aitchellsee

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 17:37:44 GMT

Having trouble learning to use an LJ-Cut - Attempt follows!
Here's a report I posted elsewhere about last weekend's concert with Howard Shore and a live version of the score to Fellowship Of The Ring played live to the film at Radio City Music Hall ....

Well, for starters, it wasn't conducted by Howard Shore at all-- he gave a pre-concert lecture (along with the author of a forthcoming book on The Music of the LOTR Films) and then disappeared backstage until the very end, after the conductor, the soloists, and the orchestra had received thunderous applause, when he came forth to take his bow.

The Swiss conductor, Ludwig Wicki, was leading his own 21st Century Orchestra from Luzerne, along with New York's The Collegiate Chorale and Brooklyn Youth Chorus, and indeed (I'd wondered) they had a print of the film with all the original sounds except the music. It was shown with English subtitles.

--How was it? It was amazing (in a good way) though on the whole I think you folks got the more unforgettable musical evening. (I mean, Puccini! and the golden voices you've all described!) The only way I could be sure that they weren't up there "lip-synching" to the film and playing air-strings and air-brass and air-percussion was that, to my ear, the pennywhistle playing the "Shire" theme seemed -- how can I put it? a little more "mezzo" where the one I recall from the film soundtrack is a bit more "spinto"? And of course, the soloist wasn't Enya. And sometimes the orchestra played at a volume that drowned out the dialogue -- hence, no doubt, the subtitles.

You must imagine the cavern of Radio City Music Hall, filled with a sort of golden house-light, not quite bright enough to read the overpriced souvenir program. On each side of the stage there was a large ancillary screen, angled, on which, before theprogram started, they played adverts for LOTR-Online and NY Comic.con and other sponsors of the event, including a sort of art show of actors in character, looking just like your typical con art-show. And there was a fellow dressed in Gandalf's robes and hat sitting at the front of the second mezzanine--fortunately he removed the hat for the film. And amidst it all--

There was an immense widescreen with "Lord of the Rings" projected thereon, suspended above a stage filled with five banked rows of empty chairs for a 200 voice chorus and, in front of them, more chairs for what must have been a 100-piece orchestra. In the very center of the stage was a big Japanese taiko drum with a vermilion body, like a beer keg lying on its side, and other curious-looking percussion instruments hanging in their places.

At 6:30, Howard Shore and Doug Adams, the author of "The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films", came out in front of all those chairs and gave their lecture (to a hall with mostly empty seats -- they didn't publicize the pre-concert lecture well enough, I only heard of it via an email from Radio City on the Thursday, and of course the tickets said "7:30"). We learned about leitmotifs *g*, and about the many Tolkien-invented languages spoken by the peoples of Middle Earth. We heard how conductor Wicki specializes in film music, and how he'd put together some tributes of earlier Howard Shore filmscores and understood them so well that when the concept of doing live performance to projected films came up, Shore's wife told him he ought to work with Ludwig Wicki.

We learned that they keep the live music at tempo to coincide with the film using techniques that were developed in the 1930's, and that now the conductor has a small screen attached to his podium on which the film plays simultaneously with the big screen, to help him keep time. (And indeed, during the performance I could see flickering images on the conductor's little screen, the size of a laptop, that exactly matched the movie playing over their heads.)

Then Shore and Adams made their way backstage, and after an interval during which the hall gradually filled to capacity, out came the orchestra, then the chorus.
When the conductor came out, to great applause, I couldn't help wondering how many of the new folks in the audience thought HE was Howard shore.

And then the lights went down and the film started and I was lost in Middle Earth for the next several hours. Every now and then I'd drag my attention back to the musicians and notice the strings sawing away madly or sections of the chorus standing up or sitting down, or see the soloist in her scarlet gown, but the live music blended perfectly with the projection, absolutely perfect timing. The audience managed to remember the performers and applaud the various solos and bravura sections (though I think sometimes they were applauding the appearance of Viggo Mortensen or Orlando Bloom, too).

