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Happy birthday, Moscow!
On Saturday and Sunday of 4 — 5 September Moscow citizens and guests celebrated the Birthday of Moscow that is conventionally celebrated on the first weekend of the first autumn month. The venue for simultaneous holding of several festivals and holidays became the Poklonnaya Gora and music did not die away here until the weekend was over. The stage located in the main lane became the centre of the celebration. The great musical festival “On the Moscow wave” was followed by a tremendous evening concert dedicated to Russian chanson. Close to the main musical stage, the folk quarter of the IV All-Russian Fair and Competition of Folks Masters dubbed “Russia — the land of craftsmen” was situated. The participants’ workshops in the open attracted all the visitors. One could see craftsmen here creating their wonderful pieces — in your presence true craftsmanship was coming to life — pottery, patchworks, caneworks from birchbark and vine, carved wood pieces. The participants of this competition coming from 40 regions of Russia competed in ten categories of folk arts and crafts. Moscow citizens were deeply enthralled by their work, asked questions, heeded advice of skilled craftsmen with the intention to make something with their hands. Visitors were interested whether they could buy all these marvelous things and received affirmative answer — all the pieces of art created by the participants were offered for sale on the last day of the competition. 
The guests on Poklonnaya Gora were particularly rejoiced to see an abundance of colorful tents and a vast assortment of articles and friendly smiling craftsmen in traditional Russian costumes. A lot of curious visitors accumulated in the pavilion with a potter’s wheel — a skilled potter readily communicated with the public and described his work with the clay. Nobody was left unmoved by the composition dubbed “Reminiscences of Arbat” — an almost life-sized donkey with a cart made of vine. People were wandering around looking after souvenirs they liked to the accompaniment of cheerful songs and dances of the participants of the folk festival “Moscow khorovod”. One could listen here to traditional Cossacks’ songs, Russian folk tunes and ditties, music and dances of Northern peoples. Around 120 artists of the best folk ensembles from various parts of Russia were involved in the performances. Eight major Moscow boulevards hosted the youth festival “The Boulevard of Arts” where numerous professional and amateur teams made performances for Moscow citizens and guests. A number of concerts were held in the centre of Moscow, in Pushkinskaya, Lubyanskaya and Teatralnaya squares. These days numerous parks and municipal manors of Moscow turned into celebration sites. The most sublime performance was held in the renowned museum estate Kolomenskoye, the international festival of travelling theaters “The World Caravan”. Vyacheslav Polunin made a true gift to Moscow citizens for the Day of the City having brought this festival to Moscow. The free access to the festival site enabled all the visitors to learn about the tradition of the street theatre rare to Russian people. 
Theatrical performances were preceded by “The White Carnival” staged by Vyacheslav Polunin in association with wonderful Japanese choreographer Shusaku Takeuchi. To the accompaniment of mysterious music spectators wandered along the park lanes where people-butterflies form Polunin’s theatre were moving among the trees in a slow dance. In the central square of the carnival camp the visitors were welcomed by people-masks from the theatre of “Wandering puppets of Mister Pezho”. Young spectators immensely enjoyed being actors in this performance, some would start mimicking the artists’ dance and imitating the lingering movements, some would play with these fantastic revived figures in white. At the festival one could see actors, clowns, artists and musicians from seven European countries. Plays of “Caravan” theatres were on twice a day — at noon and in the evening. The evening time was reserved for plays with trick effects. For example, the fire fairy show of the play “The Ark” by the polish theatre Osmego Dnia was extremely spectacular against the evening Moscow sky. Sites located in the open enabled spectators to move around freely from stage to stage during the festival. As regards the performance “Yaga’s Fire” by the French theatre Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes, spectators had to enroll for it well in advance for the number of those willing to see the modern opera in “baroque punk” style that combined puppet theatre, masks, music and machines, was far greater than the tent of this theatre could possibly hold. 
The czech theatre Divadlo Husa na Provázku brought the play dubbed “The Pig” to the festival based on the play of Vaclav Havel, the former president of the Czech Republic. Originally created as a street theatre, it has had its own building long since then and almost never takes part in such festivals, but the artists not only made an exception for the “Caravan”, but demonstrated that they have not forgotten the traditions of the street theatre. They were friendly and sociable in communicating with spectators before the beginning of the performance — they took photographs both with children and adults, making dancing movements, exchanged jokes — and they liked it! Although the jokes were in the Czech language but everyone somehow got to understand them. All in all, there were over 5 thousand various activities held in the capital of Russia during the weekend. The security of the citizens had been guaranteed — the public order in Moscow during the holidays |
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© 2010 Department of Foreign Economic |