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Over the weekend I faced that most frustrating of things, a computer meltdown. What I humbly believed should have been a simple upgrade caused my admittedly prehistoric computer to fold its metaphorical arms, sulk in a corner and refuse to come out to play. Thankfully my spare hard drive and a little middle-of-the-night ingenuity saved all my files and goodness knows what else. Yes, I back up, but things such as this remain a pain in the posterior.

The new set of arrangements for South Korea is going to take some time, based on what I have managed to get done thus far, and especially if one takes computer related woes into account. It is not particularly difficult work, and neither is the orchestra huge, but it is going to be repetitive and thus susceptible to the kinds of errors scribes used to make late at night. I think I might be quite vulnerable to those errors because I intend to get this work out of the way as soon as possible for several reasons. Beating a deadline always looks good, of course, but the earlier I finish the earlier I am likely to get paid and the sooner I can move onto whatever the next project might be.

With Thy Might is meanwhile shaping up for its first, second and third performances at the end of the coming week, as one of the repertoire pieces on the Malcolm Sargent Festival Choir tour. We had an enjoyable rehearsal on Friday evening, and even though it takes a couple of bites to get into the piece, it is sounding pretty decent once the choir gets up a head of speed.

Other that that things have been on the quietish side over the past couple of days. Alongside the composing I put together a set of lecture notes for a class this morning and some programme notes for the next Occam Singers concert, all things that tend to end up on my ‘to do’ list from time to time. This week I shall be knee deep in arranging, and would hope to be over half way through the entire project by Wednesday, in which case I should be on track to finish by the end of the week. Tomorrow I have a meeting to discuss avenues for a possible piece, so a clear road ahead would be a handy thing to have.

As for the weekend, well, I took Saturday off, and why shouldn’t I? I caught up on the remaining Godfather films and had a relaxing and indulgent day in while the drought hammered down outside. On Sunday morning I was at Hampstead for the normal fare of Mozart and Howells with a tiny choir and what is really a chamber organ. Too many notes, not enough musicians, but a whole bucket of fun, The evening was spent at Mabbots, playing for Evensong, and a modest do afterwards, and then home. Today I am tired but about to dive into some transcribing and arranging prior to taking the MSFC later on this evening.

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