Catherine the Great's St. Petersburg Court Concert

[cubanmiamiboy]

Reporting from snowy Helsinki, Finland!!

What a beautiful city, my friends...but my God...HOW COLD!! The snow is covering the whole city. BRRR..

Well, today I went to one of the activities of Sibafest, a music festival that has been taking place for three years now all around town.

http://www.siba.fi/fi/sibafest/programme_in_english/

Today´s concert was held at the Bock House, also known as the Old Town Hall, a beautiful XVIII Century building which also served as the official residence for the Governor General, the Tsar's representative in Finland for two decades in the first years of the XIX Century. Beautifully restored to its former splendor, the City of Helsinki nowadays uses it for official receptions and gala occasions.

http://www.virtualhelsinki.net/helsinkipan...a/eng/bock.html

A small ensemble chamber ensemble offered music by XVIII Century composers Thomas Bytrom, Domenico Cimarrosa, Osip Koslovski, Ivan Pratsch, Jan Ladislav Dussek and Dmitri Bortnianski. All very charming, but especially interesting the piece "The Sufferings of the Queen of France", by Czech composer Jan Ladislav Dussek-(1760-1812). Dussek lived and worked in France up to the very days before the outbreak of the French Revolution. He had been reportedly a favorite of Marie Antoinette, and so this composition was written to mourn the very last hours of the Queen. It was performed as a dramatized recitative by soprano Reeta Haavisto accompanied by pianist Olga Witthauer. The whole thing had quite a pro-monarchy feeling.

Will be back. Tomorrow I will be attending an orthodox service in the beautiful Uspenski Cathedral.

http://www.sacred-destinations.com/finland...x-cathedral.htm

[dirac]

Thank you for reporting, cubanmiamiboy. Please keep us posted. It's pretty chilly in some parts of the country over here, too....

[carbro]

... Especially if you're accustomed to Miami's climate.

I add my thanks to dirac's.

[cubanmiamiboy]

... Especially if you're accustomed to Miami's climate.

Especially if your very first encounter with the snow gets you buried up to your knees...!

[bart]

Cristian, it's finally gotten warm, sunny, and blue-sky down here -- after a week of Baltic grey. So, we're saving it for you. Enjoy!

[cubanmiamiboy]

bart...strange enough, even being so much snow and with temperatures from minus 5 to 0 degrees, I remember being way colder in New York with temperatures on the lover 30 s. It is because the air. It is a dry winter here. But, to tell you the truth, I start missing the beach already...