And another year begins. The weather was pleasant enough for us to ring in the new year at First Night Alexandria, joined by Mark Silverdragon (WINOLJ) and his wife Barbara. I suggested Daniel O'Connell's Restaurant and Bar for dinner since previous experience has suggested it's one of the more reliably decent places cuisine-wise on (or near) King Street that also isn't (a) expensive and (b) require a reservation to get seated in a timely fashion. This plan again worked well.

Sheryl and I worked through our usual progression of venues and acts: Al Pettaway & Amy White followed by The Stairwells at the Old Presbyterian Meeting House, then The Grandsons and Bill Kirchen at the Torpedo Factory. Mark and Barbara stayed with us for Al & Amy, then headed off to catch Robin Bullock, rejoining us at the Torpedo Factory. Stopped in at the Marketplace Cafe (new since NYE 2013) for coffee, hot chocolate and snacks just before midnight and ended up watching the fireworks from inside. Hey, it was warm, and slightly less crowded than the waterfront itself.

Today was a relatively lazy day. Had lunch out at Moby Dick's and dinner at Busara with thelongshot and katrinb so we could pass along holiday presents. Got in some guitar practice (needed, with both an Open Sing and GAFilk fast approaching) and watched some of the Rose Bowl. (The Rose Parade itself is on the DVR for later viewing.)

Meanwhile, with 2014 now arrived, it occurs to me I have been greatly remiss in plugging two important events happening this year. New Year's Day seems like a good opportunity to finally rectify that.

In April we have FilKONtario 24, for which I am the Official Filk Waif. I get to share the bill with Guest of Honour S.J. Tucker and Interfilk Guest Piers Cawley. If you've been following my LJ for more than a year, you know I <3 <3 <3 FilKONtario and am hugely honoured to be their Filk Waif. I've already set two evil plots in motion for my concert set. There are more pending.

Note this will be the 20th anniversary of my first trip north of the border.

In June the Northeast Filk Music Convention returns to the New York area as Contata 7/NEFilk 24. My fellow cat-herder and lovely wife Sheryl is the Listener Guest, rounding out a cracking lineup featuring Amy McNally and David Perry as Guests of Honor, T.J. and Mitchell Burnside-Clapp as Toastmasters, and Peter Alway as Interfilk Guest. It should be epic!

Overall, 2013 was a good year for us.

The significant downer, of course, was Marty Gear's passing in mid-July. A huge loss for the local fan community as well as costuming fandom at large.

This was the year the stars aligned and we finally made it out for Conflikt, which emphatically staked its claim to a spot on my list of BEST! CONS! EVER! Thank yous go out to the many folks responsible for making it such a wonderful weekend, including mysticfig and kaath9 for general awesomeness, cflute for backup on "Sedona", Mr. Wiley and his Fork-estra for the shtick-up on "Beware the Sinister Salad", Team Esty for a nice turn as Interfilk guests, and the concom for throwing a great party.

And then there was Balticon. OMG SASSAFRASS!! The spectacular, ballroom-filling, multiple-ovation-earning premiere of Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok has certainly earned a place in history as one of the Top Fannish Events of 2013. Need I point out it's eligible for the Best Dramatic Presentation-Long Form Hugo? I'm just sayin'. 8-)

If that wasn't enough to whet everyone's musical whistles in these parts, we threw a Conterpoint a few weeks later. I'm still convinced the rehearsal for admnaismith's Toastmaster concert was even more fun than the actual concert. Not that the concert didn't rock itself. Overall attendance was lighter than I'd hoped, but I think guests and members both had fun.

(Making a note here: agreeing to sing emotional songs in major concerts on Sunday afternoons of cons is a REALLY BAD IDEA AND WILL END IN TEARS.)

We were originally a bit skeptical how the family trip to England and France in August to celebrate Sheryl's parents' 50th anniversary would turn out. Things largely worked out and everyone had a good time. I especially enjoyed the Royal Observatory in Greenwich and the Musee de la Musique in Paris. And the side trip to the Who Store (*grin*).

