Happy Thanksgiving!

No editing or revising for the next few days- trying to look at everything with fresh eyes when it's time for the redraft in a few days.  Have a great Thanksgiving!

With Many Thanks to Christian Amonson

"Fall of the House of Usher" Read Through

By Brent Cirves and Mike Johnson

 

November 14, 7:30PM – Ewell Recital Hall

Courtesy Recording from http://ChristianAmonson.com/

 

ACT 1 (70MB) – http://ChristianAmonson.com/CBARecording/FallOfTheHouseOfUsher_Act1.mp3

 

ACT 2 (60MB) – http://ChristianAmonson.com/CBARecording/FallOfTheHouseOfUsher_Act2.mp3

 

Enjoy!

Thank You!

Since the House of Usher readthrough is now over, I wanted to say thank you to everyone who helped out in some way, either by reading or singing or stage managing or critiquing early drafts of songs or encouraging this project.

We got some great feedback from the audience, and I'm hoping to get a recording of the entire show online at some point for those who were not able to come see the readthrough.  I'll let you know when that happens.  In the meanwhile, there's a lot of work to be done...

49 Minutes of Music on the Wall

Sometimes things seem to just work out.  For example, today I had no homework or class to do after 9:30AM due to a field trip which forced me to wake up at 7.  This means that I had from 9:30-3:00PM to work on music, from 3:00-8:00 to record that music, and from 8-11 to rehearse.  

Tomorrow I plan on waking up early and writing as much instrumental music as I can (all of the sung music, with the exception of one song, is recorded) before 11:45.  At that point I will go to the recording studio and do a final mix of the songs.  Afterwards, if I have more time, I'll work on a little more instrumental music and then go to the recital hall to do a sound check at 3.  From 3-6 I will work on organizing the music and putting sticky notes in my script to let me know when the music needs to be played.  If there's time, I'll also try to type up a survey and get it printed out.  If there's still time, I'll come up with introductory remarks. 

The cast had a great rehearsal tonight, and at the end I asked them some of the questions on the survey that we'll be handing out to the audience.  They had some fantastic insights and solutions to problems in the show... I can't wait to see what a full audience can find.

Overall I'm very, very excited.  How could I not be?  If the audience enjoys it, then great.  If they hate it, then isn't it a good thing we had a readthrough so that we have time to change the things to make it great?  There's a little bit of rationalization in there, but not much...

5 Days and Counting

Went to the WFS-EHS game this weekend.  We won by a wide margin, as predicted.  I saw Mr. C but we didn't really have time to talk about the musical.  He did offer to fill out a form for the DC Fringe Festival, though, which is extremely nice of him to do (I think he feels bad that he can't help out with the readthrough in a more hands-on way).

I am currently in Studio 1 in the library waiting for songs to bounce (render, compile, turn into actual music- however you want to say it) and simultaneously trying to finish up some old songs.

There is a lot of work to do between now and Friday, but this should be a lighter academic week than last week (two case write-ups, an exam, and a 45-slide powerpoint presentation didn't help) so I should have time to scramble everything together.  

Sound Check

Ahh! I missed my official window for posting for the first time in 43 posts. Oh well.

I did a sound check today in the Recital Hall- couldn't get any sound out for the first fifteen minutes and thought, along with the administrative assistant who was helping me, that everything was broken. Then I found a small plug that was halfway out, and putting it back in its place seemed to fix the problem.

Also did some more sound mixing today.

Had individual character rehearsals yesterday. They went well, though half of my cast may have inflamed bronchitis. And by may I mean absolutely do. They should be well by the readthrough, though. If not, Annabel Lee may be a little more in character than I would prefer.

Halloween Weekend!

And what a lovely weekend it was.  I'm a little late on my posting, but hey, I haven't eaten dinner yet either, so it's not like I was procrastinating.

Went to Woodberry on Thursday for the weekend- I carved a very cool pumkin out of a pattern that Liza and I found- a barbershop quartet of ghosts.  Even though only four trick-or-treaters came down to her house, I feel as though it was worth the two hours it took to carve.

Saw Mr. Cirves's play- Moby Dick Rehearsed.  This was a play that we had seen about six years ago in a regional theater, and we thought it was great and were in a race to see who could direct it first.  He won.  The production was very cool- a bagpiper took to the stage between each scene change!  They also super-soaked the first four rows of the audience with the "sea," so I was lucky that I knew that beforehand and got a fifth row seat.

This morning before I left, Mr. C handed me seven beautiful black folders filled with draft five of the script.  I'll be handing these out to my actors tomorrow for our first rehearsal.  

When I got back to William and Mary, I went straight to the recording studios so that I could record Brian and Andrew at 5:00.  Brian stayed till 8 and managed to churn out every song that his character sings.  A few of them might need slight revisions, but overall he did a great and very efficient job (which takes a load off my mind since now I don't have to be in the recording studio every day this week).  Andrew stayed till 9:30, which was the point at which I realized I had nothing left for HIM to sing either.  I have a few songs that are almost written that he needs to sing next weekend, of course, but overall he's all finished too.  Now all that's left, for the most part, is the mixing.

I keep forgetting to mention this, but I wouldn't be able to put up this read-through if not for the help of Robert Black, whom I have enlisted as stage manager.  I should have put his name up on the cast list as such.  He's been scheduling things for me so that I don't have to, which is a wonderful, wonderful thing.  

I am still, of course, delightfully behind on all of my actual school work because of this.  I think that I'll go get something to eat and then get to that.