![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
All recordings and the concert, which was actually IN the Rothko Chapel, have been accomplished. Sadly, I had a cold through the entire process, which made the whole thing much more difficult, but it went well, and there were delicious greenroom and reception treats this afternoon at the concert.
It's amazing how much an experience of music can be affected by the leadership, even if the skill of all participants is equal. It makes me think again of the concept of fealty, and how weird it was that that was once a common emotion, that hierarchical, directional sense of obligation. There's a C. J. Cherryh series about an alien species called the atevi, who I suspect are somewhat feudal-Japanese in their inspiration; they're humanoid and social and highly evolved, and they don't have "love", but they have an emotion "man'chi" which corresponds pretty directly to fealty, and by which their entire society is run. There are plays about it with twists and drama related to changes and misconceptions and inconvenient placement of this emotion, just as most of the works of fiction with a plot that we are familiar with somehow use love as a plot device. Imagine if the world worked that way now (I'm not convinced it didn't work that way at least partially in feudal societies about a thousand years ago). Allegiance, I guess, is less relevant now, except in a military sense, but patronage is still a thing.
Also prompting omphaloskeptic musings on the subject of leadership, today was the first service with the all-of-a-sudden new choir director at Trinity. She's competent, at least, possibly even good, though I'm waiting to see if that impression is simply a contrast with her predecessor.
It's amazing how much an experience of music can be affected by the leadership, even if the skill of all participants is equal. It makes me think again of the concept of fealty, and how weird it was that that was once a common emotion, that hierarchical, directional sense of obligation. There's a C. J. Cherryh series about an alien species called the atevi, who I suspect are somewhat feudal-Japanese in their inspiration; they're humanoid and social and highly evolved, and they don't have "love", but they have an emotion "man'chi" which corresponds pretty directly to fealty, and by which their entire society is run. There are plays about it with twists and drama related to changes and misconceptions and inconvenient placement of this emotion, just as most of the works of fiction with a plot that we are familiar with somehow use love as a plot device. Imagine if the world worked that way now (I'm not convinced it didn't work that way at least partially in feudal societies about a thousand years ago). Allegiance, I guess, is less relevant now, except in a military sense, but patronage is still a thing.
Also prompting omphaloskeptic musings on the subject of leadership, today was the first service with the all-of-a-sudden new choir director at Trinity. She's competent, at least, possibly even good, though I'm waiting to see if that impression is simply a contrast with her predecessor.