ZBS Presents: Moon Over Morocco

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TODAY on Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio — Fri­day, Jan­u­ary 7th, noon or 4pm Pacif­ic / 8pm and mid­night in the UK, the first install­ment of…

Moon Over Moroc­co

Once in a far away land there exist­ed a knowl­edge of nat­ur­al mag­ic that has been lost to mod­ern man. Jack Flan­ders treks to Moroc­co, believ­ing that in this prim­i­tive coun­try, where mag­ic remains an inte­gral part of dai­ly life, he may find this knowl­edge. Jack dis­cov­ers far more than he expect­ed when he steps through the Gate of Pea­cocks, the entrance to that lost world. Jack has stepped out of mod­ern day Moroc­co and into the realm where the knowl­edge of mag­ic is a req­ui­site sur­vival skill. Here’s a taste…

The envi­ron­ments in Moon Over Moroc­co were record­ed by author M. Ful­ton while trav­el­ling around that coun­try. You’ll hear the Med­i­na, the Cas­bah, the music of the snake charm­ers, the lone­ly call to prayer from the minaret of the mosque, the dogs of Tang­i­er as the moon becomes full, the music of the desert tribes record­ed in the Sahara and Berber music record­ed at fes­ti­vals in the Grand Atlas and Rif Moun­tains. Music was record­ed by Paul Bowles. Ten hour-long episodes.

Fea­tur­ing Robert Less­er as Kas­bah Kel­ly, Dave Adams as Mojo Sam and Tau­re­an Blacque as the Sto­ry­teller Mustafa. And of course Robert Lorick as Jack Flan­ders / King Has­san Bizel / El Kabah

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Tarot @ Teatime Episode 23: The Druidcraft Tarot

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Thurs­day, Jan­u­ary 7th, and we’re pleased to release the lat­est episode of our pop­u­lar orig­i­nal series on the Tarot: “Tarot @ Teatime”, on the air Thurs­days and Sun­days at noon and 4pm Pacif­ic Time/SLT, 8pm and mid­night in the UK.

In Episode 23, Hon­ey and Wil­low dis­cuss the Druid­craft Tarot.

Will Wor­thing­ton cre­at­ed the images for the beau­ti­ful Druid­craft Tarot. He is often inspired by the work of the pre-Raphaelite artists, par­tic­u­lar­ly their use of the nat­ur­al imagery of the British Isles cou­pled with the Arthuri­an leg­ends. He paint­ed the images of the Druid­craft Tarot deck using an ancient medi­um called Egg-Tem­pera, which is a tech­nique also used by the pre-Raphaelite painters.

Egg-Tem­pera is cre­at­ed using fine­ly ground pig­ments mixed with the con­tents of an egg yolk. The out­er skin or mem­brane of the yolk is punc­tured and the liq­uid yolk is drained into a cup, mixed with a few drops of an extend­ing agent such as white vine­gar, oil of myrrh, or even water. Then the ground pig­ment is added. The extend­ing agent keeps the egg-tem­pu­ra from dry­ing too quick­ly — oth­er­wise the egg yolk dries imme­di­ate­ly upon con­tact with air. Egg tem­pera is not a flex­i­ble paint and requires stiff boards; paint­ing on flex­i­ble media will cause cracks to form and chips of paint to fall off.

Wor­thing­ton paint­ed the Druid­craft Tarot images on care­ful­ly pre­pared wood­en boards paint­ed with lay­ers of ges­so, cre­at­ed from fine­ly ground white chalk and ani­mal glue, which were then sand­ed smooth. Egg-tem­pera dries quick­ly, and pro­duces a smooth, rich mat­te fin­ish when it is dry.

The Druid­craft Tarot, Philip and Stephanie Carr-Gomm (Authors), Will Wor­thing­ton (Illus­tra­tor), St. Martin’s Press, Revised edi­tion (March 2019), ISBN 10: 1250307422

Missed any episodes? Catch them on our Mix­Cloud feed!

 

Jazz On The Keys

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Today, Wednes­day Jan­u­ary 5th, we’re pre­sent­ing a pro­gramme of Piano Jazz. Well, pri­mar­i­ly. While many of the pieces we’re play­ing today fea­ture or include the piano, there are also some record­ings fea­tur­ing oth­er key­board instru­ments, includ­ing some inspir­ing pieces on syn­the­sis­er — hence the broad title “Jazz On The Keys”. Keep an ear out for Alan Haven’s Image, a late-night Radio Car­o­line clos­ing tune back in the day; Cam­bridge-based David Rees-Williams and his tri­o’s inter­pre­ta­tions of clas­si­cal works; two albums by Bil­ly Bar­ber, one (Shades of Grey) on piano and the oth­er (Light­house) on elec­tron­ic instru­ments; and some mar­vel­lous per­for­mances by Ian Lynn includ­ing his clas­sic album For­got­ten Sum­mer.

Don’t miss “Engines of Our Inge­nu­ity” every four hours from 4am Pacif­ic.

“Where Have You Been?” is cur­rent­ly on hia­tus: Sea­son 2 will begin short­ly.

