Puzzlebox Music

Read the reviews and favorite memories of the various conventions we've been to during 1999

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1999

10^th & 11th Concerts: Norwescon '99

Where:	DoubleTree Plaza, SeaTac, WA
When:	April 1 - 4, 1999
Duration:	1 hour
Set List:	The Fall & Fallen of the Golden State
	Born Out of Time
	The Teela Tango
	Persian Rose
	Urban Legends
	Sir Brian
	Closer to Fine
	Takin' a Walk
	Caledonia
	My Jalapeno Man
	Ramblin' Time
	Fly Freedom
	The Merry Minuet
	Stop Singing Ose or I'll Kill You (featuring Ann "Spin" Kwinn!)

Taunya, her eldest daughter Angelica, and Paul drove up to Seattle on Thursday, arriving Thursday night in time for some panels that Paul was scheduled for. Unfortunately, on the drive up, they were in a small fender bender that left the front of Taunya's minivan slightly munched. But, everyone was safe, albeit a little shaken up. So, instead of going to Alisa's parents' house for the night, they just got a room at the hotel and settled in.

Alisa flew into Seattle on Friday afternoon and met up with the group at around 6pm. It took a bit of work to get everyone in the same room and to get all the equipment hauled up from the van (once we found Taunya to get her car keys!). But, we finally started practicing around 6:45pm. Our first concert was the 15 minutes that we'd been allotted at the Phillip K. Dick award ceremony. We were supposed to be on at 7:30pm, so we raced through our 4 songs we'd decided on for the set list. Since we didn't have a hotel room to practice in, we ended up practicing in the hallway and got lots of interested passerbys. It was kind of fun, in a way. But distracting, too.

At 7:15pm, we headed downstairs to the awards. It was in a large conference room, and the attendees were all sitting at tables (they'd been eating earlier and we missed it). We came onstage and set up our gear while the MC read some funny material to cover our set up time. Once we got started, it was a little awkward. The audience was extremely quiet and unresponsive at first...but definitely warmed up by the end of our four songs. We hadn't known what to expect, and I don't think the audience was expecting us either! There were a couple of technical difficulties with the keyboard not working on Dark Man because of the hotel PA system we were plugged into. But overall, it was a good set. We got a lot of people coming up to us afterwards saying they'd enjoyed our material. It was satisfying to finally get a response from them by the end, but this certainly wasn't a filk crowd: we had to work to earn their interest. Our set for the PK Dick awards was: $1.50 Movies, Where the Magic is Real (had been requested by head of programming Judith Herman), The Dark Man, and Nuts.

Next, we packed all our stuff up and headed back upstairs to the Green Room, where we'd gotten permission from Judith Herman to practice our hour-long set list. Our big concert was at 10pm that night, and we'd had no time to practice together since the week before. There were people in the Green Room the whole time we were practicing, but it worked out well because it kept us on our toes and was almost like giving a pre-concert. We practiced from 8:30pm to 9:30pm and then went over to the filk room where our concert was to be held.

Karen Rall was in charge of managing all the concerts and filk programming and was invaluable in assisting us before and during the concert. She gave us a great introduction and we dove right into our set. Our big concert that night was REALLY fun. One full hour of Puzzlebox! The audience was so great. They didn't know us or our material at all and really had a good time. Of course, because they were having so much fun, we were, too! People were eager to talk with us right after the concert and tell us they loved the show. Filled up a whole page on our sign-up sheet for "We'll notify you when the album's out". And the head of programming was trying to talk us into coming back next year, and the head of music programming (Karen) wanted us to consider coming to Orycon (in Oregon), which she said had much _more_ filk presence.

Also present in the audience were Paul's two sisters, Ann and Stacy, and Alisa's mom and brother Johnny. All live in the Seattle area except Ann, who was visiting Stacy. Ann, in fact, reprised her role as "Spin" Kwinn, doing a clog-dance routine on-stage while we played Stop Singing Ose or I'll Kill You, like she did 4 weeks earlier at Consonance.

We open filked on Friday night and again for a short period on Saturday night. Saturday, we were part of a panel discussion for arrangement in filk. Turned into a pretty good conversation, actually. Once Saturday ended, we pretty much split up and went our separate ways for Sunday (which was Easter). Alisa spent the time with her godkids and family, Paul spent the morning with his family, then he, Taunya and Angie took off for San Jose around 1pm. They had a long drive ahead of them again! Alisa caught the 9:30pm plane out of Seattle that night. We were all exhausted, as always happens after a con, but happy with the results.

Norwescon is a huge convention, and there isn't much filk presence there (although it is definitely growing, and we were happy to be a part of that!). It was a new experience for all of us, since none of us had ever attended Norwescon before. We loved being a part of it and were very grateful and honored to be invited!

Special Memories:

Judith Herman granting Alisa's mom and brother passes to get into the concert for free (since they weren't attending the con). This meant so much to Alisa that her family could get to see Puzzlebox perform. Thank you, Judith!!
Breakfast at Alisa's parents' house on Saturday morning. Homemade orange julius by her brother, Johnny. Easter egg hunt with her niece and nephew. Singing folk songs around the piano.
Dancing like crazy on Friday and Saturday night at the con dances. Hours of fun!
Alisa walking through the dealer's room with Angie, Taunya's eldest daughter.
Alisa, Taunya and Angie playing in the Camarilla game on Saturday night.
Sleepover at Alisa's parents' house on Friday night. Creeping in at 3am and showing everyone to their beds without waking up Alisa's parents!
Participating in the filk arrangement panel with Joe Bethancourt & Jeff Hitchin. Great discussion.
Alisa and Angie watching the Klingon Belly Dancing class.
Practicing for our concert in the hallway and then again in the Green Room, basically in front of an audience the whole time!
Paul, Angie and Alisa eating lunch in the smoky bar. Taunya had disappeared

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