General News: Beltane Festival This Weekend
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| A Maypole will be featured at the festival. |
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| Tommy Lindemann and Bernadette Montana organized the festival. |
May 06, 2008
A contemporary version of an ancient spring festival will be held this Saturday at The Grail in Cornwall-on-Hudson.
The Beltane Festival continues a tradition started by the Celtics and practiced throughout Ireland, Scotland and Wales to mark the start of summer. The ritual has been undergoing a revival in recent years in those areas, as well as in the United States.
The Beltane Festival in Cornwall-on-Hudson is being organized by Bernadette Montana and Tommy Lindemann, Jr., co-owners of Brid’s Closet, a metaphysical shop in Cornwall.
“Beltane is a celebration of fertility and new birth, with plants coming into bloom,” Montana said as she described plans for the event. Central to the day’s celebration will be a Maypole, which will be wrapped in long, multi-colored ribbons during a dance scheduled for midday.
The festival will feature merchants selling herbs, jewelry, and cloths, as well as classes in metaphysical practices like tarot card reading and psychic defense as well as yoga and belly dancing. Visitors are encouraged to wear Renaissance-style clothing.
Visitors will be able to listen to eight musical acts that will be performing on an outdoor stage. The music begins at 11 a.m. with acoustic folk singer Annie Rorick and is followed throughout the day with an eclectic line-up including a Spanish bagpipe player, at 1:30 p.m., and belly dancers at 3:45 p.m. The Gypsy Nomads, a French Gypsy Celtic band from New Paltz, headlines the day at 4:40 p.m.
Montana, who practices wicca, tarot, and Native American traditions, has taken part in many Beltane Festivals, including one that has been held for several years in New Paltz, but she has never organized one before. If this one is successful, she’d like to expand next year to a three-day event.
For ticket information and other details, call (845)458-8726 or email [email protected].
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