Conday Two

[howeird]

Much more event-filled than yesterday. The brunch was very enjoyable, I picked an empty table and was joined by many people I do not know, and a couple I did. Amazing but true, Alex was the first. Second to last, sitting on my right, was the woman who had been next to me at the brunch 2 years ago. Last to join, on my left, between me and Alex was figmo. The insta-filk was a blast, almost everyone at the table had great ideas, and we did a whole table chorus to the tune of Deck The Halls which I think was the best of the brunch. Sponsored by the yarn department at Leathermasters. Most of the other tables only had one person sing their entry.

After brunch I went looking for a place to have my nails done.  Walked a block to the beauty parlor I'd passed on he way to 7-11, but they only do hair and nail polish, nothing fancy. Hiked over to light rail and took the train to Othello, which had at least three nails places last time I was there. One turned out to also be only hair, one is a beauty school which does do nails when there are students, but there are no students on weekend mornings. The third was closed, and appointment only.

It was cold and rainy and miserable and I was out of time, so I walked back to the light rail station, waited through a very long light to get to the platform, and a train pulled up just as I got there, but it had stopped at the far end of the station, about a 15-second walk. As I passed the fare card scanner and "tagged" my card, the effing driver took off. He was looking right at me. Light rail is not on a fixed schedule, he should have waited the extra 10 seconds. So, a 15-minute wait in the cold. Who designed the seats to be cold hard metal? Stupid. Mean. Cruel.

After that FAIL, back to the con, in time for most of the songbook sing-along, which was mostly fun. Two-fers had a couple of very young entrants, both quite good. Enjoyed lemmozine's set, though I had expected a uke, not a guitar.

Went to my room during break and watched CNN talk to a lot of Atlantan-Egyptians about the unpleasantness in Cairo. Wolf Blitzer interviewed some of the scholar types, and I was surprised once again that Blitzer, who started life at CNN as their Israel correspondent and had been a "guest" of Saddam Hussein during the Gulf War, pretended to not know anything about the politics of the region. His questions were as neutral and bland as any other DC "journalist".

Back to the 12th floor, Katie Tinney's concert. I don't know how young Katie is, she looks 14. I expect she is the daughter of Tricky Pixie's Betsy Tinney. I suppose I should ask. She is totally adorable, her voice is clear and well-trained, and while I love watching her and listening to her voice, her choice of songs put me to sleep. No humor in her set, which is odd because I first heard her a year or two ago singing a comic song which she had co-written with Betsy about alligators in the room.

Next up was Leannan Sidhe, possibly the smallest adult woman in the Pacific Northwest. She and Alex are connected somehow, he joined her set, and I think Betsy did too. Katie also had a people on stage with her, but I forget who. Like Katie, Leannan sings beautifully, had no humor in her set, and put me to sleep. Tony Fabris played in one of those sets, which surprised the heck out of me, since [edited:] I thought his mother in law had just passed away yesterday. I spent a good 3 minutes trying to convince myself it was someone else up there. As the replies below show, it was his singing partner's mother who passed away. Partner Vixy is married to someone else. [end edit]

The Interfilk auction was next, and it provided much comic relief, including a fierce bidding war for the one GoH cape hsifyppah had sent, which finally was won by a cartel consortium to be given to Dr. Mary.

After the auction, lemmozine took me to dinner, Moshe Z joined us. We walked over to the nearest Denny's, which worked fine for me. Pleasant meal with some good conversation.

We were back at the hotel in time for Alex's concert (he was subbing for the missing Vixy & Tony). I opted to go to my room, get warm and catch up on the news. CNN has a woman with a very pronounced British accent interviewing Egyptians from a script which was written for an American to read. Bizarre.

Concert time. Toastmaster Mark Osier was a lot of fun, until he brought his band (two scruffy young men) on stage. A drum set and an electric bass, both of them also sang, the drummer enunciated and was in tune, the bass player not so much. How's that for a twist? Prior to the band, he brought up bluesmancd, who worked his magic on an electric guitar. Good to see him there, after a year of major foo. Spontaneous applause for his riffs. Mark had a good mix, I especially enjoy the non-PC, mildly inappropriate songs.

GoH Dr. Mary was resplendent in a red bare-shoulder ball gown, was gifted with the sparkly gold cape with blue fur collar which she modeled for us (photos to come). She was joined onstage by Betsy on cello (there's always room for cello) and a violinist whose name I can't remember (but should, she is super), and a very eager Katie. A fun set, lots of variety, a standing ovation and a somewhat reluctant encore. During her closing thank-yous, she got Betsy's name wrong, realized it immediately, and reflexively said a Bad Word
which, the toastmaster reminded her, was streaming live across the Internet. It has been a long time since I have seen someone blush as deeply. She and her dress were about the same color.

Another break to set the room up for filk circle. I went back in time for Kathy Mar to start things off with hsifyppah's The Wreck of the... but things progressed pretty slowly after that. I ducked out for a potty break, came back later,  bluesmancd did another Brooke special, I want to Die Like They Do in Sci-fi. Dr. Mary showed up in red PJs and the knit hat which was part of the cape ensemble. Unfortunately, by the time I left at 2 am, she had not sung.

Comments

[lemmozine.livejournal.com]

thanks for the kind words. i m ipadding w/1 finger, lying down. i picked a vixy parody for 1 of my 2fers because she is in everyone's thoughts here & missed by all. Tony, so far as I know, is not married. Vixy is. The 2 of them perform so well together it's easy to make that mistake. c u later.

[howeird]

Oops. Will correct the post tonite when I have a real kbd

[damiana-swan.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you got to see Katie and Leannan's sets!

Yes, Tony & Vixy are not married; it might be more accurate to refer to Janet as his Mother-out-law. Vixy has a lot of family support in this horrible time, and they consider the Tinneys to also be family; it's not surprising she wanted Tony to spend the time playing for Katie's first concert. (Okay, knowing Vixy it's not surprising under any circumstances. She's just like that.)

I think Katie is 16 now. She is growing up WAY too damned fast, if you ask me! (Not that she isn't doing it well, mind you.)

Leannan and Alec have been friends for a long time now, and she's recording her CD in his studio.

As for the set lists; I think Leannan is mostly performing her own music, and she doesn't write comedy. It's been my observation that a lot of filk is moving away from comedy and toward more serious subjects. That may have had something to do with the lack of silliness. :-) (I hear Katie did Seanan's song Dear Gina, which was not only well done but also seriously creepy, coming from someone whose name really is Katie. I'm going to be watching the video so I can hear for myself.)

[howeird]

Thanks for the comments. Say, how come you aren't at the con?

About the humor, it would have been more accurate if I had said there was a lack of diversity in both their sets, Leannan more than Katie. From Leannan's set you would think she has half an octave range, and can't sing consecutive notes which are more than one step apart. I don't remember any songs having a bridge. Add to that the story lines not being of interest to me (and that's me, and probably only a small minority of filkers).

A couple of Katie's songs were more tuneful, but again not interesting to me. Dear Gina was cute, but thanks to audio foo I could not hear half the words. Not her fault. Still, many of the tunes were monotonous and sounded much alike, using limited range. The latter is a major complaint of mine about the vast majority of fantasy filk, especially the 15-minute epics.

I like a tune which I'll remember when the filk is over. Kathy Mar's Flowers For Algernon, Zander Nyrond's Sam's Song, Vixy & Tony's Emerald Green. None of these is silly, nor are they boring/monotonous. I do like a silly song in a set, though, it breaks up the "ose".