We have had so far or since the 21 March a funny Spring, typical really of Eastern-Central Canada, bright sunny days with a cold wind and temperatures allowing for the snow to melt, slowly, slowly Spring is here. Flowers like the little daffodils and tulips are starting to sprout, so it might not be warm but it is nonetheless Spring. At any rate soon enough we will complain that it is too warm.
So I thought that this song composed by Ernest Chausson (1855-1899) would help in reminding us that Spring is here. At any rate in one month we are off to Europe, to Dresden, Munich and Salzburg for the Whitsun Music Festival.
Le Colibri sung by Sandrine Piau
Le vert colibri, le roi des collines,
Voyant la rosée et le soleil clair,
Luire dans son nid tissé d'herbes fines,
Comme un frais rayon s'échappe dans l'air.
Il se hâte et vole aux sources voisines,
Où les bambous font le bruit de la mer,
Où l'açoka rouge aux odeurs divines
S'ouvre et porte au coeur un humide éclair.
Vers la fleur dorée, il descend, se pose,
Et boit tant d'amour dans la coupe rose,
Qu'il meurt, ne sachant s'il l'a pu tarir!
Sur ta lèvre pure, ô ma bien-aimée,
Telle aussi mon âme eut voulu mourir,
I came across this piece composed by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778).
He was a philosopher, writer and a composer of music. He was one of the great lights of the Age of Enlightenment in France, like Voltaire and Diderot, though they had different points of view on equality amongst people. Also in reading Saint-Simon memoirs the notion at that time of equality was not what we think of today, the people, the great ignorant masses ruled by superstition were not present in the minds of the philosopher. They had a different notion, it was more a reform of the privileges of the Aristocracy, doing away with excess and a political ascension of the bourgeoisie, the King would be the King of the French instead of the King of France.
Le Devin du Village, an opera in one act, words and music by Rousseau, was presented for the first time at Court in the presence of the King at the Chateau de Fontainebleau in October 1752, one can imagine the magnificent background of the French Court for this opera which was only a divertissement, it quickly became a big success in Paris amongst the bourgeois. The aristocracy failed to see that it was a pointed critique. A line in particular asks: are their concerts better than our light street dances (musettes), Beauty without artifice or Pleasure without art, references to the excess of the Court.
I love these old French songs, the style is fresh and simple, the words easy to sing. The story is of a shepherd Colin and his peasant girl friend Colette, they are in love but he is seduced by a wealthy lady who lives in a Chateau and she is said to have run away with a gentleman to the City. Le devin du Village, (soothsayer) plays the referee for this couple, bringing them back together in this love story.
This is the closing song of this one act opera, the words sung, Let's go and dance among the Elm trees under the light of torches held high by our suitors (galant).
However one has to remember that Rousseau was a critic of French Society and of the Ancien Régime.
At the end of the opera, Colin the shepherd rejects the life of luxury at the Chateau and Colette the pleasures of City life among the elite. They prefer the simple idyllic pleasures of country life and their love, imagine on an antique theme. It is a rejection of the pleasures pursued by the aristocracy. One can imagine that the King who was an absolute ruler, laughed at all this silliness after all the Revolution was still 39 years away. Neither Rousseau nor King Louis XV would live to see it. It was for Rousseau a social comment of what he hoped would bring change to French Society. In a way today we have social media to do that, at the time of the Enlightenment it was a more intelligent and more articulate critique of society.
Allons dansez sous les ormeaux
Animez vous jeunes fillettes
Allons dansez sous les ormeaux
Galants prenez vos chalumeaux
Allons dansez sous les ormeaux
Répétons mille chansonnettes
Et pour avoir le coeur joyeux
Allons dansez avec nos amoureux
Mais n'y restons jamais seulettes
Allons dansez sous les ormeaux
A la ville on fait bien plus de fracas
Mais sont-ils aussi gais dans leur ébats?
Toujours content
Toujours chantant
Beauté sans fard
Plaisir sans art
Tous leurs concerts valent-ils nos musettes?
Allons dansez sous les ormeaux.
A little music for this Friday, the sort of music I like to play while driving. Well I am off again this morning to the National Gallery of Canada where I volunteer my time to help out at the museum.
Very interesting and fascinating place, so many beautiful things to look at and learn the history behind the paintings and sculptures in the various galleries, courtyards and gardens.
