This past weekend was the final Hollywood Bowl performance for the 2011 season. I did not specifically pick this event, more so than it was part of the subscription I got that had several shows I was interested in, with only a few shows that I was not. This was one of them but I was still entertained by most of the show. Last week I also finally got back into the groove of working on the damn GMs. I actually did the masking and major detail painting done before working on the subie’s lights. And sporadically over this past weekend, I also got the decals done for all four GMs.
Mid last week, I took a night to masking off the kits to get some major details painted, such as the little thruster bits, raised detail areas on the Wagtail, and other little bits and pieces that are best airbrushed. I’m planning on doing the rest of the minor detail painting with a hand brush and enamel paints. So once the major details were done, the kits were left to cure over night.
With the major details cured over night, the following night was spent spraying a clear gloss over everything. Since I’m planning on doing the minor details with a hand brush and enamel paints, a clear lacquer layer will help protect the underlying paint. And I can get do doing the decals as well. Withe the clear sprayed, I also got around to finishing up the visor pieces for the GMs. I’m using a self adhesive aurora film that I picked up from akocreation. The visors were first painted a gloss black, and once cured, the aurora film is taped on.
The clear is left to cure for a few days; which gave me the opportunity to fiddle with the subie;s lights and do the retrofit. Friday night, I finally got around to applying decals to the Wagtail.
Saturday was just busy with other things such as the Hollywood Bowl. We made dinner and headed to the event. Tonight was the first evening with the Hollywood Bowl orchestra instead of the past performances we’ve attended with the LA Philharmonic. Yuki immediately noticed a difference. The LA Phil is definitely a higher caliber group. The evening’s performance celebrated the Moulin Rouge; so everything was French. There were a few songs that I recognized, and the last song before the intermission was Gershwin’s An American in Paris. Interestingly enough, we will get to hear the LA Phil’s version in a few weeks with the Disney Concert Hall’s opening night event.
The weather was cold that evening. When we got to the main area of the bowl, I went right into the Hollywood Bowl Store and picked up a nice sweater, I was in shorts and a very thin shirt, and I knew I wasn’t going to survive the night. At intermission, Yuki told me she was cold so we went down to a small kiosk store and picked up a HWB blanket, several other people were buying blankets. The blanket and sweater will be permanent accessories to my car after tonight’s performance.
Tonight’s conductor, Thomas Wilkins was very animated and conversed with the audience after each piece giving a little background and throwing in jokes here and there. He was very entertaining and as a conductor, something that I have not often seen; high energy personality that is very comfortable warming the audience and adding entertainment value to the event. I enjoyed the event more because of him than anything else.
Starting the second part of the evening, the group Paris Combo came out and sung a bunch of French songs. Nothing to write home about. And as a “world music” type group, I much more enjoyed Rodrigo y Gabriela than the French combination. Granted the songs were all in French and I understood not a single word. The front liner paled in comparison to the entertaining conductor. As they were leaving the stage, the conductor quipped that no one understood the music, and she could have been singing utter gibberish for all we knew. He got a quick head turn and staring session from the singer which made things even funnier. I guess the conductor could easily tell the level of entertainment by the audience’s reactions to the performance, which probably prompted his fun little jabs.
With Paris Combo off the stage, the entertainment returns as the orchestra plays excerpts from Orpheus in the Underworld by Jacques Offenbach, and the stage is filled with the leggy Moulin Rouge dancers showing off their amazing flexibility as well as doing the Can Can. I will definitely upload the one video I took later this week, as pictures just do not do this justice.
The evening ended with a full playing of Orpheus in the Underworld and a fireworks show. Playing with my camera, I tried to snap a few pictures, but nothing to spectacular.
The orchestra played a few more songs after the fireworks with the Moulin Rouge dancers coming out for one more quick dance around the stage. Overall the evening was entertaining, with the exception of Paris Combo. Yuki told me that a good number of the music played that evening reminded her of the music played in cartoons. Which is probably how most of the audience felt as well, that they were familiar with bits and pieces of the music that evening through their childhood auditory memories associated with cartoons. Come January, I’ll see about a sneak peak into next year’s HWB season and see about renewing the subscription.
Sunday, I had some time to finish up the decals for the other three GMs. Working here and there throughout the day and evening, I finally got the decals done. Next will be a clear gloss layer to seal in the decals as well as protect them from the wash and minor detail painting sessions.
So hopefully there won’t be too many distractions this week so I can hurry up and just finish off the project. Ideally, I would like to have this little project wrapped up by Orangecon happening in a few weeks. But I’m also losing almost a full week and weekend because of a business trip and side trip to NYC next week.
