Three Days of Crazy

It has been a whirlwind of a the past three days.  I want to sum this up here, because it has had such great impact on my professional life.

My article is officially published, which is great.  However, someone wrote a letter to the editor about my article and they were not pleased.  The journal has a policy that publishes all letters to the editor.  To make a long story short, the letter to the editor was a bit vitriolic, seeming to be more upset with the editors than my article, but still disagreeing with some things I said.  However, for those of you that read my article, have no fear... there were two misspellings in my article, but the rest of the things this person pointed out I would take issue with.  I can back up what I wrote with research and I believe it to be pretty sound.  Needless to say, it caused me a little stress for a couple of days.  The journal is not going to print this letter to the editor, as the writer has said they would prefer it not to be published.

Based on this experience, I had a great conversation with one of my professors today.  She brought many things to my attention worth considering, but I will only mention two on here: 1) a person who has so much experience in the field should not be nitpicking a graduate students work, especially given the fact it was a relatively "small" article.  Yes, a big article to me, but small compared to anybody who is in the musicology field.  2) The opening of line of the letter to the editor criticizes the journal by saying, "Did no one who knows anything about Brahms or his choral music actually read/edit it?"  My professor wisely said to me, "This opening line says a lot about the real issue that this had."  This person who wrote the letter is a scholar in the field of the article I wrote... yet, this person was not asked to edit or write an article for this issue of the publication.  My professor pointed out this could have been a response to that, rather than the article.

My editor, in her last e-mail to me said (paraphrased), "It is a fine and well written article, and I would not give it another thought."

I am so glad that is over.  I feel less stressed with out this hanging over my head.  But what an experience!

The other thing that has made the past few days a whirlwind is: I conducted my first high school festival.  It was last minute, as I was a fill-in conductor for someone else.  But, it was amazing!  It was completely draining.  But it was wonderful.  The high schoolers did good things and many of them had fun.  The choir teachers thanked me and believed that I was teaching their students something.  Not to mention, I can put this on my CV.  I was very pleased and so excited to have this experience.

I am a bit overwhelmed about the experiences I have had.  I am so fortunate.  I have happened to be in the right place at the right time, or I know the right person.  Because of this, I get to share in the joy of music with others.  I hopefully affect their life in a positive way through music (or through scholarship about music).  Wow.