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Description
" … Superans nascentia. Parit illa mater fructum, Qui iam nostrum … "

I spent most of my time last week in recording sessions for a new disk. Recording is a really rewarding experience, and unlike anything else that I do. Each session lasts for three hours or so, and there will usually be two or three sessions a day for several days. They require short bursts of intense concentration, followed by discussions over what can improved. Each section of the music will be repeated quite a few times, but it rarely gets dull. Every sound you make could end up on the disk, so there's a constant drive to perform at the peak of your ability and keep improving your performance with each take. As everyone in the group is in the same boat, the atmosphere is electrifying and the sounds that come together in the sessions are a real joy.

I very much enjoyed the sessions for this disk, so I wanted to create something. It gave me an opportunity to show a little more of Sebastian and to try my hand at a more complete picture. Look, a background! It's a reasonably accurate copy of the corner of the Chapel in which I was singing. I've come up with a way of speeding up my new shading technique by cutting out some of the faff that comes with dealing with multiple gradients, so creating shading for difficult shapes has become quite a bit easier.

The badge on my bag is a Platinum badge. Sebastian is part of my Team from Blue Rescue Team, and they've been taking a bit of a sideline whilst I've been playing Explorers of Sky. I've still a few things to do with BRT, such as Mew and Mewtwo, so I'll probably end up with a more glitzy badge eventually.

For the eagle-eyed, that is a copy of Christopher Paolini's Eldest. As it happens, I wasn't actually reading this book during the recording downtime – it's here because I was returning it to a friend who was also at the sessions. I've recently finished the entire Cycle and very much enjoyed it, particularly Inheritance. I do feel a little bad about not drawing the tiny dragon Thorn on the cover and making do with a low-resolution blur. If I have time, I may come back and add him in at some point. In the sessions, I was actually reading a short novel by A. E. van Vogt called 'The Man with a Thousand Names'. I like short, relatively old, adventure-based science fiction for reading at sessions. Enough happens in a short space of time that you can keep quite entertained for 5 or 10 minutes a time.

For the record, that gold band on Sebastian's left arm is a watch. You just can't see the face from this angle.

I'd like this picture to form part of a pair eventually. I know that I've only really talked about the 'Singer' half of myself on here. I'd like for 'Physics' me to get a look in too, so I'm thinking about making a similar picture showing myself doing research. I'm also working on that Explorers of Sky picture I mentioned too, so I've a few things on the go.

The music we were recording is taken from the Eton Choirbook, one of only three surviving large-scale choirbooks from the 15th Century. The music is quite unlike the much more common polyphony from later centuries (I'm thinking Palestrina and Byrd, to name a few). Each piece is on a large scale so that there's rarely a work shorter than quarter of an hour. The music contrasts very florid verse sections with full chorus sections containing intensely complex interleaving of the parts. The music is free from a lot of the constraints imposed on more recent polyphony and, as such, it sounds creative and effusive, often doing very exciting and unexpected things. As you can probably tell, I'm very much a fan of choral music from this era, so this recording was very much a treat for me!

The Linoone was modelled on a Linoone from the episode of the Pokemon anime 'Showdown at Linoone'. The music stand is modelled on several makes of stand on sale at Amazon. The bag is modelled on several bags again on Amazon along with the bag shown in the intro to Explorers of Sky. The badge is modelled on the badge in the image of the new Starter Pokemon in Explorers of Sky standing in front of Wigglytuff's Guild.

Background Music: More Divine Than Human – Music from the Eton Choirbook: The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford

(If you want to a listen to a bit of this, someone has helpfully put up the entirety of Walter Lambe's Magnificat from the disk on Youtube).

Description
" … Superans nascentia. Parit illa mater fructum, Qui iam nostrum … "

I spent most of my time last week in recording sessions for a new disk. Recording is a really rewarding experience, and unlike anything else that I do. Each session lasts for three hours or so, and there will usually be two or three sessions a day for several days. They require short bursts of intense concentration, followed by discussions over what can improved. Each section of the music will be repeated quite a few times, but it rarely gets dull. Every sound you make could end up on the disk, so there's a constant drive to perform at the peak of your ability and keep improving your performance with each take. As everyone in the group is in the same boat, the atmosphere is electrifying and the sounds that come together in the sessions are a real joy.

I very much enjoyed the sessions for this disk, so I wanted to create something. It gave me an opportunity to show a little more of Sebastian and to try my hand at a more complete picture. Look, a background! It's a reasonably accurate copy of the corner of the Chapel in which I was singing. I've come up with a way of speeding up my new shading technique by cutting out some of the faff that comes with dealing with multiple gradients, so creating shading for difficult shapes has become quite a bit easier.

The badge on my bag is a Platinum badge. Sebastian is part of my Team from Blue Rescue Team, and they've been taking a bit of a sideline whilst I've been playing Explorers of Sky. I've still a few things to do with BRT, such as Mew and Mewtwo, so I'll probably end up with a more glitzy badge eventually.

For the eagle-eyed, that is a copy of Christopher Paolini's Eldest. As it happens, I wasn't actually reading this book during the recording downtime – it's here because I was returning it to a friend who was also at the sessions. I've recently finished the entire Cycle and very much enjoyed it, particularly Inheritance. I do feel a little bad about not drawing the tiny dragon Thorn on the cover and making do with a low-resolution blur. If I have time, I may come back and add him in at some point. In the sessions, I was actually reading a short novel by A. E. van Vogt called 'The Man with a Thousand Names'. I like short, relatively old, adventure-based science fiction for reading at sessions. Enough happens in a short space of time that you can keep quite entertained for 5 or 10 minutes a time.

For the record, that gold band on Sebastian's left arm is a watch. You just can't see the face from this angle.

I'd like this picture to form part of a pair eventually. I know that I've only really talked about the 'Singer' half of myself on here. I'd like for 'Physics' me to get a look in too, so I'm thinking about making a similar picture showing myself doing research. I'm also working on that Explorers of Sky picture I mentioned too, so I've a few things on the go.

The music we were recording is taken from the Eton Choirbook, one of only three surviving large-scale choirbooks from the 15th Century. The music is quite unlike the much more common polyphony from later centuries (I'm thinking Palestrina and Byrd, to name a few). Each piece is on a large scale so that there's rarely a work shorter than quarter of an hour. The music contrasts very florid verse sections with full chorus sections containing intensely complex interleaving of the parts. The music is free from a lot of the constraints imposed on more recent polyphony and, as such, it sounds creative and effusive, often doing very exciting and unexpected things. As you can probably tell, I'm very much a fan of choral music from this era, so this recording was very much a treat for me!

The Linoone was modelled on a Linoone from the episode of the Pokemon anime 'Showdown at Linoone'. The music stand is modelled on several makes of stand on sale at Amazon. The bag is modelled on several bags again on Amazon along with the bag shown in the intro to Explorers of Sky. The badge is modelled on the badge in the image of the new Starter Pokemon in Explorers of Sky standing in front of Wigglytuff's Guild.

Background Music: More Divine Than Human – Music from the Eton Choirbook: The Choir of Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford

(If you want to a listen to a bit of this, someone has helpfully put up the entirety of Walter Lambe's Magnificat from the disk on Youtube).