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Consonance
This is going to be mostly a con report for the Consonance filk music convention.
One of the things that got pushed to the back of the mental garage during grad school was songwriting and, hence, performing. But I was so thoroughly entwined in the early history of Consonance that it's never occurred to me to not go to the convention, even though I hardly do anything else filkish these days. (Well, except for hang out on rec.music.filk.) For a lot of years there I always showed up with a huge folder full of homework to correct while listening to the concerts. One of my irresolutions for this year is to start doing more music again, although I don't know if that's going to manifest as getting back to more songwriting. One of the things I want to do is train my brain to work in some of the medieval Welsh forms, and that makes it a bit harder to create good cross-over material. For me, the composition and performing aspects are locked in a bit of a circle: I don't feel the drive to perform so much if I don't have new material, and I don't feel the drive to write new material so much if I'm not performing. So, as has been usual these years, I've come to Consonance without any new compositions ... although I've got a few that are still new enough that significant numbers of people may not have heard them.
Friday
After some phoning back and forth about the possibility of giving a couple people rides to the con, I ended up without responsibilities on that end, so what with not taking time off work and insisting on my usual gym workout, I didn't leave home until almost 7pm. This brought me to the con somewhere in the second half of international guest Chris Conway's concert. He's a wiz with a variety of instruments, both usual and un. I didn't get to hear enough of the concert to get a balanced sense of his repertoire -- the tail end tended towards the funny/silly.
Next up was special guest performer Peter S. Beagle who is always a treat to entice into performing for filk crowds. I wasn't at the recent Silicon where he seems to have been "rediscovered" by the convention planners, but I remember him performing at one of the old Bayfilk conventions ages ago. Interestingly, a significant proportion of his set was songs I remembered from the Bayfilk concert (including one that I had laboriously tried to work out the tune and chords for but never really got up the nerve to perform much) including the Innkeeper's Song (which later became a novel).
After the concerts and bits of conversation, I wandered over to the Blues circle. Blues seems to be a common enough idiom (and flexible enough definition) that it works well as a unifying theme to get a lot of people performing. (I even did my two biotech-related blues pieces. A relevant theme will get me to pull out old songs that I otherwise don't feel much need to perform regularly.) As the theme started shifting into general filking, I figured it was time to head home, since I'm commuting rather than staying in the hotel. (Part of my new strict budget plan. I'm allowing myself an average of $200 a month total travel expenses, and since that includes the major "fixed trips" like Kalamazoo, Darkovercon, and family holiday, I need to cut corners wherever possible.)
Saturday
Writing up notes over breakfast at home. I'm giving CH (the downstairs neighbor) a ride to the con so she can be there for Cynthia's memorial sing and promised her I wouldn't knock on her door before 10 am. It's getting round about time to wrestle the harp into the back of the wagon. More later.
One of the things that got pushed to the back of the mental garage during grad school was songwriting and, hence, performing. But I was so thoroughly entwined in the early history of Consonance that it's never occurred to me to not go to the convention, even though I hardly do anything else filkish these days. (Well, except for hang out on rec.music.filk.) For a lot of years there I always showed up with a huge folder full of homework to correct while listening to the concerts. One of my irresolutions for this year is to start doing more music again, although I don't know if that's going to manifest as getting back to more songwriting. One of the things I want to do is train my brain to work in some of the medieval Welsh forms, and that makes it a bit harder to create good cross-over material. For me, the composition and performing aspects are locked in a bit of a circle: I don't feel the drive to perform so much if I don't have new material, and I don't feel the drive to write new material so much if I'm not performing. So, as has been usual these years, I've come to Consonance without any new compositions ... although I've got a few that are still new enough that significant numbers of people may not have heard them.
Friday
After some phoning back and forth about the possibility of giving a couple people rides to the con, I ended up without responsibilities on that end, so what with not taking time off work and insisting on my usual gym workout, I didn't leave home until almost 7pm. This brought me to the con somewhere in the second half of international guest Chris Conway's concert. He's a wiz with a variety of instruments, both usual and un. I didn't get to hear enough of the concert to get a balanced sense of his repertoire -- the tail end tended towards the funny/silly.
Next up was special guest performer Peter S. Beagle who is always a treat to entice into performing for filk crowds. I wasn't at the recent Silicon where he seems to have been "rediscovered" by the convention planners, but I remember him performing at one of the old Bayfilk conventions ages ago. Interestingly, a significant proportion of his set was songs I remembered from the Bayfilk concert (including one that I had laboriously tried to work out the tune and chords for but never really got up the nerve to perform much) including the Innkeeper's Song (which later became a novel).
After the concerts and bits of conversation, I wandered over to the Blues circle. Blues seems to be a common enough idiom (and flexible enough definition) that it works well as a unifying theme to get a lot of people performing. (I even did my two biotech-related blues pieces. A relevant theme will get me to pull out old songs that I otherwise don't feel much need to perform regularly.) As the theme started shifting into general filking, I figured it was time to head home, since I'm commuting rather than staying in the hotel. (Part of my new strict budget plan. I'm allowing myself an average of $200 a month total travel expenses, and since that includes the major "fixed trips" like Kalamazoo, Darkovercon, and family holiday, I need to cut corners wherever possible.)
Saturday
Writing up notes over breakfast at home. I'm giving CH (the downstairs neighbor) a ride to the con so she can be there for Cynthia's memorial sing and promised her I wouldn't knock on her door before 10 am. It's getting round about time to wrestle the harp into the back of the wagon. More later.