Very Quiet Public attends 6 July Concert at Lithuanian Embassy

Due to the pandemic, a concert in Paris for the Lithuania Independence Restoration Day on 11 March 2020 was rescheduled to Lithuania’s National Day. On a beautiful summery day in June, vocalist Viktorija Gečytė, vibraphonist Nicholas Thomas vibraphone, and upright bass player Peter Giron moved their musical feast event to the Lithuanian Embassy courtyard

The trio transformed the embassy grounds into an intimate setting with a repertoire of familiar jazz standards and pop classics. But, it was different, and the public was unusually quiet, very much in tune with the post-Covid-19 times and courtesy of Rūta Jusionytė’s intriguing centaur sculptures.

The works of Rūta Jusionytė, a Paris based Lithuanian artist, provided the ideal background to this unique musical event. In a world still in the ban of a pandemic, art critique, Mikael Fajour, probably described Jusionytė’s work aptly by saying, ” through her eerie atmospheres of dreams and tales, she explores our fundamental sociality, and her paintings allow her to probe deeper into the enigma of alterity, staging the founding experience.” The concert with the unique audience and its creators will be available all to see here on YouTube from 6 July 2020 at

On 6 July the Lithuanian Ambassador to France, Nerijus Aleksiejūnas also awarded the “Star of Lithuanian Diplomacy” to Honorary Consuls Anne-Marie Goussard and Pierre Minonzio, of the Republic of Lithuania in the French Republic during a short ceremony in the Embassy.

After this ceremony, a small group, lead by Ambassador Aleksiejūnas went to the Arc de Triomphe to lay a wreath at the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The remains of a French soldier were buried in 1919 underneath the nearly 200-year-old iconic building. Ambassador Aleksiejūnas said, “This is the first time when Lithuania was honoured with such ceremony in Paris. It is very symbolic because this year we celebrate the 30th anniversary of our restored independence. The fight for freedom is universal.”

After the ceremony, some 50 enthusiastic and Patriotic Lithuanians living in France joined the embassy staff to sign the Lithuanian National anthem in front of the Arc de Triomphe on the Lithuanian National Day.