Today, Sun­day Jan­u­ary 2nd, Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio is hold­ing a Vien­nese-style Grand Anniver­sary Ball to cel­e­brate a year of broad­cast­ing. It’ll be held in the Plaza in front of the Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio The­atre on Chest­nut Hills in Sec­ond Life, at 2:15pm.  And before that, at 1pm in the The­atre itself, a spe­cial clas­sic Old Time Radio per­for­mance by Sean­chai Library Live. Plus — a last chance to hear the lat­est edi­tion of Tarot @ Teatime! Here are the details…

New Year sees the First Anniver­sary of Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio and we’re hold­ing a num­ber of spe­cial broad­casts and Sec­ond Life events to cel­e­brate it over the New Year’s week­end. They range from a spe­cial inter­view with Susan­nah, the host of The MOST on the 31st to a Grand Vien­nese Anniver­sary Ball on the 2nd January.

Tune in to Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio today, Fri­day 24th Decem­ber — Christ­mas Eve — at noon or 4pm Pacific/SLT, 8pm or mid­night UK time, for a spe­cial pre­sen­ta­tion of Charles Dick­ens’ clas­sic sto­ry, “A Christ­mas Car­ol” — the time­less tale of one man’s jour­ney from miser­ly indif­fer­ence to redemption.

Through the inter­ces­sion of the ghost of his sev­en-years-dead part­ner, Ebenez­er Scrooge jour­neys through time — and Christ­mas — with three Spir­its; observ­ing the caus­es, and effects, that his life choic­es have made — and will make, unless he changes his ways.

Our pre­sen­ta­tion will be broad­cast twice on Christ­mas Eve, the very day of the year when the sto­ry begins, at Noon and 4pm Pacific/SLT, 8pm or mid­night in the UK. The sto­ry was adapt­ed for radio by Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er, based on the spe­cial abridged ver­sion that Dick­ens him­self used for his pub­lic per­for­mances of the work.

“A Christ­mas Car­ol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Sto­ry of Christ­mas”, com­mon­ly known as “A Christ­mas Car­ol”, was first pub­lished in Lon­don by Chap­man & Hall on Decem­ber 19, 1843 and illus­trat­ed by John Leech. Charles Dick­ens arguably set the orig­i­nal prece­dent for the mod­ern tra­di­tion of ghost sto­ries at Christ­mas with “A Christ­mas Car­ol” and he wrote oth­er, lat­er ghost sto­ries that were pub­lished for the Christ­mas peri­od, notably “The Sig­nal-Man” in 1866.

Our pre­sen­ta­tion of “A Christ­mas Car­ol” is per­formed by Shan­don Lor­ing, Elrik Mer­lin, and Cale­do­nia Sky­tow­er with music by Paul Mot­tram. The pro­gramme is a CEH production.

In addi­tion to A Christ­mas Car­ol, we will be play­ing sea­son­al music all day.

Yes­ter­day, Decem­ber 21st, saw the Win­ter Sol­stice in the North­ern Hemi­sphere —  the day with the short­est peri­od of day­light and longest night of the year, when the Sun is at its low­est dai­ly max­i­mum ele­va­tion in the sky.

Since pre­his­to­ry, the win­ter sol­stice has been a sig­nif­i­cant time of year in many cul­tures, and has been marked by fes­ti­vals and rit­u­als. It marked the sym­bol­ic death and rebirth of the Sun; the grad­ual wan­ing of day­light hours is reversed and begins to grow again. Some ancient mon­u­ments such as New­grange and Stone­henge are aligned with the sun­rise or sun­set on the win­ter solstice.

Today on Vir­tu­al Com­mu­ni­ty Radio, we present a pro­gramme of Celtic and Celtic-influ­enced music, includ­ing tracks of a sea­son­al nature. Enjoy!

In addi­tion, there’s anoth­er chance to catch our sea­son­al edi­tion of “Where Have You Been?”, our orig­i­nal series cov­er­ing places to vis­it and things to do around the Sec­ond Life Grid. This time we vis­it the “Let It Snow!” region cre­at­ed by Mil­lie Sharple. More details can be found here. Tune in at noon or 4pm Pacific/SLT, 8pm or mid­night in the UK.

“Stand­ing Stones” by CZMJ is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0