gare Saint-Lazere. I always love to see this piece performed well. Enjoy!!
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