I happened to be in Tallinn for the 26th Song and 19th Dance Festival, known here as Laulupidu (which, I'd translate as song party). The theme this year was "Touched by Time, The Time to Touch." I admit, I'm not a big fan of that theme, but it's from a folk story (get your mind out of the gutters -- which admittedly, is where my mind went when I first hear it).
It took me awhile to warm up to a song festival. Choral groups are not my thing. But it was hard not to get caught up in the excitment. People at work were participating in the dance or the song party. The parade at the end of my street and it was interesting to see all these people wearing traditonal outfits, be it Estonian or Latvian or Swiss. (The Swiss men's group dressed up like they should be hiking up some mountains. They were kind of hot.)
I told myself, "I'll just watch the parade." And it was a long parade. The first groups started walking around 2 pm, and the last ones around 5:30pm. I ended up following the parade to the Song Festival grounds, about a 30 min walk from my apartment. And before you knew it, I was buying a ticket to enter the festival grounds.
It was crowded and watching the singers file in and take to the amphitheater took a lot of time. The warm up/killing of time consisted of a couple of waves from the top of the amphitheater to the back of the crowd.
I didn't stay for the entire concert. I have a limited tolerance for choir music, no matter how beautiful the singing. And I had hit it. It also didn't help that there was a lot of time in between songs because some choirs came off the stage and others went on. I don't envy the logistics of moving 10,000 singers. Plus, I also knew I could watch from the comfort of my own apartment, which is what I did.
