Quirks presents...

1:36pm: For my own benefit and the benefit of readers not called Weaver

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12:21am: Upon introducing a Merkin friend to Amy Macdonald...
...her response is to wonder whether This Is The Life is anything other than an upbeat version of Zombie. Yyyessss.

4:30pm: This is what is known colloquially as A Result
I have a 2.i in Economics and Politics.

How much this is worth to me may not be known for a long time, but long-run estimates of this value start in six figures at 2009 prices and go up... he says based on theory rather than practice...

10:13pm: Wow: The Second Coming Of Helen Pt 6, June 13, 1402-1432
Only a short lesson thanks to being in a small room and having no water bottle with me, revisited I Couldn't Be Happier (read: an excerpt from Thank Goodness), which we worked on last year. Notable improvement in confidence, apparently, and Defying Gravity went rather well also, although I rather end up shouting the final section, lacking confidence in producing the high notes any other way. A quick hint on breath support later, though, and confidence was restored, and I opted to end this lesson with a range check.

And this wasn't in the script: D2-G4! Now, I've produced D2 in a small room before, and G4 in a bigger space before, but never both on the same day. I can only assume that this is going to be repeatable iff I get the breathing consistently right... this is rather good news. I keep being surprised at how much my range has expanded in the last few years; I vividly recall my range being (don't laugh) A2-D4 when I checked it first, with Scary Kate at the piano, at the age of 16, and F2-D4 in a lesson with Gemma in 2006. How things change, more than I realise - having people like EF, Scary Kate and others to compare myself with really, really does not help my self-esteem.

5:53pm: Job done.
Exams done, waiting commences now, as does lots of practice for everything I do that requires coordination.

9:32pm: Carrie on personifying
In 2007, influenced more than I cared to admit at the time by Molitva, I acquired Alice, a clarinet.

At the very start of 2009, influenced by my failure to get far on piano but the continuing determination to learn an instrument, I acquired Billy, an acoustic guitar. Haven't even mentioned that one, because I got even less far there. That's a project for the summer though, and so is Alice come to that.

Yesterday I acquired something else which will be incredibly useful for me if I gain some semblance of coordination; to wit, a bicycle. Continuing the hurricane-season convention of maintaining alphabetical order and alternating gender, I have now named it Carrie. Elphaba, Fiyero and Galinda all follow in this order if I get that far...

Already, I have a real sense of progress; tentative riding around Southampton Common and on a couple of quiet roads went well and I believe I will be ready to use the bike readily as a transportation option for all appropriate distances before the year is out, possibly well before.

10:10pm: This. Wasn't. Meant. To. Happen.
After months of minor trepidation from those in charge, and weeks of anticipatory schadenfreude, the moment arrived.

And we actually pulled the concert off.

Director of Win proved a massive inspiration, her changes made perfect sense on the night and we delivered the goods. In fact, the worst singer of the night was me, as I made several significant mistakes that may or may not have been evident in the audience. Some of these may well have derived from overexcitement; this was, let's not forget amongst the fears, my big moment, the night I became a performed composer, and my singers did not betray me, producing a fine performance and barely making a slip. I honestly felt guilty for everything that had been said, and understand it to have been read by the President (I genuinely did not know other people besides daweaver read this here blog, with the odd exceptional anonymous post). I have already told them how awful I felt, offered to give away the chocolate gift I was provided only for this to be flatly refused, and now I have realised that there was much to celebrate in everything except my behaviour.

And even then there is a flipside. Tonight, I learned not to assume the worst from - or about - others.

The relevant posts have been deleted, as I do not wish to be reminded of what was a false picture, probably influenced by my inability to truly gauge the choir's output from amidst their number and with earplugs affecting what I heard. (Lower-fidelity ones too, having lost my last good pair.) This is something to move on from, to learn from.

Perhaps the south-west's most floridly dressed television presenter has a point after all.