Said goodbye to Darkover and Clam Chowder in our last convention of the year. Like the Doctor, Darkover has regenerated into Chessiecon. Looking forward to seeing filkertom as Chessiecon's first Music GOH.

Professionally had a good year too, earning a promotion (though I still insist I'm too young to be "Senior" anything) and a bonus.

We'll be heading off to First Night Alexandria shortly. So, have a Happy New Year everyone, and best wishes to all for a great 2014!

Well, we held a Conterpoint this weekend. The hotel is empty now, the guests and attendees are on their way home (some by the long way around, but no worries there, it's by their own design), and the con-com can stagger home and collapse. (Your humble chair's afternoon included a two-hour nap.) So far the feedback I've heard suggests everyone had a great time (even the one person who got stuck in an elevator for 45 minutes), so I believe we can declare the con a success.

( A few highlights off the top of the headCollapse )

More comments and highlights to come, but there are a few other things I need to do before I SLEEP NOW.

When I first saw the schedule, I wasn't sure how well 11am concerts would work. Turns out if you have the right performers, they work pretty well.

( Concerts, Canadians, and The Great Gazebo RaidCollapse )

I heard that gasp from my readership. Yes, I'm actually starting my report the day after I got home from the con. (Helps when Wednesday is a holiday.)

The weekend was great, despite an inauspicious start. Our JetBlue flight to Boston was delayed two hours for unexplained reasons. Which meant that instead heading off in our rental car into probably more reasonable end-of-lunch traffic, we instead had to battle the early stages of a summer Friday rush hour.

( A Chance for a ChatCollapse )

So yesterday, I said Contata was mucho fun. This was not an entirely accurate description. In fact, Contata was a giant chocolate cupcake of awesomeness topped with icing made of pure sugary win.

( A skyscraper's worth of highlightsCollapse )

This past Wednesday's Washington Post ran an entertaining article on how sign-language interpreters translate Lady Gaga, Bon Jovi and other rockers and pop stars. You think interpreting filkertom or seanan_mcguire is hard? Try dealing with such exquisite lyrics as "Come on now, this beat is sick. I wanna take a ride on your disco stick" (Gaga) or "There's only pictures hung in the shadows left there to look at you" (Bon Jovi).

Of course, the article reminded me instantly of our beloved judifilksign and the wonderful interpretations she brings to the filk stage. Which you can see if you head up to the wilds of Parsippany this July for NEFilk 21: Contata 6, where she is the Guest of Honor.

Follow the link to the article. It's a fun read. Meanwhile, I'll just sit here and bask in the glory of that perfectly smooth segue into an NEFilk plug. 8-)

So, NEFilk 20: Conterpoint 2010 is over. We made the grueling 2-mile drive back home a couple of hours ago.

The con-com didn't kill each other, the hotel is still standing, nobody is in jail, and folks are telling me they had a good time. Sounds like a success to me... 8-)

All the guests were wonderful and gave excellent concerts. It was good to have a chance to get to know Juanita better, as well as Char & Randy. And getting to hang out, schmooze, sing and play with Mew and Ed is always fun. The concerts from happyfunpaul & Sassafrass were good, and we pulled off a fine Memorial Concert and Listener's Choice concert. I know audio and video recordings of the latter are on their way to jonbaker and mamadeb, hopefully they will enjoy listening to those.

Whether we use this hotel again or not will be a topic for discussion. There appear to have been an unusual number of issues with the hotel front desk staff. Elements of the hotel's physical plant may also be reaching the end of their service life.

Other than that (and a few other minor crises along the way that were successfully dealt with), it was a fun weekend, and it was great to see, hear, and sing with everyone!

