Lejla Maltija by Lejla Maltija

This is the official release of Lejla Maltija by Lejla Maltija

Lejla Maltija means Maltese Evening. The melody is a typical Maltese 'għana' guitar line
The track carries the name of the project and is about a wistful nostalgic Maltese man remembering his island home while living abroad. The lyrics and the translation follow.

Lejla Maltija

Din il-Lejla hekk sabiħa, din il-lejla Maltija
Il-mewġ jgħanni għanja helwa,
Taħt is-sema hekk kaħlanija,
Din il-lejla minn tfuliti,
Din il-lejla Maltija,
Hekk il-bogħod minn pajjiżi,
Ħallini niftakar ftit.

This amazing evening, this Maltese evening,
The waves chant a sweet melody,
Under such a blue blue sky.
This evening I recall from my childhood,
This Maltese evening,
So far away from my homeland,
Allow me to reminiscence a little.

Din il-lejla taħt il-qamar,
Ħafna għerf u ħafna sabar,
Is-sajjied bil-palmi u 'l-lampi,
Jittanta il-lampuki minn taħt il-baħar,
Din il-lejla minn tfuliti,
Din il-lejla Maltija,
Hekk il-bogħod minn pajjiżi,
Ħallini niftakar ftit.

This evening under the moon,
A lot of wisdom and patience,
The fisherman with plan leaves and lamps,
Trying to tempt the lampuki from beneath the sea.
This evening I recall from my childhood,
This Maltese evening,
So far away from my homeland,
Allow me to reminiscence a little.

Check out the track at the link below.

This is the Official Video for Lejla Maltija by Lejla Maltija

Qalb il-Buzbiez

Qalb il-Buzbiez is an orginal tune by Lejla Maltija performed by Mario Cordina on the flute. Pictures by Anidroc.
The wooden flute is one of Malta's folk instruments as is the case with most ancient cultures.The tune is based on Maltese traditional flute harmonies. The pictures are mounted in such a way as to draw attention to the various instruments playing together in this piece. Try to follow which instrument is being emphasised by the pictures.

Buzbiez is the word for fennel. A herb that can be found everywhere on the islands of Malta and a favourite with pasta and sea food dishes. 

The word 'Qalb,' means amongst, at the heart of the fennel. Wied il-Buzbiez is the name of a valley off the limits of Dingli and Rabat. Il-Farfett tal-Buzbiez, an indigenous butterfly, so called because the fennel is its preferred feeding source, is in danger of extinction and has been brought under UNESCO protection.  

Quccarina Addolorata Cemetery.

Quccarina is the old spelling of the Maltese word for tea-spoon. Inspired by a tea spoon vibrating on the guitar in such a way to create a specific sound this is Lejla Maltija's first official recording. Performed by Mario Cordina and recorded at Anidroc Studios, this is an experiment in sound using classical instruments. The video is dedicated to the Addolorata Cemetry near Rahal Gdid and Tarxien. Photos taken by Ramon Casha. Filming  by Ania Cherry Wisnia in collaboration with Kamera NGO. A new Anidroc production

Quccarina: "Playing the guitar using a spoon, requires practice and a little imagination. It turns this string instrument into a percussive one. The melody is inspired by Maltese funeral dirges. The technique was basically inspired by my need to experiment." Mario Cordina 

The guitar must be placed face down and the left hand must hold the chords or notes as in normal guitar use, although the grip needs to be tighter. The right hand delicately hits or rolls or scratches the strings to achieve the desired effect and hit the right note.











Addolorata Cemetry is not a usual stop on a tourist's itinery. It is actually close to one of Malta's greatest attractions, The Tarxien Prehistoric Temples and right on the road to other hotspots, like the sea side village of Marsaxlokk with it's fish market and dainty boats, to Ghar Dalam, a prehistoric cave and to many other places of interest. However Addolorata Cemetry is a unique gem in its own right. 

Built between 1862 and 1868 on Tal-Horr hill which had already been a burial ground since prehistoric times, this monumental cemetery the largest on the islands, has a beautiful Gothic Chapel unique in Malta. From 1869 onwards, burials in churches were prohibited except for special cases as Bishops and Cloistered nuns. This cemetery is full of old Mausoleums and statues in marble and bronze and also contains 268 commonwealth graves from the two world wars.The chapel is run by the Capuchin friars of Marsa under the Authority of the department of Health. Its architect was E.Luigi Galizia, the same person who designed the Ta Braxia Protestant cemetery.

Interestingly the Addolorata was not meant to be a national cemetery but rather a burial place mostly for the towns and villages in the vicinity which had no burial grounds of their own. There was also a reluctance to use it at first and no one was buried here for the first few years of its existence.  Today over 200,000 people are interred here.. 

The Addolorata can perhaps be called a monumental cemetery because of its exceptional use of topography - with the cemetery planned very symmetrically around a hill with the main chapel at the apex. There is a dearth of impressive monuments although the western side of the cemetery has quite a few beautifully designed, privately owned chapels.

The starting point was the Dominican chapel where the nun Teresa Parlar was buried in 1927. Parlar was known as something of a mystic in her time and was controversially reputed to have eaten little if anything from the age of eight - surely a record as far as hunger strikes go.  Parlar got into some trouble with the colonial authorities because of her saintly reputation and she was for a time hospitalized and put under observation. Today she is all but forgotten.

One of the stranger curiosities is the tomb of a business family from Marsa whose crest is a tower. The tower is reproduced on the tomb and the family apparently chips a block off the tower every time a member dies.

Perhaps the most poignant monument is the one put up by a travelling businessman who, upon his unexpected return from abroad, so surprised his mother that she apparently died suddenly on seeing him. This is one of the finest sculptures at Addolorata even though it still has shrapnel damage (visible lower right in the photo above) when a bomb exploded nearby in the Second World War.

Also of artistic merit is the Sette Giugno monument which recalls the 1919 riots and contains the remains of four of the victims. The monument was designed by the Russian émigré artist Boris Edwards and recalls the style of our own Antonio Sciortino. Incidentally the cemetery did contain a few funerary sculptures by Sciortino himself but these have apparently all been stolen.  An interesting article on Boris Edwards can be found here.

One other oddity is the tomb of an unfortunate boy who was killed by a fallen brick. The actual brick that killed him was incorporated in the statue adorning his tomb. Incidentally the unlucky boy was nowhere near as ugly as the tifel tal-precett represented on the tomb.
 

A last oddity and infamy - there is apparently only one illegally dug tomb in the whole cemetery and this belongs to a deceased former politician who was notorious enough in his life. It is not pretty to speak ill of the departed but to carry one's arrogance into the next life is something else…