Bradley University

A few weeks ago, Steve and I organized a Drupal BootCamp here at Bradley University that went very, very well. About 40 people attended. Steve and I tag-teamed the morning sessions on how to get started using Drupal to build a simple website, step-by-step.

The blog has been a bit quiet the past few weeks. Both Steve and I have been very busy. We've both been working to plan another Drupal Boot Camp event -- this time at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. The event will be Friday, May 2nd all day, starting at 8:00am. We're planning to follow a similar layout to the UIUC Drupal Boot Camp last month, with morning presentations on Drupal basics and topics, and an afternoon of hands-on and question-and-answer topic discussions.

Grading quizzes is always fun. Last semester, I got my favorite answer yet from a student who remarked that:

"Standards-based web design uses XHTML and CSS to separate the men from the boys."

(The answer I was looking for, of course, was presentation from content.)

As I finished up some grading for midterms, I got a far funnier answer than that one. You will need to know something about web design to understand this one.

The question was "What is divitis?"

<div id="maincontainer">
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<div id="title"><h1>THIS IS DIVITIS</h1></div>
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It's where people use waaay to many unnecessary div's to basically fake the "power" they had with tables.
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<div id="answerBottom"></div>
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I won't post the author's identity, but I'm guessing he or she will comment and claim this massive, epic win.

As a trained classical musician and one of the few gigging tenors based in the Peoria area, I'm actively involved in the classical music scene around here. I'm a cantor and the tenor section leader for St. Mary's Cathedral downtown. It's a great honor to get to sing there two or three times a weekend - it is of the most visually and acoustically beautiful places in Peoria.

Before I get into the musical event which you should all see this week, I need to mention a groundbreaking theatre performance called The Adding Machine that you should see if you get the chance. Bradley University Theatre and Multimedia have been laboring together for seven months now to produce this show. In addition to the official site I linked to earlier, the Peoria Journal Star did an excellent write-up on the show this weekend. Because of the demanding technical nature of the performance, including actors brought in from Internet 2, live video compositing on stage, and so on, it will only run this week.

As for music, the Cathedral always puts on quality performances, but we have an extra-special concert going on this weekend. This Friday evening for Stations of Cross, the Cathedral Schola welcomed Mervyn Cousins, an internationally-renowned conductor and organist. He sang with us and played organ, and he also joined us for our Saturday afternoon Latin-language Mass and our Sunday morning Mass.

Each night this week, the Cathedral Schola is meeting to work with Mervyn on John Rutter's excellent Requiem. After four nights of practice, the Cathedral Schola will put on a concert this Friday night at 7:15 PM that includes not only Rutter's Requiem with orchestra but also a special Latin three-part Stabat Mater.

Again, the executive summary:

1. This Friday night, come to the Cathedral of St. Mary's on Monroe Street in downtown Peoria at 7:15 PM for a special Stations of the Cross mass with a unique Stabat Mater and a full performance of John Rutter's Requiem with choir and orchestra. (It's free, but a free-will offering will be taken at some point, I'm sure.)
2. Go see Adding Machine this week. It plays Tuesday through Saturday nights at 8:00 PM and Sunday afternoon at 2:30 PM. Call the Bradley University Box Office at (309)677-2652 for tickets.

I hope you get to enjoy both of these performances this week. (Because of the choir practices are every night this week, I won't get to see Adding Machine until Saturday evening.)