Bealtaine Festival April 26, 2008

The Bealtaine Festival 2008 is nearly upon us.  Bealtaine - celebrating creativity in older age.  A lot of emphasis is appearing in the newspaper now about how older people are being creative in many different areas.  For the past 3 years I have been playing clarinet with an adult beginner band.  Most of the members of the band have some sort of musical background and they have played an instrument when they were younger or they have decided to try playing a particular instrument for the first time.  The Rathfarnham Adult Band is what we call ouselves and we come under the umbrella of the Rathfarnham Concert Band Society.

For several years we have been talking about giving a concert - 5 years ago in its very early stages the band held a concert but I understand this was quite rudimentary.  This year we became more serious about it and a date was set and a hall was booked - we were committeed and it was going to happen.  That focussed our minds and attendance at our weekly rehearsals improved dramatically.  Excitement and trepidation went hand in hand.  The word went out to family and friends and last Friday night, the Concert actually took place.  The hall was full to overflowing.        Spring is in the Air was the title of our concert and

here is the programme showing the pieces we played. 

It was a wonderful evening and we felt absolutely euphoric over how well it went.  We did not play on our own however.  To boost our confidence - and needless to say to make for a much better sound - we had a number of “guest players” from the Rathfarnham Concert Band Society.  What a boost that was.  A very skilled clarinet player played with us in the clarinet section and she was so helpful in keeping us on the beat and at the right place in the music.  The same was happening in other sections of the band.   

I felt that this event was very definitely in the spirit of Bealtaine.