ALUG pubmeet

December ALUG Norwich pubmeet, photos (from phone) at http://sfrsaluganddebianphotos.ukgeeks.co.uk/c1161003.html

Those gnomes lurking behind Adam(quinophex) were scary. Some of them were moving!

The much-delayed ALUG post-Christmas meal was again discussed. Maybe if we book the restaurant in the Reindeer for the second Thursday in January or February...

Licensing and copyright

Musos of all kinds, and that includes anyone who fancies singing carols - or even football songs - in a pub: please take a look at a petition to re-open debate on having music and dancing tied up in the licensing law.

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Date: Tues 12 Dec 2006 20:43
From: Dominic Cronin

Dear all,

I mentioned a couple of days ago down in the bowels of some licensing thread or other that I had taken advantage of the new e-petition feature on the Prime Minister's web site, and created a petition with the following wording:

Main text: We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to recognise that music and dance should not be restricted by burdensome licensing regulations.

Details: The recently introduced changes in licensing law have produced an environment where music and dance, activities which should be valued and promoted in a civilised society, are instead damaged by inappropriate regulation. We call on the Prime Minister to recognise this situation and take steps to correct it.

I would like to invite you all to join me in this petition. The cynic in me says it won't do any good, but there's still a part of me that says, what the heck, give it a go anyway. It can't hurt.
Obviously, the more support this gets the better, so please publicise it anywhere where that might do some good.

The petition is to be found at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/licensing/

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TOPIC: Licensing
http://groups.google.com/group/uk.music.folk/browse_thread/thread/c690a73ae4dd9504
Date: Tues 12 Dec 2006 19:44

This year, the BBC is inviting nominations for *existing* laws to be *repealed* See
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/vote/2006vote/index.shtml

A poll on the Today programme is a very long way from forcing the DCMS to act, but it coincides with all government departments coming under increasing pressure to "reduce red tape". They don't really mean it, of course, but it does mean that the cynical Sir Humphreys will be looking for a few turkeys that can be sacrificed as a gesture.
Well, there's one we can recommend...

If enough of us fill in the nomination form, and explain clearly and concisely why we're doing it, then at the very least we can give the issue some more publicity.


And finally, the music copyright issue.

Sonic Arts - an advert

Wednesday 29 November: Ian Tyson and Simon Waters in conversation
Sainsbury Centre Gallery, University of East Anglia, Norwich

Join artist Ian Tyson and musician and composer Simon Waters for an evening of discussion, sculpture viewing, and the opening of Sonic Arts 44: Installation.

18:00 drinks
18:30-20:00 talk and opening of the installation
Tickets: £4, concessions £2.50
Booking advised, telephone 01603 593199 (Tickets may be available on the door)

Ian Tyson has exhibited widely and has work in many public collections. He will be in residence at the Sainsbury Centre in November. Ian was commissioned to make a sculpture outside at the University of East Anglia in memory of Professor Ilham Dilman. The new work, Proximity, is now installed in the grounds.

Simon Waters is a musician with a background in composition for dance, improvisation, performance (not always music) and the visual arts, particularly as these relate to digital technology. He has worked with Ballet Rambert, Adventures in Motion Pictures and Scottish Ballet amongst others. He is a Senior Lecturer and Director of the Electro-Acoustic Music Studios at the School of Music, UEA.

Simon's work, Sonic Arts 44: Installation, is a multi-channel sound installation created in response to Proximity, a sculpture by Ian Tyson. The work involves a fixed element within which each audience member moves, carrying their own individual portable component of the overall sound environment.

Je chanterais la joie

Yesterday I was tired from the weekend and did little. Except go into the city with HMB and HMV and Finally and At Last visit Norwich Castle, in between a little shopping.

About 4 years ago in #pubfood (the UEA irc channel, sadly defunct), Karo planned a trip to the Castle, but I never did make it.

The castle looks boring from the outside, because it has a fairly modern shell around it. Inside is quite different: the largest Norman (Will the Conq) motte-and-bailey castle in England, built of Norman stone specially imported. Norwich being not exactly on the way to anywhere, the castle was demoted from royal palace after a while: Henry I did Christmas there in 1121, but after that they didn't bother with it much, and then it spent 400 years as a gaol before being taken over as a museum in late C19, by which time it needed much repair.

