Gaming, Portraits, Evensong, Swashbuckling

10-31-2008

My dad and I took full advantage of today. We went to Leicester Square right off the morning to the ''day of'' tkts shop. There we got tickets for later that evening, which I'll write about after we've gotten through the day. I love building suspense!

From there we went to Trafalgar Square and ran into the London Gaming Festival. In Trafalgar, Electronic Arts was displaying their games, Leicester Square was featuring Microsoft's games (including the new Bond), and Charing Cross had Sony products. I had the opportunity to play a few games and catch some sweet new releases. 

We grabbed lunch with my roommate Luke since he works right off of Trafalgar square. Following our O'Neils meals, Luke took my dad and I on a personal tour of the Coliseum, home of the English National Opera.  The company was just finishing up with a rehearsal so we stayed to watch them tear down the set, very behind the scenes VIP kinda stuff.

We also took an hour to glance over The National Gallery,as it was also in Trafalgar. Neither of us were keen on spending hours upon hours at this gallery, however, I saw plenty of what I needed to see, including:

• Van Gogh's  Sunflowers, Long Grass w/ Butterflies (more abstract than I'm used to for Van Gogh) , and Two Crabs (which was different than any other kind of Van Gogh I've seen before)
• Seurat's Bathers at Asnieres 
• Velazquez's The Rokeby Venus (woman on a bed looking in a mirror, her reflection stares back at the viewer)
• Beuckelaer's The Four Elements: Fire, Air, Water, Earch; a series of paintings each portraying a different daily seen of a market
• Delaroche's Execution of Lady Jane Grey (takes place at Tower Hill)

From there were ventured to Charing Cross where shops and street performers entertained us for a few hours. A stunt man did tight-rope walking, knife juggling, sword swallowing, and all of it with humor and whit.  My favorite was a string quartet that not only played well, but worked the crowd as well. I'll get a video up sooner than later. 

From the buskers to the banks of the Thames. We walked around by the Eye and checked out the living statues and other street performers. I randomly remembered that daily Evensong at Westminster was at 17:00, which was coming up pretty quick.

Once again these boys & men, ranging from ages 6 to 60, almost moved me to tears with their beautifully blended tones reverberating throughout Westminster Abbey. This time I was actually able to see them in action since we got to the Abbey early enough to get a decent seat near the choir stalls. 

On our way out of the Big Ben / Parliament area, I finally got the picture I've been meaning to get for a while and finally had a decent camera to take it with. 

And now to break the tension, the suspense. Have you been feeling it?? Aren't you just dying to know what show I saw tonight? Well, by now you've probably forgotten that I even mentioned I went to a show tonight. Dammit, I really need to work on my suspense building.

Anywho, we went to see Zorro: The Musical. Ever since I heard it advertised I figured it was going to be a cheesy show, more of a spectacle that a musical, but for some reason I was still ridiculously intrigued by it. I have to admit, I was thoroughly entertained. Not only by the artistically creative sets, interesting plot-line (that was, however, a little dodgy at points), and sweet sword fighting / fight scenes, but the music as well.

The music was all of spanish origin: flamenco, mariachi, and of course throw in a few musical theater ballads. But the dancing that accompanied the uniquely scored show sold it as well. All around a solid show for a new West End musical. 

They just need to do something about the tube trains that are loud and clear passing underneath that Garrick Theatre...