May Day Festa del Primo Maggio

May Day è una festa celebrata il primo maggio nell’emisfero settentrionale, è una festa di Primavera, la festa che segna l’inizio della Primavera inoltrata, della stabilità della bella stagione e l’avvento dell’Estate, la vera fine della stagione fredda, dell’Inverno ed è un periodo adatto a festeggiare all’aperto. E’ l’equivalente delle antiche feste pagane di Primavera come Calendimaggio, Beltaine, Walpurgisnacht, Maiuma, Floralia, che, con l’avvento del cristianesimo sono state inglobate e trasformate in feste religiose cristiane oppure sono sopravvissute sotto forma di feste della tradizione popolare. Oggi, con la crescita del Neopaganesimo, molte feste della Tradizione Spirituale pre-cristiana vengono celebrate di nuovo con lo spirito di un tempo, come feste religiose e spirituali.
Nella festa di May Day non possono mancare i fiori, le ghirlande di fiori, i canti e le danze, il Palo di Maggio, il Re e la Regina di Maggio e, a volte, l’accensione di falò.
May Day è una festa che celebra la primavera inoltrata celebrata in paesi e villaggi sin dai tempi più antici quando si smetteva di lavorare nei campi, perchè il periodo di semina era giunto al termine, e nelle fattorie e le persone si riunivano per fare festa insieme e celebrare la fertilità delle Terra, erigendo solitamente il Palo di Maggio, spesso nella piazza principale del paese, palo al quale venivano appesi dei nastri di vari colori, ciascun nastro era tenuto da un danzatore che, danzando in circolo, avvolgeva il nastro attorno al palo. In altre regioni il Palo di Maggio era invece i Palo della Cuccagna, un palo eretto nella piazza principale del paese al quale venivano appesi dei vasi contenenti cibo o denaro, o dei salami e dei prosciutti, o altri generi alimentari e varie, il palo veniva cosparso di grasso e chi voleva si poteva iscrivere per arrampicarsi sul palo e tentare di aggiudicarsi un premio. Il primo di maggio è anche il giorno dedicato ai santi Filippo e Giacomo che sono diventati in Inghilterra i patroni dei lavoratori.
In Gran Bretagna la festa di May Day si celebra innalzando un Palo di Maggio, incoronando la Regina di Maggio e danzando la Morris Dance, una danza popolare inglese basata su passi ritmati e nell’esecuzione di figure coreografiche da gruppi di ballerini. Nella Morris Dance si usano bastoni, spade, e fazzoletti che vengono maneggiati dai danzatori.
La Festa dei Lavoratori, che si celebra in molti paesi del mondo il primo maggio, affonda le sue radici in questa antichissima festa.
Il nome Morris Dance deriva da “Moorish Dance”, “Danza Moresca”, che diventa nel 17° secolo Morris Dance. Questa tradizione deriva principalmente dalle tradizioni pagane celtiche e anglo-sassoni.
La festa di May Day fu soppressa dal parlamento puritano nel periodo dell’Interregno inglese e fu reintrodotta da Carlo II nel 1660. Il 1° maggio 1707 è il giorno in cui entrò in vigore l’Atto di Unione che unì l’Inghilterra alla Scozia nel Regno di Gran Bretagna.

A Oxford è tradizione che a “May Morning”, la festa locale del Primo Maggio, i “festaioli” si riuniscono sotto la Great Tower del Magdalen College alle 6:00 di mattina ad ascoltare il coro del college che canta i madrigali tradizionali in occasione della conclusione delle celebrazioni della notte precedente. La tradizione vuole che, dopo aver ascoltato il coro, alcune persone si tuffino dal Magdalen Bridge (Ponte Magdalen) nel fiume Cherwell. Questa usanza è stata praticata legalmente fino agli anni 1970, poi è stata vietata e il ponte è stato chiuso per evitare che le persone si tuffassero, a causa dall’alto numero di feriti, anche gravi, causato dal basso livello del fiume, solo 61 cm. Nonostante i divieti ci sono ancora delle persone che scavalcano le recinzioni e si tuffano nel fiume e restano feriti.
A Durham, per la festa di May Day, gli studenti dell’Università di Durham si riuniscono sul Ponte di Prebend fino al sorgere del sole festeggiando per tutta la notte con musica folk, danze, cantando madrigali e facendo delle grigliate. Questa di Durham è comunque una tradizione più recente rispetto alle altre tradizioni di May Day.
A Whitstable, nel Kent, la festa di May Day ha un sapore decisamente più tradizionale con le celebrazioni del Jack in the Green festival, ripreso nel 1976, con la sua processione annuale di morris dancers. Un altro Jack in the Green festival si svolge a Hastings dal 1983 ed è diventato un evento di grande importanza per la città; ed un altro ancora si svolge a Rochester, sempre nel Kent, dove Jack in the Green viene svegliato all’alba del Primo maggio dai Morris dancers.
Jack in the Green è un personaggio tradizionale delle parate della festa di May Day, un figurante recita annualmente la parte di Jack in the Green e si traveste con un’ampia tunica di foglie, di forma piramidale o conica, che lo ricopre completamente dalla testa ai piedi. Il nome Jack in the Green si usa anche soltanto per intendere il costume di foglie o alle ghirlande di foglie.

