A Long Silence, then Noise
Oct. 1st, 2006 12:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tealinI just realised I haven't posted anything in over a week... shaaaaame.
Excuses:
working
costume
eye appointment (new glasses for meee!)
working on Super 100 Triple Crossover Gag Sketch (you'll have to wait and see)
And tonight I went to a concert.
It was a concert put on by an 'intercultural orchestra' which is baically a bunch of world music ensembles that get together and swap instrumentalists on occasion, and play cool music with an odd collection of sounds that somehow work. Most of the music tonight was 'new' but done in the traditions of various locales, some of it 'fusion.' The programme started with a piece in an Arabic mode which sounded a lot like everything on my CD of Sefardic music from medieval Spain (and whose instruments are used in many of my early music CDs) and it was really amazing to see it actually played ... I'd seen photos of the instruments but never 'in action' as it were.* The daff was particularly amazing – it's a circular Middle Eastern drum that looks rather like a Celtic bodhran but has a bit more brassy of a sound, and one of the techniques for playing it is to drum one's fingers on it really fast, accenting certain beats. This makes sense in my head musically, but watching it was weird because the sound coming out of the drum didn't appear to be matching up with the hands at all. I got to see the santur for the first time, too; I've been familiar with its sound but had no idea what it even looked like, much less how it was played. (It's a bit like a dulcimer.)* And the odd pitched drums (which are apparently from north India?) that make a sort of scooping sound, which I remember most from my Portuguese folk music CD and had no idea what they were – apparently the scooping sound is made by hitting the drum with the fingers while the ball of the hand rests on the rim, and then as the sound decays you slide your wrist towrds the middle and it rises in pitch. Fascinating!
And then there was the piece for bagpipes, taiko drums, and didjeridoo ... that worked. (But it would have been nicer if the if the bagpipes had had a melodic line.)
(And the whole time I was thinking 'wow, Katie ought to be here...' So there you go, Katie, when you finally make your trip up to Canada, you must schedule it for when these folks are playing again!)
*I am abusing the 'quotes' tonight.
*(And the parentheses).
Oh yes, um ... there will be an art post again when I finish that dadgum S.100 T.C.G.S. [EDIT: That is to say, probably on Wednesday. Tuesday evening if you're lucky and I have a lot of time on my hands at work.]
Excuses:
working
costume
eye appointment (new glasses for meee!)
working on Super 100 Triple Crossover Gag Sketch (you'll have to wait and see)
And tonight I went to a concert.
It was a concert put on by an 'intercultural orchestra' which is baically a bunch of world music ensembles that get together and swap instrumentalists on occasion, and play cool music with an odd collection of sounds that somehow work. Most of the music tonight was 'new' but done in the traditions of various locales, some of it 'fusion.' The programme started with a piece in an Arabic mode which sounded a lot like everything on my CD of Sefardic music from medieval Spain (and whose instruments are used in many of my early music CDs) and it was really amazing to see it actually played ... I'd seen photos of the instruments but never 'in action' as it were.* The daff was particularly amazing – it's a circular Middle Eastern drum that looks rather like a Celtic bodhran but has a bit more brassy of a sound, and one of the techniques for playing it is to drum one's fingers on it really fast, accenting certain beats. This makes sense in my head musically, but watching it was weird because the sound coming out of the drum didn't appear to be matching up with the hands at all. I got to see the santur for the first time, too; I've been familiar with its sound but had no idea what it even looked like, much less how it was played. (It's a bit like a dulcimer.)* And the odd pitched drums (which are apparently from north India?) that make a sort of scooping sound, which I remember most from my Portuguese folk music CD and had no idea what they were – apparently the scooping sound is made by hitting the drum with the fingers while the ball of the hand rests on the rim, and then as the sound decays you slide your wrist towrds the middle and it rises in pitch. Fascinating!
And then there was the piece for bagpipes, taiko drums, and didjeridoo ... that worked. (But it would have been nicer if the if the bagpipes had had a melodic line.)
(And the whole time I was thinking 'wow, Katie ought to be here...' So there you go, Katie, when you finally make your trip up to Canada, you must schedule it for when these folks are playing again!)
*I am abusing the 'quotes' tonight.
*(And the parentheses).
Oh yes, um ... there will be an art post again when I finish that dadgum S.100 T.C.G.S. [EDIT: That is to say, probably on Wednesday. Tuesday evening if you're lucky and I have a lot of time on my hands at work.]