Edit: And as if to prove a point, I've trumped January 2008 - speaking of which, The Enviable Lyndsay was ill and unable to attend, and that was a massive loss but perhaps it was her spirit that was in me tonight - and sung (if the pitch-recognition function in my audio editing software is accurate) Ab4 in something other than falsetto. Recorded evidence to come as part of my first audio post this weekend, because this note was not in an exercise but in song, and which song is relevant. That it sounded awful is irrelevant - that I produced it is entirely relevant, as it shows that limitations can be exceeded when one dares to believe as such.)

Edit 2: Fate and destiny? The Chamber Choir concert clashed with ours, and I would have gone to see it otherwise. However, the ending featured an organ and some 'very loud brass', according to the conductor (and our former accompanist), and as such would have been A Panic Attack Waiting To Happen. Somehow you just have to sense this was my night in so many ways.

11:06am: The sheep-keepers of Effingham: The Second Coming of Helen Pt 5, May 20, 1105-1201
An hour-long lesson this time, and the decision was made to do a new piece. Well, new to me, it's the oldest piece I've ever sung in a lesson by a margin of several lifetimes; Nymphs and shepherds (Purcell). Yes, it's the beginning of the laughable notion of Quirks-as-classical-singer!

This was something that had been tentatively planned a long time ago. A very long time ago. The plan re-emerged when I reasoned that picking something that went up to F4 would be A Good Thing at this point, and recalled that this book of classical pieces was full of options.

(This is, of course, the pun in the title; a place name containing the 'F' sound, coupled with a mention of shepherds.)

Predictably it proved tricky; Purcell's trademark melismas caused me no end of trouble with breath control. Until, that is, Helen started playing the piece at full speed, instead of slowed-down to aid learning. That made a difference. I'm pretty sure I missed all the top notes every single time, but when one sets the word 'this' to a high note, one is asking for trouble. Given that the piece sits relatively high - its lowest note in my octave is C3 - it is obvious the intention was for it to be performed by a relatively high voice, which mine is not. Good practice, though.

11:45pm: Unlikely poignancy
As I watched Norway give its douze points to Iceland rather than Finland, condemning me to gambling losses on a scale I've never faced before, my world caved in. As the reprise kicked in - and I wondered why on earth I rejected the chance to bet on such a certain winner at odds-against earlier today, in favour of the idiocy of predicting Finland would make the top 10 - I noted the bittersweet lyrics had an eerie poignancy...

I'm in love with a fairytale
Even though it hurts

Yes, I'm one to dream even amongst the agony of defeat.

'Cause I don't care if I lose my mind
I'm already cursed

And lose my mind I did.

Next Sunday, a £50 free bet comes into play, and I will - barring a hugely unlikely turn of events - at least have made a £2.50 profit on betting on Middlesbrough For The Sinking. It is my last chance to recoup my losses, and my sanity. Things are so bad now that in order to cancel out the awful memories of this night, I will not be placing the ESC CDs on my birthday list, as is annual tradition.

This self-loathing attitude is probably going to come out in an even fiercer attack on Gambling Party than any I've released before... and that is saying something.

I have an addictive personality. My avoidance of tobacco, alcohol, even sex, comes out of recognition of that addictive personality. And yet I managed to ignore the most obvious one of all, and the one I have spoken at length about.

I'm a hypocrite, I'm an idiot, and nobody with any sanity could employ someone like me.

12:10pm: The draw is in...
...Norway are to perform 20th.

What's Oslo like at this time of year?

Israel are second, and will be blown out of the water by France if reports I have heard are correct; they could easily come last, and Ladbrokes quote them as 3/1 favourites to do just that and 8/1 to accrue nil points. Sweden (4th) are still quoted at odds-on on Betfair to finish ahead of Finland (24th and right after Jade). As you know, I very rarely bet. As you also know, 2.02 for anything drawn 24th to beat anything drawn 4th approaches the heights of ridiculousness. They're also quoted at 100 for the wonning, 40 to beat everyone bar Norway, 13.5 to finish in the top four and 3.9 to finish in the top 10. All of these are exceptionally tempting, and a fiver on each of these turns the total bet of One Geordie into:

* £747.65 if Finland win
* £272.65 if Finland are second to Norway
* £82.65 if Finland are second to anyone else, or third, or fourth
* £18.53 if Finland are between fifth and tenth

Alternatively, sticking the entirety of my Geordie into a top-10 finish pays £74.10 if they get it. (All these are based on the 5% Betfair commission rate.)

