Marching On

Last week was 8 voices... this week is 8 hands. This is a larger spectacle than I usually choose for Sunday music (my days of flashy church offertories are, thankfully, long over) but I think variety is good and I love to see young people collaborating to create church music.

Dilbert and Caffeine

Jeff here. Stef has been completely knocked out with a bad cold this week and she's fed up having to drink tea.  To cheer her up, here is my coffee-loving wife's favourite Dilbert.

Have a good weekend!

8 voices.

1 beautiful piece of early music.

There's not much else to say. 

Here's Voces8 with Orlando Gibbons' 'O Clap Your Hands'. Perfection.

Dilbert and Learning New Office Equipment

Jeff here. I'm training today for my company's new 3D printer. I hope it goes better than this.

Have a good weekend!

Blue Background Part 2

Home makeover reveals are always better with a "before" photo.

It seems I forgot the before photo.

Here's the best I can do- a photo of our family room from 3 Christmases ago. Ignore the decorations and look at the built-in bookshelves at the back of the room. Rather boring and messy, despite numerous attempts at staging.

Here's what what we did last weekend: 

Happier, brighter and, after a book purge, lighter. And bluer. It's a lot of blue (Benjamin Moore's Electric Blue to be exact) for someone who has painted the last three rooms in her house white, pale grey and white, but I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.

Blue Background

The Princess Margaret Show House is always filled with wonderful decorating ideas. The dining room from the 2011 house has remained in the back of my mind for the past two years. Isn't that hit of blue in the back of the dining room cabinet beautiful?

Photo by Michael Graydon in the October 2011 issue of House & Home

This inspired us to do something this weekend... I'm putting the finishing touches on today but will post some photos tomorrow!

The Ground

I stumbled upon young Norwegian composer Ola Gjeilo (pronounced Yay-lo) last month. While Gjeilo composes pieces for choir, orchestra/symphonic winds and piano, his main passion is improvisation (he is a pianist and you can see him in action here).
I'm in awe of anyone able to improvise at this level.

In 2008, Gjeilo composed a Sunrise Mass for Choir and String Orchestra. In 2011, he further developed the chorale from the last movement "In the Moment" into a free-standing anthem entitled "The Ground".  What's fascinating is that the piano accompaniment stands on it's own as an improvisational-style piece (you can here a version of it here). All together with strings, I find it simply beautiful.

Here is Kairos String Quartet and the composer, Ola Gjeilo, accompanying the Central Washington University Chamber Choir.

Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua. Osanna, Osanna in excelsis.

Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini. Osanna, Osanna in excelsis.

Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, Dona nobis pacem.

Heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Hosanna, hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of the world, Lamb of God, grant us peace.

Returning with Dilbert

And we're back! We'll get back to regular blog posts next week but for now, here is Jeff's Friday Dilbert.

Have a good weekend.