When I was out earlier for my morning spatiamentum, shortly after 0600, I saw a star bright against the Moon-- below her and to her right, from my point of view; am not sure how one describes that 'geography' in the skies. Mars or Mercury it had to be but I looked about on the Interweb.
Mars will rise around 10pm ET, depending on your location, in the eastern sky. But shortly after midnight, it will have moved further south and will have a close encounter with the moon in the early hours of Sunday, September 6, on the East Coast. The fourth planet from the sun will have a conjunction with the moon that night, meaning you're going to see these two get nice and cozy in the sky.
Mars and the moon will almost be on top of each other. In some parts of the world, Mars will even be seen to disappear behind the moon and reappear on the other side. This is a lunar occultation, but you'll need to be in southern Europe, South America, or western Africa to see the occultation. It will not be visible from the United States.
Happily discovered, a few minutes ago, that the Chopin Institute in Warsaw sponsors a Sunday recital, in the season from May through September, at Zelazowa Wola, where Chopin was born; this tradition was begun in 1954 by the pianist and pedagogue Professor Zbigniew Drzewiecki. The pianist today is Dmitry Ablogin; a bit of Liszt and then two waltzes, the Nocturne in C minor op 48 no 1, a mazurka, the Berceuse in D flat major op 57, and the Polonaise-Fantasie in A flat major op 61. The piano that Ablogin is playing was made in 1838. He is performing an encore, Czerny's op 12 Variations on a Favorite Viennese Waltz by Schubert. Splendid, and worth the taxi fare.
I rose to say the Office at 0300 giving the livestream of Holy Mass from Saint-Eugène a miss; probably I won't 'attend' regularly again until Advent begins, although there is the solemn feast of Christ the King and then All Saints, which occurs on a Sunday this year. But I see that they will stream the Masses of Our Lady's Nativitiy on the 8th and of her Holy Name on the 12th, with the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on the 14th and of Our Lady's Seven Sorrows on the 15th-- so perhaps we are coming up to a 'run' of 'attendance'.
Vespers there in an hour or so; but I must go out to catch the bus. Holy Mass here at 0900. Well, I've put departure off for too long and so must call the taxi. The upside of this is that I don't need to leave the house for another forty minutes.
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I have succumbed to the charms of Amilcare Ponchielli, I guess; am listening to La Gioconda, a 1960 recording from the 1959 production at La Scala featuring Maria Callas as Gioconda.
There are still his I promessi sposi and I Mori di Valenza (the plot has to do with the expulsion of the Moriscos, the 'Moors', by Felipe III and was completed by Ponchielli's son... Annibale; Wikipedia says it hasn't been staged since 1915, Ponchielli's final opera) unheard on Spotify.
Vespers for the 14th Sunday post Pentecosten.
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