We started with the current exhibition of shoes. Not generally my thing, for fairly obvious reasons, but the display and information about Turkish wedding/engagement shoes was lovely and fascinating: shoes of white paper, for men and women, carefully stored in the family treasure chest. After a look at the art galleries we tagged on to a guided tour, which is worth it for the extra information (worth the time, that is, because it's included in the entry price). The upper bit, once the Great Hall and royal apartments, was almost empty so we could look past the Victorian and modern alterations and pretend to be C12 visiting minor nobility - or, in my case a trouvère, of course.

The café there has the most amazing chocolate and carrot cakes.

And then we had a brief wander round M&S while HMB bought a winter coat. Puce. A very C19 colour.

Gig report

The National Railway Museum is a one of the best settings for a gig.

After a hard afternoon's rehearsal with guitarist Scardy (including learning a new song) I was too tired to worry overmuch about singing solo and being on first when the audience was sober and cold.

My programme had started out as trobairitz (ref to a concert of trobairitz music attended last year in York) and acquired pieces about trains - mainly suggested by my gentle readers, thanks :)
I was a bit unsure about the Beatriz de Dia "A chantar" in the context of the rest of the programme (being followed by Monosect and then Modulate!), and it was a culture-shock for the valiant Scardy, but it got a good response and questions from some of the audience afterwards ("Where did you find it?" How do you get hold of that music?"). Perhaps we can encourage a revival ;)

Le train qui siffle - Richard Anthony. I love it. Again a new thing for Scardy, though not as weird a style.

Trains - Andrew Eldritch. This had been requested and I hadn't been able to get a recording, but Scardy had it and persuaded me to try. I was most unsure (it's quite growly and the timing of some of the lines needed a lot of practice) but I was so glad he talked me into doing it. It was hugely improved by the last-minute addition of DJ Echo on drums. One audience comment: "I liked your version better than the original". !!

Night mail - Auden. Read, not sung, over a lovely train-y guitar riff.

Finally the nightmare of Green and Grey. It seemed ok sung along to, but... listening to the CD on decent kit showed that voice and backing diverged muchly. um. Oh well, I thought, Stuart and a few others will sing along and I won't have to worry. But Leila banned him from singing! And it was too slow for him anyway :(

Then I could relax and listen/bounce to Martin and Geoff doing their thing in Monosect and vice versa in Modulate. Good luck wishes to Geoff for his big gig today.

Matt Howden's Sieben was superb. Uses of the violin reminded me of Horses Brawl.

LinuxWorld Expo

Debian stand. "Best linux distro ever."

New tshirt. Won a goat at hoopla.
Took a video of 4 NZ'ers and a giraffe doing a Linux chaka.

Found a surprising number of 'doze users on the other stands, and attempted to convert them (though I shall never know if successful). Chatted with the Oracle guys about the good old days of command-line installation.

Pub quiz. "My" team the Cute Gnomes (er, I don't remember actually answering any questions) were joint winners and received a goat, which was given to me. The other winning team also got a goat.
Subsequent Goat sex.

Another bus, another pub. Some drunken DD kept appearing next to me and insisting that I should become a Debian Developer, in spite of all protest. He introduced me to Sledge to further this plan. Sledge said I can attend the Cambridge bug-squashing this weekend, and I am permitted to squash bugs. "Ants, beetles, mosquitos - as many as you like."

I gave a goat to Noodles. Photo of Noodles the Evil Mastermind, with his goat.

Short video of Noodles the EM. Warning: turn down the sound!

Oh wot a luvverly weekend

We have internet! But my laptop is broken :(

Lovely weekend. Three friends from York arrived, with guitar and leccy fiddle. On Saturday the boyz went to conquer Norwich while W and I drove to my cottage to meet Mark for the purpose of digging a French Drain (along the back wall of the old part of the cottage). When we got there Mark had already dug it! He's such an energetically competent bloke :)

Sunday was warm and sunny and perfect for a late bbq, with visitors and 3/4 of the Mayes crew. First I took W and her trusty camera round some of the interesting parts of the city, and then out to Colney Church (flint, with round tower); we dashed back when Mark arrived. Later L came over, and thus met another group of friends. And Richard III.

Joeboy turned up in the evening after the northern contingent had left, and we watched a very interesting set of films: Richard III followed by Syriana - sandwiched around the BBC Jane Eyre. Curious mix.

Excellent acting in Syriana, though the camerawork was rather uneven. And the actor who played Nasir was the doctor in Deep Space Nine. The Arabic sounded so good because he was born in Sudan!

