"Overture International Festival....."

Saturday was the International Festival, which was held at the Overture Center. We actually got moving fairly quickly that morning, since festival activities began at 11 AM.

The Swiss Alphorns are from New Glarus. The Alphorns are actually made from pine trees that grow from the side of a mountain. That is how the bend is created at the bottom of the horn. It grows out from the mountain, then curves, reaching for the sun. :) The tree is cut to approximately 12' long, then split in half, carved out, and then put back together, making the hollow horn. In Switzerland, they were used to communicate from mountain village to mountain village. All the sounds that come out of the horns are made by the person using only his mouth while blowing into the horn, similar to how the early trumpet worked, I guess. The music was slow but varied and quite beautiful.

The next performance we saw was put on by the Zhong Yi Kung Fu Association. They performed the traditional Chinese Lion Dance. The music accompanying the dance was made by drums and cymbals.


There were 4 or 5 lions (2 person)....all going different directions.....



Colorful, eh?


They even went up onto other levels of the Overture Center. We left after awhile to go to the next performance that we'd chosen to see.......The Tania Tandias Flamenco Dancers, whom you will see in tomorrow's blog entry. :)