Bonus.

As if the concert wasn't enough.

I self-medicate with music.  Life is good better best bestest.

Yesterday I went into LA for "A Mighty Voice" by the Gay Men's Chorus of Los Angeles.  Absolutely brilliant.  Somehow they managed to make early religious chants interesting.  Orff's In Taberna Quando Sumus from Carmina Burana was stunning, and Sensemaya, a piece based on a poem by Cuban poet Nicolas Guillen was delightful and exciting at the same time  (don't kill snakes by kicking them or they will bite your foot).  I think my favorite, though, was Everyone Sang, based on Sigfried Sassoon's poem with music by Joel Martinson.

Everyone suddenly burst out singing;

And I was filled with such delight

As prisoned birds must find in freedom,

winging wildly across the white

Orchards and dark-green fields; on--on--and out of sight.

Everyone's voice was suddenly lifted;

And beauty came like the setting sun;:

My heart was shaken with tears, and horror

Drifted away... O, but Everyone

Was a bird, and the song was wordless, the singing will never be

done.

This was my second GMCLA concert and I guess what strikes me the most about this group is the profound emotion infused throughout the theater.  Twice now I'm struck by the audience's willingness to share the joy or the sorrow of the music.  And leaving one of these concerts is painful; I just don't want to walk through the door and away from such bliss.

I spend a bit of time in the city now.  This is fairly new to me, suburb dweller that I am.  Hick.  But over the summer, as I grew, I found myself seeking new experiences and most of them led me into Los Angeles.  My favorite route is down the Pacific Coast Highway.  I'm not fond of our California freeway system, but am getting more assertive in traffic and so am not so intimidated about finding new places to explore.

Yesterday, as always, I was loving driving down the beach when Nature gifted me with a bonus.

Am seriously wishing I had turned off the car (I was worried about being late to the concert) and gotten out and stabilized the camera (my essential tremor is worse when I get excited) for a good long capture.  This was a huge pod.  I want to say porpoises, although I used to watch a small pod further up the coast when I was commuting to UCSB and these creatures seemed much larger than those.

I'm supposed to return to the city for my writers group on Tuesday.  Perhaps I'll have another chance to film them again.