Surprise

Listened to the 230-odd measures of my vocal score to Life Is A Nice Place To Visit and, while not quite blown away, I was impressed. I have something decent in the works. Yes, there are dull moments to fix but several arias were so sad and lovely they brought tears to my eyes. So I buckled down and composed another 20 or so measures, and I hope to get back into a daily rhythm with it. It's hard work, lots of fixing to do, but something is definitely worthwhile is getting born.

We're seeing the opera Hamlet Saturday as part of the HD simulcast from the Met. So I thought I'd read the play. I haven't read Shakespeare for pleasure in far too long.

I saw a very strange production of Hamlet at the Pasadena Playhouse in the 60s. Hamlet was played by Robert Vaughn, "the man from U.N.C.L.E." and he delivered the "to be or not to be" soliloquy while throwing furniture around the room in some kind of nervous breakdown. Pretty weird.

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Two great basketball games today, starting at 4.