FKO part one
Spent this weekend at FilkOntario - my first FKO and what a blast! It was a great weekend and a great con.
As i type this, I am sitting in the toronto airport waiting for my flight home. I am hoping that by writing this now, I will forget fewer things and fewer people, but given how much stuff (and how little sleep) was packed in to this weekend, it is inevitable that I will leave some things and some people out. I also don't have my list of livejournal handles handy, so I will try to paste those in later.
Chris and I left our house on Thursday at 2:45 am. Yes, you read that correctly, IN THE MORNNG. First leg (to DFW) was smooth, but we landed to the news that our flight to Toronto was canceled. We were rebooked on a later flight that was itself delayed almost three hours, so needless to say, we were past exhaustion when we walked into the hotel lobby a little after 9:30pm. We grabbes food at the bar and crashed.
Friday we played tourist in downtown Toronto, strolling down Yonge street and doing the hop on hop off bus tour. Got back to the con in time to register, grab a quick bite to eat, and head to the reception.
Opening ceremonies was followed by concerts from Howard Scrimgeour, The Stone Dragons, and Mary Crowell. Went to the Ose-free comedy song circle, then headed to open filk. Open filk was small Friday but fun and collegial.
Saturday started with Sally Childs-Helton's workshop on guided improvisation, which was really cool, although I ducked out a few minutes early because something triggered a way to finish off the last verse of the song Dene and I were working on for the Penguin song contest (more on that in the next post) and I dashed out to revise the lyrics and get them to Dene before he got too far into writing the tune.
The rest of Saturday was spent listening to concerts and visiting with folks, before heading up to get ready for the banquet. The concerts were all great, but for me the coolest was Ghost of a Rose. About half of what they did were songs written by Dene and I, and I hadn't heard some of the arrangement. Then they really surprised me by announcing that they had decided that even though I don't perform with them, they were making me an official fourth member of the band - the "Ghost Writer". It was really cool and I am thrilled.
The banquet was lots of fun, as we were seated with Jane and Phil, Gary and Sheryl, Sally and Barry, and I am blanking on the other two - I was already quite sleep deprived at that point (or did the table seat 8)? The banquet was followed by the inductions into the filk hall of fame, and the entire thing (banquet and hall of fame) was lovely and very well done, and we enjoyed visiting with the folks at our table.
It was then time for the auction (scored a cool messenger bag with part of the lyrics from Take it Back embroidered on the flap) and open filk.
Next up - reports on the song contests, open filks, and Sunday at the con.
As i type this, I am sitting in the toronto airport waiting for my flight home. I am hoping that by writing this now, I will forget fewer things and fewer people, but given how much stuff (and how little sleep) was packed in to this weekend, it is inevitable that I will leave some things and some people out. I also don't have my list of livejournal handles handy, so I will try to paste those in later.
Chris and I left our house on Thursday at 2:45 am. Yes, you read that correctly, IN THE MORNNG. First leg (to DFW) was smooth, but we landed to the news that our flight to Toronto was canceled. We were rebooked on a later flight that was itself delayed almost three hours, so needless to say, we were past exhaustion when we walked into the hotel lobby a little after 9:30pm. We grabbes food at the bar and crashed.
Friday we played tourist in downtown Toronto, strolling down Yonge street and doing the hop on hop off bus tour. Got back to the con in time to register, grab a quick bite to eat, and head to the reception.
Opening ceremonies was followed by concerts from Howard Scrimgeour, The Stone Dragons, and Mary Crowell. Went to the Ose-free comedy song circle, then headed to open filk. Open filk was small Friday but fun and collegial.
Saturday started with Sally Childs-Helton's workshop on guided improvisation, which was really cool, although I ducked out a few minutes early because something triggered a way to finish off the last verse of the song Dene and I were working on for the Penguin song contest (more on that in the next post) and I dashed out to revise the lyrics and get them to Dene before he got too far into writing the tune.
The rest of Saturday was spent listening to concerts and visiting with folks, before heading up to get ready for the banquet. The concerts were all great, but for me the coolest was Ghost of a Rose. About half of what they did were songs written by Dene and I, and I hadn't heard some of the arrangement. Then they really surprised me by announcing that they had decided that even though I don't perform with them, they were making me an official fourth member of the band - the "Ghost Writer". It was really cool and I am thrilled.
The banquet was lots of fun, as we were seated with Jane and Phil, Gary and Sheryl, Sally and Barry, and I am blanking on the other two - I was already quite sleep deprived at that point (or did the table seat 8)? The banquet was followed by the inductions into the filk hall of fame, and the entire thing (banquet and hall of fame) was lovely and very well done, and we enjoyed visiting with the folks at our table.
It was then time for the auction (scored a cool messenger bag with part of the lyrics from Take it Back embroidered on the flap) and open filk.
Next up - reports on the song contests, open filks, and Sunday at the con.