POLARITIES - balance of power

As well as the elements (Earth, Air, Fire and Water) and the modes (Cardinal, Fixed and Mutable) there's a third aspect to be considered in a natal chart: polarity. Astrological polarities are variously described as masculine/feminine, active/passive, or Yin/Yang, take your pick!

Starting with Aries (positive/masculine/Yang) the signs change alternately positive/ negative. So:

Aries, Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius and Aquarius are all positive/masculine/Yang.

Taurus, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn and Pisces all negative/feminine/Yin.

Extract from Astrodienst (full explanation at website)

"The positive signs describe object-oriented, sociable people who are not afraid to jump into unknown situations. The negative or yin principle is subject-oriented, receptive, yielding, enclosing, withdrawing and inward-moving. The yin individual ‘is characterised by a reflective nature which causes him always to think and consider before acting. His shyness and distrust of things induces hesitation, and so he always has difficulty in adapting to the external world."

From Astrotheme's lists, some years ago, I noted names of some of the best known individuals who have Yin or Yang @ between 99% and 90% in their natal charts, reflecting in a high proportion of their personalities. I felt disappointed that easily perceivable difference between the people on these two lists isn't apparent. We know only their public faces though.

Men and women are listed separately, in case it helped to throw up any glaring differences between Yins and Yangs, but it didn't seem to do so.

Yangs include Anita Roddick, but Nina Ricci is amongst the Yins - both are, or were, very successful business women in similar fields. I'd have expected Anita Roddick to be among the Yins though. Kim Farnell is among the Yins - which seems correct for an astrologer. Paris Hilton is strongly Yang.

Do the Yang guys seem like a more macho, active group than the Yins? Not really. Er -wait a minute - perhaps the Yin males are a wee bit smoother? Bono has the highest Yin of all, almost pure Yin!

I wonder if these considerations might have more importance in relationship compatibility, rather than in straightforward personality assessment. Perhaps a strongly Yang person needs a strongly Yin partner, and vice versa.

Here are the lists. I've included percentages for first and last names in each list, percentages between are...well...between!

Yang - active - masculine

Paris Hilton 94.44%
Brit Ekland
Loretta Lynn
Barbara Walters
Anita Roddick 90.08


Ralph Bellamy 96.92%
Dan Quayle
Danny Elfman
Alfred Molina
Gary Puckett
Sasha Baron Cohen (Da Ali G)
Paul Hogan (Crocodile Dundee)
Jimmy Durante
Hoagy Carmichael
Stan Laurel
Barry Manilow 90.95%


Yin - passive - feminine

Kim Wilde 98.08%
Cindy Crawford
Maureen O'Sullivan
Kim Farnell
Nina Ricci 90.83%

Bono 99.09%
Keanu Reeves
Kurt Cobain
William Friedkin
Upton Sinclair
Keith Urban
Gary Player
BB King
Adam Sandler
Bob Kennedy 91.23%

Remember the balance; the give-and-take of energy. The symbol of yin and yang is more than the integration of male and female. It’s also the balance of light and dark, soft and hard, active and passive, in and out, giver and receiver. You can’t have one without the other.
― Brownell Landrum, A Chorus of Voices: DUET stories Volume III - Adult Version.

The circle that represents the whole is divided into Yin (black) and Yang (white) halves--two polar complements in harmonious balance. The two smaller circles in the centers (the eyes), shaded in the opposite color, illustrate that within Yin there is Yang, and vice versa. Yin and Yang contain within themselves, at their very centers, the seeds of change. The curve dividing them indicates that this change is dynamic and continuous. Each half invades the other half and establishes itself in the center of its opposite.
SIMMONE KUO, Yin-Yang in Tai-Chi Chuan and Daily Life.


The Pentacle - The ancients envisioned their world in two halves - masculine and feminine. Their gods and goddesses worked to keep a balance of power. Yin and Yang. When male and female were balanced, there was harmony in the world. When they were unbalanced there was chaos.
Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code.

 Hat-tip HERE

BLUES in the charts?

Dr. Cornel West, in his book Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, A Memoir, wrote:

“I'm a bluesman moving through a blues-soaked America, a blues-soaked world, a planet where catastrophe and celebration- joy and pain sit side by side. The blues started off in some field, some plantation, in some mind, in some imagination, in some heart. The blues blew over to the next plantation, and then the next state. The blues went south to north, got electrified and even sanctified. The blues got mixed up with jazz and gospel and rock and roll.”

Iconic blues singer B.B. King died recently. His passing prompted me to seek out a post about some blues singers, including B.B. King, that I wrote in 2008. I've taken parts of that old post, edited, updated them and re-posted below.

