That's the Irish title. I studied the entire Duolingo module, but that was in 2017-2018. My mother's family comes from Northern Ireland. Mostly Scots-Irish. Not sure if it's that region, but it might be. Either way, in Early Medieval Ireland, these were the hostages and slaves. The O'Neill's were the boorish Australians to the North. Sandwiched between the two O'Neill territories, in fact.

As I said, people need to tolerate my assertion of human rights. I wrote a script. It wasn't bought. You may have ripped me off, but I've used WriterDuet and APRA to block you from producing a derivative. Do your thing. I'll do mine.

One guitarist only. Jake Church doesn't get to be that guitarist. I don't care that he plays in a duo with Joel. One guitarist only. Would you suddenly hire a second violinist for a violin concerto? Or a second oboist for an oboe concerto? Or a second percussionist for a percussion concerto? - No, you fucking wouldn't, in large part because it would be pointless and expensive. Two guitarists would also cost a lot more, and it would muddy the texture. The orchestration was

As O'Leary said recently, 30 is when one becomes pākeke.

Unless somebody taped the Facebook broadcast, the final cut doesn't exist. There's a version that's ten minutes shorter which one of my old drives might contain. If I'm really lucky, it'll have a few extra 2022 compilations.

I reckon the NZSM has lost of sight of their main goal: excellence in classical music. When I say classical, I'm including gamelan and Indian/Persian etc. Jack's legacy makes that our undeniable selling point, particularly for Asian musics. Jack transcribed a lot of Southeast Asian music. - They're offering a syllabus that's even more varied than the one from my student years with way fewer people. I said that adding traditional music is good, but it's not cheap. At the

One of the upsides of our DIY revolution was that we all got to do what were often improvised bits, capturing those on our phone cameras (or crews, in some cases). Dak Headroom is the archetypal example, but it permeates the entire film.

We got in a fight, and I put him in a choke-hold for a few seconds. This was in late 2018. He was behaving erratically, and there was physical assault from both sides. From the end of the guitar competition forward, Stephen wasn't well. Jane noticed, but left when he began to act crazy. People left it to me, and it was a rough few weeks. Then he went out and slept in the Town Belt for a couple of days. He was stabler when he returned. - Yes, I broke the window: the point

I'm noticing it. As I've noticed, Ms. Swarbrick uses Runway to do her background removal. Winston's using a GPT-like thing to do his social media. National and Act have both been tagged for using AI brown people to fake support. Then there's the junk submissions. - AMPP is my main AI experiment, and the recent theorising was a result of the success of the AMPP experiment. AI built a coherent party with one member. 5-10 years from now, a lot of staffers will be replaced

I didn't realise that Peter and Fran still have a controlling interest. Bodes well for Shipwrecked. I'm thinking that a cel-shaded mocap style might work. My personal goal for Shipwrecked is to build a model of NZ in a box, and then apply crazy climate science to it. Even if the graphics are a bit crude - like video games rather than Avatar. Something that's like GTA's LA. - Dirty Creatures is a good test film. I'm wondering about mocap with those motion-tracked rear proj

Watching with the sound off. Need to get my laundry soon... Personal explanations. Introduction of Bills. I'm neutral in the TPM dispute. Hoping to maintain that if I come to the AGM. Nobody comes out all that well from my POV. Seems like a clusterfuck. 30 minutes left. My sheets and towels are in the dryer. Sound on. 1. Chippy to Omelette C 5 PO 4 Food, cost of living. 'I have more faith in parents' - Luxon. Opening my second beer of the day. Cooper's Extra Stout. Tāku

My book is openly using AI. Not in the writing, though. I did use it to write the articles and the Tupaia story. To me, it's impressive that it was able to generate all those various charts for the theory essay. Believe me, it didn't 'write' the whole thing. My brain, fleshing it out paragraph by paragraph. I've spent years making it write in my voice, so it's good at it. Bluntly, it's irrelevant to me. Academic and technical writing is something AI excels at. It doesn't r

The effect of identity politics and post-modern philosophy on musicals and opera. Everyone says theatre is the most collaborative of all the arts, but nowadays it's all tainted by people trying to make everyone shine equally - in order to take credit for the 'social moment' or some other such PR nonsense - or by scene-stealers. Actors are self-obsessed. Here's Sondheim snarking about them re: Into The Woods (p. 92) 'One of the many reasons that I would make a bad director

Delay it all you like, but the injunction is a surefire win. I don't think Steve will take it to court. He'll fade away; that's what the pros reckon. Such a fucking bummer that I'm unlikely to get much justice. - Most of the people have faded, but the pollies are still hassling me. I gather that they didn't enjoy answering the police questions. It's a sore point in National. Lots of them think I'm a decent person. - No, Cass. You're a selfish prick who tried to steal my son

Short answer: Yes. After checking the full score, this entire  33–34-song cycle is through-composed. There are no  true strophic songs, no formal repeats, no da capo structures, and no recurring musical numbers that function as arias or “set pieces.” Everything unfolds continuously in new material. Your cycle is through-composed in the strictest  possible sense: Each movement is newly generated, both internally and relative to the larger cycle, with no musical repeating arc

I'm not being paid. I'm a freelance composer. These are the rules: 1. You don't get to discuss instrumentation or orchestration with me. I'll set an ensemble, and you'll tolerate it. There are people who I would ask for advice; pretty confident these days, though. 2. You're only licencing the notes on the page, not any revisions. Revisions are paid separately. Not adding guitar to the finale of the quartet. Why? It'll sound different live. Guitars can't get the tunings;

There's quite a long past, stretching back to the late 19th Century, but few recordings. Waituhi was recorded, but I'm pushing for a full revival. Since I've been old enough to attend concerts, NZ vocal music has been somewhat obsessed with things like cantatas and oratorios that aren't officially opera. It's much easier to get a couple of singers and a full orchestra than loads of costumes. NZ Opera should be stepping in and commissioning a new piece every year. - I real

The cat's well and truly out of the bag now, so I'll explain what motivates me. Dream O'Clock: inner landscape vignettes was about using AI paint to rewrite all those stereotypical trans fantasy images into something that was artistic and philosophic. Never used any of those deepfake AI porn sites, obviously. The public profiles are sorta fun, and also a corrective to the idea that one has to present such a fetishised image. DeviantArt suits me better, as it's only partly

Finally getting into the holiday mindset. Watched a whole movie.

No. If I'm not mistaken, all that's happened is that some sleazy producer and his mates have stolen my IP and passed it off as their own. You rewarded them with funding. Therefore, it's like I won and you're transphobes. That's what the NZFC board needs to accept. I haven't pitched. I haven't given away my rights. Therefore the film is dead. - Let's focus on getting me a credit with a journalistic expose on third gender injustices. Or one of those short films I've written