Birthdays and other things

Today is Anne Neville's birthday. Also angevin2's. Happy Birthday to both!

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The Haydn D-major concerto is one of the few pieces of major-mode music that makes me sad. Sad in a good way, though. I got sort of teary of mm 71-76 while practicing it this morning. Sooooo good!

books and such

I wanted to listen to Marriage of Figaro tonight -- but NAXOS seems to suddenly only have either a)exerpts, b)"Opera Explained" or c)a really cool looking 1930's historic recording that I can't access because of "copyright reasons." What happened to the version that I listened to all year? So I am listening to Purcell Dido and Aeneas, instead. It's very pretty -- maybe they'll do it in Opera Class next semester and I will get to play pit: that would be awesome. Naxos keeps pausing in the middle of tracks, and I guessed the last word + pitch + rhythm of one of Belinda's arias on my own. Oh, I am so talented. Or Purcell is sometimes predictable.

I finally got Grand Tour from the library. I still don't think these Wrede/Stevernmer ones are as good as Mairelon the Magician and Magician's Ward. I also think that Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell is a better Napoleonic England w/wizards novel. But I liked this one, two.

( spoilers, probably -- I'm not very good at talking about books without giving stuff away )