Well, since I’m currently being kept awake by my upstairs neighbors (who have apparently conspired to keep me awake a lot lately), I guess an update is in order.

• Making progress on CocoNES. Finished the initial code for the NES core, minus the audio processing unit. I think I came up with a fairly slick solution that fits the code neatly into the Objective-C/Cocoa framework while still being able to cut out the overhead on some repetitive operations. More on that in another post.
• I have my second concert with Masterworks Chorus this weekend. I’ll be singing the solo movement 17 from Brahms’s Liebeslieder-Walzer. It’s a lovely tenor solo… too bad I’m not a tenor. I’ve managed to almost convince myself I could pass for a lyric baritone, though. At the right time of day. In any case, as long as my voice cooperates it should be fun. I enjoy singing it, it’s a lovely movement, it just hinges on how my G4 and A4 are feeling that day. If you HAPPEN to be in Omaha this Saturday, you should stop by the Strauss Center at UNO and take a listen.
• Hockey season has started. I’m making generous use of NHL Center Ice. Watched most of Minnesota’s season opener on Saturday (except for when I was fighting with my routers), and caught the end of another game last night. Minnesota’s looking really sharp this year, and Marion Gaborik hasn’t figured much into that, which is a really good thing, because I’m guessing that he will no longer be wearing a Wild uniform by Christmastime. Fuck him, if he wants to be greedy there are plenty of other great players out there who realize that Minnesota is the envy of the league as far as market and culture, maybe beaten out only by Detroit. Doug Risebrough did a bang-up job this summer bringing in Antti Miettenen (who had one goal in the opener and two last night) and Marc-Andre Bergeron.
• I’m finally working on some new music, a different setting of a poem that I already set in college and wasn’t really happy with the result of. I’m shopping around for a digital piano; Yamaha has a new line of home digital pianos that are really tempting. I need to work on my piano… I’d love to teach private lessons once we get a place of our own, but I won’t be able to do it fumbling around on the keyboard.
• World of Warcraft 3.0 was released yesterday. All sorts of cool new shit. I’m forcing myself to NOT get up and play it right now and throw my sleep schedule even more out of whack.

I think that’s about it.

I just listened to a recording of Eric Whitacre’s string transcription of his beautiful song, A Boy and a Girl. (link) It really opened the floodgates for me. I vividly remember being on the stage in Sioux Falls with Iowa State Singers, giving our performance of this then-new piece for the NCACDA regional convention. I can remember feeling like the entire contents of my soul were being spilled out with each word. In any other situation like that I probably would have been curled up on the floor sobbing, but I was so focused on the choir and the music there wasn’t room for anything else. That was one of the top–if not the most–soul-shattering moments I’ve ever experienced.

After the conclusion of our concert that afternoon, we received a standing ovation, which as I understand it is VERY rare at a convention like this. I remember filing off the stage, having to carefully watch my step as my glasses had fallen apart during the warm-up just prior to the concert. I remember the incredible sense of closeness I felt to all of the people in that room as we shared hugs and elations.

I have a recording of that concert. It is really quite a masterful recording of an exquisite performance. I can’t bear to listen to it anymore, because even though I know it’s an excellent recording, it still feels dull and lifeless compared to the memories it evokes.