Monday, January 03, 2005
My list of must-see shows….
What better time than the beginning of the year to devise a must-see list of New York theatre!
But as a refresher, here are the new shows this season I have already seen: The Frogs, Dracula, Brooklyn and La Cage Aux Folles.
Ones I would like to say I’ve seen by the time we arrive at the Tonys in June: Dame Edna, Pacific Overtures, Little Women, Good Vibrations, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, Monty Python’s Spamalot, All Shook Up, A Light In The Piazza, Sweet Charity and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
If I have the time and the money, I’d like to see some plays, too: Streetcar Named Desire, On Golden Pond, Steel Magnolias, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and Glass Menagerie.
Do you think the Tonys will be worth seeing this year? I think it’s hard to say at this point. Wouldn’t it be so much easier to take all this in if I just lived there? Hmmm.....
Sunday, January 02, 2005
iPod-ing
Probably one of the best and most useful gadgets I ever bought for myself is my iPod. That would probably be after my Tablet-PC (which I couldn’t live without). I am actually on my third iPod. This first one was from the first generation of iPods that had a 10 GB maximum. Shortly after a year, I outgrew that. The battery life was pretty limited, too. I finally sold it on eBay to someone who ended up enjoying it. My second iPod had 20 GB which was more than enough room for all my songs, but didn’t survive a drop it took while I was running one day. You see, I didn’t exactly have it in a protective case, so in one quick fall, it was history. And now I am on my third one - what they call a 3rd generation iPod. It has 40 GB which is really more than enough space for all my stuff - almost all songs plus a few video files that I’ve transferred back and forth between home and school. That is one of the nice things about the iPod - it works as an external hard drive also.
So over this past week I have enjoyed setting the iPod to randomly play the 4,840 songs I have on it. That is about 25 GB of space. It’s also only a portion of my CD collection, but definately the stuff I enjoy most. Usually I don’t listen to songs in random. I like to create a playlist I call Favorites. In that playlist I have about 60 songs I could listen to all the time. I change the songs in here every couple of months. Right now I have things like: Paris Through the Window from A Class Act; The Ballad of Czolzosz from Assassins; and Epilogue from Ragtime. About 80% of my iPod is show music, 15% jazz, and 5% Classical. When I get a new CD, I’ll create a playlist for that title which makes it easier to pull up on the iPod. Most recent CD purchases:
In Your Dreams: Christine Ebersole - I think I bought this because I was desperate for something new. Her accompanist is jazz pianist Billy Stritch along with a bass player (who is very good). The disc is pretty unmemorable. There is only one song I like: Baby, Dream Your Dream. I never cared for Tony-winner Ebersole. She has her share of freaky pitch moments. Plus, she stole the Tony from Marla Shaffel and her performance in Jane Eyre.
Finian’s Rainbow - At the same time I got the Ebersole disc, I bought this one of the recent Irish Repertory Theatre’s production. A much better disc! I love the songs from this show: How Are Things In Glocca Morra? (sung beautifully by Melissa Erico), Look To The Rainbow, and Old Devil Moon. At first I was bummed that they used two-piano accompaniment, but the more I listen, the more it doesn’t matter. It’s the tunes that carry this. Wish I would have seen the production!
The Fix - I received an Amazon gift certificate for Christmas. I knew nothing about this show, but it kept popping up in my recommendations and the reviews were positive. After just one listening, I can’t say I’m impressed. John Barrowman is in the cast along with Philip Quast. The score is by Dana Rowe who also wrote Witches of Eastwick. This does not seem to be in the same league, but maybe some more listening will convince me otherwise.
Woman in White - This new Andrew Lloyd-Webber musical does not impress. Again, I haven’t listened to it all but once, but it seems like a yawn to me. One interesting thing about the recording is that it was made on opening night in front of a live audience. You really can’t tell. Shows what technology has allowed us to do these days.
If you don’t want to buy CDs you can download music from the iTunes store (and from other places on the web). I’ve done this a few time, but only when I wanted something immediately. You obviously don’t get the nice printed materials that come with a traditional CD. It is also more difficult to transfer or share the tracks that you download. Go with the real thing....even if you dump the tracks on your favorite MP3 player and have the CDs sit on the shelf.
Saturday, January 01, 2005
Resolutions??
Hmmm....have I ever really been into the New Year’s Resolution thing? I don’t think so because I am frequently taking stock of where I am throughout the year and correcting course if I can. Even if I’m not into making resolutions only at the beginning of the year, it might be a good time to just put some things down and see where they are in the coming weeks and months.
I’ll start by saying that this week’s vacation was really pretty nice. I got to do a few things that I normally don’t make the time to do. So maybe my ‘resolution’ will be to continue into the new year those things that I enjoyed. Things such as going to the movies (I saw The Aviator and The Phantom of the Opera, even though I don’t consider myself much of a movie buff), eating right, getting exercise everyday, setting up my blog, reading, napping, listening to music, and very little school work!
So maybe my resolution will be to do the following:
- eat right and exercise daily
- read something every day (I have soo many things sitting here to read!)
- focus less on school and more on me and friendships with others
Most people make resolutions they can’t really keep. They work hard for a few weeks and then what they said they would do usually goes by the wayside. But we’ll see...I think I can do this! In fact, I’ll resolve to check back in on these things in exactly one month...February 1! In the meantime, I’ll be posting about some of these things as well as music and theatre stuff I enjoy and am involved in.