Next year, same time same station, they're doing The Two Towers!

Sigh. No matter how closely I hew to the model format I downloaded from LJ, it just doesn't cut it. :-( Or does it? Sorry for any repetition in flists.

"Solitary Diner" and Friends

Mon, 03 Aug 2009 15:24:11 GMT

Back in June I floated a proposal that folks without other plans for dining with friends or editors might wish to band together to explore the restaurants of Montreal, and got quite a response. I'd hoped to check in with everyone as the Con came closer, to see if we could settle on particular nights, times, and restaurants that were especially appealing, but "stuff" intervened, and here we are on Monday of Con week.

First off, it was proposed that folks who were arriving early might want to get together for a meal, and it turns out that I won't be arriving until Thursday afternoon so I won't be around to help put up signs or coordinate such an activity. But I still think itmight be fun and perhaps anyone interested could coordinate through responses to this message and then run with it.

As for the rest of us, one of the Montreal residents had kindly offered to make reservations for a group of us at one or more restaurants, this to have been done the week before the con. I don't know if it's still on offer, but if we can arrive at a consensus as to where we might want to eat, and the time and date that would be most convenient, I'll inquire of her.

Could you check through the online version of the Program and see what days and what time you'd most like to have a group meal? With so many responding I thought we could perhaps do this more than once, and thus be able to sample more than one cuisine on more than one night, Or more than one group setting out on the same night to allow for different taste preferences -- I think there are enough of us to make up several good-sized groups and have a wonderful time chatting and eating.

I'm off to check the restaurants listing and con schedule in between stabs at the day job, but I wanted to get this up here so we could start synchronizing our watches!

<blockquote>
Are there any other singleton con-attendees who might want to make up a posse to have dinner at some one of the marvelous restaurants Jo describes so well over at the antici_food community? The folks I know are always already tied up with professional obligations, or have commitments to catch up with the friends they only see at cons, but there must be hundreds of us {whispers) semi-mundanes who'd enjoy the chance to dine with other people to talk to, so we wouldn't have to worry about getting poutine on the pages of our new books! [snip]

ETA2: If we get enough folks, we can subdivide according to which nights people have free, or which cuisine is calling them most loudly, or whatever, and perhaps keep track of ourselves on the what-do-you-call-them, message boards at the con itself, as time gets closer. Meanwhile I'm saving all these posts to memories, so it will be easier to keep tabs on responders. Welcome! (Nom nom nom as the LOLcats would have it)
</blockquote>

Oh how I wish

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 00:42:51 GMT

that I still had, at 57, the energy and curiosity and spirit of adventure that I had When We Were Very Young....instead I grew up to be a hobbit, portly, sedentary, and settled in my ways. But wait -- who is that at my door?

You Gotta Start Off Each Year With A Meme (as Jimmy Durante used to say)

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 04:53:13 GMT

	Via roadnotes : "a question from fuyukodachi
	Don't take too long to think about it. List 15 books you've read that will always stick with you -- The first 15 you can recall in 15 minutes."

The Lord of the Rings
The Party Pig
The Wizard of Oz
The Sheik
An Old Fashioned Girl
The Scent of Water
The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Mr. Wicker's Window
The Pilgrim's Progress
The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes
The Beekeeper's Apprentice
The Deed of Paksenarrion
Manchild in the Promised Land
A Girl of the Limberlost
Further Fables For Our Time

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 06:13:51 GMT

!!!!!!!!! YES WE CAN! !!!!!!!!!!

The Day Before Election Day - One Day More!

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 18:11:23 GMT

Last month, when everyone was passing round links to this video, I fell in love with it. It's such a brilliant pastiche and reworking of the material, so perfectly realized by the vid makers (whoever they are). And it made me go back and dig up my old Broadway cast CD, and prowl around on YouTube and iTunes searching out various versions and productions of Les Miserables.

