World Choir Games 2014 - Programme

Zigmars
Liepiņš
composer
The Peace Bell
The Opening ceremony of the World Choir Games at Arēna Rīga on 9 July will see
the Peace Bell being rung to symbolically launch the eighth World Choir Games
in the presence of thousands of spectators. The Peace Bell will ring in the coming
together of five continents, 73 countries, 460 choirs and 27 000 singers on
the Baltic Sea coast.
The World Choir Games 2014 Peace Bell, one of the most important festival symbols
and comparable to the Olympic flame at the Olympic Games, was cast in
Amsterdam by Royal Bell-foundry Petit & Fritsen. The company was founded in
1690 and is one of the oldest family businesses in the Netherlands.
The bell that will ring in the Rīga Games is tuned to A1, 44hz. It is almost one
metre high and a metre in diameter. The bell weighs 480 kilograms, the clapper
alone weighing 20 kg.
The bell features the World Choir Games logo and the Games motto in Latvian
and in English: DZIESMA VIENO TAUTAS! SINGING TOGETHER BRINGS NA-
TIONS TOGETHER!
The sound of the Peace Bell will also ring out the World Choir Games on 19 July,
taking its message into the future.
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