Saturday, Jess and I attended the Yule event for the Baronies of Bergental and Beyond the Mountain. It was a lovely chance to get to see people one last time before we pack it in on SCA events for the winter (and the corresponding COVID surge, which of course is already on the rise). We were primarily there so I could deliver a commission:
Baroness Maria von Ossenheim of Concordia of the Snows had requested that I create a new filk in honor of her elevation to the Order of the Pelican, the Society’s Peerage order for service. (There is an informal tradition in the Society that people are advised to prepare “In Case of Peerage” documents, so that If and When the Time Comes, whoever will be in charge of organizing their vigil and elevation ceremony will know their specific wishes around it–foods they’d like at the vigil, who should speak on their behalf, their taste in regalia, and the like. Learning that a filk from me was actually in someone’s ICOP doc still makes me blush to the roots of my hair. And bounce like a little kid.)
There was a delightful but odd feeling of coming full circle with this commission: Maria had asked me to sing “Concordian Soil” for her and her husband Faolán’s investiture as Baroness and Baron of Concordia some three years back, which performance caught the attention of then-Queen Vienna, leading to her asking me if I knew of her ABBA royal whim. So the degree to which I have become known for doing filks in court was not exactly Maria’s fault, but she had certainly helped it along.
Getting to sing in front of a full live audience for the first time in nearly two years was certainly a treat, which I had missed far more than I had realized. I’m not disappearing, but I hope to see my fellow populace at events again in the spring.
Drake Oranwood 