“Shai Mae­stro” by Nathan Bul­li­vant is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

The Anniversary Ball

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Today, Sun­day Jan­u­ary 2nd, Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio is hold­ing a Vien­nese-style Grand Anniver­sary Ball to cel­e­brate a year of broad­cast­ing. It’ll be held in the Plaza in front of the Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio The­atre on Chest­nut Hills in Sec­ond Life, at 2:15pm.  And before that, at 1pm in the The­atre itself, a spe­cial clas­sic Old Time Radio per­for­mance by Sean­chai Library Live. Plus — a last chance to hear the lat­est edi­tion of Tarot @ Teatime! Here are the details…

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Anniversary Weekend Continues…

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Today, Jan­u­ary 1st 2022, marks the sec­ond day of our 1st Anniver­sary cel­e­bra­tions.

Our FEATURED MUSIC today is  Sat­ur­day At The Movies — On the air all day apart from times not­ed below.

Sec­ond Life res­i­dents, don’t miss our ICE-SKATING JAZZ PARTY with DJ Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er — at the Win­ter Hol­low Skat­ing Pond in Sec­ond Life, 2–4pm SLT. If you can’t be there in per­son, tune in to Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio and catch the music. On The Air and in Sec­ond Life.

And tune in for THE MOST EPISODE 3 - join your host Susan­nah for the third episode of  The MOST — Music from the Orig­i­nal Sound Track - this month with music by com­posers includ­ing Ennio Mor­ri­cone, Les Bax­ter and John Bar­ry; from movies and TV series includ­ing tracks from Hell’s Belles, Sex And The Sin­gle Girl, East Side/West Side and more. Catch the show at 12:30pm & 4:30pm Pacif­ic Time/SLT, 8:30pm and 12:30am in the UK. On The Air.

 

Our Anniversary Weekend Starts Here!

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Fri­day, Decem­ber 31st, marks the start of our First Anniver­sary Week­end — yes, Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio real­ly has been broad­cast­ing for an entire year! We kick off the week­end with two spe­cial pro­grammes.

SWINGIN’ ON NEW YEAR’S EVE
Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er spins the discs for a spe­cial swing par­ty, live from the plaza out­side the Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio The­atre in Chest­nut Hills in Sec­ond Life. Be there in per­son or tune in to Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio and lis­ten live: 3–5pm Pacific/SLT, 11pm-1am in the UK.

THE MOST INTERVIEW
At Noon and 5pm Pacific/SLT — 8pm and 1am in the UK — tune in for a spe­cial inter­view with Susan­nah, the host of The MOST — Music from the Orig­i­nal Sound Track, her month­ly pro­gramme of film and TV movie music that goes out on the first Sat­ur­day in the month — in this case, tomor­row, Jan­u­ary 1st.

*Fea­tured image: iStock.

Music of Scotland

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As Hog­manay approach­es, today on Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio — Weds Decem­ber 29th — we are fea­tur­ing the music of Scot­land: from tra­di­tion­al pipers and Scot­tish Coun­try Dance bands to mod­ern pop­u­lar music from some of the nation’s lead­ing artistes.

“Where Have You Been” is cur­rent­ly on hia­tus until Jan­u­ary 5th, but you can catch “Engines of Our Inge­nu­ity” every four hours from 4am Pacif­ic Time.

“The Piper” — shot aside the A82 by dig­i­cla — is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Programmes & Events for Anniversary Weekend

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New Year sees the First Anniver­sary of Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio and we’re hold­ing a num­ber of spe­cial broad­casts and Sec­ond Life events to cel­e­brate it over the New Year’s week­end. They range from a spe­cial inter­view with Susan­nah, the host of The MOST on the 31st to a Grand Vien­nese Anniver­sary Ball on the 2nd Jan­u­ary.

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New shows on Mixcloud

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We’ve uploaded two more shows to our “Lis­ten Again” facil­i­ty on Mix­cloud:

A spe­cial pre­sen­ta­tion of Charles Dick­ens’ clas­sic sto­ry, “A Christ­mas Car­ol” — the time­less tale of one man’s jour­ney from miser­ly indif­fer­ence to redemp­tion.

Through the inter­ces­sion of the ghost of his sev­en-years-dead part­ner, Ebenez­er Scrooge jour­neys through time — and Christ­mas — with three Spir­its; observ­ing the caus­es, and effects, that his life choic­es have made — and will make, unless he changes his ways.

The sto­ry was adapt­ed for radio by Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er, based on the spe­cial abridged ver­sion that Dick­ens him­self used for his pub­lic per­for­mances of the work. Our pre­sen­ta­tion of “A Christ­mas Car­ol” is per­formed by Shan­don Lor­ing, Elrik Mer­lin, and Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er with music by Paul Mot­tram. The pro­gramme is a CEH pro­duc­tion.

“Tarot @ Teatime” Episode 21: In this Episode Hon­ey and Wil­low dis­cuss some of the plants that are part of the imagery of the Rid­er Waite Smith Tarot deck, and explore their sym­bol­ic mean­ing and how they enhance the cards on which they appear.

Check out our past pro­gram­ming on Mix­cloud.