Breathtaking! I will be bookmarking this to watch many times over the course of the coming brutal Wisconsin winter!

Wow Steve. Stunning. Thank you.

For lack of a stronger superlative, beautiful.

What a wonderful montage, Steve. Well done!

Pieter

I'm clipping this post, too! Wonderful!
Peggy

Gorgeous!!! The only thing missing was names! That will help us get thru' the long winter!!

You done good,Steve! I even know a lot of the hostas in the pics,which is amazing in itself! Good job. Phil

Steve, that is magnificent. Breath-taking. Including the Copeland-Shaker theme music. Brilliant!

Steve

Very, very nice.

Thank you!

Thank you for sharing.

It is WONDERFUL. If I would live in your continent I would invite me ... Super, Steve :)

Wow! Thank you Steve!

Steve, This is so beautiful and inspiring for a hosta new comer like me. Thank you for sharing!
Vivian

I felt like I was there amongst all those fabulous hostas. Great job, Steve. I'm with Rosie wishing I knew which hostas they were.

I betcha they will make me want to hole em close and hug em and squeeze em.....just like Yogi. Dare I?

Why not!!!!!! okay, you convinced me....

Absolutely perfect including the music and breathtaking hosta. A beautiful presentation and I would love to be able to do such great job growing and showing. Thank you so much for sharing
Faye

Hello Steve: Your presentation is marvelous. The hostas look so good. I can only hope to have mine look this good. I especially like the second hosta. I am wondering what the name of it is.

WOW !

Nicely done, indeed.

tj

Beautiful video and Hosta photos. Great job Steve.
Cher

Thanks for all the nice comments. I'm glad you liked it.

The reason I didn't place names on the photos is because I'm using the movie as a tease at the beginning of a presentation that I am creating for the Mass Master Gardeners Speakers Bureau called "Not Your Grandmother's Hostas". After that opening movie I post individual pictures and talk about each plant in more detail. It's all the enabling techniques from this forum. I've learned it all from you.

Steve

Awesome Steve, very nicely put together. What is the 1st hosta on the cover and then the third hosta?

I am sure you have a lovely presentation in person! Like the name, 'Not Your Grandmother's Hostas'!

Thanks for sharing!

I can't do high speed. Wish I could.

Holy cow!! That was awesome! Well done, sir; thanks very much!

Steve, I watched it twice already, and sent it to several folks who are budding hostaholics and don't know it yet.

It is really gorgeous, and I think loading it to YouTube is a good move. Your slideshow on Photobucket is good, but this is more......more...., shall we say, professional?

The music is excellent too. I recognize it as the same tune for 'Lord of the Dance' in the hymnal. Which I love. A really Celtic lilt to it as well. But not Michael Flatley.

As stated well done excellent. Paula

Hey all,

I usually try to avoid the question 'what's the one second from the left at the top' type questions, but this time I cannot resist.

I'm losing sleep over the one at the 7:00 (minutes) in point with the Distinct White Veins.

Help?

hh

Moc,

The music is Simple Gifts the first part from Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring and the second part is Yoyo Ma and Alison Kraus.

Trudy,

The first pic was taken by Rick Goodenough. It's his Brant Rock Jetty and the pic is used with his permission. The third pic was taken by me in the garden of Bill Meyers and Carol Brashear. I thought it was Southern Essence, but looking at the description of SE it didn't fit. Carol correctly IDed it for me as Misty Gold. I like that one too.

Steve

HH,

The one with white veins is H. Second Coming. It is a Gary Bennett discovery of a sport of Honeybells. It has been tested with a full battery of tests for virus and has been clean.

Steve

My apologies for missing Newhostalady's question. Many or even most of these photos are pictures from some of the best Hosta gardens in New England. They are ones that I have visited either during the 2011 AHS convention or during this summer. So I'm always pleased when someone asks about one of my plants. The second Hosta in the sequence with the large white margins is H. Formal Attire. It's really a great plant that is large upright and an attention grabber in the garden. Its one downfall is that the slugs really like that big white edge. So I use a copper mesh barrier wrapped around the petioles on this one and it seems to keep them at bay.

