Mqabba fireworks display tonight

A free spectacle of colour and music - without the deafening noise usually associated with fireworks - is being promised by the Mqabba fireworks factory this evening in a show starting at 9.45 p.m.

The sound and light show by the winners of this year's Malta Fireworks Festival, held earlier this year over the Grand Harbour, is best seen and heard from along the Mqabba bypass.

The St Mary Fireworks Factory belongs to the King George V Band Club, set up in 1910. It has been setting off fireworks to music since 1997.

This means that, because of the need to synchronise the two, the loud bags heard in traditional fireworks displays are absent.

"Naturally there is always an explosion - the fireworks have to explode to reveal their pattern - but it's not the deafening noise one is used to. We produce traditional petards too, but for shows the accent is on having a spectacle," fireworks manufacturer Ronald Zammit said.

Mr Zammit has just turned 40 and has been making fireworks for the past 12 years. Like many of the enthusiasts around the island, he learnt the skill through friends.

Patterns of Maltese crosses or stars are not what the Maltese are generally accustomed to seeing in fireworks displays at village feasts. And that's just two of the visual effects the Mqabba factory, with its 20 licensed pyro-technicians, is creating. "In addition to those who make the fireworks, we have a number of volunteers who help with cutting the cardboard and laying the pipes from which the fireworks are launched. We have to install hundreds of pipes and it's a laborious task both to fix them in place as well as to remove them after the feast," Mr Zammit said.

The launching pipes range in diameter from 2.5 to 30cm. Because petards are set off by computer during the sound and light show, no one is anywhere near them at the time.

The petards are put into the pipes the day before and are then wired so that they are fired "in step" with the music. Different sized petards explode at different heights, depending on the music.

In spite of changes in technology, there are still some old hands at the St Mary factory. The oldest licensed technician is Censu Galea, known as is-sulut, who is 68.

"The technique and manufacture of fireworks have changed over time but Censu adapted well and is very versatile to work with," Mr Zammit said. Some petards are huge, with a 25cm diameter standing some two metres tall and weighing around 40 kilogrammes.

Still basking in the glory of having won the festival, the enthusiasts at St Mary nevertheless have words of praise for the work done by their rivals.

Lija's St Michael Fireworks Factory, renowned for the magnificence of its fireworks displays, had won two awards, namely best colours and best shells, at the aforementioned festival while St Mary won three of the five categories - best synchronisation to music, best choreography and the prize for original fireworks - as well as the overall prize given by the international jury and the popular vote by the public.