Because I am going to bed at 10 tonight, which is in three minutes. This is so that I won't be miserable tomorrow. I NEED SLEEP.
Anyway, people that are just APPLYING for colleges, and not auditioning into music programs TOO, have it sooooo easy. Ughhh. Sorry to whine. There is just SO much to think about. I will go into detail another time. Because it's my bedtime. Bye :)
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
My brain hurts...
kind of literally. I feel like I have the beginnings of a headache, and I never get headaches. I just practiced piano for an hour and a half or so. "Clare, that isn't a very long time." You're right, it isn't. I'm far from done for the day. At my piano lesson yesterday my teacher asked me how much time I'm putting into the Beethoven every day, and I said maybe an hour or an hour and a half. She told me that when she was preparing to play a concerto she practiced maybe three hours a day. Which is good. Good, good, good. I hadn't had a lesson in a few weeks, and I needed someone to crack the whip. I've realized that I need a certain amount of structure in my life, like a lesson every couple weeks, or else I don't get work done. And with this performance coming up in (hopefully) December, work needs to get done.
I say "hopefully" because Sharyn, my youth symphony director, told me that if I don't feel prepared in time for the December concert, we can push my performance of the first movement of Beethoven's first piano concerto back to the next concert in March. I would normally take the March option, but the December concert is at McIntyre Hall (REALLY nice hall, REALLY nice piano) and I'm pretty sure the March one is in some church somewhere (questionably nice, piano of questionable quality.) So I really hope I can have this learned in the next couple months.
Anyway, maybe my head hurts because I was practicing the same 6 or 8 measures over and over and over. I have realized, with the help of my piano teacher, that the only way to learn this is practicing it SLOWLY with the metronome. If I think I already have the passage down, practicing it AGAIN and AGAIN SLOWLY with the metronome.
It's a really beautiful concerto though. I'm excited to have it all learned. :)
I say "hopefully" because Sharyn, my youth symphony director, told me that if I don't feel prepared in time for the December concert, we can push my performance of the first movement of Beethoven's first piano concerto back to the next concert in March. I would normally take the March option, but the December concert is at McIntyre Hall (REALLY nice hall, REALLY nice piano) and I'm pretty sure the March one is in some church somewhere (questionably nice, piano of questionable quality.) So I really hope I can have this learned in the next couple months.
Anyway, maybe my head hurts because I was practicing the same 6 or 8 measures over and over and over. I have realized, with the help of my piano teacher, that the only way to learn this is practicing it SLOWLY with the metronome. If I think I already have the passage down, practicing it AGAIN and AGAIN SLOWLY with the metronome.
It's a really beautiful concerto though. I'm excited to have it all learned. :)
Friday, September 10, 2010
Dude, FML.
So I'm driving home from the football game, and I'm about 10 minutes away from my house and I turn left at this light. I'm in the middle of turning, and my car fricking STOPS in the middle of the road. The wheel gets really hard to turn, and I barely manage to get to the side of the road (there was no shoulder) and it just coasts to a stop, and it won't go at all so I turn it off. I freak the @$%# out and call my dad, who, along with my mom and sister, is conveniently out of town for the night. He tells me to try to start it again, so I do, and it starts and I stay on the phone with my dad while I drive over the bridge. There is only a tiny bit of gas in the car, so I think that might be part of the problem. I'm almost to the gas station, when it does it AGAIN. So I pull over onto a side street and restart it AGAIN, and cross the road to the gas station. As soon as I got gas, it was fine. But the thing is, I wasn't completely out! My dad said that he thinks that has something to do with it, though, and that it's not good for the car to run on only a little gas.
So that was not fun at all. But I got home, and now I'm fine. I'm home alone though, and just a little freaked out, which I know is stupid. I don't think I would be if it hadn't been for the car incident. Also, about half an hour ago I heard A NOTE ON MY PIANO. I freaked the @&#$ out again, and I walked into the living room and it was my damn cat. I related this story to my best friend on facebook; her response? "Clare, it's ok to say fuck." I'm like, wow, thanks for the sympathy.
Other than these two incidents, I've had a pretty decent day. I think I'll blog more tomorrow; I should probably get ready for bed.
So that was not fun at all. But I got home, and now I'm fine. I'm home alone though, and just a little freaked out, which I know is stupid. I don't think I would be if it hadn't been for the car incident. Also, about half an hour ago I heard A NOTE ON MY PIANO. I freaked the @&#$ out again, and I walked into the living room and it was my damn cat. I related this story to my best friend on facebook; her response? "Clare, it's ok to say fuck." I'm like, wow, thanks for the sympathy.
