Festival Previews Video Blog

The 2008 Celtic Connections Festival is one of Europe’s biggest music festivals and takes place in the wonderful city of Glasgow. More than 1,000 artists from around 20 countries world wide take the stage along with local Scottish talent. The festival runs from the 16th January through to the 3rd February at 14 major venues across the city of Glasgow.

The headline acts at this year’s festival include the country and music star Steve Earle, the ex-Rolling Stone, Bill Wyman and a personal favourite of mine, KD Lang who has one of the most beautiful voices around. I was so pleased to read an article in The Sunday Times Magazine about her last Sunday as she had seemed to disappear off the radar scope.

Also performing are the great Capercaillie, Teenage Fanclub, Emma Pollock, King Creosote, Mike Scott, Julie Fowlis and the awsome Shooglenifty.

A new dedicated Celtic Music Radio station based at the University of Strathclyde officially launches today at 3.30 pm. Their full-time service can be found on 1530KHz in the Glasgow area. As well as keeping us all in the loop about what’s going on at the Celtic Connections Festival it will follow the cultural calendar year round providing news and feature articles from around the country of all the finest talent out there. We wish them every success.

Have a great festival!

Sydney is hot and presently in the throws of the 2008 Sydney Festival which began on Saturday the 5th. The Festival runs for 21 days and nights and welcomes over 1,000 national and international performers and artists who will showcase 120 events over the 25 different venue locations across the vast metropolis of Sydney.

The festival first began in 1977, the same year the great Australian rock group INXS was formed. The Festival’s packed programme includes dance, theatre, music (classical, jazz, folk and contemporary), visual arts, cabaret and circus acts. Not to be missed is the well known series of live outdoor concerts held in the Domain.

You can check out the regular Daily Telegraph reviews or read Nicholas Pickard’s blog for all the low down on what’s hot and what’s not at the Sydney Festival.

Mime originated as the ancient Greek dramatic art form, where players portray every day events using elaborate gestures without saying a word!

The 30th annual London International Mime Festival takes place on the 12th to the 27th January. The first festival took place in 1977, the inspiration coming from the Sydney born mime clown artist, Nola Rae who was awarded the M.B.E (Member of the Most Excellent Order of The British Empire) by the Queen in this New Year’s Honours List for her services to Drama and Mime.

If like me you think of stripey jumpers, baggy clothes, sad painted faces, gurney expressions and white gloves then we are sadly not in the loop of the modern day Mime Festival. While fond memories linger of the inspirational Marcel Marceau we sadly have to let go these stereotypes and embrace today’s modern London International Mime Festival showcasing the very best and exciting physical performance from around the globe. Elaborate puppetry, comedy, dance, theatre, hand-blown soap bubble creations, trapeze artists, acrobats, fire-eaters, jugglers and workshops now transform the fascinating world of mime.

Have a great Festival!

It’s New Year again!

Festivals are fascinating in that they are steeped in the culture and traditions passed down from generation to generation. The Burning of the Claivie (a large wooden barrel filled with tar and wood shavings) is an ancient fire festival that dates back to Pictish times but it has also been associated with the Celtic, Viking and Druid fire festivals of ancient times. The Clavie was ceremoniously burned in many North East of Scotland fishing villages centuries ago but was outlawed in 1704 by the then strict Presbyterian establishment because it was considered idolatrous and heathenish.

Somehow the people of Burghead kept the tradition going. This sleepy fishing village lies on the shores of the Moray Firth on the North East of Scotland. They celebrate Hogmanay with the burning of the Clavie on the night of January the 11th; the original date of Hogmanay before the Julian calendar was abandoned in 1660 for the Gregorian calendar. Defiant to the calendar changes, and perhaps one wonders to the 1704 law as well, the locals decided to enjoy the best of both worlds and celebrate New Year twice!

The Calvie is affixed to a strong wooden post by a specially forged nail called the Clavis (latin) which is reused each year. Once the Clavie is lit, the flaming barrel is carried around the town by 10 or so local men, usually fishermen known as the Clavie Crew. They proceed in a clockwise direction around the town’s fortification with a large crowd in tow. The Clavie Crew stop now and again at the homes of local dignitaries and present them with smouldering embers deemed to be good luck tokens for the New Year. Being a traditional fishing village they used to carry the Clavie around every fishing boat in the harbour but somehow this part of the ceremony has died out.

The Clavie is carried up to a stone alter on the Doorie Hill. It is then refilled, flaming the night sky like a beacon in the darkness of winter. The barrel eventually collapses and the blazing embers are dispersed all over the hillside where they are keenly collected by the local towns folk to kindle a New Year fire in their own homes - good luck tokens for themselves and for family and friends who have departed their home shores for distant lands.

Check out this website to see a picture of the Clavie. There’s even a video for sale of the Burning of the Clavie.

HAPPY HOGMANAY BURGHEAD!

Just had to share this one mega cool website with you. Enjoy Zune Journey!