Share the Wealth - Bitch

Found this delectable website - and after reading a few entries, it has definitely made it to my Google Reader.

Nico Muhly; New York based composer - hilariously refreshing look on, well, most things.

Enjoy.

Rein it in there, SPARKY.

Found this little article on the Gaurdian News website: What football can teach Classical Musicians.

This article - though has its points - sort of irritated me. What does it matter that your orchestra is made up of a variety of musicians from different regions of the world?

Yes, I understand the nationalist argument here, but this isn't sports - you don't have orchestras lining up to compete with each other.

So, doesn't that nationalist ideal sort of become null and void here?

A Room of Insanity

It's amazing how a simple change in practice rooms can either make or break the rest of your practice session.

Here's how I continually ruin my life via horrible, no - HORRENDOUS practice room choices: Typically, I like to practice in smaller rooms because they aren't as acoustically deceiving as many of the larger CAVES. That's how I started yesterday - a smaller room, and I was generally happy for a majority of that practice.

THEN, I took a break and changed practice rooms to a room that was as dead as - well - DEAD.
It put a HUGE damper on the rest of my practice session, not to mention the awful mood that surfaced as a result.

However, in light of the horrendous finale of my practice session - I did have a rather FANTASTIC run through of the Nielsen. With only a mistake here and there - I WAS smiling for at least an hour and a half.

It wasn't until I played the rep for the ICA that I wanted to VOMIT.

Such is life.

And, as many of my fellow reed players may know - we're officially in the season of HELL. With the climate and humidity lacking any sense of consistency - reed selection is like a crap shoot. It's like playing Russian roulette with at half-loaded gun.

Annoying.

I question my reed break in process - as I tend to do every time the weather changes. But, as many times as I've sat and logically thought about how I work and break in my reeds - I'm pretty certain that it's rather consistent - it's the weather that isn't.

I just fail to accept that. Every time.

I always find myself questioning my reed control via the break in process and that during times of weather anomalies, I fail to break them in at regular intervals.

I've got to accept the fact that - during periods of insecure weather, I need to break in more reeds.

Every now and then, I miss making reeds - but then again - sometimes I don't. I honestly don't have the time - and I'd rather be spending that time practicing. On top of a full doctoral load of classes, learning various works, memorizing music for competitions, research, etc. - my time has become a tight as the kids head stuck between the rungs of a stairway.


Bah.