Holiday checklist

In the spirit of making a list, and checking it twice:

  1. Verify my concert schedule for the Pops and the Symphony (schedule available online, for those who wish to attend concerts or stalk me). Check.
  2. Note conflicts with my church choir, and apologize meekly to my director. Check.
  3. Coordinate with three other couples, including one from San Francisco, to identify date that they want to attend Pops concert. Check.
  4. Purchase tickets. Ignore scream of protest from credit card, which is already freaking out over the final expenditures for our bathroom remodels. Check.
  5. Speaking of bathroom remodels, spend two hours sanding, tacking, patching, and priming exposed plaster in every room downstairs. Except for the living room, where the radiator patch is hidden by the sofa, because hey, it’s hidden and it’s too much of a pain to move the sofa. Check.
  6. Try to call Wilson Farms to reserve a Thanksgiving turkey, and remember too late that they’re closed on Tuesdays. Check.
  7. Wonder where we’re going to stow all the crap that’s currently in the library room in the basement, which will become a guest bedroom for at least part of the Thanksgiving holiday, starting on Thursday night. Check.
  8. Notice that the contractor still hasn’t gotten the correct grab bars to install in the new downstairs shower, which are needed by my in-laws—who also arrive Thursday. Ask contractor about them, and watch him sheepishly disappear. Check.
  9. Drop dogs off at doggie grooming spa so that something can be done about faint lingering odor. Check.
  10. Actually plan Thanksgiving menu. Not yet.
  11. Finish painting. Not yet.
  12. Remove tools, drop cloths, tubes of caulk, tubs of spackle, and cans of paint from their current positions on all horizontal surfaces on first floor. Not yet.
  13. Identify activities for houseful of five adults and one visiting teenager (and two Bichon-Americans) so we don’t all go nuts. Not yet.
  14. Realize that the room in which the visiting teenager will be staying on Friday and Saturday will be filled with construction detritus and shifted crap from all the other rooms in the house until at least Friday afternoon. Check.
  15. Design this year’s Christmas card—what do you mean, Christmas card? Are you KIDDING me?. Um, not yet…

Ah yes the holidays. Our favorite part of the year.

Clemencic Consort: Dunstable, Cathedral Sounds

dunstable cathedral sounds

There is a long stretch between the earliest known polyphony—the works of Perotin and the other masters of the Notre Dame school—and the next high point in the 15th century with the works of Ockeghem, Obrecht, and others. In between lie the Black Death, the birth of the Renaissance, and other major cultural developments, of course; musically there is a school of early polyphony called the contenance angloise, literally the “English guise,” so named because the composers on the Continent who adopted the English techniques were said to be putting on an English face. Without the composers of this school, the course of the evolution of Western music would be dramatically altered. With this background, this recording of the works of John Dunstable, foremost composer of the contenance angloise, takes on historic significance.

Even without the historical setting, this recording earns its musical significance on its own merits and on superlative performances by the Clemencic Consort. The ensemble, comprising three male voices and Dr. René Clemencic on a reproduction positive organ, is superbly tight, and the polyphony is rich and vibrant. In fact, the musical ideas in the polyphony, including the use of Gregorian melodies as a cantus firmus on which the piece is built, are consonant with the work of composers who flourished a hundred years or more later. It is difficult to remember that this music, which sounds as though it came from the height of the Renaissance, was written within fifty years of the plague’s devastation. Dunstable’s work is thought to be influenced by contemporary understandings of astronomy—one of the few surviving artifacts that attests to his existence (many of his scores having perished during the Dissolution of the Monasteries) is a note in his hand in a book on astronomy at Cambridge. Whatever the source for his inspiration, his music is presented on this recording with warmth and humanity.

Allegro Music is reissuing a number of other pivotal recordings from the Arte Nova label (this recording was originally released in 1995), and on the basis of this performance the rest of the series is certainly worth checking out.

Originally published at Blogcritics.

Home stretch

Whew. Lisa and I are finally starting to feel as though we are over the hump for our renovation projects. The tile guy is a day ahead and will finish our upstairs bathroom today, meaning that the remaining fixtures will be installed by the end of the week and we can start painting. Last night I sanded the new plaster on the first floor—in the process realizing we had unpainted surfaces in every room in the house, thanks to the new shower and the radiator niche patching—and Lisa tacked the dust away. We’ll paint tonight.

Incidentally, for the sanding we used a vacuum equipped sander with drywall sanding screens, which I can’t recommend highly enough. Very little mess was created and it did the trick, removing the few ridges and blots left behind by the plastering work. We didn’t use a name-brand sander, just a generic kit from one of the home warehouses, and it seemed to work just fine.

There are still a few loose ends that I need to make sure the contractors get wrapped up, though. In particular, the grab bars for the downstairs shower, which we need for her dad, haven’t arrived yet, and we are still waiting for a few odds and ends of trim—soap dishes and such. But we’ve come a long way and I am looking forward to having the final stages over and done with.

Oh—and they might even be able to get the front door and storm door replaced this week, too. Swoon. Likely later, though.

Just in time, too: Lisa’s folks arrive Wednesday for the holidays, and her brother will fly in late Thursday—while her niece will drive down from Vermont on Friday or Saturday to hang out with us for a few days. The new bathrooms will get a real workout.

An ironically timed CD Project update

I crossed a mini-Rubicon on Thursday: I finished ripping both my classical and my jazz discs. (Somewhat ironic, in light of the Sony Boycott Blog activities—but I haven’t bought many new CDs, if any at all, in the last year.)

