We have already reported about full moon delicacies, which are being produced during the full moon. Especially popular are full moon bread, cheese, sausage, coffee, beer and water. But there are also foods that have been simply connected to the Moon via their shape and therefore carry the moon in their name. For example the mooncake at the Chinese festival or the American »Moon Pie«, a sandwich cookie that has been made since 1917. [read more]
Peter Bradley Adams is an American singer-songwriter, who has managed amid the flood of commercial songs and loud beats, to tell his own story – with a warm voice and quiet sounds.
His song »Full Moon Song« from 2011 is one of those stories. According to his own statement, this song came to fruition after a short stay in prison (from which he did not break out as stated in the lyrics, but was released on bail). He talks about freedom that now becomes significant to him and makes a new life possible. He wants to see the world through the eyes of a child and experience love without fear of losing something. [read more]
Nena and her band belong to the most successful artists in German music history. With »99 Luftballons« from 1983, she made a name for herself internationally and also reached 2nd place in the US charts with the English version »99 red balloons« [*]. This has only been accomplished by very few German musicians.
In the song »Vollmond« [full moon], also from 1983, Nena sings about the silver Moon and describes the romantic longing and restlessness, which can capture us during a full moon: [read more]
Neil Alden Armstrong (1930–2012) was a US American astronaut, who was the first man to set foot on the Moon as the commander of the Apollo 11 mission on 21st July 1969, and hence the first to step on a foreign celestial body. The mission was preceded by a fierce competition about the »reign« of space, between the then super powers USA and Soviet Union, so that the success of Apollo 11 turned out to not only have a historical meaning but also had a political relevance. [read more]
In 1977 the English music group The Kinks, released their album »Sleepwalker«, with which they returned to the more rocky sounds of the 60s after a more conceptual and overtexted phase, and thus were at least able to resume their previous success.
The Kinks are considered to be one of the most important British rock bands of this time, next to The Beatles, Rolling Stones and The Who. [read more]
They have properly never met in person, Frank Sinatra (1915–1998), the American singer and entertainer and Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943), the Russian pianist and composer, although, mathematically it could have been possible. However, almost two generations lay between both musicians and stylistically they are probably worlds apart. But there is a meeting point indeed, that even has to do with the full moon. [read more]
Let us still stay with the music for a little while and let us bring our attention to a grand musical genre of theatre, the opera. We recently saw TOSCA (from Puccini) in Madrid and lo and behold! In the first act, we suddenly heard »luna piena«, which is Italian for full moon. A real highlight!
Then we had the idea to rummage through some libretti (opera lyrics) to find out if the full moon motif may also play a part in other operas. For this purpose, one can view the libretti online. We were interested in particular in the actual mentioning of it, as these were created by the composers themselves, whereas the appearance of the full moon on stage was usually the part of the stage designer. [read more]
It is self-evident to sing about the moon and some may have caught themselves humming a few quiet sounds while gazing into the full moon light. There are a large number of folk songs in all cultures addressing the full moon and having been passed on from generation to generation. Quite often, songs were sung in the evenings and hence it was natural that the moon would come into play. It appears to contain something inspiring. We have compiled a few examples of comtemporary songs about the full moon and realised that the word full moon can be found in numerous songs across all music genres, from Rock to Pop, from Jazz to New Age. Maybe it is the unattainability of the moon that is reflected in so many areas and experiences. [read more]
When Neil Armstrong became the first human being that set foot on the moon within the scope of the Apollo 11 mission in 1969, he said the famous words »That’s one small step for (a) man … one … giant leap for mankind« and hence erected a monument for this historic move. Rarely in history, did the success of human research and development work, condense so impressively in just one moment. [read more]
As is generally known, the Moon is not a disc but a sphere and one could ask the question if we actually get to see different sides of this Moon sphere? The answer is: no! At least this is true for the observer from Earth.
Indeed, we always see one half of the Moon. This is because the Moon is locked into the Earth rotation. This is called »synchronous rotation«. It means that we are never able to see the side of the Moon facing away from us. And until it was possible to photograph the reverse of the Moon with space probes, nobody knew what we would find or how it would look. [read more]
