Books!
Ok, I've added a new spiffy feature to my blog! In a blatant display of procrastination, I was doing one of my periodic web surfs through the web pages of my favorite authors. Most of the time I just do this to see if there are any new announcements of upcoming releases. But this time I noticed several of them had blogs or other pages to post writing advice, news, and random musings. Well, on Gail Dayton's blog I noticed she had a cool bookshelf thing. I had noticed something like it on someone else's--Jacqueline Carey's maybe?--page too; but Gail Dayton's stood out more because she uses the same exact blog site as me. And I thought--If she can stick this up on her blog, then so can I...somehow. Now in both cases, one of the fascinating things had been the fact that right up at the top of these bookshelves were books I knew and loved! So of course that (and the fact that these are authors I respect anyway) made me all the more interested in the books I didn't know.
Anyway, I soon tracked down the Shelfari site and got signed up and figured out how to put it on my blog. So here it is!! Well, adding things to it is also a bit of work and procrastination could only last so long. So some of my favorites are up, and anything that happened to turn up in the searches for my favorites that I've also read. So, as things occur to me, or as the need for procrastinatory activities strikes, I'll expand the collection.
Music!
My last performance with the Madrigirls was last week. It was great fun, as usual. We performed in the Kibble Palace in the Botanical Gardens as part of the West End Festival in Glasgow. We sold out! And the people running it said we had a record number of pre-sales (Ron being one of them). It was a very pretty venue, though I have to say most of the churches we've performed in had nicer acoustics; not bad though. Perhaps because of the venue, or the summery feel, or the fact we were all still recovering from all the excitement a week and a half back, this concert had a somewhat informal feel to it, at least to me. This was definitely increased by the fact that the serious readings from the Life of St Kentigern from the tour were replaced by our director's very funny summaries of the same ("And next St Mungo went to Wales...I don't remember why. Oh he wanted to see St David. Or was it St David that wanted to see him? *looks back at choir for guidance* Anyway, he went to Wales and....was there anything else? *hint from our ranks* Oh yes, he met St Columba too. That might have been after Wales. But we have this lovely piece of chant about St Columba." ...ok, so that's not a direct quote, and hopefully it won't get me killed if someone from choir reads this blog, but I think that was a fair impression. ;)
Anyway, the last concert was fun. Though I'm very sad it's all over now. They've promised to send me CDs or a DVD of the movie when it comes out if I can't see the movie in the States. I'm very very glad I decided to join. Amazing where volunteering to help out with the role playing table at Fresher's Fair led to eventually!! If I hadn't been promoting gaming, I wouldn't have seen the information about the choir tryouts on the table kinny-corner, and thus wouldn't have tried out, and thus wouldn't have had all this fun singing with an awesome choir this year.
Sunday 22 June 2008
Thursday 12 June 2008
Sing, Sing, and Sing Some More!
So, last weekend the Madrigirls (the chamber singing group I'm in) went on tour down to the Borders and Northumberland (you know, I always have to stop and think whether Northumberland or Northumbria is the modern term and which is medieval). We all got matching sweatshirts--Madri-hoodies--and headed down in a minibus rented from Glasgow Uni--the Madi-bus--and got down to Simonburn in Northumberland (vaguely near Hexham) for our concert for friday night. Naturally we sang most of the way down.
The reason we picked the tiny village of Simonburn for our first full-weekend tour ever (despite the fact that the West End Festival information persistently says we went on tour in Europe "last year"...they've said this for two years now, and it was true for neither, which we keep telling them, but that's all neither here nor there) is because their church is St Mungo's Church and as everyone knows, St Mungo is the patron saint of Glasgow (what do you mean everyone doesn't know that?). So, yes, we got to sing in a gorgeous 14th century church. We had a great turn out--the church was nearly full. We saw fliers all around on our way and they were clearly excited to have us and it was great fun. We had an incredible dinner at the local tea room before hand and then the proprietors bought one of our CDs after the concert and said we'd be heard in the tea room for a long time to come! They must have really liked us.