A Edimburgo May Day è celebrata a partire dalla sera del 30 aprile con il Beltane Fire Festival, di cui abbiamo parlato in “Beltaine -parte 4-”. Sempre ad Edimburgo, la tradizione racconta che il Primo Maggio, a May Day, le ragazze si arrampicavano su Arthur’s Seat e si bagnavano il viso con la rugiada del mattino per ottenere una bellezza durevole per tutta la vita.

In Irlanda la festa di May Day coincide con la festa di Beltaine e in Italia con la festa di Calendimaggio. In Germania si celebra la festa della Notte di Valpurga; in Finlandia si celebra la festa di Vappu; in Svezia la festa di Sista April (l’Ultimo di Aprile) o Valborgsmässoafton (Notte di Valpurga).
La festa di May Day è celebrata anche alla Hawaii con il nome di Lei Day, introdotta nel 1920 da un poeta e giornalista locale è stata adottata dallo Stato perché è diventata subito popolare.
Negli Stati Uniti d’America la festa di May Day è celebrata in modi diversi a seconda del posto dove si festeggia e spesso unisce entrambe le feste, quella di tradizione pagana, “Green Root” e quella della tradizione del lavoro “Red Root”, ed è chiamata anche Law Day.
In tutto il mondo la festa di May Day è la Festa dei Lavoratori, detta in italiano anche Primo Maggio.

Loreena McKennitt – The Mystic’s Dream

“A clouded dream on an earthly night
Hangs upon the crescent moon
A voiceless song in an ageless light
Sings at the coming dawn
Birds in flight are calling there
Where the heart moves the stones
It’s there that my heart is longing for
All for the love of you”
 

The Mystic’s Dream is the opening song of Loreena McKennit ‘s album ” The Mask And The Mirror“. It is a particularly evocative and powerful song, whose beauty and truth is lost in the meandering of time and space. It is a love song, where love merges as a mystical force. As the μυστικός, mystikos, was the initiate of a mystery religion, in fully conscious awareness of the mysteries of life through direct experience, intuition, instinct and insight, so Loreena McKennit ‘s song reflects that love dwelling with all Life and in the dreamy heart of the mystic, that unites the mask of appearance and the mirror of the soul.

Here the Muse has crossed paths with all the other folks around the world, with their musical heritage reproducing a fragment of their spirit and as Loreena McKennit herself wrote as introduction to the album:

 “ I looked back and forth through the window of 15th century Spain, through the hues of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity, and was drawn into a fascinating world: history, religion, cross-cultural fertilization….For some medieval minds the mirror was the door through which the soul frees itself by passing…. for others the pursuit of personal refinement was likened to polishing the mirror of the soul. From the more familiar turf of the west coast of Ireland, through the troubadours of France, crossing over the Pyrenees, and then to the west through Galicia, down through Andalusia and past Gibraltar to Morocco….the Crusades, the pilgrimage to Santiago, Cathars, the Knights Templar, the Sufis from Egypt, One Thousand and One Nights in Arabia, the Celtic imagery of trees, the Gnostic Gospels…who was God? and what is religion, what spirituality? What was revealed and what was concealed…and what was the mask and what the mirror? ”

The “Mystic’s Dream” was featured in the 2001 miniseries, The Mists of Avalon, based on the novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley, as well as the 1995 film Jade.

