Welcome to Phil's Crossword Corner (PCC)! Philip Chow (aka Phil) is an auditor at NYC Dept of Parks and Recreation who makes crossword puzzles for fun in his free time. A new meta puzzle posts every other Saturday weekend on Crosshare.
Phil’s metas will usually include immediate nudges, a great tool for new solvers. You can reach him at pchow13@gmail.com
Please see below for the latest puzzle PCC#26 - "Encore! Encore!"
[Level 2] Meta prompt: The answer to the meta is a one-named pop diva that is 7 letters long
Many thanks to FrankieHeck and Abide for test-solving! (Clue writing credit to Abide for 29-Down)
Note: the level is the intended difficulty I had in mind when I designed the puzzle, but may play differently since every solver has their own area of expertise... what one person may find easy, another may find difficult.
Have fun and keep in mind if you're ever lost at sea, google is your best friend (actually, I don't know if you'd get internet service in the middle of the ocean)
-Phil
Hint #2: In the unlikely event that the artists in the four long entries collaborate, we might get mash-ups like "Hot Stuff Everyday," "I Have Nothing No One," "Sweet but Psycho Chain of Fools," and "Bad Blood Vampire"
Hint #3: Encore! Encore! Don't you just love these pop divas so much you want to hear them again?
Hint #4: Summer Grande = take the D from Donna Summer (who sang "Hot Stuff") and the A from Ariana Grande (who sang "Everyday")... repeat the two letters = DADA
Hint #5: you'll end up with a 4-letter repeated bigram when you extract the first letter from the relevant clues but this doesn't fit the 7-letter answer criterion... the 4-letter name you found is an alternative answer for the clue at 59-Down
Solution below - SPOILER ALERT:
Answer explanation: Answer explanation: The four long Across answers contain two pop divas... SUMMERGRANDE = Donna Summer + Ariana Grande, HOUSTONKEYS = Whitney Houston + Alicia Keys, MAXFRANKLIN = Ava Max + Aretha Franklin, SWIFTRODRIGO = Taylor Swift + Olivia Rodrigo... Extracting their first initials gives us DA | WA | AA | TO which doesn't amount to much... but taking the hint from the title "Encore! Encore!" we shall repeat these initials: DADA | WAWA | AAAA | TOTO... the first letters of the clues to these grid entries = RIRI, which is Rihanna's nickname (and sometimes appears in crossword puzzles as "[popular Rihanna song]" singer, to fans"), making RIHANNA our meta answer.
Constructor Notes: Easter eggs are planted in the grid such as the 2011 Grammy performance referenced in 59D. I included a few red herrings of other 7-lettered one-named pop divas to throw you off the scent.
Happy Birthday to Rihanna on February 20!
Last edited by pchow13 on Sat Mar 23, 2024 12:01 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Guessed the answer (4 tries.) I know some names but not really up on my pop diva queens. Missed the mechanism until I accessed the nudges/explanation, but now that I understand, I quite like the puzzle -- thanks, Phil!
Solved, with one minor quibble that slowed me down slightly.
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta!
Late start. Which is too bad as it was a delightful and uplifting puzzle.
Funny story. I was all set to enter Par for the course for the CrossHare midi contest for April but I mistakenly thought midi meant 7x 7 and not 11 x 11. Oops. Well.... Here's a complex but **small** meta on the subject of golf.
Forgot to post earlier, but Turned The Corner! Very much not my wheelhouse, needed nudges to identify some of the names, but a delightful puzzle all the same.
Missed the mechanism until I accessed the nudges/explanation, but now that I understand, I quite like the puzzle -- thanks, Phil!
Turned the corner, tho I needed interwebbing help here and there. Lovely construction - thanks, Phil!