Blues music is such a well defined genre, I had wondered if some of its best known stars might have something in common astrologically. As Ed Kopp wrote in "A Brief History of the Blues" :

"When you think of the blues, you think about misfortune, betrayal and regret. You lose your job, you get the blues. Your mate falls out of love with you, you get the blues. Your dog dies, you get the blues.

While blues lyrics often deal with personal adversity, the music itself goes far beyond self-pity. The blues is also about overcoming hard luck, saying what you feel, ridding yourself of frustration, letting your hair down, and simply having fun. The best blues is visceral, cathartic, and starkly emotional. From unbridled joy to deep sadness, no form of music communicates more genuine emotion.

The blues has deep roots in American history, particularly African-American history. The blues originated on Southern plantations in the 19th Century. Its inventors were slaves, ex-slaves and the descendants of slaves - African-American sharecroppers who sang as they toiled in the cotton and vegetable fields. It's generally accepted that the music evolved from African spirituals, African chants, work songs, field hollers, rural fife and drum music, revivalist hymns, and country dance music."

What astrological factors spring to mind? Saturn aspects, mainly with Mercury (communication - which includes singing). Saturn says angst, difficult times, limits, barriers. Next, some emotional depth: Moon and its aspects, Water signs, perhaps a lot of negative (Yin) polarity.
(Wikipedia: "Yin - shady place, cloudy, overcast; the dark element: it is passive, dark, feminine, negative, downward-seeking, consuming and corresponds to the night.")

I picked the first three names my husband suggested as being quintessential blues singers: B.B. King, Robert Johnson, and Muddy Waters. No times of birth are available for any of them, which limits search for Moon aspects and house positions, so I looked at their natal charts mainly for Saturn aspects, Water, and polarity.

B.B. King, born 16 September 1925, Berclair, Mississippi.
astro.com has a rectified time of birth for him but I'll stick with a noon chart for this purpose.

Saturn sextiles Mercury and possibly Moon, (which could be anywhere from 1 to 12 Virgo). Jupiter trines Mercury. There's a loose Grand Trine in Water linking Pluto, Uranus and Saturn. Negative (Yin) polarity dominates 9 to 1!

Robert Johnson, born 8 May, 1911, Hazlehurst, Mississippi.


Saturn conjunct Mercury and 7 degrees from Sun, Saturn opposes Jupiter and sextiles Mars.Moon would be in Virgo and possibly in trine to Sun/Mercury/Saturn if born before 10pm.Grand Trine in Water, Jupiter/Mars/Neptune. Negative (Yin) polarity dominates 8 to 2.

Muddy Waters (birth name McKinley Morganfield) born 4 April in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, in either 1913 or 1915...or? (Note: Wikipedia and other websites have his birth year as 1913, some biographies state 1915, as does his gravestone.) From Wikipedia's page:

Although in his later years Muddy usually said that he was born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, in 1915, he was most likely born at Jug's Corner in neighboring Issaquena County in 1913. Recent research has uncovered documentation showing that in the 1930s and 1940s, before his rise to fame, he reported his birth year as 1913 on his marriage license, recording notes and musicians' union card. A 1955 interview in the Chicago Defender is the earliest claim of 1915 as his year of birth, which he continued to use in interviews from that point onward. The 1920 census lists him as five years old as of March 6, 1920, suggesting that his birth year may have been 1914. The Social Security Death Index, relying on the Social Security card application submitted after his move to Chicago in the mid-1940s, lists him as being born April 4, 1913. Muddy's gravestone gives his birth year as 1915.

Doubt surrounding his year of birth is as muddy as his chosen name! An alternative place of birth, within a short distance, won't make much difference, but the year of birth will. I'll post charts for 1913, 1914 and 1915, maybe a clue will emerge.

4 April 1915
Saturn squares Mercury/Mars. Moon in Sagittarius (degree uncertain) might well be opposed by Saturn in Gemini. Stellium in Watery Pisces. Water predominates, negative (Yin) beats positive polarity 6 to 4.

Alternative chart #1
4 April 1913
Polarity is equally balanced negative with positive here (Yin/Yang), and elements are well balanced also.

Alternative chart #2
4 April 1914
Polarity favours positive (Yang) here, 6 to 4, and elementally Air and Water are balanced.

The chart for 1915 does best fit the pattern of the other two legendary blues singers, and one would expect his gravestone to be correct, but.... We'll never know why 1913 inexplicably changed to 1915 - or even whether either year was the correct year of birth.

Conclusion (if Muddy Waters' year of birth is taken as 1915): Saturn aspects Mercury in all three charts. Negative polarity dominates in all cases. The element of Water is a big factor in all three charts, via Grand Trine or stellium.


The blues these men sang, are traditional in style, blues singers from later years have expanded the range and flavour of the genre a little, but I think the three artists above illustrate the blues genre's very core.