Seeker

Why am I remembering the 'March of the Thumbs' on St Cecilia's Day? Well, St Cecilia is known as the patron saint of musicians and I am thinking about the significance of music in my life. The 'March of the Thumbs' was a memorable step in my musical development. I can still remember the excitement of my first formal piano lesson when I was about 5 or 6 years old. In that lesson Miss C taught me how to play the first piece in the beginners' piano tutor book - not only how to play it but also how to play while reading the music from the stave. I already had a love for the piano because my mother played it well. The sense of accomplishment at mastering that first lesson and performing it later to family and neighbours set me on a pianistic journey of progress, setbacks, ups and downs. Like life really - sometimes developing gifts and other times neglecting them. The March of the Thumbs only needed the thumbs of each hand, used alternately to perform it. An...

St Cecilia is known as the patron saint of musicians and it is her feast day today 22 November. This painting of St Cecilia and an angel by Orazio Gentileschi (1563 - 1639) and Giovanni Lanfranco (1582 - 1647) really appeals to me. The young woman is concentrating so carefully on playing her organ. The angel is holding the manuscript but Cecilia is not looking at it. Her expression is sad and she seems to be hearing an inner voice to which she is responding. St Cecilia is often portrayed accompanied by an angel. The reason for that lies in the mythical stories about her. She is supposed to have been one of the Christians martyred under the Romans, possibly in Sicily or Rome in the 2nd or 3rd Centuries A.D. The pious legends about her date from the 5th and 6th centuries. You can read one account here . Since she is known as the patron saint of musicians I think one way to celebrate her day is to listen to part of Handel's Ode to St Cecilia and look at some more visual im...

What better than Handel's Ode to St Cecilia for today's commemoration of Cecilia, a Christian martyr who died at Rome about 230 A.D. Handel's music is beautiful. The manner of Cecilia's death was not. The reason she became the patron saint of music and musicians is based on a romantic legend that she continued to praise God after her incomplete beheading. There are some truly ghastly descriptions of this but the Wikipedia article about Cecilia glosses over some of the more horrendous fantasies about her death. Ignore those and enjoy the music.