And despite whatever one might say about the overblown bombastic quality of some of those Cameron Mackintosh musical extravaganzas, I sat here at my computer watching scenes from Les Mis and hearing the words of the idealistic students willing to die on the barricades for their dreams of a better world, and weeping when I thought of what has happened to my country over the last eight years. And wondering if we really dare hope for actual change. And hoping.

And so, because tonight is the exact time specified for the actions of this video in its stage directions/subtitles, there can be no better time to present you with an encore performance of

LES MISBARACK

The Day Before Election Day - Exhortations on Video

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:36:53 GMT

While browsing 'friends of friends' this morning, I ran across this video, recommended by zoethe and it inspired me to post it on my LJ (also I really wanted an excuse to make a few posts using my Ballot Box icon - see last entry).

The Day Before Election Day - Liberty and the Ballot Box

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:17:10 GMT

I love this little detail from Thomas Nast's 1880 political cartoon for Harper's Weekly and several years ago I made it my icon for early November. An old-fashioned Ballot Box, from the days of real, countable, verifiable paper ballots, stands on a pedestal incised with the words "Liberty - No Man - No Party - No Country Can Destroy It". The Ballot Box is crowned with a liberty cap (which Nast converted from the (red) bonnet rouge icon of the French Revolution to a "Stars-and-Stripes" version) surrounded by the victor's laurels and adorned with a star-shaped "US" badge.

Years ago I borrowed this image from a copy of the cartoon we had in our collection at work, and put it on that year's ballot form for elections in my professional association, changing it slightly by adding the initials of that association to the cap just over the star. And when I wanted to make this icon, I couldn't locate the original cartoon, so I took a copy of the old association ballot, whited out the group's name and inked the stripes back in the positions I remembered they should have, and scanned it for my LJ icon. But you can't really appreciate it at 100 pixels by 100 pixels, and courtesy of my friend Google I found the following full version, along with many cool images related to paper ballots, at a webpage from the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History:

http://americanhistory.si.edu/vote/paperballots.html

Eek! On the full cartoon, you can see that Nast's original caption read "The Coming Crown." A Republican victory, and an everlasting Republican form of government. Presumably back in 1880, Nast was calling for a GOP victory for that year, but not for a Rovian "permanent Republican majority", rather for an everlasting version of that form of government to which Benjamin Franklin referred in his famous words, "A republic, ma'am, if you can keep it".

LIBERTY - NO MAN - NO PARTY - NO COUNTRY CAN DESTROY IT

May it be so, please God. May it be so.

VOTE!!!

In which I break down and attempt a meme

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 23:10:35 GMT

Meme from many friendslist entries:
1. Take a picture of yourself right now.
2. Don't change your clothes, don't fix your hair...just take a picture.
3. Post that picture with NO editing (except resizing if they are HUGE).
4. Post these instructions with your picture.

Unposted Draft of my June 1st Attempt to Post

Mon, 23 Jun 2008 19:05:14 GMT

Well, THAT resolution worked out about as well as most New Year's resolutions, didn't it?

But here it is, June 1st. What better time to make another stab at "posting regularly" :-)

And a good time to look back at how far I've come since last year, too -- back then I was just starting to recover from surgery, with a huge incision that didn't fully close til sometime in July. I was staying with a friend, away from my own stuff, and feeling rather cut-off from my normal life. And looking forward (if that's the word) to a lot of stressful moving -- both my office and my home -- and wondering where it would all end up.

And now, here I am on a perfect June Sunday, sitting in front of an open window in my third floor brownstone apartment with the beautiful woodwork, looking out at green leafy treetops and listening to birdsong and the sound of the breeze rustling through the leaves.

ETA: And now it's June 23rd, and I'm back from a most enjoyable and thought-provoking weekend at 4th Street Fantasy Convention in the Twin Cities, and a whole bunch of things have happened in between (as is the nature of Life). The draft of this post disappeared into the ether back in the day, and magically re-appeared just now under the guise of "do you want to post from a saved draft?" when I meant to wrestle a few words about 4th Street onto the screen, and I can think of nothing better to do than to post the June 1st thing and then Do It Again! Post Early and Often!

Happy New Year!

