Thursday, January 5, 2012

Music For Christmas 2011 - The Twelfth Day

Twelfth-night (The King Drinks), David Teniers the Younger (1610-1690)
This is the twelfth and final day of Christmas 2011. In the Western tradition, it is time for general merriment, song, dance, and feasting, and plays that turn the world upside down.   At Twelfth Night celebrations, it is time for the Lord of Misrule to turn those "above the salt" into peasants, and peasants into kings, to enjoy the mummer's plays, to let the feasting and wassailing carry on to midnight. As the clock strikes that hour the party ends, and Epiphany, the commemoration of the three kings's visit to the manger begins.

This year Trinity Wall Street, an Episcopal church in lower Manhattan, has sponsored a Twelfth Night concert series. Here are two selections by Claudio Monteverdi from that series:





And if readers want to see Twelfth Night partiers in action, here is some old-fashioned wassailing and good fun from Maplehurst, West Sussex, UK:

 

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