O cantare, O solo mio!
A few months prior to the war, I was approached by the A and S minister, Lord Frederick Vandeveer, about giving a concert at the event. Excitement and anxiety rushed over me, you might say it came in like a wrecking ball!
I eagerly accepted, and had thus sealed my fate. After allowing this information to sink into my brain, I realized that, while working a standard 40 hour per week job, my skadian career, modeling, cosplaying, fencing, and an overwhelming need to satiate a need for social connection, an hour-long concert would be a little bit of an undertaking to attempt on my own.
So I decided to call in a life line and make this a tag-team Super Friends concert.
Thus, the birth of Lady Solveig and Friends!
I reached out in a frantic… I mean “composed” (yea, we’ll go with that) fashion to all my talented friend base of performers. The super list included Mistress Analitta Falconbridge, His Excellency Jean Du Montagne, Lady Eva Southerland, and Lady Nuala McKensie.
I had asked all except for Eva to have 2-3 pieces of diverse style to perform. Eva was local to me and would not only be performing her own pieces, but accompanying me on guitar as well. I had also asked everyone to include the titles and duration of their contributions. I should note this was my first time ever organizing a concert.
Eva and I got together many times to rehearse up until the day of the concert. The concert was scheduled for Saturday after court, which seemed to run on forever. To be fair, most GNE courts do. Originally the concert had been scheduled in Bardic Grove, however, due to the copious amounts of rain that had fallen, a more apt title at the time may have been “Bardic Lake”. Therefor, the concert had been moved to the barn.
8:30 or so, I hauled ass to the barn, trying to stay as dry as possible. I was blessed to have heralds announcing the concert, or I fear no one would have come. Circum 9:00, we had about 45 attendees, but 2 of my performers were still missing. But, alas, the show must go on!
I sat on the stage in front of the audience and had a casual conversation with them to warm up the crowd, and perhaps to calm my own quickened heartbeat. And after about 5 minutes of this, only 1 of my 2 missing performers had shown up. Jean De la Montagne, with his 21 Charisma (+5 modifier!) strolled in with his infamous hat (with admirably long plumage!). He offered up this hat to me, and it seemed to have magic powers. The hat bestowed upon its wearer (now me) a new sense of bravado and confidence. At this point, the concert began.
Songs wove between the first 4 performers until the 5th had finally shown. There was no competition between the performers. Our only battle was against the rain, with its tapping against the roof a constant backdrop to any music we sought to perform.
At one point, I was so bold as to entice the audience to join in the song. I taught them the round, “Rose, rose”, and had them sing in 4 parts. On top of that, I added another layer of “Poor Bird”, and, finally, Mistress Aneleda added an addition layer of “Hey Ho”.
About an hour later, the concert was over, and the rain had let up. This whole concert seemed to be in perfect harmony, and I had earned some new followers. All in all, a rather positive experience.
Meddlings of the Minnesinger 