Walk in the Day: the Musical

Guess what I did this week? I wrote a one-act science fiction action/adventure musical about Quaker peacemakers and Space Marine engineers working together to save adorable fierce furry nocturnal aliens from extinction on a desert planet.

Yes, that musical. Yes, all of it. Last you heard, if you've been following this journal, there were four songs in this song-cycle. Now there are fourteen (the secret: a lot of repeated leitmotifs), linked together by about eight pages of prose dialogue. I know a lot more about the characters than I did before, and a lot more about the plot. Which is good, 'cause it's done.

After the cut, you'll find the complete script, and I recommend listening to the songs in context, but to ease your downloading, here's the complete list of songs (note that "Long, Bright Day" is three times longer and contains much more plot that the version posted last week):

[ edit: "Rules of War" has been expanded into "War vs. Peace/Open Your Eyes", which is a much deeper treatment of the just war vs. pacifism debate, please update your playlists accordingly. ]

mp3 — Called by the Shade
mp3 — Strange Rumors
mp3 — Speaking Lessons
mp3 — Long, Bright Day
mp3 — Science Lessons
mp3 — Shade
mp3 — Dark Moon Daughter
mp3 — Star-flecked Nights
mp3 — The Raid
mp3 — War vs. Peace/Open Your Eyes
mp3 — Peace vs. Peace
mp3 — The Escape
mp3 — Walk in the Day
mp3 — Meeting for Worship with Attention to Shade

This will be produced as an album, at some point — it's a single, self-contained album-sized work, so I have no worries about having future qualms about the exact selection of songs on it. I'd also love to stage it (like, really stage it), but that would require a Julie Taymor-like level of puppet design and an extremely creative lighting designer.

Meanwhile, if you would like to play any role (technical, vocal, or instrumental) in the production of an album, or if you would like to participate in an on-book cast (a recital, without blocking) at Swarthmore Alumni Weekend, Concertino, Pi-con, OVFF, GAFilk, Arisia, or Boskone, please let me know.

I'll also be posting some more expository notes in a separate entry to follow.

( Complete script (long!) after the cut )

Some notes on Yrichii ecology and culture

First, go check out Walk in the Day: the Musical — I'll wait.

edit: They're "Yrichii" now. Unlike the old name, this one is (a loose transliteration of) a native word, probably a word for "people" in the language of one of the larger city-states in the south, where contact was established first.

I'll be throwing explanatory notes and background information on the setting of Walk in the Day in here until I get around to setting up my new personal wiki. Since I love world building (all that plot, character, and theme stuff — just an excuse!), this could get long, so to spare your friends pages, I'm adding a cut. ( Click for more information about the Yrichii, their culture, and their homeworld. )