Tue, 01 Jan 2008 04:59:00 GMT

Happy New Year to all and to all a good night!

from HLC in NYC
whose resolution for 2008 is to post regularly in LJ :-)

What I Did on My Spring Break (the Colectomy, Part I)

Thu, 03 May 2007 23:58:38 GMT

Well, I'm home.

I've just been in hospital for a week having part of my large colon removed due to complications of diverticular disease -- I realize I should put this under an Ick! linkie-thing but my brain is pretty fried at the end of a long day wondering if I'd be released today or have to stay over again as I did yesterday, and then packing up and coming home, and getting ready to go stay at a friend's while I recover, and I can't deal with the coding. So there's the brief edition.

Suffice it to say, the op went quite well all things considered (though I have an ostomy bag now for a few months) and I'm doing OK with coping with the various new attachments.

I missed all of you a great deal == probably never catch up with all of Bear's posts -- and I'm looking forward to catching up as I lounge around recovering ;-)

I have just about the best Real Life Friends (and family) that there are.

And Doctors and Nurses are pretty damn kewl human beans.

More anon.

Merry Christmas to All!

Mon, 25 Dec 2006 08:43:55 GMT

For all my friends who celebrate, may the light and warmth and joys of the season be yours. (And may there be Peace on Earth!)

O Tannenbaum O Tannenbaum
Last Christmas a German friend invited me to see a real Christmas tree in the old style, with real candles.

Election Day

Tue, 07 Nov 2006 22:41:28 GMT

I voted.

I went at mid-day and the turnout seemed pretty light - there was one person ahead of me for my Election District, and I didn't really see any lines for any of the, maybe three, maybe four, ED's whose voting macines were all in the one big room.

My polling place is a couple of blocks away, at a residence for the blind, and they were having a bake sale, so after casting my ballot I scored a couple of cupcakes, one chocolate and one seemingly vanilla, but as it was wrapped in green saranwrap I couldn't yet swear to it :-)

I have to keep my fingers crossed that this election goes as the people actually vote, and not as some crypto-corporate-fascist group alter the voting machines to make it come out.

And that it is the start of a turnaround for the country, and a return to the values of the Republic for which our Flag stands, and all that.

Sat, 28 Oct 2006 13:29:29 GMT

I can't believe that no-one on my f-list (which includes several very active communities) has posted a single message since the middle of the night -- is something wrong with LJ this morning?

The lure of the shiny beadses

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 11:40:30 GMT

The beadses have been speaking to me again...as you see, I've been busy making a pair of earrings to go with my elisem necklace "Wyatt's Cat". These earrings have been prowling around the odd corners of my mind ever since I found the little cat beads that matched the eponymous Wyatt's Cat bead in my necklace, and they've finally taken (temporary) form. I expect they'll evolve a bit as my skill increases and they speak to me more clearly about what they're supposed to be, but in the meantime I can wear them :-)

Apologies if the series of Scrapbook photos has clogged your friend's page -- I'm still getting the hang of working with the LJ Scrapbook feature and haven't mastered the LJ cut, either.

Ruler of All He Surveys

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 11:30:07 GMT

Not Wyatt's Cat - Mr Zak is Really In (the inbox)

The ruler of my office surveys his domain

Homage to EliseM: Part III - Wyatt's Kittens (2)

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 11:27:59 GMT

Earrings by Aitchellsee (Alt. View):

Another view of my earrings, an homage to the necklace "Wyatt's Cat" by elisem , named "Wyatt's Kittens". [Sterling silver, bone, early Moe's beads, dalmatian jasper, fancy jasper, glass, horn, coral, and some other stuff]

Homage to Elise M: Part II: Wyatt's Kittens (1)

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 11:23:45 GMT

Earrings by Aitchellsee:

My homage to "Wyatt's Cat", a pair of earrings I call "Wyatt's Kittens". [Sterling silver, bone, early Moe's beads, dalmatian jasper, fancy jasper, glass, horn, coral, and some other stuff]

Beadses: Homage to Elise M. - Part I: Inspiration

Tue, 17 Oct 2006 11:21:22 GMT

Wyatt's Cat (detail of necklace by Elise Matthesen)

This is my first and favorite necklace by elisem. She named it "Wyatt's Cat" for the cat-bead and the marshal's star that reminded her of Wyatt Earp.</lj>

Oh dear....