 

Personnel
Loreena McKennitt – organ, synthesizer, dumbek, piano, accordion, harp, keyboards, vocals, voices
Anne Bourne – cello, background vocals
Al Cross – drums
Nigel Eaton – hurdy gurdy
Ofra Harnoy – cello
Brian Hughes – guitar, balalaika, electric guitar, oud, electric sitar
Patrick Hutchinson – pipe, Uillean pipes
George Koller – bass, cello, tamboura
Rick Lazar – dumbek, percussion, drums, udu
Dónal Lunny – bouzouki, drums, bodhran
Hugh Marsh – fiddle
Ravi Naimpally – tabla
Abraham Tawfik – oud, nai
Strings – Kent Teeple, Marc Sabat, Sharon Prater, Douglas Perry, David Miller, Morry Kernerman, Sylvia Lange, Susan Lipchak, Fujiko Imajishi, David Heatherington, Heinz Boshard, Marie Berard, Andy Benac, Adele Armin
Victoria Scholars – choir, chorus

Links
http://www.quinlanroad.com/

Gwydion Pendderwen: Born of Trees -part 3

In 1979 Gwydion Pendderwen  published a songbook of his music and poems ‘Wheel of the Year’, with production help from Isaac Bonewits, Craig Millen and Andraste. He followed this in 1980 with ‘The Rites of Summer’, two musical fantasies he had performed the year before at the 1979 Summer Solstice gathering at Coeden Brith.

Early in 1982, Gwydion Pendderwen together with Starhawk, and other members of her newly emerging and politically active group ‘Reclaiming’, took part in an antinuclear demonstration at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California. During the protest Pendderwen and a number of others were arrested for civil disobedience and spent three days in jail. Gwydion Pendderwen described the incident later in a letter to Margot Adler:

“I spent three days in jail as a result of the blockade of the Lawrence Livermore Lab. It was a very empowering experience, in which I learned that my personal power and greatest potential in healing and reaching people is in music. The brothers, on the way to arraignment, began singing “We won’t wait any longer”, which I had sung in jail. They prevailed upon me to lead a chorus and sing it as my statement in court. It’s in the record, with a men’s chorus of 25”.

 

(Read part IV)

 

Sources and Links
www.controverscial.com/Gwydion%20Pendderwen.htm
pandorasbazaar.blogspot.com/2006/05/gwydion-pendderwen.html
www.chasclifton.com/2006/01/gwydion-pendderwen-re-mastered-earlier.html
www.chasclifton.com/2005/09/celto-pagan-music-i-am-not-exactly-go.html
annwfn.caw.org
www.bardicarts.org
Drawing down the Moon, Margot Adler.

Tuvan throat singing

Tuvan throat singing is one particular variant of overtone singing practiced by the Tuva people of southern Siberia.

The art of Tuvan throat singing is a style in which two or more pitches sound simultaneously over a fundamental pitch, producing a unique and vibrating sound. The history of Tuvan throat singing reaches very far back. Many of the male herders can throat sing, but women are beginning to practice the technique as well. The popularity of throat singing among Tuvans seems to have arisen as a result of geographic location and culture. The open landscape of Tuva allows for the sounds to carry a great distance. Ethnomusicologists studying throat singing in these areas mark khoomei as an integral part in the ancient pastoral animism that is still practiced today. Often, singers will travel far into the countryside looking for the right river, or will go up to the steppes of the mountainside to create the proper environment for throat-singing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is simply the harmonized sounds that they are able to produce from deep within their throats. Ordinarily, melodies are created by isolating the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th and 12th partial in accordance with the harmonic series (if fundamental frequency were C3, the overtones would be: G5, B♭5, C6, D6, E6, G6). The base pitch is typically around a G below Middle C.

The people of Tuva have a wide range of throat singing vocalizations, and were the pioneers of six pitch harmonics. There are several different classification schemes for Tuvan throat singing. In one, the three basic styles are khoomei, kargyraa and sygyt, while the sub-styles include borbangnadyr, chylandyk, dumchuktaar, ezengileer and kanzyp. In another, there are five basic styles: khoomei, sygyt, kargyraa, borbangnadyr and ezengileer. The substyles include chylandyk, despeng borbang, opei khoomei, buga khoomei, kanzyp, khovu kargyraazy, kozhagar kargyraazy, dag kargyraazy, Oidupaa kargyraazy, uyangylaar, damyraktaar, kishteer, serlennedyr and byrlannadyr. These schemes all use Tuvan terminology.

