The night before Christmas was always a mini-celebration. In my family we'd sometimes open up one present to whet our appetites. The night before your birthday is often a good night, even if you can't get to sleep so easily. You fall asleep thinking about what a great day it's going to be. Or the… Continue reading The Night Before
Month: July 2018
Someone in the audience
No matter what stage you're on, when you're performing, there's always a special joy if you know someone in the audience. It makes everything more real. Maybe because there's a witness. Someone there to hear the tree fall, so that the noise it makes matters. A performance isn't a performance without an audience anyways; otherwise,… Continue reading Someone in the audience
Tom Cruise Is Jack Reacher
There's something mesmerizing about an actor at the top of his game. Lee Child's Jack Reacher series tells the story of a 6'5" 250-pound muscular ex-military policeman who, after leaving his position, foils bad guy after bad guy as he hitchhikes his way across the country. The character as envisioned in the books is an unstoppable… Continue reading Tom Cruise Is Jack Reacher
Vacations, not quite unplugged
It's really nice to take a vacation unplugged. To leave it all behind... and to know that there's nothing you can really do to help out with all those responsibilities you left behind. (Like the responsibility of writing daily blog posts.) And yet... there are advantages to a vacation that's not quite unplugged. When you've… Continue reading Vacations, not quite unplugged
Finding Triumph in Lord Nelson’s Mass
Cross-posted from my blog about singing, Just Another Bass... Our final choral performance this weekend is Haydn's Missa in Anguistiis, known more commonly as the Lord Nelson Mass. Of the 14 different mass settings Haydn composed, this one is considered his greatest -- in fact, his biographer calls it "arguably Haydn's greatest single composition," though my… Continue reading Finding Triumph in Lord Nelson’s Mass
The Joys of JJFoley 