h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

We got them up to twelve players in the end. Six strings and six wind/brass - we don't have any air guitarists, but I guess we must have air percussion as I don't recall anyone actually saying we had a drum kit in the band!

It's still not big enough, but it's all they can afford. Well at least they can't complain that we're too loud...

I'm really looking forward to it all now!

Putting my 'I may not be Welsh, but I live in Wales' hat on here, I promise that there's plenty of vocal talent in Wales, but that it's not been 'discovered' and force-fed to people with large dollops of sugar . Otherwise no-one would have any teeth left as they'd all have rotted away.

Wales' reputation as 'The land of Song' is based quite largely on it's amateur traditions (going back centuries), which are still thriving - though suffering from a chronic shortage of Tenors, which seems to be a country-wide problem. Aled has very sensibly abandoned his sugary recording past and carved out a nice little TV presenting career for himself both on BBC and the Welsh Language Channel S4C.

We all miss Sir Harry too . He had such a wonderful sense of humour and the World is a sadder place without him (and Spike/Peter/Michael).

There is a CD by Yuri Bashmet which has Kol Nidrei on it (plus some other viola stuff) - I can't give you the catalogue number as I've lent the CD to someone who wanted to listen to the piano accompaniment of one of the works on it and I haven't had it back yet. Again, I got it when I was at college around ten years ago, so I don't know if it's still available.

Well may'be when they hear the Orchestra and ask what is missing you could get a very large Rrrrrugby Player (Swansea accent) to give them a rendition of air tympani.

You are of course quite correct in what you say, and we also feel the that the Welsh are still getting a bad press after hundreds of years, mainly from the English,Anne and the BBC. We are sympathisers of their cause. We miss Sir Harry too, though not, we hasten to add, any of his appearances on "Songs of Praise".

It's good to know that the Eisteddfods are still going. Have you ever attended any yourself?

We've seen the DVD and loved it, viewed both discs, the camera work, costumes and sets were amazing. What a pace, the music was brilliant, and the dance exhilerating. Jim Broadbent was wonderful, as were the whole cast. A realy good fairytale, though Kidman's role was a little over played.

Found a copy of Jacqueline Du Pre and Daniel Barenboime's with the Brahms Cello Sonata's 1 & 2 plus Bruch's Kol Nidrei. Thank you for that, it's going to be a favourite of ours.

Also picked up a copy of Vaughan Williams "The House of Life" and "Songs of Travel", with additional pieces by Butterworth, Ireland, Warlock and Gurney.

Jolly good stuff.

By the way - if you haven't already found them, look out for the green fairies and red windmills on disk 2 of the MR DVD. They are icons randomly scattered about and, if you select them, lead you to little snippets of action such as Baz giving the actors advice on what he wants, mucking about with his co-writer - and a fantastic bit with Jim Broadbent doing his very own version of the can-can (with sung accompaniment by Baz Luhrmann) in Satine's dressing room! (you can get that one by scrolling down the second menu on Disk 2 - select the 'return to previous screen' icon, then scroll down again - a green fairy shape should then appear above the menu.

I am still unable to decide whether 'The Pitch' or 'Like a Virgin' was the funniest sequence in the film, though the 'French Farce' in the Elephant with Satine desperately trying to hide the fact that Christian is hiding behind the supper table comes a very close third - particularly when the candle falls over. I think that Baz manages to switch between the comic and tragic aspects of the story with aplomb, and it works like a dream.

The show was actually much better than I feared it might be. The cast were all excellent (particularly the leads), and the band was more-or-less able to hide the fact that there weren't enough players. The audiences were good, and (apart from an interesting moment on the last night when we thought that there was going to be a tea chest left in Prof. Higgins' study from the previous scene - hastily removed before the lights went up!) the scene changes were smooth.

We did have a bit of fun on the last night with the Ascot sequence - whilst Eliza was 'encouraging' Dover the horse in the race, there was an outbreak of clip-clopping with coconut shells in the pit!

The show sounds briliant, wish we'd had the chance to enjoy it too, especially on the last night. sounds as though you had a great time doing it.
So are there any more gigs planned for the future?

And nobody gave the air guitars a solo, ?

We'll have to rent out MR again to catch the green fairy's thing, we'd enjoy a second viewing anyways.

Did you ever catch the musical episode of Buffy, we're not fans you understand but that one was a hoot.

Alas no - I don't have sky and season 6 hasn't been on BBC2 yet (though I believe it's not too far off). I have heard from various sources that it's good so I'm looking forward to it. I'm not a raving Buffy fan either, but I do enjoy it if I catch it on telly (mind you, I did prefer Angel when he turned into a baddie in season two - somehow he was more convincing - uuurgh, I'm in danger of sounding like I'm interested here...) .

I believe that the Society who did My Fair Lady this year are doing Yeoman of the Guard next year (some time in May). I don't yet know if we will be called back to accompany them (the original MD retired last year so fixing the band is very much more ad hoc than it used to be). The Society does a G&S every other year, so it was Mikado last year (which was absolutely cracking). The first one I did with them was Pirates of Penzance - that was superb. I think we might have benefited from some air guitar during the dialogues though - boy they were loooooooooooooong... a real test of concentration, and I think I failed once or twice!