 

 

 

African American Work Songs -part 2-

In early slavery drums were used to provide rhythm, but they were banned in later years because of the fear that black slaves would use them to communicate in a rebellion; nevertheless, slaves managed to generate percussion and percussive sounds, using other instruments or their own bodies.Perhaps surprisingly, there are very few examples of work songs linked to cotton picking.

Corn, however, was a very common subject of work songs on a typical plantation. Because the crop was the main component of the slaves’ diet, they would often sing about it regardless of whether it was being harvested. Often, communities in the south would hold “corn-shucking jubilees,” during which an entire community of planters would gather on one plantation. The planters would bring their harvests, as well as their slaves, and work such as shucking corn, rolling logs, or threshing rice would be done, accompanied by the singing of the slaves doing work.

 

 

 

 

Another common type of African American work song was the “boat song.” Sung by slaves who had the job of rowing, this type of work song is characterized by “plaintive, melancholy singing.” These songs were not somber because the work was more troublesome than the work of harvesting crops. Rather, they were low-spirited so that they could maintain the slow, steady tempo needed for rowing. In this way, work songs followed the African tradition, emphasizing the importance of activities being accompanied by the appropriate song.

 

African American Work Songs -part 1-

A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a specific form of work, either sung while conducting a task (often to coordinate timing) or a song linked to a task or trade which might be a connected narrative, description, or protest song.

 

 

 

 

African American work songs originally developed in the era of slavery, between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. Because they were part of an almost entirely oral culture they had no fixed form and only began to be recorded as the era of slavery came to an end after 1865. The first collection of African American ‘slave songs’ was published in 1867 by William Francis Allen, Charles Pickard Ware, Lucy McKim Garrison. Many had their origins in African song traditions, and may have been sung to remind the slaves of home, while others were instituted by the slave masters to raise morale and keep slaves working in rhythm. They have also been seen as a means of withstanding hardship and expressing anger and frustration through creativity or covert verbal opposition.

 

 

 

 

 

A common feature of African American songs was the call-and-response format, where a leader would sing a verse or verses and the others would respond with a chorus. This came from African traditions of agricultural work song and found its way into the spirituals that developed once slaves began to convert to Christianity and from there to both gospel music and the blues. Also evident were field hollers, shouts, and moans, which may have been originally designed for different bands or individuals to locate each other and narrative songs that used folk tales and folk motifs, often making use of homemade instruments.

 

Fabrizio De Andrè – Songwriter & Poet – part 4-

 THE KIDNAPPING

At the end of August, however, a most striking episode occurred: De André and his wife Ghezzi were kidnapped for ransom by a gang of Sardinian bandits and held prisoners in the Supramonte mountain. The couple was released four months later; ransom was reportedly paid; as De André states in some interviews he was helped by his father in finding the money, and had to start a tour shortly after the release of the “Indiano” album to repay him.

When the bandits were apprehended by the police, Fabrizio De André was called as witness before the Court. He showed compassion for some of his kidnappers, since he was well treated by his “guardians” and declared his solidarity with them. “They were the real prisoners, not I”, he said. This declaration is a good example of Fabrizio De André’s viewpoint and approach. He said he understood they were driven by need, but he did not show any compassion for the higher echelon of the group that organized his kidnapping, since they were already rich.

This dramatic episode, and the hard life of the Sardinian people, gave him inspiration for his following album, released in 1981. The album is untitled, but, from the image of a Native American appearing on the cover, the mass-media call it “The Indian“. In Fabrizio De André’s poetical vision, the American Indians merge with the poor Sardinian shepherds as an allegory for the marginalization and subjugation of people who are “different”. The album contains one of his most famous songs, “Fiume Sand Creek” (“Sand Creek River”): in De André’s unique, allusive way it tells the story of the massacre of defenseless Native Americans by US Army troops on 29 November 1864.

 

 ( Read part V)

Links
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0207044/
http://viadelcampo.com
http://www.youtube.com/user/deandrechannel

Sources
http://www.fondazionedeandre.it/index.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/18/italy-fabrizio-de-andre

Fabrizio De Andrè – Songwriter & Poet – part 3-

Fabrizio De André ‘s first LP, Volume 1, was issued shortly after (1968), followed by Tutti morimmo a stento (“We All Died Agonizingly”) and Volume 3; both LPs soon reached the top of the Italian music chart. The former contained a personal version of “Eroina” (“Heroin”) by the poet Riccardo Mannerini, entitled “Cantico dei drogati” (“Canticle of the Junkies”). De André’s first LP, Volume 1, was issued shortly after (1968), followed by Tutti morimmo a stento (” We All Died Agonizingly”).