For a top-four bet, the best way to go is with William Hill, quoting one-fifth the odds for the top four and 66/1 for the wonning. That translates into 13.4 for the top four, without Betfair's 5% commission. Furthermore, there's the new-customer matched free bet offer to consider - a maximum of £50. Placing the first bet on something that is essentially guaranteed (Middlesbrough for relegation at 1.05 - the easiest £2.50 I'm ever likely to earn) would free up the matched bet at nominal risk, and essentially give me a risk-free shot at over £650.

This is what I am quite likely to do. I very rarely bet, but...

10:48pm: Blimey, that worked!
Five hours, 56 minutes; no missed connections, thanks entirely to a tiny but hugely significant delay to a train out of Eastleigh on which I depended for subsequent bus connections. An accident almost precisely at my starting point appeared to spell disaster (as it enforced connecting with a bus prone to delay, and enough of a delay to that bus would have screwed up the Eastleigh connection to which there was no alternative bus running) but ultimately didn't (in fact, it improved my time, as I couldn't have got any other bus to Eastleigh and the delay effectively shifted the start time a bit).

Could not have gone better in that respect. As for the money; raised approximately One Geordie on the bus, more at karaoke afterwards.

5:02pm: One to remember: The Second Coming of Helen Pt 4, May 13, 1502-1546
Firstly, tried out (at the end of a warm-up) an exercise that I devised myself; was praised by Helen for not being a scale or an arpeggio, and seemed to help reveal a number of possible flaws. Am plotting another one now, one that gradually tends up rather than down.

Then to the singing proper. She hadn't bought any music with her, so enter my long-planned intentions to sing Memory. It really does suit me, in a way I hadn't realised before despite singing it more than once at karaoke before (I don't think it was in this key).

Quote of the day from Helen - "can't men be beautiful?". (The lyric 'I was beautiful then' was noted in the sheet music as having an alternative for male voices, 'life was beautiful then'. I have a Michael Ball recording in which he sings that line in that way.) The reason it goes no lower than G3 is that the bridge before the final chorus is partially transposed an octave up; evidently nobody thought singing down to Db3 was a good idea. (But I have heard someone is doing just that in a recital here later this month!) I tried singing this an octave down, and predictably failed; it was amusing to hear Helen singing two octaves higher than me.

Next week, the plan is to sing something that goes up exactly to an F, by transposition if necessary. (Looks up sheet music.) Crikey! Lucie Silvas' arrangement of Nothing Else Matters is in the range, if that's the word, of D4-C5. Crikey! Well, if I want to work on my higher range generally, stick that up a fourth. It might well be valuable practice - we still don't know how many will even turn up for the choral concert, and the wrong combination of attendees will mean I'm singing tenor...

8:49pm: Hurrah for warnings!
Happy with the finalists, aside from Romania's desperate nymphomania; the two very careful and strongly emphasised strobe warnings were fantastic, but there were a few more that cannot have been far away. Still, watching in a small window nothing was too upsetting. Saturday night at the campus pub, with screens at every angle, will be a bit different though.

5:10pm: A uni-que endeavour
So, this is why I can't see semi-final 2.

At 3pm on Thursday, I set off on an escapade that is similar to the Circle Line Challenge of last year, but altogether larger in scale and at least as complicated despite its seemingly more modest, provincial setting.