We can only take G&S in small doses as we find it a bit Panto, not completely pants.

Did you catch the TT Big Dig last night on Channel 4 ? We've taped it as work got in the way of seeing it all in one hit. We just caught the "We Archeologists work to rule" thing and Tony keeping a low profile , whilst it goes to arbitration .

We feel Giles has gone completely 2D where he was vaguely in base relief before, but Buffy, Fluffy, Noofy and the others developed almost Batman dimensions, well the Demons are quite Riddler and Joker like. Tights and a Cape will be next, you have been warned .

Alas I was out rehearsing last night so I didn't get the chance to see it - and I even forgot to set the video! Tsk Tsk.

Never mind - I might get the chance to see it on the Welsh Channel 4 instead if they show it in the evening. They usually show it during the day whilst I'm at w*rk.

G&S is a bit pantomimey, isn't it? They always involve some form of misunderstanding that gets more and more convoluted until, hey presto, the whole thing gets sorted out in around two verses of the final number and everybody lives happily ever after!

Extraordinary. But they're good for Operatic Societies because there's loads of chorus work in them. We hardly saw anything of the chorus over the last week.

hi all hows it going, I've a Welsh Tenor sitting by me as I type this

Very well - apart from being depressed as hell at being back at w*rk again...

Fine, how are you Pat,

So this Welsh Tenor, is he part of a "Rent a Welsh Tenor" scheme they've got going in your area? Or you saying that your down to your last Tenor and it's Welsh Or is this something else your trying to say about how you have some very close friends with nice voices who also happen to be Welsh. We're getting into trouble here we can tell.

What have you been up to since we heard from you last????

CLMP has been giving us some really great tips, have you seen MR and if so, what did you think?

We've been taking an interest in the Hubble, have you visited the site yourself ever? We got a wallpaper of the Great Nebula in Orion.

Not sure about tenors, but I could do with some tenners, though. Welsh or otherwise!

Oh we don't know so much, a good Tenor sent busking in Swansea might raise quite a few Welsh Tenners. Wheres your spirit of enterprising exploitation and averis gone? Elvis did it for Col. Porker

Well I know of one Russian orchestra which was due to play in Swansea a couple of years ago. They sold so few tickets that they all needed to go busking to pay for their hotel.

They then got featured on the local news (they were busking in their full concert gear!), and the People of Swansea responded magnificently - both the orchestra's concerts ended up being complete sell-outs, and the orchestra made a profit!

I think that's where a lot of the Welsh Tenners went...

Several of the Concerts one of my Orchestras does are for charity. They're usually 'invited audience' affairs, with lots of important people's ticket money being donated whilst we give our performance for free. (a word to the Pembrokeshire ladies who do the magnificent buffets we get on these occasions, both the winter crew and the summer crew - you rock, girls!)



My internet connection keeps collapsing again

Felicitous greetings from...Cybercat

hes just a friend, s for all

That's a shame, so you'll have to split the tips between you. So who's your friend sing with and can he do the Pearl Fishers Duet thing?

We heard it live last summer at an open air concert, they did "The Impressario" as well. A first for us but nto the last, suppose Opera's not your thing though.

What's your current listening.

Welcome,

CLMP's been very good to us and makes us feel welcome. We enjoy the exchange we have with her since we're both relatively new, it's good to meet a friendly face .

Which IP are you with and do you get a lot of this sort of hassle?
We tried Freeserve but they kept cutting us off. we're with BT for now and are looking at Tiscalli and may'be a fat pipe.

We remember that story, it was a while ago though. As the Russian economy has grown some since then they should make a return some time.

How is life on the exercise machine, made any prog in the fight. Did you finish that book, and if so how was it.

We got R.A.A. Spring to Summer Programme the other day and they're putting on a show in July called Masters of Colour from the Merzbacher Collection and featuring work by Derain, Chagall and Matisse. As we like to go to the Summer Exhibition every year we'll do the double and see both.
On last year's summer exhibiton we took in an Impressionsit show and a first visit to the Tate Modern.

Did you catch any TT this week, we missed it this time around .

Hello all - and hello Cybercat! Welcome to my Kennel

I think we're attached to a University connection, but it's not very stable (I get my internet access at w*rk). We have Supanet and Softnet Free at home, but Dad is thinking of looking elsewhere, as one is not very reliable, and the other is very slooooooow...

I left the five stone mark behind a couple of weeks ago - and I've now set my sights on the five and a half mark! Treadmill walking is just as dull as ever, but I'm currently listening to Strauss' 'An Alpine Symphony' as I go as one of the orchestras is playing it in June and it's really difficult, so I want to be sure I know what's going on. But I still have the soundtrack to Moulin Rouge in my bag so I can have a good laugh at their version of 'Like a Virgin' when I get tired of scaling mountains!

Alas I haven't managed to catch TT at all - though the 'Londinium' Special is on Channel 4 tonight. I'll try and remember to tape it, 'cos I'm rehearsing again tonight.