Yesterday was a good day to be a Canadian, but beyond that, it was a good day to be a Canadian artist.
It’s all who you know
Posted By Alida on May 8th, 2010
One of the coolest things about our wedding is the number of artists we have involved. And not, for the most part, people that we’ve hired — you know, that string quartet who just comes in for the wedding and doesn’t know the couple at all.
No, the artists who are involved in our wedding are mostly close friends, and are mostly professionals who are doing what they do as a part of the wedding. Our circle of professionals includes theatrical designers and managers, musicians, filmmakers, visual artists, choir directors, photographers. Not to mention Colin and I using our own professional skills — producing, composing/arranging, design, marketing and communications, etc. — as we’re planning the day.
I’m excited to give these artists a forum to work in; I’m excited that they’re giving us their best and that they’re highly trained and qualified for these jobs. I’m excited that we can expose some Calgary and area artists to an audience that may not otherwise know of them or know what they do — and trust me, as details are finalized and we know exactly what people are doing for us, we’ll be giving them all the free advertising we can manage.
We have a fantastic community of artists surrounding us, and we’d be foolish to not take advantage of the expertise and talent available.
Posted in Real Life
Up by my bootstraps
Posted By Alida on May 7th, 2010
Do you ever feel like you have to pull yourself out of a sense of inertia? In this case, it’s the intertia of not posting for nearly three months (!). I don’t think I’ve gone three months at one time without blogging since I started in 2001! There’s no particular reason, aside from the usual — busy life, wedding plans, new house, contract work, yadda yadda. I’m going to touch on all of that in the next few entries, but first…
Just a few housekeeping details before I get going with some new content.
First, I’m testing out a new comment system. It’s quite powerful, and you can leave comments with one of a number of profiles. Click on the “Add another site” button, and you can choose the profile to link to — or, you can post from multiple profiles at once. Also, you can share your comments and the link to each post with your social networks, by clicking on the “Share” button. You can also follow the replies to an individual entry, as well as add pictures to your comments. (And, as always, if you click on the “share” button at the bottom of the entry (as opposed to the one in the comments), you can send your favorite articles along via any of 200+ services.)
Second, I’m (at least temporarily) disabling the Facebook integration via Networked Blogs, since there’s no way to integrate Facebook comments with the Wordpress comments. More people than not were leaving comments on Facebook, which means that the great conversations sparked by various blog entries never made it to the blog itself. It’s all stuck on Facebook, and I’d rather see it all take place over here, where it can be archived with the entries. So, I’m changing my Facebook notifications to direct people to this site, instead of showing up within a Facebook app.
Please, even though you’re not commenting via Facebook anymore, keep on talking! There have been some interesting discussions, and I want to see those continue! The conversation is always open; I’m just here to facilitate it. (And with this new comment system, you can still choose to be notified of replies to your comments, just like the Facebook notifications allowed for, so you can follow the conversation on any entry that you find interesting.)
Posted in Uncategorized
One more reason
Posted By Alida on February 17th, 2010
One more reason why it’s great to be a Canadian during these games: CTVolympics.ca. Yes, I was a little peeved at CTV last week when they continually showed footage of the fatal luge crash (come on, I did not need to see that), but in the days since, I’ve realized that, in other ways, they’re doing really well these Olympics.
In the past few days, I’ve been talking to my American friends and discovering how incomplete NBC’s coverage is: No live streamed coverage of most events, tape-delayed TV broadcasts of anything major, online access restricted to only customers of certain internet service providers.
And yet, on CTV’s website, there are no fewer than 20 separate streams available for viewing at all times, whether online-only streams of events, online viewing of one of their channels, or past events on demand. Everything is available all the time. Every sport, no matter how obscure, has equal ability to be watched live. CTV is not deciding for Canada that hockey and curling (the only sports streaming live on NBC’s website) are the only sports that need to be available in real time.
