consonance prep

Doing last-minute prep for Consonance this weekend. The main trick is fitting everything into my suitcase. Because we're doing some children's programming in addition to our Guest of Honour concert and harmony/arrangement workshop, it means I have to take along extra "fun" percussion like the train whistle, the banana shakey-thingy, and so on. If I took ALL my fun percussionstuff, it would fill several suitcases. So I have to pick and choose each time. It's tough.

My favourite piece of percussion is the cowbell, even though we only use it in one song ("It Said What"). I'll have to write more cowbell songs, I guess. The most awkward piece of percussion is the tambourine. I use it quite a bit, but it doesn't pack very well. The most bizarre pieces of percussion that I have are the lip whistle and the train whistle. The lip whistle is a piece of red plastic shaped like lips. It makes a rising shriek sound when you blow through it. It's wonderfully obnoxious. The train whistle was a donation from Allison, and sounds exactly like a train whistle. I use it when we do "Morningtown Ride" in kiddie concerts, but I always keep a lookout for anyone doing train songs in open filks (I know Graham does one :-)).

I've also made some items to donate to Interfilk: an Urban Tapestry sweatshirt and an Urban Tapestry t-shirt, with a colour cartoon of Jodi, Allison and me. I also hope to donate an Urban Tapestry toddler t-shirt, but it depends on how much time I can find between now and tomorrow night. I've discovered the joy of t-shirt transfers. Anything I create in Fractal Painter (or any other graphics program, but Painter is my fave) can be put on a t-shirt. This is VERYVERY cool.

I'm off to California this evening, so won't be blathering again until next Tuesday. If you're in the Santa Clara area, be sure to drop by Consonance! Have a great weekend, everyone.

Today's Blatherpics

Parki and Jeff repairing Parki's Defender machine.

Close-up of Defender innards.

Me totally sucking at playing Defender. I kept accidentally shooting the little guys I was supposed to be rescuing.