Had a fine time at Concertino, even though we didn't get there until after midnight on Friday. My flight from Chicago (where I had business meetings Thursday and Friday) to Boston was delayed two hours due to the thunderstorms and biblical deluges that hit the Midwest on Friday. Truly impressive; even flooded and shut down one side of Mannheim outside the airport. Ended up chatting in the con suite with folks, then sitting in the filk room for about half an hour before going to bed around 1:00am.

The rest of the con was great. I always enjoy a billroper and daisy_knotwise concert. It's even more fun when there are a few people in the audience who haven't heard "Apology" or "My Husband, The Filker" yet. kbeader's Toastmistress set was also good, and hsifyppah's Intefilk set rocked. (Even if Brooke was left a bit "in the dark" since nobody could figure out how to turn on the recessed lights.) Rounding out the concerts were jhayman, Kathy Mar, and sassafrassmusic. We also caught the Children's Concert on Saturday morning with mewsic, happyfunpaul and Lady Bear.

Saturday afternoon I was part of a good Song Sequitur set along with Roberta Rogow, thnidu, and Brooke. I was crazy enough to agree to follow Brooke, but deftly managed to field the curve balls (*grin*). I sang my own "Vor Party" (a book song to follow "Acacia"), tfabris's "Comfortably Dumb" (a computer/idiot song to follow "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot"), and "A Habitrail Named Klein" (a space-twisting song to follow "The Space Lasers May Already Have Penetrated My Tinfoil Helmet (Despite My Extensive Field Research)"). I was spared having to follow "Alien Salad Abduction" (although I was ready...would have done madfilkentist's "Flatten the Grain"). Also snuck in a one-shot of "Never Too Late".

We had nice dinners Saturday night at Ciao Bello with Larry Kirby and Deborah Hill, and Sunday night at Maxwell Silverman's Toolhouse with starmalachite, madfilkentist, hillarysherwood and filkosopher.

In a case of total and complete serendipity, I wound up with a song for the "Take It Back" song contest, on account of the "tale of bardic magic and media policy" I'm in the (slow) process of writing. (Aside to osewalrus: this is the story we discussed back at Darkover.) I guess these things happen when you throw a character on stage to sing a song, then promptly realize you now have to write the damn thing! Placed second, to my delight, especially after I spent the previous week being earwormed by my own tune! Which is actually quite unusual--even the songs that have become my favorites (and my friends')--like "Sedona" for example--never became earworms. (Maybe it's the E7 chord in the verse and the D6 chord in the chorus?) Anyway, here are the lyrics:

( Songs Flying FreeCollapse )

Saturday open filking and Sunday dead dog were good. Didn't sing much Saturday, other than answering a request for "Iditarod" early on, and jumping in with "Sedona" later in the night. Did "Back in the Clydesdale", "Hyperion", "Come Travel With Me" and "The Other Shore: Filk Version" on Sunday night before crashing around midnight.

One fun moment happened early Sunday morning that I haven't seen anyone else mention--it turned out that one of the late night front desk staff used to play the flute and took an interest in us. She couldn't leave the desk, so around 2:00am a whole bunch of us appeared at the front desk and sang "Hope Eyrie" and "Green Hills of Earth" to her (with a few pauses so she could answer the phones and check in one very startled guest.) Filking the mundanes...always a delight.

Scored the Rosemary and Rue ARC and copy of Brooke's CD in the Interfilk auction. Go me! Now I can stop fretting about the fact that September 1st falls in one of the larger gaps between cons I see Larry Smith at. (I'll still buy a copy from Larry, of course...) I dangled the ARC in front of a co-worker (and fellow book club member) who is also an SF/fantasy reader (more fantasy, I think). She's intrigued now. She also wants to borrow my copy of Ravens in the Library. Oh yes, and I'm almost certain I'll be submitting R&R as my next book for the book club. Muahahahaha!

Great seeing everyone at Concertino! Hope to see most of you at Conterpoint next year. And, of course, at Confluence and Anticipation over the next month or two.