2003 History

Saturday, December 13th: Javawocky! After our traditional reading of Jabberwocky, we had: a fine performance by what may or may not have been the Vicious Fish (with some spontaneous accompaniment), some sketching in the audience, an announcement about letters for Amnesty International, the customary percussive ruckus, an improvised dialogue with insanity, jamming on penny-whistle and violin, various sonnets to a gracious Javawocky staffer: first (the inspiration for all the rest), second (and with the object of the recitations), third, and a fourth (un-photographed), a trio singing improvized barbershop-style and then a medley of Scarborough Fair, Norwegian Wood, and Drunken Sailor, a fairy tale, a pair of pieces sung with banjo, a piece with guitar, voice, and harmonica, piano from the same fine musician followed by another guitar-voice-and-harmonica performance, a piece on bass guitar, a performance with drums, sax, and guitar, and finally a reading by one of our chaperones of the magnetic poetry.

Saturday, December 6th: Snow, well packed and slick, making for Icky Roads; Javawocky rescheduled for the 13th.

Saturday, November 1st: Javawocky! Pictures and event-notes: Warming up, sitting on the floor (the usual tables weren't available, so we sat on rugs at lower ones), a performance from the Nameless Hobos, an appearance from Harry Potter, performance on guitar and piano and then two guitars, a performance by the Slime Cats, a monologue, a performance on guitar and harmonica, and a trio on string bass, guitar, and drums, the traditional magnetic poetry, some photos as a mini art gallery, and a photo op. for H.P. again, looking dazed and confused (while the camera seemed to be having troubles) and then looking scary.

Saturday, October 4th: The first Javawocky of the new school year. Pictures and other notes about events: After a recitation of Jabberwocky, we had a set by Halfmast, A. A. Milne's Disobedience, a drum circle (again from a different angle), a song on recorder and penny whistle with a drum accompniament, a piece on piano, a performance on veena and drum, a narration of a story about brownies in the fall which was acted out, a magnetic poetry reading (the magnetic poetry itself), mandolin and voice, a spontaneously sharp-looking group, and two instances of hair styling (hair, some more).

Saturday, June 14th: The Javawocky site's 'home' page topped 500 hits around 10:00am; the overall hits were about three times that.

Saturday, June 7th: The eigth Javawocky. Initially quite a lot of people (thirites), though many they filtered away after The Fuzz finished, at which point the others had fun with acoustic and poetic entertainment. Some (though not all) of the happenings were: a reading of Jabberwocky, guitar (with an on-stage spectator), audience enrapturement, The Fuzz, a performance on the veena, poetry, more poetry with saxophone and, in this case, sound effects/comments, a drone-enabled recorder, poetry from other sources, a drum circle, a reading of collected string-commentary, and reading of magnetic poetry (left, right).

Saturday, May 3rd: The seventh Javawocky. A relatively small turnout, which led to more hanging out and jamming but gladly no less enjoyability. Happenings included: setup, a reading and acting out of Jabberwocky, Halfmast (drum close-up) performing, a drum circle (with various other instruments including recorder and 'cello - but unfortunately no passable picture), poetry by the author, banjo, trio comprised of recorder, tin whistle, and banjo, guitar and 'cello, poetry from a book, and again poetry read from a book, another bit of author-read poetry, a poem inspired by the magnetic-poetry-can-face, guitar and veena, the same group with the addition of 'cello, reading of the magnetic poetry, and the magnetic poetry itself (top one, top two, top three; side one, side two, side three).

Saturday, April 5th: Sadly, no Javawocky, because of the prevalence of spring-break travel and the inability to reschedule due to CBC's conflicting needs for the space.

Thursday, March 13th: The Javawocky web site tops a thousand hits around 5:00pm. (The public statistics page for thejavawocky seems not to function. A hit counter hasn't been tried. 2-to-the-tenth hits on the 21st of the same month, around 1:00pm. The hits noted are for all the different sub-pages combined, as opposed to the number of visits to the site at large.)

Saturday, March 1st: The sixth Javawocky. Among other acts, we had two bands, which was great: New England Clam Chowder and Halfmast. Pictures: setup generally, New England Clam Chowder doing setup and playing (again), a drum circle from several different angles around it, Halfmast playing, poetry from one source - a collection of pieces of online conversation - and then another, with several poems of various topics, a performance on the veena, a rant which seems to have become tradition (this time on plastic cups), magnetic poetry reading, and magnetic poetry itself. Also, the Javawocky staff now have staff tee-shirts; at the moment, a black shirt bearing a white patch with a design based on the logo on it.

Saturday, February 1st: The fifth Javawocky. The atmosphere of this one was particularly pleasing, owing to conversation among the audience during performing breaks and the increasingly non-necessarally-staff-related composition of the attendees. Things which happened include, but certainly aren't limited to: A drum circle at the beginning (and from another angle), poetry under an umbrella with accompaniament on piano sparodically, and further poetry from the same source, a different poet reading, the piano pieces "What's This?" from The Nightmare Before Christmas by Danny Elfman and Bach's C Major Prelude, "Midnight" from Cats on piano, further poetry, a piece on guitar (and voice), another poem, poetry in the from of a crooked man, a very strange not-quite-act thing, a song and dance, a poem, intermittent appearances by our hospitable orator (different from who's been usual), a rant which was really more of a history of ties, descriptions of two present, read by one described, and magnetic poetry.

Saturday, January 4th: The fourth Javawocky. Quite possibly the best yet: lots of people, and not all within the immediate friends of the staff, and lots of performances of varied types. Included things were a reading from Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct (for the sake of a humorous analogy involving the hyrax), several people (talking, sitting holding a veena) jamming, a poem (by the reader), a violin duet playing the first movement of the Bach Concerto in D Major, a song (and a half) on guitar, a piece on recorder, a performance by the composer of a piano piece, a reading of various made up titles, a reading of magnetic poetry made by various members of the audience on a cookie sheet, again some of the jammers, and the cartoons of an artist who attended. Also, note that there is now a picture of the outside of the building the Javawocky meets in (Central Baptist Church of Wayne) available, as well as pictures of the two sides (concise and verbose) of our A-frame sign that sits out front on Javawocky nights. (Further note that the photographer now has a tripod, happily; thus the less blurry pictures.)

The next Javawocky will be

Saturday, October 2nd, 2004

from 7:30 to 10:00pm . The Javawocky as a whole can be reached at thejavawocky@yahoo.com, or you can sign or view our guestbook.