[Bards] Thank you and a question on catagories
Alden Drake
alden_drake at sbcglobal.net
Wed Apr 26 06:52:59 PDT 2006
Several people have posted on this now, but I'll throw in my two bits.
I consider a bard to be a vocal performer AND composer. This includes poetry, prose, song, story,
dialogue, etc. I think composition is an especially important element though. Anyone can
memorize and perform something another person wrote given time (and maybe some singing ability).
But to be a bard, I think one must create from nothing. I wouldn't call someone a baker who made
nothing but pre-packaged cake mixes.
Instrumental music is also a performance art, but I don't consider it bardic. In fact, you'll
note that we have a Deputy A&S Minister for Music and Dance. Note, I in no way intend to slight
musicians here. I fiddle with instruments, but I don't call myself a musician by any means.
There are many performance artforms, and I think categorizing them into vocal performance,
physical performance, and "court" performance (for lack of a better term) breaks them up well, but
I don't think categorizing performers is all that necessary.
Also, consider our Kingdom level championships. We have A&S, Bardic, and Dance Champions. That's
a bit limited, but it is what our kingdom has enough support to merit. If a musician wants to
play a piece on an instrument in a championship, or a juggler wants to compete, I don't think we
should exclude them because we put absolute definitions on what these fields are. Put them in
where they best fit. Most likely that would be Bardic. As a bard, I have no issue competing
against an instrumental piece. We can both miss notes, forget phrases, skip verses, have out of
tune instruments, etc. Nor would I mind competing against a juggler. We can both "drop the ball"
on occasion. Most bards I know are open armed and supportive of all performers.
So what it comes down to I guess (for me) is that bardic is a performance art, but not all
performance artforms are bardic.
In service,
HL Alden Drake
A Bard
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