La Buona Novella (” (“The Good News”,1970) is a very symbolic, important album. It revolves around the Biblical apocrypha and it represents De Andrè’s dissent from the hypocrisy of the Church and its regard to secular interests in contradiction with the human and revolutionary figure of Christ.

Reserved in personality and a very accomplished artist, Fabrizio De Andrè was able to blend various tendencies and inspirations in his music: the atmosphere of the historic french songwriters; societally involved lyrics transmitted with crudeness and layered, poetical metaphors; Mediterranean and Italian regional musical traditions and an unmistakable simple, yet unique way of communicating.

1979 was another milestone in Fabrizio De André ‘s life. The year began with a series of famous live concerts from which a double LP is compiled; De André was accompanied by one of the most renowned Italian progressive rock bands, Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM); the albums were released as In Concerto (1979), and In Concerto – Volume 2 (1980).

 

( Read part IV)

Links
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0207044/
http://viadelcampo.com/

Sources
http://www.fondazionedeandre.it/index.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/18/italy-fabrizio-de-andre

Fabrizio De Andrè – Songwriter & Poet -part 2

 Fabrizio De Andrè has used ligurian dialect in his music, the Sardinian “Gallurese” dialect and the Neapolitan dialect. This added an unparalleled richness of flavours to his works. 
In Italy and in the rest of world he is considered a poet. His lyrics have been included in school anthologies of Italian Literature. His popularity and the high artistic standard of his ballad collections, was recognized even by long established institutions. Many streets, parks, squares, libraries and schools carry his name after his premature death.

In 1961 Fabrizio De André recorded his first two songs, “Nuvole barocche” (“Baroque Clouds”) and “E fu la notte” (“And There Was Night”). In the following years De André wrote a number of songs which spread his name to a wider audience, soon becoming the classic hits: “La guerra di Piero” (“Peter’s War”), “La ballata dell’eroe” (“The Hero’s Ballad”), “Il testamento di Tito” (“Titus’s Will”), “La Ballata del Michè” (“Mike’s Ballad”), “Via del Campo” (literally “Field Street”, a famous street in Genoa), “La canzone dell’amore perduto” (“Song for the Lost Love”), “La città vecchia” (“Old Downtown”), “Carlo Martello ritorna dalla battaglia di Poitiers” (“Charles Martel on His Way Back from Poitiers”, written together with actor Paolo Villaggio, one of De André closest friends), and “La canzone di Marinella” (“Marinella’s Song”).

( Read part III) 

Links
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0207044/
http://viadelcampo.com/

Sources
http://www.fondazionedeandre.it/index.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/18/italy-fabrizio-de-andre

Nick Drake -part 2

 Nick Drake fumbled blindfolded on the edge of the abyss, and his songs were thoughts that accompanied him while waiting for the fall when he died from an overdose of amitriptyline at the age of only 26.

Nick Drake was obsessive about practicing his guitar playing, and would often stay up through the night, experimenting and working on songs. A self-taught guitarist, Drake used tunings which made cluster chords available using more conventional chord shapes. In many songs he accents the dissonant effect of such non-standard tunings through his vocal melodies.

Nick Drake studied English literature while in Cambridge, and was particularly drawn to the works of William Blake, William Butler Yeats and Henry Vaughan, and lyrics reflect such influences. Drake also employs a series of elemental symbols and codes, largely drawn from nature. The moon, stars, sea, rain, trees, sky, mist and seasons are all commonly used, influenced in part by his rural upbringing. Drake writes with detachment, more as an observer than participant.

Rolling Stone’s Anthony DeCurtis described this attitude “as if he were viewing his life from a great, unbridgeable distance”.

 

 

 

Sources
Dann, Trevor (2006). Darker Than the Deepest Sea: The Search for Nick Drake, Da Capo Press. London.
Humphries, Patrick (1997). Nick Drake: The Biography, Bloomsbury USA.
Fitzsimmons, Mick. “Nick Drake — Under the Influence”. BBC.co.uk. Retrieved on 2 September 2006.

Links
http://www.brytermusic.com/
http://www.ancient-enchantments.net/nickdrake/index.htm