As we finally reached the so famous St. Patrick's Festival, I could understand why I've been hearing about it since I first arrived on the island!
Yes, Montserrat proudly celebrates St. Patrick's - not only because of its Irish connections but mainly to commemorate its slave history, specifically an unsuccessful uprising that took place on that same day in 1768. Nowadays, the island is one of the few places outside Ireland where the date is officially marked as a national holiday. The celebrations last for 10 days and a variety of events make the whole island especially cheerful.
Although it has been a short gap since our last production “Montserrat meets the World” I managed to get the groups involved in some of the events. The adult section of the choir performed for a Gospel Concert as part of the 50th Anniversary of the Police and the band PULSE got invited to play in two different events during the festive week.
On St Patrick's day there was a street parade in which Re-Beat played on top of a truck. Despite the hot sun shining on our heads, we kept the energy going throughout the two-hour parade, showing-off our groovy rhythms, while trying to beat up the volume of the other drumming groups walking behind us. The excitement of our group was visible and as soon as we finish, the students were already asking me if we could repeat it for New Years’ Parade.
Still on the same day there was a Cultural Show where the junior and teen sections of the National Youth Choir performed three local songs, accompanied by some students of the Ukulele Club.
In the meantime, I’ve been having some musician friends visiting from Portugal who have been helping me out with the projects, as well as giving a lot of input and ideas of things that can be done in such a peculiar place like Montserrat.
One of those friends, David, who’s both a musician and dancer, has been an incredible help in these last weeks. We’ve been putting our heads together to plan new projects, possibly involving some other groups. I knew from the beginning that it’s hard to get things started here on island, but I’ll keep pushing for things to happen.
In the meantime I got asked to play for a fundraising event for the Montserrat Children's Society at the Governor's Residence. With that in mind, me and David had a good time preparing a good bunch of tunes, from bossa nova, french and italian songs, a few tangos as well as some classical music. The people who attended the event seemed to have enjoyed our music, so we might arrange another gig somewhere else, while David is still around.
Besides that, I’ve just started my research for the next production… More news on that very very soon!
