A Virtual Homecoming?

I decided to post something here since I haven't in a long time and for no explicable reason I have begun to feel guilty about this. Let's see, since November, I have:

-Gotten my new/old cello! My "e-bay special" made in approximately 1720 in Saxony was restored and I've been playing on it since January. It sounds great, has a big meaty tone, lovely dark varnish, a short neck I've been adjusting to slowly. I'm very happy with it but as of yet have not been inspired to name it.

-Taken a medieval notation class that is a lot of hard work but really fun (it's like solving puzzles!) and mostly enjoyable. I can now decipher really old music.

-Produced a concert by myself. It happened in March and was a whole bunch of beautiful German laments from the late 17th century. It was great fun, I learned a lot, I hope to do this again but maybe not for a while.

-Played in a masterclass for Wieland Kuijken. While I only had fifteen minutes with him due to poor planning, I played the first movement of the G-major Bach gamba sonata fairly well, got some interesting ideas and played it again much better. Nothing life-changing but a lot of people got to hear me play and I got to meet Wieland. Am looking forward to his concert tomorrow night.

On the table right now:

-Am still dating K. This isn't so much of an accomplishment, per se, but it kind of feels like one. It's been almost a year and we're still happy with each other. How cool is that?

-Am preparing for my lecture recital. My final requirement for my master's degree. The topic is the musical symbolism of the gamba. I will trace the gamba's allegorical meanings from the Italian intermedii through Bach's highly specialized usage in his cantatas and passions. There will also be pretty music. Tentatively, the date is May 12th at 3PM in Marsh Chapel at BU.

-Am preparing for the Concentus tour to Japan. Starting to learn St. Matthew bass lines as I will be the cello for orchestra one.

-Am also working on a longer term project of creating a Baroque cello excerpt book. This seems to have snowballed into a gigantic bit of work compiling everything hard for the Baroque cello, finding public domain sources and creating my own edition (possibly for publication!). A second volume of gamba excerpts may follow.

-I will be graduating from BU in mid-May with a Master of Music degree pending me turning in all the appropriate paperwork.

-Hence, I am looking for employment for next year. Also, housing. I'm staying in Boston since I've dug myself a nice little hole here full of friends and colleagues and occassional musical work.
Trying to put together a resume that includes skills other than music. Also, trying to figure out a way to make money that won't suck the living soul out of me. I am open to suggestions, offers, ideas, etc.

-My father is going to build a house on the land he just bought right outside of Ithaca and I'm hoping to spend some time there this summer helping him build and plant fruit trees and make a garden.

That's all I can think of at the moment. I have been terrible about keeping in touch with various people I love so maybe this post will count as something in a small way.

-Z

Decisions

Decisions, those pesky mental tasks we put off as long as possible, letting them accumulate dust and cat hair like the piles of unread books sitting around my room. But lo, I have made some. I am going to stay in Boston a third year. I am going to apply to the musicology program at BU so I can do the combined major that J has been doing. I'm going to spread the extra courses out over two semesters so that I can also take German. I will come up with a brilliant and interesting thesis/lecture-recital topic, write the best Fulbright application ever, and continue playing with my wonderful musical colleagues. I am relieved to be done with the pondering over this. Whether or not it turns out to have been the right decision (although I think it will), now that I've made it, I can get to work on its implementation, a concrete thing that I find much easier than the endless contemplating.

There is something so invigorating about fall weather, the crispness of the mornings, the lazy warmth of the afternoons. I've been sleeping with the windows open and a big comforter wrapped all around me. I love the juxtaposition of the warmth and the cold air on my face.

My recital is four weeks from tomorrow. I'm not ready, but hopefully I will be when the time comes. There are a lot of notes in my program and a lot of expressive things I need to figure out, get control of, learn to execute well. It's funny feeling like a cellist again after years of identifying more as a gamba player who also plays Baroque cello. I do love the cello, in a different and perhaps not equal way to the way I love the viol but still, there's a deep affection for it. Cello has all the memories of my past from before I began gamba.

There is leftover sweet potato bread and rice and curry from my cooking efforts last night, I think they will make a lovely lunch after I finish my tea.