Well then we headed off in the trusty madri-bus for our first hostel which we had entirely to ourselves. It was incredibly picturesque, very cottage-like looking out over a lovely valley and complete with their own chickens in the yard. We sang more on the way there. And then we talked half the night. I introduced the game "How's Yours?" (any BREAK@8 readers in the audience groaning at that?) and we played all the way around till everyone had a go. Then we went to bed...which didn't mean going to sleep since I seem to have ended up in the rambunctious room both nights. Anyway, eventually sleep was had. The bunk beds were novelties to some and nostalgic to others. I suppose I fell in the latter category.
The next day we headed back north for Scotland. We had lunch in Jedburgh and then sang in fairly substantial ruins of Jedburgh Abbey. It was very pretty. I wish I'd had time to explore. In fact, if I'd realized we would have so little time afterwards, I would have ditched the choir members to go explore during lunch since my Historic Scotland card would have got me in. But hindsight and all that. It was very fun nonetheless. We went for all quite medieval songs, naturally, most of them Latin and drew a small crowd. Sadly there wern't many people around that day, but practically everyone in the abbey came to listen to us, and one bought a CD and two came to the concert that night.
Then it was off to Bowden Kirk for our final performance. We got another quite decent turn out. By this time our voices were a bit on the tired side. We went into it tired and not quite in the mood, but inside another lovely old kirk with all the nice people there to hear us, how could we resist? Once again, fun was had. And if various people, myself included, faded out here and there, well, at least we never all did it at once and the concert came off splendidly anyway. I got an adrenaline kick right before my solo that carried me through a few more songs besides. After the performance we all filed out and then while Katy and Catriona (our directors) greeted people as they came out, some of the Madrigirls invented new lyrics to one of our warm up rounds. The original words are "Mango, Mango, Mango...Kiwi, Kiwi, Kiwi...Pineapple, Banana, Pineapple, Mmm." And it became "Mingle, Mingle, Mingle....Mingle with the people...Talk to them, talk to them--nah." Unfortunately we were overheard, but luckily people seemed to think it was rather endearing....I hope so anyway. Once on the bus Evonne and I introduced the version we had invented weeks ago "Mungo, Mungo, Mungo...holy, holy, holy...Kentigern, Kentigern" which was well received.
Then it was back to our mansion-like hostel in Melrose to change. Soon we were headed out to the pub--one of the two pubs in Melrose. The other one was showing sports of some kind, and in fact one of the two rooms of ours was too. After the first round or so of drinks we started singing...again. Actually, I have to admit, I instigated it this time. A pint of cider was enough to give me the courage to go teach "Battle is better when followed by beer" to Evonne who helped teach it to a half dozen others and soon we had nearly everyone singing it. We even tried it as a round--it more or less works. Well, once singing had started, we couldn't stop. For a while we sang non-concert stuff, searching for other fun things that we might know or could be learned quickly ("What would you do with a drunken sailor?"...) Soon after we'd started singing we seemed to have cleared the remaining locals out of the pub...but then one of the band of men who'd been drinking outside came in for a fresh round and dragged all his mates in to hear us and soon we had tons of men requesting more and more. At this point we fell back increasingly on our own repertoire, going through all the rowdiest, and most fun songs. Quite intoxicated by this time (well, I nursed two drinks through the whole night, but I'm a lightweight and most of the choir is undergrads after all), we *might* have shouted out the music a bit. But a grand time was had by all.
Despite being once more in the rowdy room, I was soon asleep. The next day I for one tried to refrain from idle singing since many of us we nearly hoarse from days of non-stop singing. We couldn't resist entirely though. It's so hard! Once you're around fellow-singers and let your hair down a bit, it's almost impossible not to sing and sing and sing some more.
