Saturday 16 February 2013

Le violette

The violet a little flower and listening today to WFMT Chicago, I heard two pieces, one by Scarlatti in Italian and the other in Spanish by Padilla. I long for Spring time which is not very far now and violets are nice reminder of days to come on this sunny but cold day in Ottawa. The violet is in the same family as the African violet and this is the flower I am more acquainted with being common in many households in past decades but not so much now.

Le Violette sung here by the late Luciano Pavarotti




The other song a famous tango, I always liked by José Padilla, La Violetera, sung here by opera, bel canto specialist Montserrat Caballé. She is, I am told, still singing and was in Vienna last year in Fille du Régiment.



We always had lots of African Violets, my Mom really liked them and they were on the window sill
in the kitchen or the living room.
Saint Paulia or African Violet named after Baron Walter Von Saint-Paul Illaire (1860-1910) discovered the plant in Tanganyka today Tanzania in 1892 and sent it back to Germany to his father an amateur botanist. They arrived in Canada as a house plant in 1926.

I don't think Violets are associated with Spring, though I remember seeing some in Rome in late March last year.
The balcony of Via Tronto, Rome.

2 comments:

  1. For Valentine's Day J bought me a box of Charbonnet and Walker violet and rose chocolate creams - a selfless act as he doesn't like the violets (though discovered the roses were exquisite).

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  2. I used to listen to WFMT every day when I lived in Chicago - oh how I miss that radio !

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