New totals for the losslessly ripped files: 355 artists, 441 albums, 130.64 GB for 5584 tracks, 19.4 days of playing time.

Sorta Slashdotted

Hey folks. If things are a little quiet here today, it’s because the Boycott Sony blog is kind of getting Slashdotted at present. “Kind of” because there’s no direct /. link, just a link in a comment on a related article that has still steered almost 900 visits here. At the same time the blog has been linked as related to a BBC article about the situation, so things are a bit hectic. Feel free to stop by and join the discussion.

Not such a bad little tree

Courtesy Boing Boing, the Urban Outfitters version of Charlie Brown’s pathetic Christmas Tree. Someone could bring this to my house at Christmas if they were inclined (hint hint). UO has done a remarkable job of reproducing the pathos of the original animated version, though you have to supply your own security blanket:

urban outfitters charlie brown treecharlie brown animated christmas tree

However, there is some irony here: the point of Charlie Brown’s tree was that, as scrawny and pathetic it was, it was real. Urban Outfitter’s tree is “made of wire branches and plastic needles.”

Update, 2009: The current version of Charlie Brown’s tree at UO now comes with the security blanket… but is still “bendable wire branches and plastic needles.”

Virginia is keen for Kaine

Congrats to my native state for electing Tim Kaine as governor last night. The 11th hour appearance of the president, his only swing into the state to support Republican candidate Jerry Kilgore, apparently didn’t help Kilgore as much as it did Kaine. I love this quotation from Mo Elleithee, the Kaine campaign’s communications director: “Can someone tell me where to send the thank-you note? The president fired up our base.”

The tone of the campaign is neatly summed up in the closing paragraphs of the New York Times article:

Mr. Kilgore tried to make character and ideology central ideas, portraying himself as a straight shooter who “doesn’t need a poll to make up his mind” and attacking Mr. Kaine as “instinctively liberal.”

Mr. Kaine tried to build his campaign on the issues of managerial style and bipartisanship, asserting that Mr. Warner and he had—with Republican help—made state government more efficient and effective. But he also questioned Mr. Kilgore’s honesty, and accused him of planning to outlaw abortion if Roe v. Wade was overturned by the United States Supreme Court.

It’s good to see that the voters of my state are too intelligent to fall for the same tired rhetoric of the “l-word” and accusations of flip-flopping.

A look back

Sometimes I forget how long I’ve been writing this blog: over four years, going on five. Four years ago today, in 2001, I pointed to my friend John Vick’s band Hello Swindon. Four years later, Vick is a family man—congrats, John, on your recent marriage.

Three years ago today, in 2002, I disclosed my struggles with depression for the first time. I won’t lie and say that that is no longer a problem, but I’m certainly a lot better off than I was then, thanks largely to the support of family and friends.

Two years (and a day) ago today, in 2003, I had just returned from Santa Rosa where we tasted some great wine and I got my picture taken with a famous round-headed kid.

And a year ago today, in 2004, I announced my job search. Happily, that one turned out well. I love what I do and wouldn’t be anywhere else right now.

Justin Rosolino returns to Club Passim

Speaking of indie musicians, your friend and mine, singer-songwriter Justin Rosolino returns to Club Passim next Friday, November 18th, opening shows for Lowen & Navarro and Brian Webb. Should be a good show, and an opportunity to see Justin in a format where he can build up some momentum between his songs. And an opportunity to give him hell about this little blackmail photo with the man called W. (See my notes about Justin’s last Club Passim appearance.)

Harvey Danger as viral infection

WSJ: What if we give it away? The Journal’s free article today covers Harvey Danger’s experiment in giving away content, and in the process provides a concise description of the business model for bands today, as well as why it doesn’t usually work:

CD sales aren’t a great money-maker for most bands: Absent a huge hit album, a band’s best chance to make money is through a combination of publishing royalties, concert-ticket sales and merchandising — all driven by the hard work of creating and keeping a dedicated fan base that will buy not just a current CD, but back-catalog albums and future releases as well. The problem is that takes time and patience labels increasingly don’t have.

“The time frame for success is a lot longer than what a label will give you,” [Harvey Danger guitarist Jeff] Lin says.

The band’s solution—to use the music itself as the free promo for the CD—is insightful, taking advantage as it does of the classic “viral infection” model for marketing experience goods. If you get the barriers to experiencing the music as low as possible, you “infect” as many possible listeners as possible. And it appears to be working, within the limits of the band’s terms of success.

Of course, the question is, what’s the incentive for users to buy the CD once they have the music for free? Here the band is smart, offering a custom bundle with a shirt and other hard goods for listeners who buy from the band’s site.

The model works for Harvey Danger even though they don’t plan to tour. I can only imagine how well the model would work for a band with Harvey Danger’s name recognition—or even a fraction of it—that does embrace touring.

Nice stuff on Jeff Lin’s blog about this, too.

Autumnal journey through New England, by Amtrak

crossing light by train

Pictures from the train ride last Sunday. Every time I take the train down to see my in-laws, I think, “I should have brought my camera.” This time I did, and took mostly very blurry photos of things passing by outside. But I got a few good ones, I think.

The leaves haven’t quite turned on our street, or much of anywhere; the weather has been too weird for autumn to do its magic. But fortunately there was a bit of good foliage along the way.

I did think that the regional train left something to be desired compared to the Acela in terms of comfort, but it got me there on time.