It's Showtime! Danbury Parish Church Flower Festival

Hello there!
My oh my, it has been a rather hefty week!  It's been my first proper week of teaching and it was hard-going! In addition, I didn't get home till 12.20am from orchestra on Tuesday and 2am last night from watching the Aurora Orchestra at the Late night prom. WATCH IT here on BBC iPLayer- it was AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMAZING! I've been conducted by this wonderful conductor and it is amazing to see how well he is doing!

Back to last Sunday!  My flute trio, Flautista, were invited to play at a Flower Festival in a village near Chelmsford.   The theme of the festival was "It's Showtime!" with an emphasis on arrangements that were representing some of the most popular stage shows.  I confess, I was intrigued to see how they would achieve this, having experienced some amazing flower arrangements at previous Flaustista performances and at my own church.

Come and have a look at these arrangements with me and enjoy the breathtaking ingenuity in which these artists have intertwined the beauty of creation with additional props to create a show to remember.

At the top here, we have the elegant simplicity of the stage show, Top Hat.  I thought the adornment of the white flowers and green foliage really did seem to emulate the outline of that top hat and cane, married with black drapes and the silhouette.

Above, Madame Butterfly, Puccini's most famous opera is presented by these proud spiky displays of pink and green with the Kimono-clad mannequin providing extra reference.

Below, River Dance is cleverly interpreted with these rigid tall towers of flowers cleverly reminding the eye of the line of Irish dancers with perfect posture.

Above, The King and I.  How clever is that green foliage and the flowers upon the bust reminding us of the Siamese costumes worn by the King's children and wife and those sprayed gold leaves.

Below, we have Cats. Confession- it is beautiful and very clever though would be hard to recognise without the cats! Maybe those long tendrils of green are paws stretched out.

Sunset Boulevard is obviously focused on the glorious colours of Sunset!

Below- the display in the bell tower is by my friend Pat, who I discovered goes to this church now. It was so nice to see her there!

I wish I could have captured the above display better because it was truly magnificent- The Phantom of the Opera!  The boat and lamp which he carries Christine Daae to his underground lair, the white tropical flowers so similar to masks, the red roses of Christine- the musical notes! Brilliant!

 Below left, Moulin Rouge is all brilliance and the real vivid showstoppers and flaunting it all stars of the flower world!
Below right- Follies is cleverly focused on feathery pink blooms with feathers to add to the impact.

Below left, Eliza Doolittle's Flower market is clever represented with the different colours in crates and her famous Ascot hat.
Below right- Bizet's Carmen is all Spanish hot colours and clever props.

The Lion King, below left, employs a breathtaking array of huge African blooms and mane-like foliage.

Below right, will you raise the barricade with Les Miserables?  The colours of France!

 Swan Lake below-all white feathery down and incredibly clever woven foliage.

Below right- South Pacific employs a beach and shells as well as tropical floral magnificence.

Joseph and his Amazing Technicolor dream coat below.  This is my favourite one!  Notice the sheaves of corn on the right!
Below right- Aladdin's lamp from Aladdin is turned into flower form!

There were some others, but my pictures of these weren't very good.

I was amazed and wowed by the incredible artistry and I was very honoured to be able to see these.

What do you think? Do you have a favourite?

xx

Woodham Walter Flower festival 2015 part 2

Here's part 2 of the Woodham Walter flower festival and I think these ones are even cleverer than the first batch!

Britt Pop and Punk:

The Union Flag guitar is sheer genius and so intricately put together! The colours really make it stand out! Plus, I only realised now that that is a punk's hairstyle on the left! Brilliant!!

Choral music:
There were two of these on either side of the altar and I like the obvious allusion to trumpets since lots of church choral music is based on psalms which often talk about sounding the trumpets!!!

Disco:

Oh, how I wish I could get a decent picture of this (I had to edit this and adjust exposure and clarity a lot on this!) but this was suspended above the doors to the church and I was amazed by the cleverness of creating a sparkling disco ball through flowers.  Apparently, this was really difficult to get up a tall ladder and hung up as it weighed a lot.

Latin music:

Again, the colours were majestic on this arrangement and those pink flowers were the key stand out flowers!

Musical notes:

There were two of these outside the church and they were very cleverly arranged with the additions of cut outs.

The conductor:

This was very dramatic taking the conductor's stand to cover it in flowers rather than trying to create a conductor out of flowers which would be very difficult! Definitely a beautiful statement.

The Pink Panther:
I wish I could have taken a better picture of this but the lighting was tricky with the light coming from the outside. Taking a specific piece of music, I loved the use of varying shades of pink gerberas for this.

Barbershop quartet:

This was in its clever simplicity, one of my favourites- the use of the stripy Barbers' poles and use of only white and red gerberas, this one was striking and I realised, having four little arrangements creates the quartet! 

I really can't wait to visit this Flower Festival again! Woodham Walter is definitely the place to visit for a Flower Festival!

Which is your favourite?

x

Woodham Walter flower festival 2015

I was lucky enough recently to be asked as part of my newly established quartet, Harewood Ensemble, to be asked to play at a Flower Festival in a church in an Essex village called Woodham Walter.   After the performance, we went to have a look around the flowers which were utterly sublime.  If you are around in July next year in the Essex area, I would really make the time and the effort to visit this annual event as the displays were truly excellent. It is truly the most exquisite set of displays I have seen over the years.  The event is supported by sponsors for each display which is lovely for people to feel they have contributed and to be acknowledged on the display name as well as the arranger.  The church had well organised it with performances and a tea-tent which sold cakes and tea in addition to preserves and there seemed a steady stream of people coming to look.  

The theme this year was Music and I really do think that the displays were clever.  As there are a few photos, I thought I'd share these in two posts:

Flamenco:  details such as the clever displaying of a guitar, shawl and fan added to the presence of this fine display with its oranges and yellows which made me think of Seville oranges and lemons.

Calypso:  The exotic blooms on this display were really fitting for representing the vibrancy of the Calypso and those pine-cone looking flowers reminded me of maracas!

Classical:  The white simplicity was stunning and I feel really reflective musically of an era that tried to achieve a simple elegance in the music with a focus on structure.

Jazz:  The orange and yellow flowers and the form they took really reminded me of a saxophone and the desk stands and dramatic black drapes really made the flowers stand out.

Bollywood:  Clever, clever use of colour in this bold and riotous explosion of colour- really suited the style of music.

Rock n roll:  these displays made me think of girls in full-petticoated skirts dancing around to the music.  Such ebullient colours really reflect the youth of this music.

Lullaby music:  the white drapes and an emphasis on the simplicy of whites, baby-pinks and baby-blues showed the innocence of childhood.

Opera: With a stunning scene at the feet of the pedestals of these two main white displays, I was put in mind of two primadonnas commanding the stage.

Baroque: the ornate elegance of the floral display reflects the architecture of the Baroque era and that clever sculpted violin shows the development of the violin and makers such as Stradivari in the Baroque era.

Part two will follow soon and there is one with sheer genius in the second set.

xxx