Alone

I'm writing this from Myrtle Beach, where I drove down so that my sister could see a concert as an early 16th birthday present. Though I was not super excited about spending two days driving and doing essentially nothing, the screaming which nearly deafened me as she got into the car tonight to tell me all about how the lead singer signed her jeans made it all worthwhile.

Yesterday I did a lot of work setting "Alone" to music. The words, which are direct and as-of-yet unchanged from a Poe poem of the same name, is as follows:

From childhood's hour I have not been

As others were — I have not seen
As others saw — I could not bring
My passions from a common spring —
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow — I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone —
And all I lov'd — I lov'd alone —
Then — in my childhood — in the dawn
Of a most stormy life — was drawn
From ev'ry depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still —
From the torrent, or the fountain —
From the red cliff of the mountain —
From the sun that 'round me roll'd
In its autumn tint of gold —
From the lightning in the sky
As it pass'd me flying by —
From the thunder, and the storm —
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view —

It's a metaphor.

Anyway, I think that went pretty well. I have one more major piece in the puzzle before I start fitting everything together and finalizing draft one (please please, before school starts, please), and that is the CRAZY motif. Not sure exactly what that'll be, but I have faith in pounding random notes out in Finale and waiting for the Ouija board of musical ghosts to take over.

Pretty soon I have to start thinking about how and when to arrange auditions for the readthrough that we're planning in November. Closely related to that is thinking about when to record demos of all of the songs... and as much as I'm sure everyone enjoyed my singing voice on the "Tragedy!" demo CD, I'd like to get other people to sing it all. It would be beyond wonderful if we could have a well rehearsed readthrough AND a decent sounding CD to go along with it- helps to focus on actual problems with the show rather than performance issues. Here's hoping.