Tonight my husband and I went with his parents and sister to the Jim Brickman Holiday Concert. It was fabulous. It was a great mix of holiday music, romantic hits, and audience interaction. At least I thought so.
I have so much I want to say about the concert, and the range of emotions I felt listening to the beautiful music and lyrics, but as I sit at the computer and type, everything is clouded by an overwhelming feeling of sadness.
I want to share why I'm feeling this way, but even as I'm sitting here thinking about it, it's only making me sadder. I feel like if I blog the details, I'm going to fixate on it. And if I ever re-read the post, I'm going to remember how awful I feel right now and I don't want to remember this feeling.
So I know this a post of gibberish and not much else, but I just felt like I needed to say ... something. Hopefully a good night's sleep will be the remedy to all that ails me.
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Showing posts with label music. Show all posts
Friday, December 24, 2010
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Charlotte Arts: The Nutcracker
One of my favorite Christmas memories is going to see The Nutcracker. I remember getting dressed up and going to see the ballet every year when I was little. I also remember falling asleep a few times, but I was four or five years old... can you blame me?
My husband and I have continued the tradition of seeing The Nutcracker before Christmas. We don't go every year, but we try to see it as often as we can. Each ballet company and orchestra uses different choreography and arrangements, so every time we see it, it's like new!
Last night we went to see the North Carolina Dance Theatre's production, and it was wonderful. They were accompanied by the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra, and they were truly fantastic. Of course, I'm a sucker for a great orchestra. The performance included professional dancers, of course, but also used ballet students from the community, so there were lots of adorable children too.
This was my first experience with the arts in Charlotte and I was not disappointed. I am, however, disappointed in myself for not seeing any other shows before last night. Charlotte offers a range of options, from orchestra to dance, and community theatre to professional touring companies. I love the arts and I need to do a much better job of supporting them, especially in my new home!
Thanks to the NC Dance Theatre and the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra for their introduction to the Charlotte performing arts. I'll be back soon, I promise!
My husband and I have continued the tradition of seeing The Nutcracker before Christmas. We don't go every year, but we try to see it as often as we can. Each ballet company and orchestra uses different choreography and arrangements, so every time we see it, it's like new!
Last night we went to see the North Carolina Dance Theatre's production, and it was wonderful. They were accompanied by the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra, and they were truly fantastic. Of course, I'm a sucker for a great orchestra. The performance included professional dancers, of course, but also used ballet students from the community, so there were lots of adorable children too.
This was my first experience with the arts in Charlotte and I was not disappointed. I am, however, disappointed in myself for not seeing any other shows before last night. Charlotte offers a range of options, from orchestra to dance, and community theatre to professional touring companies. I love the arts and I need to do a much better job of supporting them, especially in my new home!
Thanks to the NC Dance Theatre and the Charlotte Symphony Orchestra for their introduction to the Charlotte performing arts. I'll be back soon, I promise!
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Gym PSA
Along the same lines as my college search PSA and my Corporate Wife PSA, I now present a Gym etiquette PSA.
But first, an update on my workout plan: Success! Well, sort of.
I went to the gym with no intention of running. I'm feeling a thousand times better and I'm pretty breathing normally. Still, I didn't want to push myself because I'm still not 100% healthy. And yet, I got on the treadmill, turned on my "work out" channel on my Pandora blackberry app and somehow convinced myself that I could do it today. I could run! I could run far!
AND I DID!
Ok, it wasn't far. But it was longer than I'd done, and it was exactly what my program had told me I was supposed to do. Well, almost.
And here's where the PSA comes in.
I'm running along, twenty seconds from finishing my last interval, and I'm in pain. I was tired and starting to get a cramp, but I wanted to finish. Jog, jog, jog, fifteen seconds to go and then all of the sudden...
SLAM
I hit the front bar on the treadmill right below my ribs. My treadmill had just come to a complete stop. At the same time, a woman had jumped onto the treadmill next to me (actually one foot still on my treadmill) where her son (or so I thought) was just starting his workout.
Had I hit the stop button? Had I dislodged the little magnetic thing? Nope.
The little whore had knocked out the power cord when she jumped on the treadmills. The ones people were already using.
In knocking the cord out, she also bent the prongs so there I was squatting on the ground, huffing and puffing, and bending the prongs back in place so I could plug it back in. It took her a good minute to realize that when I slammed into the bar and immediately started checking everything on my treadmill to see why my treadmill had suddenly stopped, it was because that pesky thing she kicked was in fact the plug to my treadmill, and not because I like injure myself. When she did recognize that I hadn't voluntarily thrown myself into the front of the treadmill, she said, "Was that me?"
And here's my PSA.
When I responded, "Yes" to her question, the proper response should have been a sincere apology. What did she say?