I’ve made no secret of the fact that I’m fairly fed up with how far behind Canada is in a lot of things. Cell phone plans and prices are atrocious and make me want to cry. Online shopping still sucks, since a far smaller percentage of Canadian stores or chains offer it (for instance, Wal-Mart and Canadian Tire only allow you to check inventory online, not actually make purchases), and if you do order from the U.S., shipping is often astronomical. I don’t know of a single Canadian ATM that’s as comprehensive and intuitive as the Bank of America ATM, where my cash deposits are credited within hours, instead of the 7-day waiting period that Scotia Bank forces me to endure. And I could go on…
But not in this. In this, it’s so nice to be vindicated; to see that for once, Canada is where we should be.
Nice going, NBC.
And minus the sarcasm, well done, CTV.
Posted in Real Life
True North Strong and Free
Posted By Alida on February 13th, 2010
Yesterday was a good day to be a Canadian, but beyond that, it was a good day to be a Canadian artist. The level of artistry, skill, technical ability, and talent that went into the Opening Ceremony last night was amazing, and it made me proud to be a part of a community of artists that has the skill to pull that off. Beyond that, it was a great day for Calgary artists. The composer/music director, Dave Pierce; the assistant music director, Donovan Seidle; and the choreographer, Jean Grand-Maître, are all Calgary-based artists with huge international successes.
However, aside from the dampening of the day for the most obvious reason (and my heart just aches for the Georgian team and the Kumaritashvili family), there’s something that has been nagging at me for weeks. The more I hear of the controversy and ill-will surrounding the Games in Vancouver, the sadder it makes me. The Olympics in Calgary were such a great experience for the city — culturally, they put Calgary on the world stage, and the arts and culture (not to mention both amateur and professional sports) have flourished so much in the last 22 years due to the foundation laid by the Games — they seemed to draw the city together, not tear it apart. Continue reading →
Nights on the town
Posted By Alida on February 11th, 2010
The other day, I participated in a focus group that was part of a study commissioned by a theatre company in Calgary, to explore theatre-going trends and opinions in the city. The focus group that I was part of was one of three types: people who have been to the theatre within the past six months; people who have been in the past (2 or more years ago), but not more recently; and people who have never been to the theatre. Of course, this one was the first type, and most of the people there were even more frequent than every six months. I think that I was the only theatre professional in attendance, but most of the others were season ticket holders, and many regularly attended shows presented by more than one company.
The first question we were asked was, “What is your ideal night out in Calgary?” Continue reading →
Best of all worlds
Posted By Alida on January 25th, 2010
One of the things that disappoints me most about Calgary is the lack of foresight in the city’s planning. It’s a city that has exploded in the past decade, and the foundation hadn’t been laid in the decades before to sustain such rapid growth. It’s still a city that’s scrambling for its infrastructure to catch up to the population growth, and while it’s growing well in many areas, there are many where the city is being held back by its own short-sightedness.
Imagine what it would be like today if city planners had believed, 40 or 80 or 100 years ago that Calgary has the potential to be a world-class city — to someday stand up against any great city in the world in its arts and culture, industry, nature, and people. Imagine what it would be like if, when it was a city of 100,000 people, city planners had dreamed — and planned — ahead to Calgary as a city of 5 million, instead of seeing it grow to a small city in the something-hundred-thousand range. Imagine how much further ahead we could be now if, instead of playing catchup with roads and transit and infrastructure, the city was able to allocate those resources differently. If Calgary had the resources to be a city friendly to a large population, rather than struggling to sustain it and finding ways to both grow and retroactively fit at the same time.
What would it look like now if the dreams had been bigger then?
I’m on the brink of several new adventures, both career-wise and otherwise, and I’m looking at the steps ahead and finding ways to dream big. As I’m stepping out into a career as a freelance producer and consultant, what does it mean to dream big — and more than just dream big, to plan big? To lay the foundation for whatever success I want to see come my way? To create a starting point that can lead to something big — or to something smaller?
If I plan for the best, the smaller result will always fit into the larger foundation. Being over-prepared for a more humble end point is never a bad thing, but anticipating something small can be disastrous when the opportunity for something bigger comes along. What a waste of time, money, energy, and potentially opportunity it is if I have to do the work to retrofit myself or my projects to sustain something grander than anything I’d originally dreamed.
So tell me. What does it mean for you to lay the foundation with an eye to the best possible outcome?
Posted in Real Life
