Calvin Austin's Blog

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Pavarotti and I - a true hero

I was very fortunate and lucky to meet Pavarotti in 1982. Its an easy date to remember as it was at a recording session for Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera. I sung in the Junior Royal College of Music choir and on this occasion we were taken by coach to the recording studio and then waited for Pavarotti to arrive.

It was a fairly hot day in London. When he entered the studio, his presence I can only describe as being even larger than he was himself. He had his trademark handkerchief and he greeted the kids in the choir like long lost friends. I'll never forget the warmth and sincerity. His singing was unbelievable, I was standing a few rows behind him and I could hear him as if he was singing head on.

Thank you Luciano for an amazing career

Java and the Titanic

Yesterday I spent several hours walking through the Java pavilion floor, lots of great stuff to see and some good giveaways by the vendors here. I also stumbled upon a photo opportunity of James with the Dukes Choice awards

Java is number #1 again

http://www.tiobe.com/tpci.htm

In the TIOBE search results this was based on its rise to 3.2% in their index compared to the declining 6.5% of Visual Basic. I had to stare at their graph to even see the C# line so this is a pretty far out statement to me!

Java is back at #1, reclaiming from C. Infact until Java 5 came out things were looking down for Java. Good to see that has reversed.

Free event at my place (Bay Area)

Checkout the website, http://www.spikesource.com/testfest.html for registration and further details.

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