Monday, August 13, 2012

Olympic Closing Ceremony


Football superstar: Pele appears on stage, wearing Brazilian colours, for a performance with former street cleaner Renato Sorriso
 Brian May of Queen performs together with Jessie J during the Closing Ceremony of the London 2012 Olympic Games
 The Spice Girls reformed to perform a spectacular set on the top of black London taxis at the closing ceremony
Traditionally, the closing ceremony is a chance to celebrate what the athletes have achieved, with Lord Coe describing the night as a time to "party, party, party."Entering the Olympic Stadium, the audience was treated to a vision of working London wrapped in newspaper as they were taken to the heart of the capital's busy rush hour.As well as typically rainy weather forecasts and stocks and shares, the reams of print celebrated British literary greats from the earliest surviving Anglo-Saxon poetry to current poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy, with extracts from Shakespeare and Milton along the way.A series of ramps - covering the track where Mo Farah and Jessica Ennis made history - formed a black and white Union Jack, the first of many versions of the flag to feature in the extravaganza.Unwrapped on a newspaper rubbish truck, singer Emeli Sande, who performed in the opening ceremony, delighted the crowds with hit song Read All About It.Percussion group Stomp emerged to swing from the scaffolding, playing models of the capital's landmarks including Big Ben and the London Eye as if they were instruments.
 Supermodels Lily Cole, Karen Elson, Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell walk the catwalk in a show of British beauty and designWithin moments, The Beatles' hit Because, performed by London gospel choir Urban Voices Collective, merged into Edward Elgar's Salut d'Amour by cellist Julian Lloyd Webber on top of the Royal Albert Hall. As the morning traffic jam came to life, newspaper-clad vehicles from black cabs and vintage cars to folding bikes revved their engines and honked their horns as newspaper-dressed businessmen and women portrayed a busy Monday morning on Waterloo Bridge.Winston Churchill, played by King's Speech actor Timothy Spall, stood atop Big Ben reciting the same lines from Shakespeare's The Tempest which helped open the Games 16 days ago: "Be not afeard: the isle is full of noises."As the deafening noise grew to a crescendo, Churchill brought the worldwide audience's focus to the royal box as a fanfare announced the arrival of Prince Harry and International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge.As Union flags were waved from car windows, the packed stadium was led in the British National Anthem by the London Symphony Orchestra and the Urban Voices Collective.

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