How was Blog-art?
Yesterday me and my Rockin’ Chair were guests at Blog-art in Theater aan het Spui,The Hague. A festival by and for bloggers. Although organizers Marco Raaphorts and Karin Ramaker obviously worked hard to pull this off and got plenty of well deserved media attention, it still wasn’t quite what I expected… First of all there were less people than I had imagined and secondly many of the lecturers sometimes didn’t seem to realize they were dealing with an internet savvy audience or just weren’t conveying there ideas all that well. Or maybe I’m spoiled, could be.
One other thing I should have realized beforehand (but didn’t), was the nerd factor. Blog-art sometimes felt like entering another world. Physical and virtual weren’t that far apart. Weird (but not unpleasant).
Having said that, especially for a first edition it had a good variety of things to offer. Like John Dear Mowing Club. Even in the late afternoon, in front of a blogging/twittering audience, they still managed to impress me. Even though Erwin Blom said basically nothing new, his enthousiasm and rhetouric is extremely infectious. After a pleasant talk with Miriam Reeders and Eva Meijer, I know I should have taken more time to work through their entire blog-wall. I didn’t. I’ll probably have to go see their next performance to make up for that.
And than there was Matt Harris playing my Rockin’ Chair. He did good. Although he himself concluded that his half hour rehearsal went better. But I guess that’s inherent to the unpredictable nature of the Rockin’ Chair’s effect bank. Matt suggested I should make a more mobile version of it, like a cajón. Could be a good idea.
I also met some online aquaintances in the flesh and was treated to a tasty Chinese take-out. I left before Blog-art was over (having to drive all the way back to Deventer), so I can’t say if more personal highlights would have emerged later on…
All the way during my long drive back I somehow got me an uncontrollable craving for this song (despite the abundance of other good music in my van). There’s something magical about this song… anyway, here it is.
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in english?
it’s funny how some people had some sort of expectation and that expectation worked of worked not. makes me want to think more about what the mind does with something like expectations.
for me personally, my overall feeling was good. for a first edition things went smoothly. and with some of the feedback we got we can work with. but that’s (more than) okay.
and then my name. (and also chinese take out) I could write another blogpost about those topics. (without an ‘S’.) thankS. ;-)
mooi toch hoe hij er naar het einde toe een slot aanmaakt.
als je er een tube-overdrive in stopt wil Tom Waits hem vast hebben.
@karin r. Nederlands reageren mag ook hoor, maar ik schrijf m’n stukjes meestal in het engels, ja. Dat leek me gezien de herkomst van een groot deel van mijn lezers wel sympathiek ;) Ik heb die totaaaaal overbodige ‘S’ maar snel weggehaald. Excuses.
@Marco Raaphorst vindt Matt’s einde inderdaad ook erg goed! Ga binnenkort weer verder experimenteren met variaties op Rockin’ Chair. Bel jij Tom Waits vast even?
ja, misschien dat Michael Blair dat zeer kan waarderen zo’n stoel met allerlei vervormers erin. en een springgalm bv. lekker rock und roll. lofi chair :))
Peter de Kock over Rockin’ Chair:
“Na de opening was er muziek in de foyer. Matt Harris maakte muziek op de rocking chair van Harco Rutgers. Het Engelse woord rocking chair betekent schommelstoel maar de rocking chair van Harco was geen gewone schommelstoel maar een schommelbankje vol met electronica en geluidseffecten. Als je op de rocking chair tikt, klopt, slaat, bonkt, beukt of trommelt, kun je er muziek mee maken.
Nu hou ik meer van strakke-vierkwartsmaat-rockmuziek dus ik was meer geboeid door het verschijnsel rocking chair dan door de voor mij nogal science fiction achtige muziek die Matt Harris ermee maakte. Mijn dochter en ik trommelen na het eten wel eens op tafel en maken dan samen muziek. Daar heeft ze dan enorm plezier in. Misschien dat Harco Rutgers eens met de meubelindustrie moet gaan praten want ik denk dat er een interessante markt ligt te wachten om ook andere meubels (vooral tafels!) om te bouwen tot elektronische muziekinstrumenten.”
http://peterdekock.nl/2009/10/13/blog-art-het-verslag-en-zo/
About:Blank over Blog-art (in november meer):