My thoughts on Orycon

CONCERTS
        We've had duos and trios before, the main issue was that we started using microphones and guitars with pickups and things. I personally missed having a monitor to use so that I could hear what was going on. You get spoiled when you have a monitor a few times, you almost can't live without one. For me, this was the first time having more than one instrument being used, and so I was miked for the piano, but not for the guitar since I could outsing the guitar without too much difficulty.

        As for talent - WOW! Great stuff. Maya & Jeff kicked righteous butt! Now, as far as the best, that guy in the Santa suit was killer! :) Yes, folks, I'm being facetious.

CIRCLES
        I'm not sure how to solve this problem. If we want concerts, and there isn't enough room, then once circle has to be sacrificed by an hour or two. I did like swapping the circles so that chaos got pushed back one night, and the next night bardic got pushed back. Much fairer that way. Unfortunately, they put "Whose Line is it Anyway?" in the next room, and those walls aren't thick, which caused the migration and all the confusion. However, before Whose Line, we were told to be quiet by a panel in the next room also. This was after "We Will We Will Filk You" and you know how loud that can get.

        As far as the sudden change in circle format, my only complaint was that it was one person who insisted on the change, and none of us stopped and then divvied up the circle again for those who wanted chaos and bardic now that more filkers were showing up. This is when having a designated "leader of the filk" in the room at all times helps. Granted, John couldn't be there all the time, which is why he or whomever is in charge needs to have some alternates. However, things went smoothly even though we had some unpredictable things happen.

ETIQUETTE
        This still needs to be addressed. Heather's concert on Sunday was quite obnoxious. The concert itself was fine. Heather's performance was great, as always. We just had a few issues with the audience. When told to clear the floor so that chairs could be set up, folks wouldn't clear the floor. They moved chairs that shouldn't have been moved and when the chairs did show up, they wouldn't get out of the way. This delayed things a bit. One person was brazen enough to put a chair in the middle of the floor, sit there and then refuse to move, blaming the hotel for not telling her earlier that more chairs were coming, so she was forced to move a chair into the middle of the floor so that she'd have somewhere to sit. Oh, that follows logically.

         During the concert itself, while I was sitting there just trying to listen to Heather sing, several people right behind me sang along loudly to songs that were obviously NOT singalongs. Heather herself gave indicators as to which songs were singalongs, but people sang along anyway, making it really difficult to enjoy the concert since I couldn't hear her half the time, and I was only sitting two rows back!

        All in all though, I enjoyed Orycon immensely and look forward to coming back next year!

Jeff
santa at serv.net Received on 11/10/97