[Bards] A Question of Timing in Elfsea

[Darius of the Bells]

Actually I don't see a five minute limit as a problem. the majority of
pieces I have watched in the SCA are about 3.5 to 4 minutes. When it gets
past 4 minutes in a solo performance most bards are fighting to keep your
audiences attention. The ones that are 5 minutes or longer I have witnessed
personally fall into two area's.

1: the piece is good enough that the audience isn't looking at a stopwatch
any way.

2: the audience is busy refilling their drinks and wondering what piece is
coming up next.

I doubt that we will see anything like the mundane drama performances
competitions some of us are accustomed to. No time keeper holding up cards
in the back of the audience to tell us how long we are running, no auto
disqualification for those who go over the time limit. No minimum time
limit.

To sum up, I wouldn't worry over much if you have to go over 5 minutes but I
wouldn't try to go over five minutes just because you can either. Remember,
as Ulf says, this is not a competition it is an audition. When auditioning
before a noble for their patronage it would be a very period practice to
follow the guidelines they have set.

Darius
"we figured the code was more of guidelines than hard rules" ~PotC