Music by Johann Melchior Molter (1695-1765), the age of the Baroque and of Frederick II of Prussia, Voltaire, Louis XV, the Age of Enlightenment.
Today we decided that despite the fact that it will be a quiet Easter at our home we wanted to decorate and do the traditional thing. So we have put together a menu which will include roast lamb with the roast potatoes and green beens, we will start with a giant shrimp cocktail and for dessert we have this wonderful Almond and Apple cake a recipe from our friend B.S.
It is gluten free and is wonderful. We also went to the local bakers, there are two on Elgin street a few steps from each other, both are Japanese. They make wonderful bread, cookies, pies and other special items daily.
Making coloured Easter Eggs with food colorant
from our favourite florist Minou at Bel Fiore Flowers on Elgin street
we found these beautiful natural flowers just sprouting out of the clay egg enchanting. This will be our table centre piece.
Russian Easter Festival Music by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov. The painting is Easter Procession by Illarion Pryanishnikov.
Easter this year was a simple affair, only us and one guest, but it was fun all around and the lunch was wonderful. We ate the coloured eggs.
so simple to make and it makes the table special.
But to start the day we had the traditional Hot Cross Buns
In setting the table we got special bread shaped like Easter bunnies
Our table with the Polish table cloth we purchased 14 years ago near Warsaw while we lived there.
With family tableware that is more than 65 years old and used at so many family events.
We were especially pleased with our centre table flower setting arranged by Minou of Bel Fiore accompanied by the Cristal egg with the small chick inside a gift to both of us some 35 years ago.
To accompany our espresso after the meal the Easter cookies, they are decorated gingerbread.
Today in Saint-Peter's Square, Easter Mass with Pope Francis
The government of our dear Leader Stephen Harper has demonstrated again problems in understanding how democracy actually works in a country like Canada. We are seen by PM Harper as the governed, an expression he and his party members use all the time when speaking of Canadians, us the taxpayers and citizens of this country, the Constituents who elect Members of Parliament. Harper and Company see themselves as great Lords of the Realm.
This past week again another example of this attitude of rejecting the concept and the role of Parliament when a Conservative Member of Parliament tried to ask a question and was stopped from doing so by the Party Whip. His question on selective abortion based on the gender of the foetus would have raised a point PM Harper did not want raised. By doing so the Party put itself in the place of the Speaker of the House. Only the Speaker can decide who will speak and be recognized. The sports team analogy is particularly inappropriate.
In the House, Elizabeth May, Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands and and Leader of the Green Party of Canada rose to make this point of Privilege on 26 March 2013.
Elizabeth May: Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague from Langley, as well as the hon. member for Vegreville—Wainwright. As a specific case, may I say this is one of the most important points of privilege I have heard in the brief two years, almost, that I have been serving here? It cuts to the core of what is wrong with parliamentary democracy that the hon. government House leader could put before you a sports metaphor that we are here as teams, as brands or colours, and we are all to take instructions from our team boss.
We are not here as teams. The principle of Westminster parliamentary democracy is that we are here as representatives of our constituencies and our constituents. We are merely incidentally members of political parties. Political parties do not exist in our Constitution. They are not an essential part of our democracy. They have grown to be seen to be the most interesting thing going on, and we have grown to see politics as some sort of sport. However, democracy is not a sport.
The Prime Minister and the Conservative Government House Leader, think that MPs are just Team Players like in some Hockey team. This way one Member cannot speak on behalf of a matter that may be of concern to his-her Constituents if it is not in agreement with the view of the Team Captain (Harper).
A thank you to Ms. May for making this intervention in the House.
Good Friday is a very quiet day, all the shops and businesses are closed for this holiday, so there is no one around, no cars, very few people.
As It Happens, a radio news commentary show on the CBC has been around for 45 years and the tradition on Good Friday, after they have done with the various segments of the show, is to have a reading of Oscar Wilde's short story The Selfish Giant.
I always found that story appropriate for Good Friday.
Simple and beautiful, with a wide appeal, though the story is about children and Wilde intended it to be read to children, I always thought it was aimed at our society and adults in general.
This is a not so well known symphony, the no.2 by Tchaikovsky. A very nice piece, entitled
''Little Russian''. You may recognize some airs as the composer took his inspiration from
folkloric music of old Russia. I am not familiar with this conductor but I do like his style, Vladimir Ivanovich Fedoseyev is 81 years old. He has a long distinguish career.