Then it was back to Glasgow, but the singing wasn't over yet. We split up for lunch and then reconvened for a rehearsal because...wait for it...the next night we were scheduled to record for the BBC! So we rehearsed. One song was one we knew. The other was In the Bleak Midwinter, which of course, we all knew more or less, but I'd never sung the alto harmony for it. Nevertheless, one rehearsal really did suffice in this case. Then the next night we did the actual recording...from 7pm to 2:30am!!
In the movie this is for, Fiona's Story, the main character (named, surprisingly enough, Fiona; played by Gina McKee) is in a choir at the beginning of the movie then quits when her life falls apart. At the end (spoiler alert!) she comes back to the choir...presumably symbolizing how she's put her life back together. The choir director (Jimi Mistry) is a persistent character and probably urges her to come back--though I really know little about the middle of the movie. It was really funny watching the actor imitating our choir director and getting better at directing as things went on.
All the actors and directors and everyone were very nice and down to earth. I guess I always pictured more scowling and shouting and "no, that's not right" stuff going on. But it was all quite cheerful and they plied us with food between shoots and water bottles between takes and despite going into it all quite thoroughly exhausted it was still great fun. We finished up just after 2 in the morning and they paid for taxis to take us home. Since we were filming on campus, I was really only 5 minutes from home, but given the hour I was quite happy to accept the cab though given all the one-way streets it took the cab longer to collect us and drive me there than it would have taken to walk.
So, you'll have to watch for Fiona's Story to come out and watch for me in the choir scenes!
But the singing's not over yet. Tonight we rehearse for our final performance of the year. This coming Wednesday we perform in the Kibble Palace (Botanical Gardens) as part of the annual West End Festival.
The reason we picked the tiny village of Simonburn for our first full-weekend tour ever (despite the fact that the West End Festival information persistently says we went on tour in Europe "last year"...they've said this for two years now, and it was true for neither, which we keep telling them, but that's all neither here nor there) is because their church is St Mungo's Church and as everyone knows, St Mungo is the patron saint of Glasgow (what do you mean everyone doesn't know that?). So, yes, we got to sing in a gorgeous 14th century church. We had a great turn out--the church was nearly full. We saw fliers all around on our way and they were clearly excited to have us and it was great fun. We had an incredible dinner at the local tea room before hand and then the proprietors bought one of our CDs after the concert and said we'd be heard in the tea room for a long time to come! They must have really liked us.
Well then we headed off in the trusty madri-bus for our first hostel which we had entirely to ourselves. It was incredibly picturesque, very cottage-like looking out over a lovely valley and complete with their own chickens in the yard. We sang more on the way there. And then we talked half the night. I introduced the game "How's Yours?" (any BREAK@8 readers in the audience groaning at that?) and we played all the way around till everyone had a go. Then we went to bed...which didn't mean going to sleep since I seem to have ended up in the rambunctious room both nights. Anyway, eventually sleep was had. The bunk beds were novelties to some and nostalgic to others. I suppose I fell in the latter category.
The next day we headed back north for Scotland. We had lunch in Jedburgh and then sang in fairly substantial ruins of Jedburgh Abbey. It was very pretty. I wish I'd had time to explore. In fact, if I'd realized we would have so little time afterwards, I would have ditched the choir members to go explore during lunch since my Historic Scotland card would have got me in. But hindsight and all that. It was very fun nonetheless. We went for all quite medieval songs, naturally, most of them Latin and drew a small crowd. Sadly there wern't many people around that day, but practically everyone in the abbey came to listen to us, and one bought a CD and two came to the concert that night.