Wed, 04 Oct 2006 04:29:34 GMT

I just clicked on a link from one of the plus-sized communities to an online costume retailer. And there were lots of pictures of sexy ladies in scanty costumes in perennial themes such as pirates, housemaids, cheerleaders, playboy bunnies, nurses (and doctors), and on and on....

Then there was the gal in pinstripped cleavage and a fedora and tommygun. Her costume:

The Gangster Mole.

Of Memes and Men, er, Sheep

Tue, 03 Oct 2006 17:23:02 GMT

said she with a Sheepish look.

Anyone can see from the sparse entries on my LJ that I don't often post memes, or even my own entries on life, books, food, and the like. However, I ran across the "Gay Rights" thing when I was feeling communicative, and knew where to find the "update journal" button without much searching. And ever since my first year of grad school (theological seminary) when I met my first significant numbers of openly gay folk, and met increasing numbers of gay friends over the years (some now gone, alas for AIDS and time) and learned how many people who were friends in highschool and college had come out later, I've been increasingly committed to gay rights in general, so it seemed like a good thing to join in the meme even though I couldn't quite figure how it would do any real good. ( I'm the first to confess that I suffer a lot from my plain vanilla het middleclass college-educated privilege.)

But since then, I've been seeing well-thought out comments on various friends' pages with reasons why they felt that participating in this particular meme was folly, and fairly useless folly at that. And it's made me rethink my decision to post the meme, though to delete it has a feeling about it of making a different statement, one that I wouldn't want to make. So I'm leaving the original GR post up, but posting this link to one of the better analyses of why it's not such a great idea, over on <lj user="oursin">'s LJ.

http://oursin.livejournal.com/533546.html

Gay Rights

Mon, 02 Oct 2006 22:46:03 GMT

Found via ginmar:

Pass it around
Gay Rights
"Why is it that, as a culture, we are more comfortable seeing two men holding guns than holding hands?" - Ernest Gaines

We would like to know who really believes in gay rights on LiveJournal. There is no bribe of a miracle or anything like that. If you truly believe in gay rights, then repost this and title the post as "Gay Rights". If you don't believe in gay rights, then just ignore this. Thanks.

[like D'oh!]

Pass it around.

May his memory be green

Mon, 25 Sep 2006 16:09:58 GMT

What an utter shock to turn to Making Light this morning only to read the news of Mike Ford's sudden passing.

Though I only knew him, really, from reading his incredible posts on Making Light, and a few of his books, and met him once or twice briefly at cons when passing in the halls, there are few writers whose loss has hit me so hard. I attribute this partly to knowing that he was elisem's beloved Mr. Ford, but more to the fact that he revealed himself in all his works, the poems, the pastiches, the passing comments, the essays, to be a rare and golden soul, with the true poet's eye for capturing the essence of a thing in a few perfect words, and the humor, the creativity, with, the actinic brilliance of his vision, the...anyone who's read Ford knows what I have no words for, and anyone who doesn't know his work -- could do no better than go to

http://nielsenhayden.com/makinglight/archives/008033.html#008033

and read some of the hoard of Ford-words they have linked there.

It was an honor and a privilege to share the planet with him, as it is an honor to be part of the species that gave us Shakespeare, Donne, and other great writers.

I have two little photos of Mr. Ford that I took at Wiscon this past May:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aitchellsee/sets/72157594299227622/with/160340895/

May light perpetural shine upon him.

Under the spell of the Beadses

Mon, 25 Sep 2006 07:09:54 GMT

Ever since I bought my first elisem necklace, "Wyatt's Cat" (see icon) at Noreascon two years ago, I've been under the spell of the beadses.