Semi-alug bbq

A bbq was announced at short notice in #alug on Saturday morning.

daven came over and checked phone cables. Then he looked at our bbq. Yes there was a full canister of gas, but no it isn't a gas bbq. Last week had turned up no coals in all the supermarkets (Christmas now, innit), so we went to see if we could get the end-of-season-sale gas bbq noticed in the Range. It was still there, and not surprising: it had no innards. What's the use of that? We bought an ordinary bbq for about £7 so we could try burning wood in it.

It started to rain. Thunderstorm, lightning, car alarms going off, and hail that gave concern for the windscreen, so I pulled off the road. The rain was so heavy we couldn't see the lightning.
The sky cleared and the indomitable bbqers went searching for filling stations that might have some coals left. Just as daven located a hoard, quinophex phoned to say he and wildduck and toddler Bea were waiting outside number 5 and had instant bbqs with them. We headed back, having told him that it's 7 not 5.

The Ruin'd Folly makes a good outdoor kitchen, especially soaked from the rainstorm and thus unlikely to burn down.
Noodles arrived, with bbq coals. He too thought it was #5. Weirdness.

Full of food, housemates vegged in front of the tv with Jane Eyre, while geeks tested cables and phone sockets and the router and took phonethings apart, and wildduck sat in between ;) Noodles noticed my laptop and took that apart as well.

We talked about qualifications and jobs and corporate preferences for m$oft, and the way "doing things in Windows" is taught instead of theory and algorithms, and came up with a new word - "microsoftened" for what happens to people brought up on Word, Excel, and Windows.

quinophex: Bea, pass me the IDC punchdown tool
and later...
Noodles: is the burny thing still on?
daven: oh shit!
[both run]

There were very few photos (4 on Fotopic), and daven banned the one of him and the purple snake :(

Definition of careware

This is rather cute, but I like it anyway -

CareWare.

I found it when checking up on someone's recommendation[0] of Arachnophilia for producing webpages. Unfortunately the html source is not such a pretty sight.

[0] not to me

Dido and Aeneas with Peter Holman

Good sing yesterday with Peter Holman. Doing Dido with one of the world's leading Purcell experts... well... :)

Apart from Mole as Sorceress, the solos were scattered wherever people wanted or agreed, so we had several Didos and Second Women. I got volunteered for First Witch by Sarah who wanted to reprise our famous duet (Ipswich Corn Exchange 10 years ago). Unfortunately neither of us could remember the parts well and neither of us can sight-read efficiently so we made a hash of the read-through. After a bit of lunchtime work, we did pretty well, apart from me not getting the timing right in my favourite bar ("the cry comes on apace": lovely bit quite different from the rest of the part).

Peter is very very fussy, and rightly so, about timing. Recits before late C18 were always performed in exact time, and Purcell wrote fiddly patterns because that's how they are meant. All of us except Selene messed up timing, and Peter does not change the accompaniment to fit vagaries of incompetent singers. You catch up or you miss it.

Throat was still slightly sore, but it rather fitted the manic cackle style (I like doing Character Parts). However, dropping back into lyric for Haste, haste (the girl singing Belinda had swapped to Dido for that recit) was not easy :(

I was so nervous and seized-up. Clifford (Kings Music) asked me why I'm "always so shy about solos". Wish I knew. The CBT was supposed to help, but it worked better for needles than for stagefright. Part of the trouble is that I sing solo very rarely... which is because I'm nervous about solos so I don't go for them, except in pub-singing/cabaret/busking. Then, I reckon people aren't listening, so it's ok. Pub-singing is the best, because I have few qualms about singing for drunks (they're listening, but their critical faculties have left home and they probably won't remember in the morning).

Chorus-singing is no problem at all, even one to a part, and even when I know I can be heard. Puzzling.

Peter told us to attempt a Pyrrhic measure for a bar or two of one chorus. Heh. And the ancient Greeks said it couldn't be done. Howzat, marble-painters!

Festival of Science

BA Festival of Science, 3-9 September.

Fantastic. Huge. I didn't realise it included events at the castle, cathedral, museum, library, and various other venues as well as taking over the whole campus plus the research park.

I'll be in the box office, taking bookings, updating database, issuing usernames/passwords, dealing with enquiries and putting things through Worldpay. I'll have to memorise the programme.

Only Monday-Friday, not the weekend, but I don't think I can afford to go to Edinburgh for the Debconf team meet anyway :-/

Newsclips

Quotation of the day (well, I read it today, I'm a bit behind, ok?)

"“These people on the flight have been terrorised into behaving irrationally." ... expect terrorists to ground whole fleets of aircraft just by whispering to each other about the duty free prices"

Read all about it on The Slant.

