Category Archives: Science Fiction

What Do YOU Think is the Best Time-Related Filk Song?

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This post is part 2 of a 2-part series related to the 2015 Pegasus Awards. You can read the first post at What Do YOU Think is the Best Adapted Filk Song?

Looking for more of your suggestions!

Pegasus Award Logo

As noted in part one, my first request for suggestions, the Pegasus Awards honor science fiction and fantasy-related music, and each year the organizers select two special categories for awards. This year the second of the special categories is the “Best Time-Related Song.”

Like the “Best Adapted Song” category, this one is wide open for nominations because the songs can “focus on anything related to time.” The Ohio Valley Filk Festival organizers picked the category because 2015 is OVFF’s 31st anniversary, and the 31st wedding anniversary is the timepiece anniversary.

The problem I’m running into is that I’m finding it hard to come up with time-related songs! So, a question for you: what do you think is the Best Time-Related Filk Song?

At present, I’m considering nominating:

  • “Beer-Powered Time Machine” by Mikey Mason
  • “Find Forever Gone” by Bella Morte
  • “One More Time” by Michael Longcor
  • “Welcome to the Age of Steam” by Jonah Knight
  • “’39” by Brian May / Queen

Can you think of other time-related songs I should consider for this category? You can actually suggest your own slate to the entire filk community by filling out the Pegasus Award Brainstorming Poll.* But at the very least, send me your suggestions!

___
*As always, if you’d like to hear some of my songs to consider, let me know. We’ll find a way to make it happen.

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First Convention of 2015

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This weekend I’ll be at the illogiCon science fiction and fantasy convention.


(“Professor Schrodington,” the illogiCon mascot.)

If you’re coming to the convention, or just interested, here’s my schedule:

Friday:

  • 4:00 p.m. — Panel: “The History of Anything You Wanna Know”
  • 8:00 p.m. — Open Filking

Saturday:

  • 10:00 a.m. — Panel: “Writing About People You Aren’t”
  • 11:00 a.m. — Panel: “More than Swords: The Military and Fantasy”
  • 1:00 p.m. — Baen Books Traveling Road Show
  • 4:00 p.m. — Panel: “Live Action Slush”
  • 5:00 p.m. — Panel: “Why Does it Take an Editor a Year to Read a Book?”
  • 6:00 p.m. — Open Filking
  • 7:00 p.m. — Reading
  • 9:00 p.m. — Panel: Newly Professional Older Writers: What Helps, What Hinders

On Sunday, I’ll be recovering from Saturday.

As always, I will have copies of Truths and Lies and Make-Believe as well as “Another Romulan Ale” and “Tauntauns to Glory” bumper stickers! Stop by and say howdy, and have fun!

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The Pegasus Award Brainstorming Poll is Open!

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What science fiction or fantasy-related music would you like to see on the Pegasus Award ballot next year?

Pegasus Award Logo

Opening the “brainstorming” phase signals the start of the 2015 awards cycle for the Pegasus Awards for “filk” — the music of science fiction and fantasy fandom. The Pegasus Awards are awarded at (and administered by) the Ohio Valley Filk Fest each October; in fact, the 2014 awards were just handed out last weekend.

The brainstorming phase is conducted via this online poll that allows anyone to nominate up to five songs and performers, in four permanent and two rotating categories. The 2015 categories are:

  • Best Filk Song — Any song is eligible that has not previously won a Pegasus Award or been on the final ballot in this category in the last 2 years
  • Best Classic Filk Song — Any well-known filk song that is at least 10 years old, has not previously won a Pegasus Award, and has not been on the final ballot in this category in the last 2 years
  • Best Writer/Composer — Any writer/composer of filk songs who has not won this Pegasus Award in the past 5 years
  • Best Performer — Any performer in the filk community who has not won this Pegasus Award in the past 5 years
  • 2015 Rotating Category: Best Adapted Song — Parodies, pre-existing lyrics set to new music (e.g., a Kipling poem), or other material adapted to filk
  • 2015 Rotating Category: Best Time-Related Song — Because it’s OVFF’s 31st anniversary and the 31st wedding anniversary is the “timepiece” anniversary, any songs related to time

Anyone who has an interest in science fiction and/or fantasy-related music may be considered part of the “filk community” and can participate in brainstorming possible nominees, nominating, and voting. The award by-laws define “exhibiting interest” using examples such as filking at SF&F conventions, attending filk conventions or “house sings,” taking part in related on-line forums, and just “discussing filk and filk related issues with other filkers.”

If you made it this far in this post or have read any of my previous filk-related posts, you can probably claim to have exhibited interest and would therefore be qualified to participate in the Pegasus Award process. So if you have a favorite you’d like to suggest, fill out the Brainstorming Poll Form. And unlike elections for public office, you’re allowed to fill out as many brainstorming forms as you like!

