Can we have Kenneth Zammit Tabona’s views on this, please?
He voted Labour, he told us, because Joseph Muscat’s party places greater emphasis on culture (as he understands it).
Now The Times reports:
Għanafest got off on the wrong foot today, when journalists invited to a press launched were treated to political singing by some of the Għannejja in Zejtun.
Għanafest is organised by the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts. The Parliamentary Secretary for Culture, Jose’ Herrera, was present for this morning’s press launch.
Journalists were taken to a bar where they were given details of the festival and entertained to some Għana.
They were then shown a number of busts of singers in a nearby garden and taken to a second bar, where more għana singing was taking place – including political ghana in favour of Joseph Muscat and the Labour Party.
But do check out the video in the link below. Why wasn’t Kenneth there, revelling in all this super-tacky hamallagni with the PS for Culture, a very bored-and-embarrassed-looking Jose Herrera?
Baroque festival be damned. More of this is what we can expect, and anything else will have to be fought for, hard.
37 Comments Comment
Leave a Comment
http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20130407/local/political-singing-at-g-anafest-launch.464462
They may sing għana and be all folksy but they still call their children “Nordai”
.
A thumbnail sketch of Gorg Mifsud Chircop, if ever there was one.
Antoine, Antoine. Do I have to tell you everything?
Nordai follows the model of Budaj.
What happened today in Zejtun doesn’t augur well for European Culture Capital 2018.
It doesn’t augur well for life in Malta generally for at least the next two generations.
Gensna – this time round with energy-saving LED lighting.
Prepare yourselves for Gensna II: the story of our liberation from 26 years of PN dictatorship.
Thanks to The Times for informing us on what’s to come. No more taking part in this rubbish for me.
Ghana is beautiful and I really enjoy listening to some “Ghana tal-fatt”, but “Ghana Politiku” should be a No No.
That little boy is a natural. He’s great!
We shouldn’t replace baroque with folklore; they both have their places in culture.
Baroque stands on the highest pedestal, of course.
“Il-Budaj” was a Labour-leaning ghannej, but I think he turned in his tomb on hearing that “Malta taghna lkoll” ghanja.
That was a disservice to Ghana in general.
The boy was using a TVM microphone.
He will swallow his pride.
It’s the price to pay for the promised position to run the European culture show in 2017.
He definitely did not come all out for Joseph, just for the Baroque festival – he already had that. Being an egomaniac, he wanted more and something bigger to satisfy his expanding ego.
The pro-Labour ghana song in the article:
http://www.youtubedoubler.com/?video1=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DwfhsomIi1Pc&start1=34&video2=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D9Wqjc1S0z74&start2=150&authorName=Roy+G+Biv
If Country is the music of the oppressor, and if Blues is the music of the oppressed, then this dirge must be the music of the regressed; the sound you would make to annoy the neighbours.
PS Where is the most feminist government hiding itself?
Mr Zammit Tabona was undecided on which bow tie to wear
Oh, but the bars both had a roof so that’s fine for Mr Zammit Tabona. You can’t have Culture without a roof, you see.
“Among them this morning was six-year-old boy, Nordai Desira, who performed with his grandfather at Ta’ Ġanna Bar. Young Nordai sang that he hoped the leader and those around him would not forget the confidence shown in them.”
The Times.
North Korea, Gaddafi’s Libya, Hitler’s Deutsches Jungvolk, and Mussolini’s Giovani Balilla come to mind.
My thoughts exactly.
After receiving a hell of a put-down in this blog, Kenneth Zammit Tabona decided to take the Lino Spiteri route (he does this whenever Labour do something even he cannot excuse) and write about religion, charity, the disabled or a similar topic.
He did manage a single line about politics though, and in it he shrugged off all responsibility of the consequences that might arise from his political actions.
“While the social mores by which we live have been laid down by the all-pervasive influence of Christianity, our political ones have always been based on Greek democracy which oddly enough also requires blind and unreasoning faith to believe in without taking it with a sack of salt.”
That’s right. Kenneth Zammit Tabona thinks democracy is based on blind faith. Never mind the fact that our democracy is not really based on Greek democracy but British democracy. The birth of modern democracy with political parties happened in Britain.
