30 Seconds

Yesterday I took ten minutes to play the piano.  I played through a few simple piano pieces and read a choral octavo by Rachmaninoff.

So let me take a moment to talk about how I initially begin to look at choral pieces.  I don't mean the entire process, but rather the initial searching.  I glance through the piece and get a "feel" for it.  However, I have never really taken the time to document what I'm actually doing.  Many times I think I'm just going off of gut feeling.  But that's not true.  This is my attempt to verbalize what happens in the thirty seconds I first look at a piece of music.

I often skim through pieces with my eyes and make sure it's not too boring- is all the rhythm similar?  Are the ranges limited throughout the entirety of the piece?  Yawn.  Nobody wants to hear that.  Although to be fair, I don't mind strophic pieces- as long as each verse gives me something different (textually) so I can shape the music and build the story.  Do the alto parts sit extremely low the entire time?  I don't do that to my alto section, which is often at least half comprised of sopranos.  If it's modern, I look at dynamics and articulation.  If the composer has something in mind- a story, a feeling... the music must wrap around something.  Unless of course, it's Arvo Pärt or something similar.  Then it requires more like three minutes for the initial "look through" so I can plunk out a few sections and see how the composer creates tension and growth.  I automatically throw out pieces that are clearly over edited and makes the primary language English when it was clearly written in a different language.  In those cases, if the music itself looks interesting, I'll look for another edition.  If it's an early music piece or uses counterpoint, I look at how the voice parts interact with each other, what might be difficult and determine if my particular group has the independence for it or if they can reach that particular level of independence before the performance.  I also look for where the music goes.  If it's there pages of the same three motives without much variation, it's probably going to be boring.  It needs to flirt with other tonal areas, have exchanges between voices, and moments that are important, and the music needs to be working it's way toward those moments, not just wandering aimlessly.  Unless, of course, the music is trying to make a philosophical point about... something.  But then I probably won't program it.

And then I put the music into three piles: 1) No.  Should probably throw the music.  I mean recycle.  2) Maybe.  I'm not sold, but I want to hear what it sounds like when I play it.  (My internal hearing is not as developed as I would like it to be.  That's a whole other blog post- I used to think I was lucky because I was a conductor that played the piano.  I wondered what my colleagues did who didn't play the piano.  Now I almost wish I didn't play the piano, because it's easy to rely on that instead of my inner ear to "hear" a piece).  3) This piece is a yes.  Maybe not this concert (but maybe), but certainly someday.  Remember it.

The Rachmaninoff piece?  It's now in the third pile.  I have plans for it.

Revision Process

This is my writing story.

When I was younger, I loved to write.  From the time I was in second grade, I wrote poetry.  Then somewhere in 5th or 6th grade, I decided I wanted to write a book.  Not just a book though, a novel.  I wrote two and started many others.  I still wrote poetry, and in 7th grade I started writing lyrics that I could put to music.  I always received positive feedback in high school, too.  I was creative and I loved to focus on interactions between people when I wrote.  I wanted to write things that made people feel like they weren't alone, that people had similar experiences.  

At some point in college, my love for writing changed.  To be honest, I recall the exact moment.  I wrote a paper for a course I was in, and I received a "B" on it.  But I didn't know why.  I asked my professor what I could do, and he suggested I outline and revise.  I only did "bare bones" outlines, so I knew I could improve on that.  I always revised- for the extent to which I knew how.  I wrote three papers in that class and on the last two I received better grades.  Those were my first "real" academic papers.  I think I had to write papers for my first year Paideia class, but I don't remember.  If I did, I received positive feedback.

Skip ahead to senior year of undergrad, and I wrote a senior paper.  It was only about 12 pages long, because I had actually completed a senior project.

That was the writing I recall during my undergrad career.  Except for my education classes, but those papers were fun to write.  It was easy to know exactly what I wanted to say, because so much I wrote was about my personal education philosophy.

Then next big paper I wrote was my project report for my masters degree.  It was not actually a thesis, but a project report, which was a shorter version of a thesis.  

Now how do I feel about writing?  It depends.  I'm revising essays for a grant application right now, and I hate it.  The writing feels so impersonal, but yet it's addressing things I feel very strongly about.  I read the short essays and they feel dull and boring.  The idea of writing a dissertation is daunting.  

I'm "in the middle" of the revision process for these essays.  Many people have read my essays and will continue to read these essays.  I'm extremely grateful for that.  Thankfully for these essays, I have managed to avoid asking for revisions from people that don't give helpful comments.  Also, writing, even academic writing, is very subjective.  I'm now at a point in my writing where sometimes, there are comments I ignore (although I NEVER ignore comments about clarification... if a person has had to reread a sentence multiple times or restates one of my ideas incorrectly).  

I have to be honest, however... I think my most recent draft of these essays (I'm officially on revision #4) is worse than #2 and #3.  

In conclusion, revisions are frustrating.  I would rather write a fiction story.

What does all this have to do with music?  Good question... My time has been so consumed with languages and writing this summer, I've had very little time to practice or listen or learn music.  Although twice last week I played piano for fun, and it was amazing.  About halfway through the first practice session, I realized I was unknowingly smiling.  I definitely got teary mid-practice both days.  Yes... how lucky am I, that making music and educating people is my real vocation?  Very lucky indeed!

Audience and Purpose

I had intended to blog a lot more this summer.  I realized I am faced with multiple considerations when I blog: 1) Who is my audience of my blog and am I writing things of interest to them?  Or am I writing things of interest to anyone?  2) How personal do I want to be on this blog?  How many success and failures do I actually want to share with internet-land?  3) How much time do I want to take to blog?

I know these are all questions I should have answered before I started my blog.  And I did answer them, to some extent.  But as time has went on, some of my answers have changed or it has become difficult to execute.  For example, my audience.  Is it simply for family and friends?  Perhaps, but that is not my sole intention.  But if it is meant for a larger audience, it seems quite presumptuous of me to think I would have anything of value to share with someone who does not know me.  So, I end up riding the fence of the above three questions.

Today, a friend from SoCal wrote me a note, and in response to me telling her that the normal three years of course work at my school were put into two years (just for the DMA choral conducting students), she said, "How lucky you get to be done with coursework in only two years."  It made me pause.  Lucky?  I have thought many things over the past year about the amount of coursework I have, but "lucky" was not one of those words that has popped into my mind.  However, I suppose I can see it from that perspective.  Instead of three years, like the majority of DMA and PhD music students, we must take the same amount of credits in two years.  This creates a very busy and unbalanced two years.  But it gets me to my dissertation a year earlier.  A year closer to finally being able to get a job working in the profession I have wanted to work in since I have been thirteen years old.  So, yes, perhaps there is some positive aspects about having three years of coursework put into two years.

But the real purpose of this blog entry... a little over a week ago, a friend of mine passed away while singing under the direction of his fiancé, also a friend of mine, in Italy.  I have thought a lot of about my friend in the past week.  Two things, really: We were supposed to be better friends.  I thought that once I was done with coursework, I would cultivate my friendship with him.  It seemed natural we would be friends.  Also, he was such a wonderful person- kind and passionate.  My heart is broken for those that love him and for myself- for a friendship I "put off" until a more convenient time.

I still have not fully processed this.