Schubert’s Winterreise @ Concertgebouw

Tuesday night was spent at the Valhalla of classical music, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.This concert was definitely an example of the slogan “The best things in life are free”, since I was given this free ticket by my friend’s singing teacher, on my birthday (although I doubt she knew that).
Anyway, it was a performance of Schubert’s Winterreise, by two musicians that I had never heard of before, and I think, neither had most of the audience: the bariton Roman Trekel, accompanied by pianist Irwin Gage. But the performance was AWESOME. Powerful, precise, and full of emotion. Very impressive.

The only 2 notable events were
1) They forgot one song, “Letzte Hoffunung”
2) Near the end, a phone went off in the audience. AAAARGH… Even though it was at a low volume, it was of course audible. Luckily the musicians were not noticably disturbed, and continued playing as if nothing had happened. The audience was shocked and people were heard saying “Jesus”…

But since the audience was clapping so enthusiastically afterwards, and giving a standing ovation (although this gesture seems to have undergone inflation, lately), they came back for an encore, which was… the song they had forgotten

Onze Taal Congres

Today I went to the most amusing congress I’ve ever been to in my life: the congress of the Genootschap Onze Taal   (“Our Language” Society).
The program consisted of:
- 5 invited speakers, all of whom were extremely amusing to listen to, and most of whom had something interesting to tell as well.
- 3 performances, first of all by famous comedian Freek de Jonge, the Belgian singers Laïs, and 3 actresses including Petra Laseur
- 1 debate between 2 researchers on the proposition: “Changes in language are often decline of the language”

Anyway, it was not only highly amusing, but also quite interesting. Since it was intended for a general public, there weren’t any deep scientific analyses, but those would probably just have made it boring. We went home with a ”Gee, too bad it’s only once every two years”-feeling, rather than the “Gee, my brain is completely fried”-feeling you’d normally have after a scientific conference.

Compiling under Linux

I probably started using Unix fulltime about 13 years ago, and I still love Linux. However, this CVS contraption, automake adversity, and linker limbo is almost making me pull my hairs out.

Where does this “myComponent.so: undefined symbol: XtDestroyWidget” message suddenly come from? Or better: how do I get rid of it?

And why is CVS so bloody slow? Is it our network? My machine?

3D graphics in Python

Having set but a few steps into the amazing world called Python, I just discovered this link to 3D Graphics packages for Python.

And since I always lose my bookmarks, I thought I’d just jot it down here.