September

Here we are, on the precipice of another year. For me, the new year always begins in fall. Sadly, I think this has more to do with my immersion in the academic world than my Jewish heritage. Happy beginning of 08-09. This is a big year for me. Having established myself in Boston, made friends, played gigs, learned the ropes, I now can take advantage of all that to make smart choices about how much time I spend in rehearsals and for what. I know what I can and cannot do, what makes me happy, how important it is to have food with me at all times, etc. This is also the year I graduate from graduate school. I'll be a Zoe with a master's degree. How bizarre. That's almost enough qualification to do something important! I won't bore you with my agonizing over what comes next and the long term implications of that choice. But I do find myself in the mood for arbitrary devotion. I've always been independent, constrained only minimally by my family and closest friends, neither of which has much guided my life goals or choices. Since my mother's death, I've lost a lot of the feeling of grounded attachment to my family, and since that coincided fairly closely with leaving Oberlin and my network of wonderful friends, I've been afloat here. This is how I rationalize my current inclination to grab onto things and hold on tightly. I almost want make decisions, even compromises because of a boyfriend, a musical group. This is silly and unlike me. Luckily, my relationship with K isn't like that at all, it has a transient quality and its sense of inevitable ending, so I am not tempted to stay in Boston for him. I would, however, choose my next move if it meant I could continue playing with Leon and Tats. I don't think this is in the cards either as neither knows what happens after this year nor have we really solidified ourselves as an ensemble. So in the end, I'm stuck with myself, what do I want, what is best for me? These are questions that, ironically, I'm not able to answer. Ironic, because I'm good at helping others answer them, good at seeing what people really want even when they can't see it.

In other news, I've begun scheming about the recipe for my protein/granola bar that will overtake the free world for its healthfulness and deliciousness. That or allow me to continue to get nutrition throughout the business of the school year!

Ourselves in Parallel Universes

Yesterday, while venturing out into the world to grab food between rehearsals, my roommate J, L (a harpsichordist), T (a Baroque violinist), and I got to talking about other professions we'd like to dabble in (gardening, massage therapy) and eventually posed ourselves the question: if you had to choose a career unrelated to music, what would it be?

L admitted to a deep passion for horticulture and a dream of being a landscape architect. T considered a life as a photographer. J surprised me saying that she'd enjoy a career in advertising and marketing. At the time, I claimed I'd probably go into something science-related. But thinking harder about it, that really isn't the right answer. Science was my back-up plan in case music didn't work out, another discipline I enjoy and am good at. But this is the hypothetical world we're talking about, a place where I can choose a career based on what I like unbound by such silly things as talent or practicality.

I think I would enjoy being involved in theater or film. No, I don't dream of being a movie star (although, who doesn't occasionally?). I might direct, or make costumes or sets, reinterpret great works, write new ones. Perhaps this latent desire to write is a forgotten gift from my parents. Because one cannot want to do what one's parents do, I never considered writing a possibility, never thought my love of words and books ran deeper than a childhood immersed in them. Maybe I could be a restorer of old books, a reader of dead languages. In the hypothetical it's never too late.

Alternatively, I think I'd run a diner or a B&B, or maybe a bakery. I often joke about this, but I really love the slow pace of small town life, the people stopping in to chat and have coffee and a muffin, the familiarity of everyone in the community, the small scale, the allowance for whimsy. Maybe I'd have a vegetable garden out back I'd use as ingredients, maybe I'd use my space to host concerts and poetry readings, square dances and weddings. Or just invent new recipes that people would enjoy.

In the end, I am a people-person. I like to work with them, provide for them, teach them, learn from them. If I have people with whom to ponder silly things, debate serious things, create things both great and small, I will be happy.

If you had to pick a career unrelated to the one you're currently in or aiming for, what would you do?

Too Many Rehearsals!

I love my chosen profession. I even love rehearsals. But I don't love these long days of running from one rehearsal to the next with hardly time to eat and certainly no time to learn the music.

I don't like the way I'm playing, it's sloppy and not nearly as good as I know I can play. Also, I'm not prepared for any of my rehearsals, I don't have time to warm-up or to look at the music beforehand. I scramble my way through trying to hit all the notes and hardly bothering to be musical.

I like being busy, I am happier when I've got projects and deadlines. But this week is insanity. I left the house this morning at 10:30 and got home 12 hours later having done nothing but attend class, rehearse, and grab some food. Tomorrow involves only 5 hours of playing spread over 7 hours, although four of those hours will be spent being told what to do by someone I usually disagree with.

Lest I spend an entire post complaining, here are a few upcoming concerts (all free!) with my parenthetical commentary:

--Thursday, 6:30pm at First Church Cambridge: Sarah Bellott's Recital.
(she's a really good soprano and is singing a lot (a lot!) of wonderful French Baroque stuff, the music is great but hard for me and is exhausting)
--Friday, 7:30pm at Beacon Hill Friends' House: Janey's Recital.
(come see my brilliant and intrepid roommate tackle the hardest Bach cello suite on a five-string-baroque-cello-beast and win! she also will play a sonata and some cantata arias for which I play accompaniment)
--Sunday, 3:00pm at First Church Cambridge: Cambridge Concentus
(this is going to be an amazing concert, we're playing Brandenburg 2, the one with the crazy hard trumpet part, and another concerto grosso by a guy named Heinichen, both have hard but awesome cello parts that I will be rocking out to)

That's it (it!) for this week, tune in next week for more crazy Baroque adventures!