I am to travel across the entirety of the Uni-link bus network across the student quarter of Southampton and places beyond. Every stop must be covered - although there is no need to do so in both directions (that's the next condition added by a friend!) there are some that can only be accessed in one direction. Thus, I must navigate the Swaythling-Wessex Lane Bit Of A Mess in both directions, as well as both directions on the U2 at the one-way system around Avenue Campus (my former neck of the woods). The Nightstar buses are not necessary, as they do not carry Uni-link branding; Ocean Village is excluded deliberately as it's only served on Sundays and the entire U9 service only runs on weekdays. The Eastleigh and Leisure World spurs, however, are necessary - and dictate the entire timing of this endeavour.

The Eastleigh spur is only served twice a day - once in the morning, once in the late afternoon. Leisure World is served only in the evening. As such, the only way to pull this off quickly is to connect with the afternoon U1E Eastleigh bus, then because this bus does not return to Southampton, catch a train (!) to Airport Parkway and return on the U1 city-bound from there.

Oh, and the U6 reduces to an hourly service after about 8pm and tails off altogether in the hospital-bound direction not long after that. And the U9 only runs every 90 minutes (!) in the daytime only. You don't get this on the Tube!

An awful lot of planning later, and this initial lark has turned into a six-hour epic, starting at 3pm and ending - hopefully! - at 9pm. This is followed by a test of Quirks' Dichotomy of Pop Music at karaoke, in which I swap repertoire with OW - whose range as Gemma would define it is D2-G4, but he has an understandable-considering penchant for using falsetto, something which I will adopt for the night with renditions of Supermassive Black Hole and one other song of his genre but my choice. In return, he'll be singing two female-sung pop songs an octave down - the initial plan, since thwarted as it's not on the computer (anymore), was for one of these to be Never Had A Dream Come True. More on that one in another post.

I've finally caved, and have a JustGiving page. Given that I'll be doing some more challenges - the New Forest 10-mile run, probably a Zone 1 challenge, quite possibly another distance run, maybe even something else - during this summer, I intend to use one page for all donations.

5:48pm: The icing on the week's tasty cake: The Second Coming of Helen Pt 3, May 8, 1505-1548
With confidence flowing from the essay marks all-but-guaranteeing a 2:1, the focus could shift to this lesson, delayed from Wednesday because Helen's workload had not yet abated. We got a larger room than normal, with a grand piano instead of an upright, and that can't have hurt proceedings.

Did a couple of different warmup exercises - and Helen invited me to devise my own, an invitation that (it goes without saying) I will accept - before finishing off Defying Gravity. Went through sections, got some technical advice, placed a bit of emphasis on breath control, so far so quotidian.

Got to the end bit, and in a fit of adrenalin - already starting to manifest themselves as tears on the line 'everyone deserves a chance to fly' and 'to those who'd ground me, take a message back from me' - suddenly decided to sing the second line of the final chorus in the manner Idina sings it on the recording, i.e. up to F5 (F4 an octave down, natch), which is marked as optional on the sheet music, an option I had yet to take (and had been advised not to). I got it. "Did I actually get that?", I interrupted in a stunned falsetto squeak, before I could sing 'and soon I'll match them in renown'. "Yes," Helen said, and I was stunned. (I've put the recording through Audacity's pitch-recognition function, and I did indeed get it. Was a tiny fraction sharp, in fact. Said falsetto squeak was at C#5...) It proved inconsistently repeatable, which was a reasonable result; I'll still quote my highest note as E4, but hopefully not for long.

10:52am: *drum beats, sting*
And we can now project that Quirks will secure the 2.1 degree he had targeted for himself, as another sensational essay mark comes in. 65% of the degree now reporting* and a mark of 75 in Public Policy removes any doubt, except for doubts over claims that the University of Southampton is any better than the Solent Poly down the road~.

* That actually is the percentage of my mark accounted for. 1/3 from second year, 1/4 from the three assessed modules in the last semester, and each essay I have marks for counts as 40% of a single module counting for 1/12 of the degree.

~ It's not along one road. Quickest route goes along two minor roads to the A3024, then the A335.

Singing lesson with Helen at 3pm, will post about it.

5:49pm: Get ready, because we may be about to make a projection
The state of play academically at the start of this year was simple: an average of 60 marks per module was required for a 2:1, reducing to 57 if the fourth-highest of eight was 60 or higher.