"Oh."
And that's why I'm writing a PSA about gym etiquette. And posting it as my Facebook status. And maybe I'll tweet something too. How long before #gymwhore becomes a trending topic? I'm kidding. About the trending topic thing, not about facebook. I had that posted before I even finished my cool down.
Oh, and I'm calling her a whore and not some other derogatory name because the guy I thought was her son was actually her husband, and cougar seems to be a badge of honor rather than an insult. But they had to have at least a twenty year age difference. He was probably younger than me, and she was... well, my mom's age. Gross.
Anyway, I'm calling this trip to the gym a success. I may not have run the final fifteen seconds, but I would have. And I didn't call the woman a whore to her face, so that's also success on my part.
Go me.
EDIT:
While I was running and feeling really proud of myself, I thought about a post in which I would discuss how the music I was listening to really inspired me and got me through the horrible, horrible running. Then the whore ruined my day. Oh well. I still want to share because these fun songs really picked me up, put a smile on my face, and got me to run (or kept me running) when I really, really didn't want to. Oh sure, some of them might not be "cool" according to people who have bad taste in music (ahem), but it worked for me. So there.
Hot n Cold by Katy Perry
So What by Pink
Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus
Hey Soul Sister by Train
Gold Digger by Kanye West
But first, an update on my workout plan: Success! Well, sort of.
I went to the gym with no intention of running. I'm feeling a thousand times better and I'm pretty breathing normally. Still, I didn't want to push myself because I'm still not 100% healthy. And yet, I got on the treadmill, turned on my "work out" channel on my Pandora blackberry app and somehow convinced myself that I could do it today. I could run! I could run far!
AND I DID!
Ok, it wasn't far. But it was longer than I'd done, and it was exactly what my program had told me I was supposed to do. Well, almost.
And here's where the PSA comes in.
I'm running along, twenty seconds from finishing my last interval, and I'm in pain. I was tired and starting to get a cramp, but I wanted to finish. Jog, jog, jog, fifteen seconds to go and then all of the sudden...
SLAM
I hit the front bar on the treadmill right below my ribs. My treadmill had just come to a complete stop. At the same time, a woman had jumped onto the treadmill next to me (actually one foot still on my treadmill) where her son (or so I thought) was just starting his workout.
Had I hit the stop button? Had I dislodged the little magnetic thing? Nope.
The little whore had knocked out the power cord when she jumped on the treadmills. The ones people were already using.
In knocking the cord out, she also bent the prongs so there I was squatting on the ground, huffing and puffing, and bending the prongs back in place so I could plug it back in. It took her a good minute to realize that when I slammed into the bar and immediately started checking everything on my treadmill to see why my treadmill had suddenly stopped, it was because that pesky thing she kicked was in fact the plug to my treadmill, and not because I like injure myself. When she did recognize that I hadn't voluntarily thrown myself into the front of the treadmill, she said, "Was that me?"
And here's my PSA.
When I responded, "Yes" to her question, the proper response should have been a sincere apology. What did she say?
"Oh."
And that's why I'm writing a PSA about gym etiquette. And posting it as my Facebook status. And maybe I'll tweet something too. How long before #gymwhore becomes a trending topic? I'm kidding. About the trending topic thing, not about facebook. I had that posted before I even finished my cool down.
Oh, and I'm calling her a whore and not some other derogatory name because the guy I thought was her son was actually her husband, and cougar seems to be a badge of honor rather than an insult. But they had to have at least a twenty year age difference. He was probably younger than me, and she was... well, my mom's age. Gross.
Anyway, I'm calling this trip to the gym a success. I may not have run the final fifteen seconds, but I would have. And I didn't call the woman a whore to her face, so that's also success on my part.
Go me.
EDIT:
While I was running and feeling really proud of myself, I thought about a post in which I would discuss how the music I was listening to really inspired me and got me through the horrible, horrible running. Then the whore ruined my day. Oh well. I still want to share because these fun songs really picked me up, put a smile on my face, and got me to run (or kept me running) when I really, really didn't want to. Oh sure, some of them might not be "cool" according to people who have bad taste in music (ahem), but it worked for me. So there.
Hot n Cold by Katy Perry
So What by Pink
Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus
Hey Soul Sister by Train
Gold Digger by Kanye West
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Minuet, Govotte, and Concerto
I've been playing the violin since I was five, but I haven't really played since college. However, every now and then I get the urge to play and so I take my violin out of its case and play.
I learned to play via the Suzuki method for the first five years which means I learned to play by ear before I learned to sight-read music. To this day, I'm an average sight-reader and can fumble through music with a little practice, but I can actually play the music the first time I read it if I've heard it first. When I was asked to play last-minute in the pit orchestra for Hello, Dolly! in high school, instead of asking for the sheet music to review I asked for soundtrack on CD. The conductor looked at me strangely, shook his head, and said, "Suzuki, right?"
