Long weekend of music and media

I've pretty much covered how Friday of my Long Weekend went, so here's the Saturday and Sunday recap!

Saturday: Some of this went to writing, while solarbird took off for Opening Day of the local boating season to collect signatures for the renewable energy petition she's working on. But while she was gone, kathrynt sprang free tickets to a performance at Benaroya Hall on us, so we went downtown for that. Dinner beforehand was at this place called the Islander in Pike Place Market, where we had never been before, and which proved to have quite a bit of tasty food. The concert itself was "Augusta Read Thomas' Love Songs Made in America Festival 1", and to my surprise, it actually had some pieces I'd heard before--selections from In Shadow, Light, which I own since it's got some of the most gorgeous piccolo work it has ever been my pleasure to hear. (I can only dream of playing piccolo like Zartouhi Dombourian-Eby.) Q's part of the show, the chorale pieces at the beginning, also greatly impressed me. It was purely vocal, and I had never experienced a performance where the voices in a chorale could diverge into so many layers of sound the same way an orchestra can. Very, very cool.

Other parts of the performance didn't grab me quite so much; there was quite a bit that was actively fun to listen to, and at least one part of the performance where the whispering of the violins actively blew me away. The final piece, Soul Garden, had some extremely impressive viola work as well. Quite a bit of the performance in general struck me as stuff that wasn't necessarily to my personal taste, yet I have enough of a musical background that I absolutely respect the skill and talent necessarily to play it.

Afterwards we gave Q a lift home, and she regaled us with tales of why exactly the chorale didn't perform any more of Ms. Thomas' work than they actually did, the blame for which rests squarely upon the shoulders of the publisher who holds the rights to the work. We assured her that yes, she should indeed keep telling us if she has opportunities to hand out free tickets to these things, and retired to the Murkworks replete with an evening of culture.

I wound up staying up very late that night reading donna_andrews's Murder With Peacocks. Since I've been liking her Turing Hopper mysteries quite a bit, I decided to look at her other series, the one featuring Meg Lanslow. More on this to come!

Sunday: This went to writing, mostly--though I kept waffling about whether to head out to Woodinville and get some shorts at Target. I opted against that finally, and instead burned off some restlessness on the treadmill in between trying to throw words into all of the books. Later on we watched the latest episode of the Tenth Doctor--"The Girl in the Fireplace". Short form? Damn, that was fine. Mr. Tennant is growing on me; he may even surpass Mr. Eccleston in my regard. And this episode in particular just rocked--two different lines in particular had us all cheering and clapping from their sheer fabulousness.

Meanwhile, I am amused that cnn.com thinks that people failing to go see M:I3 is news. I especially like the part where the movie's execs are dancing around the question of whether the recent behavior of their star might, just might, have something to do with why people aren't interested in throwing him their movie dollars.

And it must be noted that George Lucas' attempt to co-opt 'Han Shot First' as part of his attempt to milk more quarters out of us by selling us the original versions of the Star Wars flicks bundled up with the versions we don't actually want, is officially deeply, deeply sad.

Last but not least, I have now started naominovik's Throne of Jade. Two chapters in, and OH MY it's started with a bang. :D

Sunday miles: 1.75
Monday morning miles: 2.1
Miles out of Hobbiton: 969.3
Miles out of Rivendell: 511.3
Miles out of Lothlórien: 49.3
Miles to Rauros Falls: 339.7

Oh... my... Bob!

So there I am cruising around the OKP, when I come across a thread about the pre-show Jam Session that several attendees of the recent Somerville show had organized, including branwyn32. The thread has the astonishing subject line of "Amanda Jams With Alan", which immediately set off my radar. So I have to look.

And there in living color is a picture of Bran, her bouzouki in the hands of The Doyle Himself.

Dear gods. That there is the stuff of the daydreams of every single musically inclined Great Big Sea fan. Hell, daydreams nothing--I have dreamed on multiple occasions of making music with those B'ys. (And we'll lay aside how my cruel, cruel subconscious has frequently taunted me with only the possibility of such jamming, only to snatch it out of my dreaming mind's grasp as the alarm clock wakes me up.) I am torn between thinking that 'armed with a bouzouki' is about the only way I could begin to have a coherent conversation with any member of Great Big Sea--and the certainty that were I to experience such a thing, my zouk would then ignite next time I tried to play it.

I think I just ignited, myself, with envy. And extreme, extreme pleasure at branwyn32's good fortune. WAY TO GO, girl! A memory to treasure for the rest of your life, indeed!

Donna Andrews double-header

Two books into donna_andrews's Turing Hopper series and one book into her Meg Langslows, so far I think I may actually like the writing in the latter better, despite my naturally geeky inclination to the Turings. Both series have in common her deft touch with the Funny, though I find so far that it's more solid in the Langslow series, and the writing has a bit more substance to it as well. I definitely recommend both series, though, for those who like their mysteries on the light and fluffy side.

( Murder With Peacocks )

( Click Here for Murder )