Philipsburg Manor Celebrates Annual Pinkster Festival, 5/16

The annual Pinkster Festival at Philipsburg Manor in Sleepy Hollow, NY will take place on Sunday, May 16, from noon until 6 pm.  Dining on traditionAl West Indian and African-American cuisine and enjoying drumming, dancing, and dramatic vignettes will be som of this year's highlights.

Inspired by the grand cross-cultural springtime celebrations jointly created by Dutch settlers and enslaved Africans during colonial times, Philipsburg Manor's Pinkster is a rousing re-creation. Pinkster was a joyous, festive occasion that celebrated the arrival of spring. For the African community riven by enslavement, it was a profound opportunity for family members and friends, many of whom were split off and spread out from each other, to come together.

Pinkster features dancing, drumming, African folktales, and cooking demonstrations. Musical performers include a roaming fiddler and a player of the kora, which is a traditionAl West African instrument.

African drumming and dance demonstrations will be led by Maxwell Kofi Donkor, a Ghanaian native and renowned drummer who is also an award-winning sculptor and art educator. Kofi has shared the stage with drummers such as Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead and Babatunde Olatunji and his Drums of Passion.

Other Pinkster performance highlights include storytelling by Joyce Gilliam Brown and African Colonial dance by Judith Samuel and the Children of Dahomey.

As in historic Pinkster celebrations, two highlighted events mark the day. The first is the Pinkster Parade and the Game of Lies, beginning at 1 p.m. After this elaborate ceremony of matching wits, the community crowns the Pinkster King. Later in the afternoon, the Election takes place, which names the Pinkster Regent, or leader, for the following year.

"Pinkster" comes from the Dutch word for Pentecost and was originally a Dutch spring holiday that combined religious and secular traditions. But despite the holiday's Dutch origins, Africans in New York and New Jersey were so successful at incorporating their own cultures into the celebration that by the early 1800s, Pinkster was actually considered an African-American holiday.

Pinkster Festival is sponsored by Con Edison. Admission to Philipsburg Manor is $12 for adults; $10 for seniors; $6 for children 5-17; and free for children under 5 and HHV members. Philipsburg Manor is at 381 North Broadway (Route 9) in Sleepy Hollow, N.Y. For information: 914-631-3992, www.hudsonvalley.org.

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