Steve

Steve,

Thanks for the info! I couldn't find 'Second Coming' for sale anywhere, which probably means it is at least $250 like 'Amime Tachi', another white veined Hosta. Ouch.

Sure is distinctive, though!

hh

Someone else asked about the one with the "pin striped suit" white vein area, and it is a breath taking hosta. I'm wondering if that pin stripe effect is an anomaly of only that one specimen, or perhaps if that variegation is a definite characteristic. Would it do it for me without any experience dealing with that hosta?

Must be the one 'Second Coming' a sport of Honeybells. Well, I have TWO Honeybells, and I'm going to be looking for that sport here. Honeybells is such a vigorous grower, let's all hope we find something that gorgeous emerging next spring. If it were mine, the first name come to mind would be 'Pin-stripe Suit'

Incidentally, Steve, I have a connection to YouTube via WiFi on my television now, and I watched it on the big screen. Your video looks great in the wide screen HD and the music is still good quality.

At the next AHS regional meeting for NE, perhaps you can set it up for continuous loop, sound very low. Perhaps the handout would be a list of the hosta pictured, and raise money for the group by selling a thumb drive or disk with video on it. Just a thought.

Thanks Steve for the info on the hostas. Had a feeling the first one was Ricks. Have always liked Misty Gold and Bill/Carol grow this one very well!

OMG . . . I just found this post . . . . . .

I teared up . . . right hand to God, Steve I teared up . . .

Mostly because those are the sorts of gardens we all hope to achieve one day and you captured the essence of why we are all so captivated by hostas so elegantly . . . BRAVO Sir !!!

But there is also the fact that I played cello for over 15 years and have seen Yoyo Ma perform live . . . he is an amazing performer and a great guy to boot.

Copland is amazing . . . Appalachian Spring reminds me a lot of Johan deMeij.

Might I recommend for your ears the Aquarium Suite by deMeij. It is not an orchestral piece but was written for a symphonic band. It features three movements.

Movement 1 is the Allegretto and represents the Neon Tetra, Electric Eel, and Angelfish

Movement 2 is the Adagio and it represents the Sea Horse and Zebrafish

Movement 3 is the finale and features Guppies

I would love to hear the speech you are preparing for. I enjoy the title thoroughly :)

Many thanks again for creating and sharing this beautiful presentation and making me scour Youtube for a decent recording of Aquarium. The link is the best I could find (minus the coughing . . . live recording)

Ludi

Here is a link that might be useful: Aquarium - Johan de Meij A.C.A.M G. Verdi di Ciminna (PA)

What an awesome presentation! I teared up as well since my son just had his last marching band performance, all Copland including Appalachian Spring. -This video should help get any gardener through the harshest winter. THANK YOU STEVE!

Thanks Ludi and GC for the kind words. My presentation is finished and I'm going to test it out next week.

Steve

WON. DER. FUL.

Steve, any chance you can know the varieties of 2 in particular: at the 7:02 mark (white veins) and at the 7:12 mark (red centre)?
Thanks!

Nista,

The one with white veins is called "Second Coming". It is a sport of Honeybells that was discovered by Gary Bennett in his garden. I believe it does green up on older leaves later in the year, but new growth retains those white veins. The one with a good deal of red into the leaf surface is called "Almost" and was hybridized by Arthur Wrede of Maryland. The photo is from First Look. H. Almost is not available commercially, but is being used by hybridizers trying to get more red into Hosta leaves. There was an article about this in a recent AHS Hosta Journal. The last piece of Almost that was available on auction went for $325.

Steve

Wow, Steve - at that cost it's reminiscent of tulip mania in the 17th century! I take it "Second Coming" is hard to come by (if available at all) and also pricey... So I'll leave both of them off my wish list for the time being ;)

Absolutely wonderful, Steve. Love Copland, love Yoyo Ma, Krause...and as for the hosta-it's all been said. Marvelous! Thanks. Off to watch again.

Cynthia