Marks of 64, 61 and 57 very much kept the dream alive, but now a mark of 68 in an essay weighted at 40% of the Green Politics module effectively secures that 2:1. In another class, British Public Policy, a mass of 5-mark penalties for non-attendance at tutorials is being applied, but not to me, and the 40%-weighted essay in that one has been marked with the results revealed tomorrow.

If this is anything like as good as the prior essay mark this week, the fourth 60-plus will be all but secure, and with it so will my 2:1; even marks bang on 60 for both of these modules would leave me needing an average of barely 51 on the dissertation (weighted double) and economics modules.

It's far from over yet, but the position is starting to become rather secure.

2:34pm: Not to be?
* Didn't get to speak, alas. Most frustrating given where Anne Atkins took the discussion at one point, although perhaps for the best as it may have averted a big family discussion.
* Sheffield United can humiliate the FA at Wembley, hopefully, but the promotion I've been waiting for for two seasons now is not to be just yet. Perhaps, given that they failed to go up last year while West Ham established themselves as a top-ten club without their Argentinian connection, it was just meant to be.
* Tonight I find out if I am to be a performed composer any time soon. That's the big one...Yes, subject to a few changes as advised by The Enviable Lyndsay, my piece will be performed!

6:18pm: Mission accomplished.
1,401 words short of the 10,000-word limit but with a complete argument and precious little that could have been squeezed out of it as far as I could tell, my dissertation on the title Defining and tracing Euroscepticism: a comparative study of the United Kingdom and Denmark has been completed, printed, bound and is ready for submission Tuesday.

The deadline is 3pm this Thursday.

Am I feeling a tad smug? Oh yes.

Picnic is planned in the garden of The Magpie's Nest on Monday, and will feature a mixture of Danish and British food.

1:02am: The most important Sunday since October 1, 2006
* 10am - appear on BBC One's The Big Questions, taping from a school 2.5km from The Magpie's Nest. Arriving 8:30am. I'll be wearing a silver tie, not sure yet whether to wear it with my claret shirt for contrast or with a lighter blue, more akin to the colours of Abu Dhabi United of Manchester.

What is it with me and Nicky Campbell? My first game show taping was presented (desperately irresponsibly) by him, now this.

* 7pm - I find out if the piece I have composed for four unaccompanied voices makes the choral programme this time around, having missed out last year because it didn't fit what we were doing. It's my last chance to be a performed composer here in Southampton, and probably my last chance at all in a very long time.

On the more unequivocally positive side, the dissertation is essentially done with almost a week to spare. To say the least, this is an exciting start to the month, and how it goes could define an awful lot in the future.

1:05am: Change we have to believe in, like it or not: The Second Coming Of Helen Pt 2, Apr 29, 1126-1212
The de Bouwer-mocking title is a reference to the countless changes made in the vocal selection score from the cast recording. Yes, making this piece work in this context did require wholesale changes, and removing all traces of Glinda was the way to do it. Changing melodic fragments quite significantly when nothing else has changed, that is wrong, but plenty in evidence here. I can't even be bothered to note all of them, but there's enough to be quite distracting for someone as familiar with the cast recording as I am.

Broadly productive lesson in all, though, and I'm apparently rising nicely to this challenge. Interesting discussion at the end about the merits of high and low notes, and - combined with conversation with others before and since - there's a whole post in that.

Speaking of high notes, fluked an F#4 (basically an out-of-tune attempt at G4) in one warm-up exercise on loud staccato 'ha' sounds, but this was not repeated in any other context. The changes to the melody in the final chorus of Defying Gravity leap up to F5 - this is marked as optional in the score, and I have as yet rejected this option in favour of singing the melody as it appears elsewhere.

Other particularly significant finding - why am I better singing loudly these days, contrary to all my thoughts of the past? Because I'm now reasonably good at supporting my voice but drift out of doing so when singing softly. I have been assured singing softly is by no means easy, one of my friends suggesting it's harder than singing loudly, so... that's interesting.