Learning via the Suzuki method also means that I memorized every song I learned. This serves me well when I get the urge to play. I don't need my books or sheet music - my brain tells my fingers what to do and I'm barely conscious of them as the press the strings against the fingerboard. In fact, when I do try to slow down and think about what I'm doing, I tend to fumble a bit so I've learned to just trust the muscle memory of my hands and enjoy how easy it is to play the songs I learned when I was five or eight or ten.
The Suzuki method also encourages immersion in music and the musical community. We had regular group lessons and concerts from the beginning. One of my teachers took me to see an opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors, when I was eight or nine years old. Because of these early experiences, I've always felt a sense of community around my own violin playing and felt the most enthusiastic about playing when I was performing with others - the school orchestra, the pit for musicals, the church choirs, etc.
The problem with this type of learning is that I struggled to learn or play individually. I thrived in the group setting, but I never engaged with unfamiliar music that I had to learn on my own. When I stopped playing Suzuki, I felt uncomfortable because I was expected to sight-read and I wasn't very good at it. I wasn't required to memorize the music either, which meant that my fingers never developed muscle memory and my brain would interfere and cause me to fumble around as I processed how the note on the page translated to fingering on the strings. The music itself didn't get more difficult, but playing the music seemed more challenging, and I simply didn't enjoy it as much.
My struggles with playing didn't diminish my love of music or the music community - Quite the opposite, actually. I have a deep love and appreciation of musicals that I am lucky enough to be able to share with my husband. (How many couples are equally happy at both a Broadway show and the Big East basketball tournament on vacation?) I also love classical music and find myself fingering along whenever I hear my favorites - Pachelbel's Canon in D, Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, and Bach's Air on the G String. Music is meant to be shared and experienced with others.
I picked up my violin a few weeks ago to play for fun. Even after all these years, my fingers knew just what to do. There's something very comforting in knowing that no matter how many years pass, or how many other things I learn and forget, I'll always know how to play Bach's Govotte in G Minor.
I wonder if there are any adult Suzuki group lessons out there.
I learned to play via the Suzuki method for the first five years which means I learned to play by ear before I learned to sight-read music. To this day, I'm an average sight-reader and can fumble through music with a little practice, but I can actually play the music the first time I read it if I've heard it first. When I was asked to play last-minute in the pit orchestra for Hello, Dolly! in high school, instead of asking for the sheet music to review I asked for soundtrack on CD. The conductor looked at me strangely, shook his head, and said, "Suzuki, right?"
Learning via the Suzuki method also means that I memorized every song I learned. This serves me well when I get the urge to play. I don't need my books or sheet music - my brain tells my fingers what to do and I'm barely conscious of them as the press the strings against the fingerboard. In fact, when I do try to slow down and think about what I'm doing, I tend to fumble a bit so I've learned to just trust the muscle memory of my hands and enjoy how easy it is to play the songs I learned when I was five or eight or ten.
The Suzuki method also encourages immersion in music and the musical community. We had regular group lessons and concerts from the beginning. One of my teachers took me to see an opera, Amahl and the Night Visitors, when I was eight or nine years old. Because of these early experiences, I've always felt a sense of community around my own violin playing and felt the most enthusiastic about playing when I was performing with others - the school orchestra, the pit for musicals, the church choirs, etc.
The problem with this type of learning is that I struggled to learn or play individually. I thrived in the group setting, but I never engaged with unfamiliar music that I had to learn on my own. When I stopped playing Suzuki, I felt uncomfortable because I was expected to sight-read and I wasn't very good at it. I wasn't required to memorize the music either, which meant that my fingers never developed muscle memory and my brain would interfere and cause me to fumble around as I processed how the note on the page translated to fingering on the strings. The music itself didn't get more difficult, but playing the music seemed more challenging, and I simply didn't enjoy it as much.
My struggles with playing didn't diminish my love of music or the music community - Quite the opposite, actually. I have a deep love and appreciation of musicals that I am lucky enough to be able to share with my husband. (How many couples are equally happy at both a Broadway show and the Big East basketball tournament on vacation?) I also love classical music and find myself fingering along whenever I hear my favorites - Pachelbel's Canon in D, Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, and Bach's Air on the G String. Music is meant to be shared and experienced with others.
I picked up my violin a few weeks ago to play for fun. Even after all these years, my fingers knew just what to do. There's something very comforting in knowing that no matter how many years pass, or how many other things I learn and forget, I'll always know how to play Bach's Govotte in G Minor.
I wonder if there are any adult Suzuki group lessons out there.
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