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HonorCon Starts Today!

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I’ll be there tomorrow, but the HonorCon convention — centered around the Honor Harrington novels by David Weber — starts this afternoon in Raleigh.

My schedule:

  • Saturday at 9 a.m.: Baen Books Traveling Road Show
  • Saturday at 3 p.m.: “How to Get Published” Panel

I suppose I should give some thought to what I will talk about during my panel!

And as always, I will have a few copies of Truths and Lies and Make-Believe as well as “Another Romulan Ale” and “Tauntauns to Glory” bumper stickers!

Stop by and say hello!

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Islands, the Complete Audio Drama

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Islands is now available — in its entirety! — at Baen Ebooks.

(Islands poster. Click for larger version.)

Based on an alternate history novella by Eric Flint and adapted for audio by Tony Daniel, Islands takes place in a Roman Empire in which alien intelligence has introduced industrial age technology such as muskets, steam engines, and the telegraph.

Yours truly played several minor roles in the drama, and had a lot of fun recording it with a group of terrific actors from the Research Triangle region. Tracey Coppedge and Paul Kilpatrick star as Anna and Calopodius Saronites, and the story features Lex Wilson, Jeff Aguiar, Izzy Burger, Rika Daniel, Carter, Paris Battle, Samuel Montgomery-Blinn, Pj Maske, and Cokie Daniel.

So if you missed when it was serialized on the Baen Free Radio Hour, you can pick up the complete audio drama here on the Baen Ebooks site.

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The Musical Extravaganza That Was Dragon_Con

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Dragon_Con 2014 was terrific! I’m sorry that it took me so long to put together this post about it. I’m also sorry that I’m not a better photographer with my phone … so I apologize that the pictures below are in general blurry and badly exposed.

This year’s Dragon_Con had a number of highlights — including the fact that a few people I didn’t know came to my solo concert! Overall, the convention turned out to be a musical tour de force. Mainstage groups like The Cruxshadows and Bella Morte get most of the attention, but thanks to the Dragon_Con Filk Track lesser-known groups like The Gekkos, The Ken Spivey Band, and Foot-Pound Force also got the chance to perform throughout the weekend.

Mikey Mason, the “comedy rock star” and “white trash geek,” had a number of shows:


(Mikey Mason, performing on the Hyatt Concourse.)

The Blibbering Humdingers also had several shows, in addition to putting on a standing-room-only medieval music workshop:


(The Blibbering Humdingers, and friends.)

One fantastic musical discovery of the convention was Pandora Celtica, who had been absent from Dragon_Con for a couple of years. I remembered catching snippets of their music before, but this time I was able to hear their marvelous harmonies several times.


(Pandora Celtica.)

In addition to their “Dragon_Con reunion,” the Brobdingnagian Bards — Andrew McKee and Marc Gunn — put on several solo concerts and workshops. Marc’s “Firefly Drinking Songs” concert overflowed the room, with dozens of people standing in the hallway to listen!


(The Brobdingnagian Bards. L-R, Andrew McKee and Marc Gunn.)

And Mikey Mason was paired with Tom Smith, “the world’s fastest filker,” for a comedy music duel:


(Mikey Mason and Tom Smith.)

Last but not least, Tally Deushane played some of her delightful songs in the filk room (and also came to my concert!) — I didn’t get the chance to ask her if she’s been working on a new album.

So, while Dragon_Con is a crazy, loud, confusing, hectic event, from a musical standpoint it was terrific! My thanks go out to Robby Hilliard, Amber Hansford, and Pat Var for their enthusiasm and diligence in running the Filk Track, and especially for inviting me to participate at a higher level. I hope to make it back next year!

___

P.S. If you want more information on any of my musical friends, check out their websites:
– Andrew McKee
– Brobdingnagian Bards
– Foot-Pound Force
– Marc Gunn
– Mikey Mason
– Pandora Celtica
– Tally Deushane
– The Blibbering Humdingers
– The Gekkos
– The Ken Spivey Band
– Tom Smith

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The ISLANDS Audio Drama is Set to Debut September 19th!

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Hey, you podcast listeners and lovers of radio drama! Tune in on Friday, September 19th to the Baen Free Radio Hour to hear the first part of our newest dramatic addition to the podcast: Islands, based on a novella by Eric Flint and adapted for audio by Tony Daniel.


(Islands poster — click for larger version.)

Islands is an alternate history story that takes place during the later days of a Roman Empire that has been vastly transformed by the early introduction of industrial age technology such as muskets, steam engines, and the telegraph.

