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Well, I'm at Bruce's and getting ready to leave for home. It's awfully difficult to leave him - hard for both of us, but we're doing what we must.
The last couple of weeks will go by without further comment than this. The house is starting to be settled; boxes are going away and things are feeling more like 'home'; I got the duplex cleaned. While there I saw two men standing in the driveway. In looking out the front, I saw a Sanitation Dept. truck and a Mo Water Dept truck. In speaking with these gentlemen it turns out that there is work needing to be done that will tear up the driveway - I told them I'm moved out and am glad to be so. They asked who is the management of the building (hee!) as they've been trying to notify them and have gotten no response (quel surpris!) After telling them a bit about the problems in the past couple of years; they commented that this is probably the source of those problems. They were pleased to get details on how to reach this management company; I told them it was my pleasure to be able to help! Witnessing instant karma is a lovely thing. We'll see what happens from here!
Ok; on to the weekend. The Boare's Head Feast was fun; a tad discombobbled but that's usual for this kind of thing. I believe a bit more delegation on the part of the Castle would be a very good thing; they have some very capable people around and need to trust them to handle things *sooner* than the very last minute. John asked me how I thought it was going and there wasn't time - not while we're in the middle of a dance! But I'll prepare and send to him a brief critique. After having done events, apart from faires, for so many years I may just have some helpful reflections for him. Briefly, performers can't eat before a performance but having food out so they can 'graze' would be very helpful and less expensive in the long run. Unamplified vocal music is pointless; up-beat instrumental music such as we did at the beginning are it. Screaming your lyrics over activities going on at each table is frustrating at best. Musicians hired for such things work their butts off especially when going straight into the dances. Long drawn-out improvs which the audience can't hear or understand are out; loud, quick, hard-hitting fun ones are great. And having a total of five musicians isn't really enough for a whole evening like that. Finally, if the Bedlam Bard's had been scheduled to continue with a bawdy set immediately following the dances there would have been an audience for that and more beer/wine would have been sold. And then the ones who wanted to be quieter or get ready to leave could listen to Kerridwin and Queen's Gambit in the other room. I think this was the intention but the momentum got dropped. I do know that we had a great reception when Bruce and I started doing some of our love song/ballads after the dancing. That's where we are the strongest at this point and I think a few people were surprised (just to see me out of noble garb, for starters!) Bruce and Beth work well for the dances and I want to learn the different names for the dances so I can be more helpful there; every place has different names for the same dances!
We've more rehearsal time scheduled to get Beth up and running with our existing sets; having a group spread out from KC to Dallas is a challenge, but we're on our way! I think Queen's Gambit got a good first reception, proved a few things to a few people, and will be around for a long time to come!
Now - off to KC and back to work.
The last couple of weeks will go by without further comment than this. The house is starting to be settled; boxes are going away and things are feeling more like 'home'; I got the duplex cleaned. While there I saw two men standing in the driveway. In looking out the front, I saw a Sanitation Dept. truck and a Mo Water Dept truck. In speaking with these gentlemen it turns out that there is work needing to be done that will tear up the driveway - I told them I'm moved out and am glad to be so. They asked who is the management of the building (hee!) as they've been trying to notify them and have gotten no response (quel surpris!) After telling them a bit about the problems in the past couple of years; they commented that this is probably the source of those problems. They were pleased to get details on how to reach this management company; I told them it was my pleasure to be able to help! Witnessing instant karma is a lovely thing. We'll see what happens from here!
Ok; on to the weekend. The Boare's Head Feast was fun; a tad discombobbled but that's usual for this kind of thing. I believe a bit more delegation on the part of the Castle would be a very good thing; they have some very capable people around and need to trust them to handle things *sooner* than the very last minute. John asked me how I thought it was going and there wasn't time - not while we're in the middle of a dance! But I'll prepare and send to him a brief critique. After having done events, apart from faires, for so many years I may just have some helpful reflections for him. Briefly, performers can't eat before a performance but having food out so they can 'graze' would be very helpful and less expensive in the long run. Unamplified vocal music is pointless; up-beat instrumental music such as we did at the beginning are it. Screaming your lyrics over activities going on at each table is frustrating at best. Musicians hired for such things work their butts off especially when going straight into the dances. Long drawn-out improvs which the audience can't hear or understand are out; loud, quick, hard-hitting fun ones are great. And having a total of five musicians isn't really enough for a whole evening like that. Finally, if the Bedlam Bard's had been scheduled to continue with a bawdy set immediately following the dances there would have been an audience for that and more beer/wine would have been sold. And then the ones who wanted to be quieter or get ready to leave could listen to Kerridwin and Queen's Gambit in the other room. I think this was the intention but the momentum got dropped. I do know that we had a great reception when Bruce and I started doing some of our love song/ballads after the dancing. That's where we are the strongest at this point and I think a few people were surprised (just to see me out of noble garb, for starters!) Bruce and Beth work well for the dances and I want to learn the different names for the dances so I can be more helpful there; every place has different names for the same dances!
We've more rehearsal time scheduled to get Beth up and running with our existing sets; having a group spread out from KC to Dallas is a challenge, but we're on our way! I think Queen's Gambit got a good first reception, proved a few things to a few people, and will be around for a long time to come!
Now - off to KC and back to work.