A performance with selected songs that capture the eternal alternation of light and darkness. Sometimes directly connected and sometimes inspired by the ceremonies of Spring, and what it symbolizes: From the wide range of musical reception for the passions, human and divine, which become one in the popular lamentation of the Virgin Mary of women during Holy Week, since the Virgin Mary is sung throughout Greece as one of the women of the village lamenting her dead son. Songs about mourning but also about the joy of life, of the long-awaited Resurrection that have always given and give meaning to the spring ceremonies. From the ritualistic folk lament of the Virgin Mary before Easter, to the municipal and urban rituals from the Greek area, the rituals of the Mediterranean, the Balkans for the celebrations of Spring, with themes such as separation, loss, the grieving mother, the woman, the refugee, passion, love and the sevdas that goes hand in hand with Spring and also mobilizes the change of seasons, death and life that in each of its cycles is resurrected and surprises us. A performance about the rituals that are being lost, from the elegy to the improvised feast of the company, the rituals that are gestated, nourished and perpetuated within the basic cell of culture, the company that is increasingly rare in the era of individualism and robotization. For the redefinition of the concept of rituals in today's world with the ultimate goal of genuine spiritual expression, far from outdated frameworks of human vanity that trap us. Through smaller human communities-choirs and other self-organized systems, with a common aesthetic, coexistence and smooth cooperation, we present to you a modern ritual with reference to Spring that, despite the obstacles, will always arrive in the end to share with us... lives! With songs, poetry and other spring stories, our great company comes to shed light on the deep darkness and at the same time to make us think about the blinding brilliance of false light….
Finally, we dedicate this performance to the just and hopeful struggle of the parents of Tempi victims for our society, so that injustice and the absurd that is baptized as rational in our time will not pass, but also for all the Tempi of our lives, the “rites of Spring” come to speak in an allegorical way about our human passions and to symbolize the change that is coming at full speed with the “Spring!”
“I am darkness and you are light and some gods have cursed us to mix only dawn and dusk”* *(Hainis, D.Apostolakis)
The choirs ‘’Kotza’’ and ‘’Lakkos’’ (names of choir members) participate with love and selflessness
And the musicians: Asteris Varveris: lafta, terrestrial lute
, guitar Sol Likertwood: Cello
Panagiotis Kapizionis: bouzouki
Maria Koti: musical direction, performance coordination, percussion, choir direction
Co-organization, co-curation: ‘’Thyrathen’’ Museum
(Note: The proceeds of the performance will be donated to a good cause, it is in no way for the selfless participants to profit from it! We thank the museum of traditional instruments ''thyrathen'' for the free use of its space for our rehearsals)