The audio drama was produced with some wonderful actors from the Research Triangle region. Tracey Coppedge and Paul Kilpatrick star as Anna and Calopodius Saronites, and the story features Lex Wilson, Jeff Aguiar, Izzy Burger, Rika Daniel, Carter, Paris Battle, Samuel Montgomery-Blinn, Pj Maske, and Cokie Daniel. Yours truly also played several minor roles in the drama.

The Islands premiere will take place on Wednesday, September 17, at 6:30 p.m. at the Living Arts College in Raleigh, and will be serialized in four installments on the Baen Free Radio Hour starting that Friday.

We would all appreciate you listening in!

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Going to Dragon_Con

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With a shout-out to my classmates who will be gathering for a multi-year reunion this weekend,* here’s my schedule for Dragon_Con 2014 — the largest science fiction and fantasy convention in the Southeast! — being held this weekend in Atlanta, Georgia.

While I will be attending as many of my writing and musical friends’ sessions as I can fit into the schedule, I’m taking an active part in these events:

  • Thursday, 7 p.m. (Dragon_Con Eve) — “Spaceships & Zombies,” a Baen Books launch party for ISLANDS OF RAGE & HOPE by John Ringo and A CALL TO DUTY by David Weber & Timothy Zahn — Peachtree Ballroom, Atlanta Westin
  • Friday, 8:30 p.m. — “Princess Alethea’s Traveling Sideshow,” hosted by Alethea Kontis (whose book of essays, Beauty and Dynamite, was recently re-released) — Room A707, Marriott Marquis
  • Saturday, 1:00 p.m. — SOLO CONCERT! — including songs from Truths and Lies and Make-Believe and the hopefully-soon-to-be-recorded new album … including the DEBUT of a new song based on Howard Tayler’s “Schlock Mercenary” webcomic — Baker Room, Atlanta Hyatt
  • Saturday, 2:30 p.m. — “Baen Books Slide Show and Prize Patrol!” with Baen Publisher Toni Weisskopf and the rest of the Baen crew — Regency V Ballroom, Atlanta Hyatt

Meanwhile, here’s an interview with yours truly on Andrew McKee’s “Everything is Filk” Podcast. Hope you like it!

If you’re coming to the convention, I look forward to seeing you! But whatever you do this Labor Day weekend, I hope you have a terrific time!

___
*I started a rumor that they picked Labor Day weekend because I was already booked.

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On Reaching the Fifteen Percent Mark

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As a bit of insight into the economics of independent music publishing, this weekend I broke the 15% mark in terms of CD sales.


(Image by Paul Cory Photography.)

To be precise, I reached the 17.15% point, which means that so far I’ve made back a little over 17% of the cost of recording, engineering, manufacturing, distributing, etc., the CD.

In other words, I’m still over 80% in the hole, almost a year after releasing the album.*

Maybe you didn’t even realize I had a CD out. In that case, at this link you can listen to all 10 songs of Truths and Lies and Make-Believe, which I call “a compendium of musical selections, inspired or influenced by science fiction, fantasy, life, and faith … a multitude of things.” If you decide to buy it, it’s $7 for a download or $10 — only $1 a song! — for a physical CD. (Though you can pay more, if you want to.)

So as I told folks at my concert this past weekend at ConGregate, if you’ve ever bought a copy of my CD, THANK YOU!

And if you like any of my songs, even a little bit, I’d be much obliged if you told a friend or wrote a review or otherwise helped spread the word.

And maybe next month I’ll crack the 20% mark!

___
*And yet I’m crazy enough to be thinking of starting to record a second one!

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Next Weekend I’ll Be at ConGregate, a New Convention in Winston-Salem!

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A week from today I’ll be at the inaugural — yes, the first-ever! — ConGregate science fiction and fantasy convention.


(Greg-8, the ConGregate mascot.)

ConGregate has been put together by a wonderful team of experienced and talented convention organizers, so I anticipate it will start out as one of the best conventions going. I’ll actually be there all weekend and will be busy with a number of events, including a solo concert on Sunday morning where I will debut at least one new song:

Friday:

  • 8:00 p.m. — “Beyond the First Draft” workshop
  • 9:00 p.m. — Filk Collective

Saturday:

  • 2:00 p.m. — “Ask the Military” panel
  • 3:00 p.m. — Baen Books Traveling Road Show
  • 8:00 p.m. — “Beyond the Evil Goddess/God” panel

Sunday:

  • 9:00 a.m. — Non-Denominational Prayer Service
  • 10:00 a.m. — CONCERT
  • 1:00 p.m. — “Managing Your Finances as a Writer” panel

As usual, I will have copies of Truths and Lies and Make-Believe as well as “Another Romulan Ale” bumper stickers. Should be a lot of fun — if you’re there, be sure to find me and say hello!

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