Then it was off to Bowden Kirk for our final performance. We got another quite decent turn out. By this time our voices were a bit on the tired side. We went into it tired and not quite in the mood, but inside another lovely old kirk with all the nice people there to hear us, how could we resist? Once again, fun was had. And if various people, myself included, faded out here and there, well, at least we never all did it at once and the concert came off splendidly anyway. I got an adrenaline kick right before my solo that carried me through a few more songs besides. After the performance we all filed out and then while Katy and Catriona (our directors) greeted people as they came out, some of the Madrigirls invented new lyrics to one of our warm up rounds. The original words are "Mango, Mango, Mango...Kiwi, Kiwi, Kiwi...Pineapple, Banana, Pineapple, Mmm." And it became "Mingle, Mingle, Mingle....Mingle with the people...Talk to them, talk to them--nah." Unfortunately we were overheard, but luckily people seemed to think it was rather endearing....I hope so anyway. Once on the bus Evonne and I introduced the version we had invented weeks ago "Mungo, Mungo, Mungo...holy, holy, holy...Kentigern, Kentigern" which was well received.
Then it was back to our mansion-like hostel in Melrose to change. Soon we were headed out to the pub--one of the two pubs in Melrose. The other one was showing sports of some kind, and in fact one of the two rooms of ours was too. After the first round or so of drinks we started singing...again. Actually, I have to admit, I instigated it this time. A pint of cider was enough to give me the courage to go teach "Battle is better when followed by beer" to Evonne who helped teach it to a half dozen others and soon we had nearly everyone singing it. We even tried it as a round--it more or less works. Well, once singing had started, we couldn't stop. For a while we sang non-concert stuff, searching for other fun things that we might know or could be learned quickly ("What would you do with a drunken sailor?"...) Soon after we'd started singing we seemed to have cleared the remaining locals out of the pub...but then one of the band of men who'd been drinking outside came in for a fresh round and dragged all his mates in to hear us and soon we had tons of men requesting more and more. At this point we fell back increasingly on our own repertoire, going through all the rowdiest, and most fun songs. Quite intoxicated by this time (well, I nursed two drinks through the whole night, but I'm a lightweight and most of the choir is undergrads after all), we *might* have shouted out the music a bit. But a grand time was had by all.
Despite being once more in the rowdy room, I was soon asleep. The next day I for one tried to refrain from idle singing since many of us we nearly hoarse from days of non-stop singing. We couldn't resist entirely though. It's so hard! Once you're around fellow-singers and let your hair down a bit, it's almost impossible not to sing and sing and sing some more.
Then it was back to Glasgow, but the singing wasn't over yet. We split up for lunch and then reconvened for a rehearsal because...wait for it...the next night we were scheduled to record for the BBC! So we rehearsed. One song was one we knew. The other was In the Bleak Midwinter, which of course, we all knew more or less, but I'd never sung the alto harmony for it. Nevertheless, one rehearsal really did suffice in this case. Then the next night we did the actual recording...from 7pm to 2:30am!!
In the movie this is for, Fiona's Story, the main character (named, surprisingly enough, Fiona; played by Gina McKee) is in a choir at the beginning of the movie then quits when her life falls apart. At the end (spoiler alert!) she comes back to the choir...presumably symbolizing how she's put her life back together. The choir director (Jimi Mistry) is a persistent character and probably urges her to come back--though I really know little about the middle of the movie. It was really funny watching the actor imitating our choir director and getting better at directing as things went on.
All the actors and directors and everyone were very nice and down to earth. I guess I always pictured more scowling and shouting and "no, that's not right" stuff going on. But it was all quite cheerful and they plied us with food between shoots and water bottles between takes and despite going into it all quite thoroughly exhausted it was still great fun. We finished up just after 2 in the morning and they paid for taxis to take us home. Since we were filming on campus, I was really only 5 minutes from home, but given the hour I was quite happy to accept the cab though given all the one-way streets it took the cab longer to collect us and drive me there than it would have taken to walk.
So, you'll have to watch for Fiona's Story to come out and watch for me in the choir scenes!
But the singing's not over yet. Tonight we rehearse for our final performance of the year. This coming Wednesday we perform in the Kibble Palace (Botanical Gardens) as part of the annual West End Festival.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)