Mi Contra Fa

Things you can do with poetry #32: Write invitations

If all goes according to plan, this will be presented to their newly-crowned Majesties, Vladimir and Kalisa, at Their coronation today, to invite Them to Storvik's thirtieth birthday celebration in two weeks.

Seanan, sovereign   stalwart king of East
Saw in his south   separate shires
Aster, fair flower   farthest to south
Caer Cladach   created from stone
Mighty Murklndr   men of strong arms
Also Tarhvassir      talented scholars

A single shire   Seagate they formed
At royal request  they reduced their numbers
But better, they thought   to be barony
Seanan agreed   So south he sailed

Doughty duchess        deserved his trust
Ysabeau Cameron  crowned by king
Bright baroness   of a-borning lands
By the Great Bay   bathed in salt spray
Storvik is formed   by Seanan's hand

Storvik has stood   strong by the bay
Baronies birthed,  battles well-fought
Thirty years old   come autumn's chill

Vladimir, prince,  we pray and implore
Not for bright riches   rings from your hand
But blessed our birthday  if bold foe-slayer
And clever queen   Kalisa most kind
Came to celebrate  with kinfolk and friends
Our hearth and home   Our hall and mead-bench
We open for you  We ask that you come
No better boon   for barony's birth

At long, long last!

I am finally, finally buying a Korg OT-120, an electric tuner that supports Pythagorean temperament!  And, between the Amazon.com discount price and $50 of credit card "rewards" coupons, I'm getting it for under $25!

I think it's taken me so long because I had the Korg OT-120 pegged in my head as "expensive outlay."  Over $100!  I could buy several books or CDs for that!  But it's also really well past time I got it.  My ear isn't good enough to do "circle of fifths" unassisted tuning; I can barely hear the resonance on the wire harp and don't hear it at all on my other instruments.  Even on wire, I seem to hear it quite a few cents on either side of true tone, so I just don't trust myself to get it right that way.

Gut strings will likely be the next major investment; we'll see how long it takes for me to get around to that.

Storvikkvitha: Beginning

It's a month until Storvik's Baronial Birthday. As long ago as April, I had my subject matter to turn into an appropriate piece.  It's time to get moving on it.  I would love the leisure to read several skaldic poems, or all of the Poetic Edda, but I'm afraid the time just isn't there.

Which meter to use?  Fornyrðislag is closest to what I'm used to; I'm not sure if it's the most appropriate.  That's the primary eddaic form, and I don't know if it's suitable for legendary history; a quick look at some of the stories in the Poetic Edda shows the gods are often lurking about the edges of the stories, if not standing center stage.  But the skaldic forms, especially with the heavy use of kennings, isn't something I want to jump into, untried, for a longish piece in honor of my barony's 30th birthday. 

As for "longish"... I would like to present this in court, if their Excellencies are amenable.  That means not too long.  No padding, no added episodes.  Two minutes, tops.  For a bardic circle, I'd give myself five, but this is court, not a bardic, and there will be business to do.  Using Seven Virtues as a guide... I can do about 40 lines in two minutes.  I'll aim for 30.  Yipes.

Next step is to find my notes from Performer's Revel with the names of the principles, and then get started!

Norse Poetry Resources

The Viking Answer Lady knows all.

Wikipedia always has something to say.

Which makes one wonder how this fellow thinks he's the only site for Nordic prosody on the Web.

Buckets and buckets of the real thing, in a language I can't read.

The Poetic Edda, in an alliterating 1936 English translation.

I have a copy of the Prose Edda at home.

August Acorn Poem

When world was young   wide her oceans
To Great Bay  glory-men came
Dark drekkar  dragged to shore
Hear a tale  told of past days
Storvik's story  skald will sing

Poeta Atlantia is sponsoring a contest at Storvik's Baronial Birthday in September, on the theme of "The mythic and legendary history of Storvik."  Myths and legends may be entirely fictitious, although points will be given for those based at least partly in fact.  Eddaic or skaldic forms preferred.

Developing a New Technique

It's hard to do something new, not in the least because it's usually a good idea to start small.

I'm moderately pleased with last night's experiment, but the music seems... really lame.  I can do better than that!  Well, yes I can... but not necessarily while I'm reciting poetry.  At least, not to start.

For fun, I might record an improv or a period piece and try setting the spoken word track on top of that.  If it sounds good, I might try aiming for that in the future - that is, playing something complex while speaking. 

I could start working on that right now, but experience tells me that would not be very clever.  Why? Because I will learn things about this style of performance as I go along.  I will learn about pacing or emphasis, or ornaments, or inserting interludes, or all kinds of little tweaks and effects that I can't even predict right now.  I'll learn to listen to myself as I perform, and fold that back into my performance.  I'll learn to have the two parts of the performance support each other rather than be two independent "tracks" that happen to be played simultaneously.  And I'll learn those skills better and faster if I'm not also trying to jump my technique ahead.  And if I were to jump ahead with the music, I'll just have to come back later with the Lessons Learned and redo it anyway.

One thing at a time.  I am often not a fan of "learn the right hand part, learn the left hand part, then put them together" techniques, but in this case, I think I would be well-served to practice the poem solo, practice the instrument solo, and when I can do either in my sleep, put them together again.

Gnomic Verses with Harp

A tech-enabled experiment!

Poem: A selection of the gnomic verses from the Exeter Book as found in "The Earliest English Poems," trans. Michael Alexander, Penguin Books 1991.

Music: A progression of open fifths: DAda (x4), CGcg (x4), repeat for one minute ending on DAda

Recording software: Audacity

Microphone: Initially, the mic on the webcam was picking up too much noise so I tried the directed mic-on-a-stick I have (a $10 cheapie).  Noise problem solved, audio quality fairly wretched.  On a different computer, I did once get a good recording off of this thing...

Recording Notes: Place mic near harp soundboard to record music.  Place mic near mouth to record words.

Mixing: I recorded the music and spoken word components separately, in different Audacity files.  Then I copy-pasted the spoken word track into the music project and "Saved As" a third project.  I had to balance the two tracks a bit, turning down the harp and turning up the words.

Technical Difficulties: Make sure Windows Vista Defender is NOT running before doing ANYTHING.

Result: Can be heard here (MP3, ~ 1 Mb). 

Conclusion: It's not exactly a show-stopper, but there's nothing wrong with the very simple progression as an underlay.  I stress again that they were recorded separately, with no attempt to align the words with the shifts in the music.  The recording itself is fairly crap, but it does let me hear roughly what I sound like without me having to play, recite and listen all at the same time.

Future Work: Try it with lyre. Also, memorize the selection of text.