Monday Morning

I have emerged from the dark and gloomy cave that was last week! All concerts went well, especially J's, she was amazing.

I watched the movie "Out of Africa" last night. It's from the mid-80s but is set in first-world-war-era Kenya and based on the real writings of a Danish Baroness who lived there for a while. Aside from such minor annoyances as Meryl Streep's fake Danish accent and a slightly overwritten score, it's a very moving film. During their long courtship, Streep and Robert Redford's characters face angry lions and unreadable Masai and other classically "African" things but also recite poetry to each other and tell made up stories. In one touching scene, he washes her hair on a river bank while editing out the "boring parts" of a poem. Besides the beautiful photography and story, what really spoke to me was this wonderful juxtaposition of "culture" and a love of the wild in the same people. At one point, they play a record of Mozart for a group of curious baboons. Unlike the classic "in the wild" movies where the uptight and cultured colonialists are lampooned in contrast to the "street-smart" hero, these protagonists have it all. It was so refreshing.

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!

Last Week Summed Up OR Many Lists

Exciting things:
-My dad was in town for 16 hours Tue/Wed and I got to spend a little time with him and our artist friend, Katherine.
-I played consort music with my teacher and two other professional gamba players and a great singer.
-I got payed to play a church service with a couple of singer friends and some professionals and the music was unbelievably beautiful.
-Last night I saw some friends I haven't seen in a long time and even had a glass of wine.
-Today I made recital posters for J which involved both construction paper and cartoons from the New Yorker.
-I made cookies and gingerbread with pears.

Unexciting things:
-I failed to practice at all this week and am having to postpone my recital because I'm not going to be ready in time.
-I seem to have hurt my back.
-Though I managed to clean the rest of the house, my room is still horribly messy.
-Am not feeling particularly accomplished or motivated, desire to become a hermit currently outweighing desire to become a musician.
-Am getting old, bitter.

Highlights of the upcoming week:
-Too many rehearsals!
-Sarah's recital on Thursday night
-J's recital on Friday night (and following reception)
-Concentus concert on Sunday afternoon

Reasons to live:
-Friends
-Gingerbread
-Zelenka
-Hugs
-Hope

Singing

Listening to the recording of J's Spanish Renaissance concert, I was struck by how enormously nostalgic it made me. Not just because all five voices belong to friends whom, with the exception of J, I haven't seen in a long time, but because I miss singing. And it's more complicated than even that. I have recordings of lots of the music I love. I was subbing in a church choir in the fall but didn't enjoy it and have been turning down their offers. There is something primal (for lack of a better word) about singing. Rather than grappling with an instrument you ARE the instrument. And to lose yourself in the sound created by a group of people singing is the most wonderful experience imaginable. It is odd that this should be the case for me. I am a good instrumentalist and I enjoy playing in ensembles but that only approximates the joys of group singing. I am not a singer. I am under no delusions about my voice, it is not particularly beautiful, nor do I know how to wield it particularly well. I have no plans to change my life and attempt to become a singer but oh, how I miss it! The wash of harmony and the intertwining of individual lines. The feel of the words in your mouth, who cares what they mean! The physicality of the resonance and the connection to people who are experiencing the same ecstasy as you. It's intoxicating. Almost enough to start a choir of extremely musical non-singers to sing purely for pleasure! Maybe after I finish the millions of other projects I'm already working on. For now, I will listen to the Tallis Scholars with the yearning of an addict who can only watch others get high.

Sunday Brunch

Maybe it's related to the satisfaction of being needed but there are few things I enjoy more than cooking for other people. Case in point, brunch this morning. Dancing around the kitchen to Irish music I stole from my mom (who would have been 57 today, happy birthday mom!) while alternately flipping pancakes and sipping coffee and knowing that people were going to come over and enjoy all the food I was making made me about as happy as I get. There's also something viscerally satisfying about pancakes. They sizzle when you ladle out the batter, bubble as they cook, and then you get to flip them. I have wonderful memories of cooking pancakes with my dad as a child and being allowed to flip them (I wasn't very good at it at first and often mangled them). Sometimes, we'd make pancakes in the shapes of letters so that I could arrange my pancakes on my plate to spell my name. Of course, it was difficult to decide what order to eat them in. One is tempted to go left to right across the plate as one would read and yet the first letter of your name is more meaningful than the others so one wants to leave it for the end. Today, I avoided such dilemmas by making your standard round pancakes. They were delicious, especially with the bananas sauteed in butter and rum. The silence of happy people eating food I made has filled me with joy. So if you ever want to cheer me up, bring me a vegetable and ask me to cook for you.

On Beets and Crocuses

Having returned from visiting Val who is managing to eat almost entirely organic food she cooks from scratch herself, I have vowed to put more effort and thought into what I eat. So on my way home from my lesson yesterday, I stopped at the little produce store and bought two beautiful bunches of beets. J had requested I make borscht for us a while back so I figured now was the time. Making it all the better, the beet greens (which fall on the crinkle-index somewhere between Chard and Collards) were still attached by their spindly red stalks. Walking home with them peeking out the top of the plastic bag, I felt strong, like Gary Larson's triumphant vegetarians returning from the hunt with their giant carrot. And while proudly carrying my beets I saw the first crocuses of the year (likewise triumphant in their gaudy yellows) it occurs to me that Spring is a good time for resolutions. No one can keep them in the doldrums of winter and so we conclude that we are not resolute enough and give up. So in the spirit of flowers and vegetables, I hereby muster my resolve to cook more food, to practice more music, to read more books, to take more risks, to write more letters, to be a better friend.