The summer flit

Today I moved out of the shared house in Norwich. Byebye sauna.
Car-full of stuff. Temporarily homeless after next week (I'm house-sitting until 18/19th).

Cleaning up was hard work, even between 4 of us, but eventually the house was shiny: skirting-boards scrubbed, paintwork touched up, patio weeded. The inspection went well, so we have fingers crossed for return of deposit.

I almost fell asleep on the drive back to Suffolk.

Death of Ligeti

The great micropolyphonic composer Ligeti (whose music was used in Kubrick's film 2001: A Space Odyssey) has died.

Douglas Adams

I know where my towel is

Conference, perhaps

I'm considering submitting a paper for the Evolutions conference, which covers just about anything to do with cultural evolution or revolution, including a panel on Degeneration into which my research topic will fit.

I wonder how many words makes a 20-minute paper. Not that I would actually read out a paper, but academia expects things in publishable format.

The Tango Lesson

Semi-autobiographical film by the director/writer Sally Potter, in which she plays herself.

The first thing that struck me was the visual patterns - cool, spare, and smooth, but then suddenly a burst of rhythm, echoing the visual impact of the tango. Most of the film is black and white (in brightly-coloured contrast are the passages from Sally's imagination about the film she didn't make). Each shot is perfectly composed, and several of them are based on paintings - overtly in one scene where the characters meet in front of a painting which echoes their situation, and consciously take up the pose. In many scenes, movement, and particularly dance, expresses the thoughts and feelings of the protagonists.

Every hint in the plot or dialogue of the mental and emotional state of the main character was reinforced by the images (for example, the shot down onto the precisely aligned blank white paper on the blank white table, in the most vivid portrayal of writer's block I've ever seen).

Emotionally it was very satisfying: uplifting with nothing sickly or cloying, especially the resolution in a surge of music and dance which went onwards forever into the future.

Bach cantatas

Eastern Early Music Forum is organising workshop on Bach cantatas on 9 April.
It's also the date of a family party, so I shall only get to half the workshop. This is half a workshop more than usual!

Horses Brawl at Norwich Arts Centre

Horses Brawl is a fairly recently-formed trio - Laura Cannell, Adrian Lever, and Jonathan Manton, playing recorders, crumhorns, violins, guitars, and 'cello. They bring a fresh and entertaining light to European mediaeval tunes and melodies, founded on scholarship and a serious knowledge of the music but with the addition of creativity and humour. On Saturday I went to see them at Norwich Arts Centre.

The programme began with a hopping dance, as Laura told us, adding "There's another one later, and it would really make me happy if anyone would have a hop during it"; and indeed three people did so, to their own round of applause. Laura created a drone-sound by playing two recorders at once. I had wondered how a repertoire based on mediaeval music, mainly dance tunes, would work on primarily modern instruments and without percussion. The answer is that they do have percussion. Guitar used percussively I've met before, but a 'cello used as a drum? Fear not for the safety of the lovely cello, though - Jon has stuck on a bright green taxdisc holder to protect the wood from his thumping.

They use the instruments in innovative ways to produce sounds which are reminiscient of mediaeval instruments - for example, the part that sounds so much like a hurdygurdy is in fact a violin played with the bow outside and around it. In one piece the guitar is bowed, too (Adrian's preparation is an amusing piece of stage business, entailing rather more rosin and squeaking strings than may be musically necessary). The cello is hit, slapped, tweaked, plucked, and slithered, as well as conventionally bowed; Jon even uses a plectrum at times. The result is an astounding range of textures. Of course, it helps that all three are superb musicians, with the accurate and warm ensemble that brings out the best in dance tunes.

They have to tune between almost every piece - not because of the environment or dodgy strings, but because their arrangements call for so many different and unusual tunings. To pass the time while tuning, they make little jokes about needing to be rich enough to have a suite of guitars and 'cellos ready-prepared, and handed to them by attendants. Laura: "You'll miss all our tuning when we stop!" Jon: "Yes, and there's no tuning on the CD".

The mood varies from toe-tappingly jolly to sensually languorous and even to the strange and almost disturbing, as in the first part of Galliard (Branle des Chevaux); from traditional to Machaut to their own composed works. Most are neatly-paired tunes (in the style of folk-dance music), from various parts of Europe, as far as Istanbul.

This is historical performance brought into our times, giving us some feel for what the music must have been like for the original listeners. The hour passed very swiftly!

You can read more about them on their website (www.horsesbrawl.co.uk), and order their first CD, released through their very own record company Brawl Records.