Wales-Madagascar

Bicentenary Concert

Here are some more photos from the concert - more are available here:

Niddum Ensemble

Paddy Bush and Justin Vali

Craft stall

Wales - Madagascar Bicentenary Concert

Wales-Madagascar

Bicentenary Concert

Justin Vali and Paddy Bush were joined on stage by some fine musicians from Madagascar and Wales, and a great time was had by all attending.  Here's a couple of photos from the event, more later.

Justin, Paddy and friends on stage

Justin played the Valiha and other traditional Malagasy instruments

Click here for a video of a sample part of the event.

Wales-Madagascar

Bicentenary Concert

Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama Cardiff

 Saturday 22nd September 2018 

A special fundraising concert of Malagasy and Welsh music to celebrate
200 years of cultural connections between the two countries. See here for more information.

Justin Vali  Quintet

Justin Vali ranks among the greatest living players of traditional Malagasy music on the valiha, a bamboo tube zither which is considered to be the national instrument of Madagascar.  He will be joined on stage by Paddy Bush, a singer, songwriter and performer on many exotic instruments. 

Nidum  Ensemble

Formed of young professional musicians, The Nidum Ensemble is a dynamic, diverse and innovative group made up of young Welsh musicians from orchestras including The Royal Philharmonic, The London Symphony, The Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, The BBC Symphony and The BBC National Orchestras.

There will be crafts from Madagascar on sale in the foyer and also a showing of a short film about the first missionaries before the concert and during the interval.

Tickets: £17.50     Concessions: £15.00    Children under 12 free

Available from the College: 02920 391391 or See venue website for tickets

Bicentenary celebrations

What are we celebrating? An amazing piece of almost-forgotten history that started in disaster when, in 1818, all but one of the first group of Welsh missionaries, sent by the London Missionary Society, died of fever within eleven weeks of landing in Madagascar. The survivor, David Jones, went back to Mauritius to recover but later returned to Madagascar. A third young Welshman, David Griffiths, and his wife Mary arrived there in 1820. 

What followed was truly astonishing: Mary and the two Davids went up to the capital, learnt Malagasy and started schools, with girls included from the very beginning. By 1824, scarcely three years after their arrival, over 2,000 children were in school and being taught in their own language. The two Davids built a chapel and started preaching in Malagasy.  With the help of their most able pupils they then set about translating the Bible and the first complete edition was published in 1835.

At the request of King Radama and using the Roman script, they created a written form of the Malagasy language which is almost perfectly phonetic. As a result, learning to read has been a relatively painless process for generations of Malagasy children ever since.

Various events are planned to mark this bicentenary. Ny Ako, a group of Malagasy singers and dancers, will be touring the UK from 31st May - 18th June. Their programme will be detailed in another blog.  The Welsh Independent Chapels have plans for celebrations from 8^th – 10^th June in West Wales, from where the first two missionaries came, including a play, a concert and a service of thanksgiving.

Theresa, Co-ordinator of MfM for many years, is putting on a concert in Cardiff on 22^nd September featuring Welsh and Malagasy musicians. Details of this will be included nearer the time in another blog. 

Music reaches every part of life in Madagascar and when King George IV sent King Radama the gift of a piano he was overjoyed.  Some of the music composed by him in the 1820s will be performed in this concert.

Paddy Bush, brother of the singer Kate Bush, is Irish, not Malagasy, but he is a fine performer on the Valiha, the national instrument of Madagascar, and will be joining Justin Vali and his group in the Cardiff concert.

We look forward to seeing MfM supporters at one or more of these events.

To find out more information email info@moneyformadagascar.org or to make a donation visit www.moneyformadagascar/donate

By Theresa Haine

Thanking Our Volunteers!

Volunteers and Staff at the Merchants Pub

On the 18th of June, we had a volunteer get-together in Lancaster. It was a small way of expressing our thanks to volunteers who contribute their time and skills to MfM, and also a chance for them to meet up with each other.

Not all our volunteers could make it but those who could had a choice of two events to attend. One related to a concert put up by Lancaster Millennium Choir, a faithful supporter of Akany Avoko. The concert was for an hour and it showcased their latest piece - Charlie the Cello. Some of our volunteers attended this event and were also able to sell some Malagasy crafts and greeting cards to raise money for our partners in Madagascar. Others joined us at the pub, and you can see from the picture above that we were enjoying some lovely summer sunshine. We want to say a special thank you to our volunteers for all their hard work and commitment!

Ash Rofe receiving certificate

Earlier on this month, one of our volunteers Ash Rofe received a certificate from the Mayor of Lancaster at the annual Volunteer Awards which are hosted by the Lancaster chapter of CVS (Council for Voluntary Services). He was nominated in the category for Young Volunteer of the Year. Ash has been an intern with us since October 2015 and he is returning to complete his undergraduate studies at Lancaster University. Ash has come in to our office once a week every Friday and contributed his skills and knowledge to help us with a variety of office tasks. We thank him for his time and efforts and wish him all the very best as he enters his final year of undergraduate studies.

We would also like to thank Alice Tooms our fundraising intern from Lancaster University who has completed her undergraduate studies and is moving on to new pastures. We do hope that both Alice and Ash will continue to be in touch with us and will spread the word about the work that our partners do in Madagascar!

Wessex Strings serve up Concerto & Cake

This Sunday residents of Sherborne (and beyond) are in for a treat. The Wessex Strings will be performing a benefit concert in support of Money for Madagascar. The line –up is exciting:

Their conductor is a Venezuelan cellist who has performed in many prestigious venues all over the world, including in the Royal Festival Hall in London. The programme includes a Mozart piano concerto.  The soloist, also originally from Venezuela, was a prize-winner at the Royal College of Music and in a number of international competitions.   She has also performed with the celebrated Simon Bolivar Youth Symphony Orchestra.

Tea with home-made cake is included in the ticket price and some wonderful crafts from Madagascar will be on sale.  This promises to be a wonderful evening in aid of a good cause. 

Do come if you are anywhere in the area!