9:18pm: Something has changed within me: The Second Coming of Helen Pt 1, Apr 24, 1355-1445
Having shown the sort of cost-cutting tendencies that would make a (moderate) Tory baulk in the last year, my finances have improved more than I expected, and so for six short weeks until exam season I have resumed my singing lessons.

Goodness that was an inspired decision; I'd forgotten how much fun they were. Nerve-wracking at times, but much of that was self-inflicted; I'd only gone and decided to work on singing Defying Gravity, after all! The idea was to pick a song that would really stretch me and expose all of my weaknesses technically; we've only got as far as completing the first chorus* and the one finding so far is most unexpected, the line with that leap of an eleventh being problematic primarily in terms of phrase length.

* the vocal selection score heavily edits many of the songs to cancel out some of the plot-advancement-through-song that is a Schwarzian trademark. Defying Gravity becomes a solo, starting with a short piano introduction, and the first vocal line being 'something has changed within me'. Other significant changes have been made, and the result is a song that unequivocally stands as an independence anthem.

Helen, from having heard me at karaoke, has asserted that my strengths are in rhythm and tuning (well, I did beat her in a precision singing contest in December, which amusingly she recalled without prompting), and my weakness is in phrasing and in 'shaping' the sound. Of course, there was only so much room for that when dealing with such a difficult song as today's.

Disappointment at the end; letter-finding result was F2-E4 (in a practice room about the size of a small single bedroom, which is still twice as big as the location in which I produced a most unexpected D2 in June).

Speaking of low notes, though, and we come to the highlight of the afternoon. Recall here that Helen is a classically-trained mezzo-soprano.

QUIRKS completes the first verse, and HELEN sings the first line of the chorus in an overtly classical manner, which somewhat amuses QUIRKS.
HELEN: Gosh, that is hard isn't it?
QUIRKS: It's a nightmare of a song... if you ask anyone in musical theatre about this song they will say the same thing.
HELEN: (interjecting quickly) Especially as in musical theatre it's not... they often don't have the range of classical singers.
QUIRKS: (interjecting quickly): Well it's a different set of incentives... they tend to be lower. Bearing in mind that the same character has... (turns vocal selection book to last page of I'm Not That Girl) that note to sing.
HELEN: Oh my gosh, I can't even sing that note! HELEN tries anyway, and produces... a sound, granted, but not a pleasant one.

5:13pm: I saw this when handling the online test as part of my job application
And realised destiny has dictated I am unemployable.

I don't know how I'm not crying now. Oh, and my brother's girlfriend, a Solent Poly dropout, just got a promotion, in a field - local government finance - terrifyingly close to my own preferences.

I knew my visit to Weymouth would be painful. I didn't know it would be this bad.

It does work in IE7, I can confirm, but the feeling of resentment remains almost undiluted.

5:50pm: Overdue update
Dissertation going better than I feared, less well than I'd like, but it seems as though the essay due in a fortnight will be a bigger problem... that said, if the dissertation gets a sufficient mark, only significant underperformance elsewhere will deny me a 2:1.

Running is going particularly well, although I'm not so sure about today's, where I had quite a nasty stitch about 150m from the finish. Mostly good progress, though, and I really do enjoy it much more than the gym.

Returning to Fortress Weymouth tomorrow; returning to Kelly's Bar, sunglasses in tow to protect against Quirks-unfriendly lighting, for karaoke tonight.

10:39pm: Something to chase
I never did report on my Tube Challenge; to be honest, to admit I took two hours, 36 minutes in this company was quite embarrassing. I did raise a three-figure sum with ease at the university, though - not that I can recall how much.

It is a traditional fundraising approach I am taking this year, though - the old-fashioned charity endurance run. A full 16,093m... that's ten miles, imperial fans... in the New Forest on July 12. (The organisers take entry fees to local charities; I will be raising money independently of this.)

Current plan is to split funds between the National Autistic Society and Beat. Which leads on to a second, cut-protected post.