All songs
copyrighted
by David Rood
except as noted.
OVFF 2001 Con Report
This was my first OVFF, and this is my first con report. I'd been filking for one year, and I'd only attended cons in Georgia, so I didn't know many people. However, friends in GaFiA introduced me around, and I'd been frequenting #Filkhaven, so I knew folks from there.
It's been a few weeks, so my memory on dates may be off. Apologies, but the events are the important things.
We drove from Atlanta on Thursday-Jerrie Adkins and I-but only made it to Cincinnatti. Along the way Jerrie introduced me to some of the people that would be at OVFF by playing their CDs. We missed the impromptu #Filkhaven gathering, but Jerrie helped me stuff CD cases.
Arriving at the scene, we were greeted by numerous people. In particular, Daniel and Melissa Glassner hugged me like a cousin they hadn't seen since July 4, not as someone they'd met once ten months earlier... that was really cool. All afternoon people accrued in the lobby, and the GaFiA Irregulars introduced me to a baker's dozen-Terence Chua, Erica Neely, Dave Weingart, the list goes on. Faces matched to reputations.
One of these evenings I joined a gang for dinner at a pizzeria. Weingart and Terence and Erica and Debbie Ohi were there. A few suggestions were made regarding filks of "Least of My Kind". Basically, the food was good and the company better.
The Pegasus Nominees concert was a must, especially since I'm relatively new to filking and uneducated in the literature. For example, though I've been going to the same housefilks for a year, I'd never heard Bill Sutton's "Stray Dog Man". What a howler. Matt Leger's "Simple Country Doctor" may have been the best performance of the set, or at least the most genuine, but it was Echo's Children doing "Least of My Kind" that gave me chills. This concert more than anything else was really the reason I wanted to go to OVFF-to see what was happening in other parts of the filk world and to have my standards raised.
Friday night I sat in the main room circle for a while, but eventually I ran into Mary Crowell of Alabama, whom many will remember from the GaFilk 2001 2x10s. She found the baby grand in the hallway behind the main room and started playing her torch songs. A small crowd gathered, including Kathy Mar, George Powell ("Bubba" of Three Weird Sisters/Year And A Day) on bass, Debbie Ohi on flute, and Pete Grubbs tearing it up on lead guitar. This was an exceptional gathering of talent.
Saturday included the TwoFers and some concerts. Either this day or another I got to see Echo's Children-great stuff, looking forward to seeing them at GaFilk 2002. Terence Chua did his set; the man knows how to work an audience. After a passionate performance of "Fanboy Soul", if that's what it's called, someone asked, "When were you walking around in my head?" Terence replied glibly, "I call them like I see them. And you should really clean up in there."
Next, the Three Weird Sisters performed. I'm familiar with their repertoire, but they had some new material, including a wicked cover of Cat Faber's "Least of My Kind"-it was Brenda's laugh that really set my hair on end. They closed their set with a filk by Rob Wynne, "Terence Chua Can Filk It". They brought Terence on stage and had Erica Neely, Debbie Ohi, and Jodi Krangle wench him while they sang, to the delight of the audience.
By the evening filks, I had finished a response called "I Wanna Be Filked By the Three Weird Sisters". While waiting for things to get started, I ran into Bill Sutton in the bar. We talked over a pint and started trading verses to old drinking songs my parents taught me. Diffusion-limited aggregation occurred, and eventually we had about a dozen people in there-the Three Weird Sisters, Erica Neely, Dave Weingart, Terence, Rob, I'm not sure who else. Erica did a nice song not on her album called "Dying Heroes". I got to do "I Wanna Be Filked By The Three Weird Sisters" in front of most of the people named in the song, which was mad fun.
Sunday evening at the Dead Dog, lots was going on, but at one point Kathy Mar said, "There's a fellow over there who hasn't sung anything solo yet." The guy, a cheerful red-bearded fellow whose name I never caught, then sang something that sounded like an a capella Scottish folk song. His singing was the finest I heard all weekend, obviously well trained but beyond doubt a naturally good voice.
Monday we drove back, uneventfully-as it should be.
Convention Schedule