Venezuela - End of Festival to Coroni

Well, it's been more than a few days since I've been able to blog, so I'll just post some of my memories: (Sorry, still no pics!)

At the final night of the Festival, SPC won an award for best song: "Si somos americanos," a song celebrating the shared heritage of all Americans, from the northernmost villiage in Canada to the southernmost tip of Tierra Del Fuego. Our director's own composition, "Let America be America Again" got only a lukewarm response, but it was cut down from 20 minutes of choir and brass ensemble to the last 6 minutes accompanied by keyboard, so I expect a better response when we sing it in its full form in Caracas.

Another of the groups that performed that night was Sies Seis, a Venezuelan vocal jazz group. I'm definately going to find a way to get one of their CDs, because it's exactly the type of music I listen to. I already know of a couple German a cappella groups, but this is the first time I've been able to find a South American group in this style. All their songs were in English or scat, but I hope they have some in Spanish too.

Yesterday we stopped in a small town to see the Festival of St. John the Baptist. Crowds of people in red were in the streets dancing and chanting "eh áh" (apparently an African word). At each intersection, four people carrying an alter with St. John as a boy made the sign of the cross, and people threw rice, lentils, and confetti.

After a couple of days on the road, we're relaxing for a few days in Coroni, a small beach town. I've got a bit of a cough, so I'm taking the day off to relax instead of going on one of the day trips. Last night there was another fantastic group of drummers. They were mostly just kids, but I couldn't manage to count most of the rhythms they played. We sang a few african songs and they played along lightly. Then we sang "Si Somos Americanos" and we had some problems. Some drunk guy misunderstood the point of the song and started chanting "Viva Venezuela." Doug tried to explain it too him, but he didn't want to hear it.

Usually Sergio explains our songs before we sing them with a particularly long speach before that one, and now I see why. Though many latin americans protest that they too are Americans, they've come to expect that estadounidenses use the word americanos solely to refer to themselves.

I'll try to get photos up later today using another computer, but that's it for now!