January 14th, 2010
Merry post-Christmas! This is an attempt at a new way of posting pictures. I think it’s working well, but let me know if you find broken links or anything else out of sorts. If it works well, I’ll convert all the old albums to this system.
July 2nd, 2008
I now live in a two-harpsichord house:
(not the greatest picture – maybe I’ll try again when the light’s better, or experiment with a flash…)
Rachelle Taylor is lending me her Beaupré French double while she does some renovations to her house. I’m happy to give it a home for the next little while! It’s great fun having two harpsichords in the same room, to be able to run back and forth and compare the different sounds. This is a very nice harpsichord, with a very rich sound, and it’s a breeze to play compared to mine. I’m not sure it works wonderfully for a lot of the earlier music I usually play, but it’s fantastic for Rameau, and sounds very nice for Bach as well. I need to dig up some music that I haven’t played in a while – Forqueray and the like.
November 16th, 2007
To continue the personal news catch-up that I’m attempting this week, I thought it would be good to mention that Sari and I got married! Now that it’s been over a month, I figure it’s time to say something here. Enough secrecy!
The wedding was a wonderful day on Thanksgiving weekend. Perfect weather – just a bit chilly, but very sunny. Lots of friends and family. All in all, a fine party. Thanks to everyone that could come! Sari made a web site for the event, and we now have many photos up on it. If anyone has photos that they’d like us to post, send them over! We can always add more.
November 10th, 2007
Sometimes a blog doesn’t get updated because nothing is happening. Other times, it doesn’t get updated because there’s just way too much going on! I’ll try to make a few posts in the very near future about all the new developments in my life, but for now, a very quick run down:
February 27th, 2007
We got back from Winnipeg last week, right on schedule. I’ve posted more pictures from that trip, as well as a few much older ones that I hadn’t gotten around to uploading for some reason.
Other exciting news is that several concerts are coming up! First of all, I’m doing a series of three solo harpsichord recitals in New Brunswick:
March 9, 7PM, All Saints Church, St. Andrews
March 10, 7PM, Arts Center, St. John
March 11, 3PM, Gallery 78, Fredericton
The programme is varied: it’s titled Six Degrees of Separation: a musical genealogy of the Baroque period. Beginning at the very beginning of the Baroque, with Frescobaldi, it moves through several times and places, relating each piece to the one which precedes it, eventually finishing with Mozart, right at the end of the Baroque (perhaps a bit beyond the end, but that’s ok). Let me know if you’d like any more information about any of these concerts!
After I get back from that, Sari and I will both be playing with La Fiorenza in All’ombra della Croce: Music for the mystery of Lent. That concert is on March 21 at 8PM, at the Church of St. John the Evangelist, here in Montreal.
Back to practicing!
February 14th, 2007
Sari and I are in Winnipeg, visiting her parents. The trip got off to a nice start, with some typical Manitoba weather: -25°C when we landed, and then much colder the next day! We can handle it though. We’re mighty and have socks.
We’ve spent some of the time setting up a computer with a network connection, so that Sari’s parents now have an e-mail address for the first time ever!
January 22nd, 2007
I’m back! And akemashite omedetou gozaimasu! (Happy New Year!) It has snowed several times since the last entry, and rained, and then snowed some more! So far, we’ve been a couple of weeks with no rain, which is fantastic! It’s even been quite cold for a few days.
In the weeks and weeks and weeks since the last entry, Sari and I traveled to New Brunswick for Christmas, celebrated a few birthdays, performed with the Seasons Baroque Ensemble, settled Catan extensively, and generally had a silly and jolly time.
The concerts with Seasons included shows in St. Andrews and Saint John this time. These went very well, and we had a great turnout, especially considering the new venues. Everyone seemed very enthusiastic, so we’re looking forward to the next shows!
The next performance put on by Early Music Fredericton will be a series of solo harpsichord recitals that I’m playing. Friday, March 9 will be in St. Andrews, Saturday the 10th in Saint John, and then Sunday afternoon in Fredericton. More details to come on those concerts! Watch this space!
In other exciting news, I’m no longer a regular McGill employee. My last day working at the venerable help desk at ICS Customer Support was last Thursday. It’s been a long time – after five and a half years, I was, except for Mary-Ann, the most senior employee there, including all the managers, etc. It was time to go though – I have more than enough work these days with other web work and programming and all the music work, so it was time for a change!
Unfortunately, I have a cold. I’ve been treating my symptoms by staying in bed for most of the past three days (medicinal laziness?). I think I’m on the mend, but it’s slow going. One nice part of working from home though is that I can stay in bed in my pyjamas all day long, and actually get a whole lot done!
December 3rd, 2006
Well golly. Would ya look at what happened here:
We had a few flurries over the past week, and one dump of slush in October, but this is the first real snowfall that looks like it will stay for a few days. Wednesday might be too warm, unfortunately, so we might get some rain then, but the rest of the coming week looks like it will be cold and snowy! YAY!
(thanks for the pics, Sari!)
November 30th, 2006
I haven’t done a whole lot in the past month. However, I have eaten some food. More than once, even!
First was a big chicken that Sari and I roasted with some veggies:
Then she (Sari, not the chicken) ran off to Japan and had many adventures, some of which also involved food. (Raw whale meat, anyone?)
Upon her return, inspired by yummy Japanese food, we had a feast or two:
(follow the link to see what all the stuff actually is)
And finally, now that it’s getting a bit colder out (no significant snowfall yet though…), I’ve started making bread again!
I managed to get a nice texture with lots of holes in it, which is nice. I’ve been trying to do that for ages, but it didn’t usually work. Not sure why it did this time though! Maybe because I put in more olive oil than usual? Or did most of the second rise in the oven while it baked? (with interesting side effects).
October 27th, 2006
For the latest concert with the Seasons Baroque Ensemble, Sari and I decided to rent a car and drive there and back. It was fun to have a road trip together, and to not have to worry about schedules or anything like that. It was exhausting though… and somewhat more expensive than the bus (since we were there for a whole week).
The concert was also exhausting. Katherine and Graham only got back to town two days before the show, so we put together a very challenging programme, including F. Couperin’s L’apothéose de Lully on very short notice. The end result was very good though – many people commented that it was our best yet. We certainly had a good turnout, too. The Cathedral is a very nice place to play.
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