Mi Contra Fa

Moose, moose, I like a moose

In three weeks, Highland Foorde will be having a tournament and collegium, followed by a bardic.  I'll be teaching my research class, leading a children's bardic for the Pages' Academy, and hopefully participating in the bardic.  There is a theme of "Ode to the Mythical Moose."  I'm not allowed to play unless I can relate it to my personal performance goals.

Who were the skraelings?
Wikipedia on skraelings
Wikipedia on the range of moose today
Wikipedia on the Saga of the Greelanders
Aggressive moose
Moose stories
Snopes.com moose urban legends

Surely I can make something out of that...

Happy Second Birthday, Mi Contra Fa!

It really doesn't seem like I've been keeping this blog for two years.  Time flies when you're having fun!

It continues to be the best thing I've ever done to motivate and document my SCA research.  Last year's output was skewed hard to poetry - not surprising, as I spent most of that year as Poeta Atlantiae.  I wrote "To Put the Devil Into Hell," which is quickly becoming a showpiece.  Every time I recite it, someone wants to know where I got it and if they can learn it. 

I still feel like I was spending most of my time unfocused, though.  My first year, I focused on my Great Translation Project, which was/is awesome but not really a coherent study of any one period or style of performance.  Last year, as Poeta, I certainly indulged my inner Anglo-Saxon but tried to offer competitions and examples in a variety of styles.  Or, briefly but tellingly: Over a year after my voice-with-lyre disaster at Twelfth Night 2009, I still do not have a voice-with-lyre performance of "Wulf and Eadwacer" ready to go.  Okay, the two kids have something to do with that, but so does a lack of focus.

So in the third year, I want:

• To continue to produce original pieces for performance
• With a focus on Anglo-Saxon appropriate genre and style

To this end, I will:

• Continue making translations and writing original pieces at my current level of knowledge
• Begin to learn more about chant, the earliest known Western musical tradition
• Listen to chant
• Read about, view and/or listen to oral performance styles alive in traditional cultures today

In housekeeping/tech issues:

• The Original Works page needs re-organized with the best stuff right up top
• I need to figure out if my computer's recording problems originate in the soundcard, the microphone, or the software system
• I will try making a YouTube video or two

And in service:

• Keep teaching as family schedule permits
• Finish the Lyre Book and make it available

Well, it's been a while

I've been working on an entry into the Kingdom Arts and Sciences Festival's Persona Pentathlon.  In addition to two performances, I'm entering three physical items.  I didn't feel entirely comfortable blogging about them here, since they're not music/poetry related.  Is that kind of silly?

Anyway, that's what's been taking up a good bit of my time and energy.  The Festival is this weekend and my projects are wrapped up*; I'm just doing the final bits of polishing on the documentation.

*Or, as wrapped up as they are getting.  Sure, I could punish myself with all-nighters to decorate the border of the tafl game or to weave a border for the veil, but you know what?  No.  That's what the "Future Work" section of the docs is for.

The two performances are my Wulf and Eadwacer translation and the new Veni, delectissime mentioned a post or two below.  I decided not to add any verses to Veni - it takes the poem from some serious bald longing into a region of camp.  I learned how little I really know about chant and performing chant, and also that everyone argues about how to perform chant.

It's been over a year since my crash-and-burn Wulf and Eadwacer performance at Twelfth Night, and it's very tempting to give it another go with the lyre.  However, I still haven't really practiced it and, from an A&S persona perspective, there's no evidence for women playing lyre.  So... I should really, really resist the temptation.