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I haven't been this thoroughly busy in awhile. It's weird; there are two important things way behind deadline here at dayjob, plus out in the world I've been asked to do a bunch of things I'm not usually professionally known for. In the past two months, I have been:
- paid for two choral arrangements
- paid to act
- commissioned to design a logo
- tapped for a concert series with a 4-person paid ensemble
- asked to learn choreography for a paid gig
And now it's nearly concert week for the chamber choir, and concert week for the Hildegard Consort, and there's a bit of a crunch. Plus dayjob crunching. Plus, Saturday night was Stephanie's wedding, which, while delightful (and oddly good for my self-esteem; while I was feeling particularly fat, many, many people went out of their way to enthusiastically compliment me in my favorite green silk dress, including the bride), was an hour's drive to Galveston and an hour's drive back, all while Kyra was here.
Speaking of which, Kyra was here! It was really excellent to see her. We didn't have all that much time together, due to aforementioned crunch and wedding, plus she had an audition and other friends to see, but we got to hang out and I got to foist my current musical obsessions on her as I do in my inept ritual of friendship, and I may have introduced her to the demon timesucker that is Picture 2048. Particularly the Hiddles Sexual Tension one. And we recorded! There are now violin tracks on Backstage of the Universe! I am so excited! It's so good to know good musicians who like you enough to do you recording favors. And also come and stay at your house.
It was a bizarrely pleasant and trafficless drive to the airport despite the hour on Sunday morning, and then the drive back was nearly idyllic, with King Washington turned up and the windows down and the hours before church call stretching out before me. I got several logo design concepts out on my tablet, which I haven't used in years; my work computer has a full trial of Photoshop, so it's extra-easy to just churn out ideas. I sent them off to Tony for his and his group's consideration, and traipsed off to church, which was uncomfortably crowded in the choir stalls, as we were all stuffed into one side of the chancel, but it was over quickly.
I spent too much of Sunday afternoon doing one of the overdue dayjob tasks, but at least I was outside for a lot of it, in the gorgeous (and bizarrely not overhot) sunlight. And then was a double-booked pair of rehearsals: one for Hildegard Consort, one of only two we get before the first show (the other one's tomorrow), and one for the thrown-together workshop PIVO's doing with Yumiko (apparently I was volunteered to sing tenor in my absence. That's what I like to hear).
Hildegard was extremely pleasant in some ways. We're doing a really excessive plethora of settings of the Anglican Burial Sentences: Croft, Morley, Tomkins, Purcell, and a Boyce setting that isn't on Youtube, so we can only assume it's rarely performed and we may be giving it its Houston premiere. It's been awhile since I sang Renaissance music one-on-a-part with extremely excellent and ensemble-oriented singers who knew the music well enough that I was basically the one holding the rehearsal back with my occasional reading stumbles. It's great fun, but I was already very tired due to lack of sleep and stress and the lateness of the hour, so my breath control was nearly nonexistent, and that makes Renaissance music even more tiring, so it was an avalanche of tiredness and intercostal fatigue.
And then it was on to Paul's place for the last 40 minutes of a PIVO rehearsal of vocal jazz I knew pretty well, with less-skilled singers (except Laura) and less-tiring rep, but more of a mental effort for me (part-switching all over the place including within a song). It was fun, but I was tired. There was some leftover food, though, and I hadn't eaten since church, and the company was good; I ended up hanging around and talking to Laura and Paul for another hour or so.
I'm still tired today, and I think some of my difficulties in the Hildegard rehearsal may be due to what I perceive now is kind of a sore throat. Which needs sleep to recover. But I have to do all these things. But also in order to do the things I have to sleep.
Well, we'll see. Lots to do, lots to sleep.
- paid for two choral arrangements
- paid to act
- commissioned to design a logo
- tapped for a concert series with a 4-person paid ensemble
- asked to learn choreography for a paid gig
And now it's nearly concert week for the chamber choir, and concert week for the Hildegard Consort, and there's a bit of a crunch. Plus dayjob crunching. Plus, Saturday night was Stephanie's wedding, which, while delightful (and oddly good for my self-esteem; while I was feeling particularly fat, many, many people went out of their way to enthusiastically compliment me in my favorite green silk dress, including the bride), was an hour's drive to Galveston and an hour's drive back, all while Kyra was here.
Speaking of which, Kyra was here! It was really excellent to see her. We didn't have all that much time together, due to aforementioned crunch and wedding, plus she had an audition and other friends to see, but we got to hang out and I got to foist my current musical obsessions on her as I do in my inept ritual of friendship, and I may have introduced her to the demon timesucker that is Picture 2048. Particularly the Hiddles Sexual Tension one. And we recorded! There are now violin tracks on Backstage of the Universe! I am so excited! It's so good to know good musicians who like you enough to do you recording favors. And also come and stay at your house.
It was a bizarrely pleasant and trafficless drive to the airport despite the hour on Sunday morning, and then the drive back was nearly idyllic, with King Washington turned up and the windows down and the hours before church call stretching out before me. I got several logo design concepts out on my tablet, which I haven't used in years; my work computer has a full trial of Photoshop, so it's extra-easy to just churn out ideas. I sent them off to Tony for his and his group's consideration, and traipsed off to church, which was uncomfortably crowded in the choir stalls, as we were all stuffed into one side of the chancel, but it was over quickly.
I spent too much of Sunday afternoon doing one of the overdue dayjob tasks, but at least I was outside for a lot of it, in the gorgeous (and bizarrely not overhot) sunlight. And then was a double-booked pair of rehearsals: one for Hildegard Consort, one of only two we get before the first show (the other one's tomorrow), and one for the thrown-together workshop PIVO's doing with Yumiko (apparently I was volunteered to sing tenor in my absence. That's what I like to hear).
Hildegard was extremely pleasant in some ways. We're doing a really excessive plethora of settings of the Anglican Burial Sentences: Croft, Morley, Tomkins, Purcell, and a Boyce setting that isn't on Youtube, so we can only assume it's rarely performed and we may be giving it its Houston premiere. It's been awhile since I sang Renaissance music one-on-a-part with extremely excellent and ensemble-oriented singers who knew the music well enough that I was basically the one holding the rehearsal back with my occasional reading stumbles. It's great fun, but I was already very tired due to lack of sleep and stress and the lateness of the hour, so my breath control was nearly nonexistent, and that makes Renaissance music even more tiring, so it was an avalanche of tiredness and intercostal fatigue.
And then it was on to Paul's place for the last 40 minutes of a PIVO rehearsal of vocal jazz I knew pretty well, with less-skilled singers (except Laura) and less-tiring rep, but more of a mental effort for me (part-switching all over the place including within a song). It was fun, but I was tired. There was some leftover food, though, and I hadn't eaten since church, and the company was good; I ended up hanging around and talking to Laura and Paul for another hour or so.
I'm still tired today, and I think some of my difficulties in the Hildegard rehearsal may be due to what I perceive now is kind of a sore throat. Which needs sleep to recover. But I have to do all these things. But also in order to do the things I have to sleep.
Well, we'll see. Lots to do, lots to sleep.
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