According to Kenneth, democracy is not an educated and informed decision. It’s not about choosing the best people for the job according to track records, political plans and trustworthiness. It’s a leap in the dark. It’s a Damascus moment. It’s about deciding whether to swig from that jug of swishy, strange, brown liquid that the shaman just thrust into your hands.
The middle ages, the renaissance, the French revolution, Nazism, Communism, Fascism, Marxism, two world wars, numerous dictatorships and the utter destruction of Europe all count for nothing. Kenneth Zammit Tabona thinks that democracy depends on blind faith.
Our lessons in democracy were learnt the hard way, thank you very much. Just ask Mintoff’s and Karmenu Mifsud Bonnici’s many victims.
When someone as well educated and supposedly knowledgeable about history as Kenneth is reasons in this way, it makes you wonder what hope there is for the less educated and less informed.
What strikes me about the public, attention-seeking switchers is that at some point they all say or do something which makes you realise that, either because of arrogance, ignorance or both, they truly belonged to Labour all along and it was only a matter of time until they found their way home.
Maybe Goosio is an expression of our culture too:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/30/cyprus-luxembourg-italy-or-malta-which-country-will-unravel-the-euro-zone/
Check out the video introducing Malta. I know…I had never heard of this ‘goodwill gesture’ either.
I really don’t know why people are at all surprised with this trash coming from the PL.
I was expecting it and did not expect better. Some switchers are feeling that they have been done. And all this just 4 weeks after the elections.
Ghana is traditional Maltese song and therefore part of Maltese culture.
And?
So were the faldetta, walking your goat herd through Valletta, and driving around in donkey-drawn carts.
I would like to go on record as saying I like Ghana. It reminds me of the Iliad where Homer (Homer was not a single author but rather a whole army of orators) would go round telling stories through oral tradition.
The same exists in many cultures, in the Maori culture too for instance.
Yes, because Maori culture is the pinnacle of Western civilisation.
Excuse my disdain, but you may call me racist if you wish.
I am not cultural relativist but I have an appreciation for ghana as an expression of the land.
Certainly not MY expression. The expression of a tiny fringe minority of the land, perhaps. But it’s been elevated to a national art form post-independence, as with all manifestations of working-class culture. And so the darkness spreads.
Surely this is not the type of culture that KZT will be introducing as a side line at his next Baroque Festival
Din duttrina tal-Korea ta’ Fuq.
Hbieb, naf li se nkun cuc, pastaz u arroganti, imma rrid nghidha hawn qabel ma mmur norqod.
X’hin rajt dan ir-ritratt
http://daphnecaruanagalizia.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/state-1.jpg
ftakart fi strofa ta’ hekk imsejha “ghanja” antika jew ahjar barzelletta ta’ Ganni l-Laus:
TAL-KAROZZIN DAQQILHA L-HORN
U KULHADD JAGHAJJAT
“HOXNA GHAL-FORN”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CAYNuRppu5Y
Not so much Ghanafest as Taghnafest.
Il-kbir ghadu gej. Issa naraw Gensna b’Renato, il-Bajzu u Mary Spiteri tkantalna “Mitna ghal-Barrani” jew “Tema 79”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcMih-S_COg
Gensna was written to celebrate what the MLP labelled as “Jum il-Helsien”. It was produced around 1982.
Now, we should expect another rock opera to celebrate the birth of a new republic. Anything before that will be depicted as the dark ages.
The ghosts of Labour past are back to haunt our present.
Onor. Jose’ mur gib in-nanna Herrera tarak ma’ dik il-marmalja fil-hanut ta’ Ganna.
Of course, there is nothing wrong with ghana.
What is wrong is that the PL could never distinguish the difference between Party and Government.
They turn Government events into Party activities.
They think that winning elections and becoming the Government, they are now ‘Il-HAKEM’ and they own Malta with all its possessions.
They tell you ‘issa oqghod hemm, ghax issa il-power taghna’.
The give the best jobs to the boys Laburisti.
They think that they own you as well and that you have to be grateful towards them for their benevolence.
They believe that they have the right to insult and spite whomever they want. Even a President Laburist seems to believe in having the right to insult his people.
In other words, they follow a completely different set of ethics than those that we believe in.