An Irish Update

The weekend of Oct. 11th we had guest Richard Bellis visiting for a seminar. He wrote the book “The Emerging Film Composer” and is on the board of Directors for ASCAP. You can check out his credits here http://www.richardbellis.com/index.html

He was a very good teacher. Gave a lot of helpful tips, explained the business and work flow of the field.  Very neat to meet him.

Thursday there was a film festival in Tralee, Ireland. It’s a 3.5 hour drive, but we decided to make it into a mini vaca. Brendan rented a car. Driving on the left side of the road was hard to get used to, but he did a very good job.  We got into town just in time. The festival was good. There was a panel (of which our college director Derek Gleeson was on) talking about music in films. Then we watched 3 shorts.

On the way home, we drove a little out of the way to go to the Cliffs of Moher. Not to down play the festival, but this was the highlight of the trip. J We got there at the perfect time. It was blue sky and sunny when we arrived.  A lady was playing harp on the walk to the “castle”, and there were rainbows everywhere! --One going into the ocean, one behind the “castle” and one over the valley on the other side.  Such a beautiful place!  Just as we were leaving there was a cloud out over the ocean and you could see the sheet of rain making it’s way toward us. We went and had lunch in the visitor center while it poured.

Oct 16th was Brendan's birthday. We went to a really nice dinner at Ely's. I mentioned it was my husband's bday, and on the way back from the bathroom the waitress stopped me to ask for his name so they could give him a nice birthday dessert.  Earlier that day I had also asked Sarah (our roommate) if they would buy a cake while B and I were out to dinner to surprise him. They went above and beyond to make a really special surprise bday party :) 

This past weekend (Oct. 18th) we had visitor Christopher Young. http://officialchristopheryoung.com/ He taught us all day Saturday and Sunday. We did a VERY good exercise on writing a “good tune”, listened and analyzed some film music. Saw some of his works which he talked us through. Then each student in the Masters had a one on one session with him. We sent him some of our music to listen to the night before. He told me I had a “voice” in all my music… which one of my piano teachers told me once before so it was kind of neat to hear someone else say it to. Then he said he would describe my music as “deep” and having “introspective beauty”. Told me he think if I can combine my gift of writing concert music (since of course that all I really have in my repertoire right now) to work for film that I could be a very good film composer. He was a VERY encouraging and approachable man. Really enjoyed the time with him. He also graciously bought everyone dinner the last night he was here.

Since we worked through last weekend, our director gave us this Friday off and Monday is a holiday over here. Of course, we all have a TON of homework due Tuesday and Wednesday so it won’t be all fun and games. But today (Friday) I got up and went to the gym, cleaned house, started some homework/research, had a massage and then went out to dinner and a Traditional Irish Music concert at DIT with the roommates. Very fun! Tomorrow I will work hard on my homework but Sunday I plan to go shopping. I need more sweaters then what I packed. Or “Jumpers” as they say here.

Also, DO NOT ask for “a ride” out here. It’s bad. You ask for “a spin”.