Other than these two incidents, I've had a pretty decent day. I think I'll blog more tomorrow; I should probably get ready for bed.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
So much for finishing that last post tomorrow.
Anyway, CHOIR.
So at the end of last year, I tried out for concert choir, which is basically the highest one if you don't count the smaller groups like Bel Canto and Synergy, and I got in, I'm pretty sure for one reason and one reason alone. That is the fact that I am a decent sightreader, meaning depending on how hard it is I can often look at a tune and be able to sing it, using my knowledge of music theory, it if you give me a starting note. When I had to do that during my audition I did pretty well. My actual voice sucks as of now. I'm hoping to improve it, a lot.
I am an alto. When I was auditioning and she was testing my range, I am like 99.999% sure that she said "A soprano!" when I finished. And for my sister, "An alto!" (My sister got into advanced treble, and is an alto without question; she can easily sing down to a low C.) So I thought that I was a soprano, and I learned the soprano part for the song that Ms. Lizama gave us to practice. I went to Emma's and she helped me learn it. Emma is AMAZING. She's our section leader with Lindsee, who is also AMAZING. A few days later, I got a facebook message from Lindsee, telling me about an alto sectional. I told her I would love to come, but I wasn't an alto! She told me I was on the list of altos, and she called Ms. Lizama and asked about it, and apparently I was an alto all along! So I went to the sectional, and learned the alto part. And I definitely AM an alto, but it's weird because I'm so sure she said I was a soprano at first. Anyway, I'm happy being an alto. :)
We had the concert choir retreat on Saturday and it was really fun. I can tell choir is going to be awesome. (Of course, band wins over everything, but still.) It's a very different feeling not being the one who pretty much always has their part down. Emma and Lindsee are so eager to help everyone out though, even though they could totally just ignore everyone if they wanted and wallow in their little bubbles of perfection.
But choir is just the beginning of all the exciting stuff that's going on this year!! The rest will be posted about soon.
So at the end of last year, I tried out for concert choir, which is basically the highest one if you don't count the smaller groups like Bel Canto and Synergy, and I got in, I'm pretty sure for one reason and one reason alone. That is the fact that I am a decent sightreader, meaning depending on how hard it is I can often look at a tune and be able to sing it, using my knowledge of music theory, it if you give me a starting note. When I had to do that during my audition I did pretty well. My actual voice sucks as of now. I'm hoping to improve it, a lot.
I am an alto. When I was auditioning and she was testing my range, I am like 99.999% sure that she said "A soprano!" when I finished. And for my sister, "An alto!" (My sister got into advanced treble, and is an alto without question; she can easily sing down to a low C.) So I thought that I was a soprano, and I learned the soprano part for the song that Ms. Lizama gave us to practice. I went to Emma's and she helped me learn it. Emma is AMAZING. She's our section leader with Lindsee, who is also AMAZING. A few days later, I got a facebook message from Lindsee, telling me about an alto sectional. I told her I would love to come, but I wasn't an alto! She told me I was on the list of altos, and she called Ms. Lizama and asked about it, and apparently I was an alto all along! So I went to the sectional, and learned the alto part. And I definitely AM an alto, but it's weird because I'm so sure she said I was a soprano at first. Anyway, I'm happy being an alto. :)
We had the concert choir retreat on Saturday and it was really fun. I can tell choir is going to be awesome. (Of course, band wins over everything, but still.) It's a very different feeling not being the one who pretty much always has their part down. Emma and Lindsee are so eager to help everyone out though, even though they could totally just ignore everyone if they wanted and wallow in their little bubbles of perfection.
But choir is just the beginning of all the exciting stuff that's going on this year!! The rest will be posted about soon.
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Band camp!
It started today, and goes through Friday. Today was just seniors (ME!) and freshmen, and we taught them how to march. We also worked on some music... our field show this year is going to be Earth Wind and Fire, and one of the two songs is In the Stone, which has really tricky rhythms and which I've never heard, and also which I got to lead a sectional on. That was difficult... thank God I had Gracie there to count off for us and to make it less awkward. Yeah, it was awkward standing there for like an idiot for probably two whole minutes trying to decipher the rhythm in two measures before I could even attempt to teach it to the freshmen, who had no clue what was going on. But we managed, and they aren't really bad at all for freshmen on their first day of band.
"What other exciting musical things are you participating in this year, Clare?" Oh, I'm glad you asked! Because this year, I'm in CHOIR!
Me, to two of my friends last year: "I'm thinking of being in choir next year."
Them: "Wait, so you would.....sing?"
Me: "Um, yeah...."
They bursted out laughing uncontrollably.
Yeah, I never really considered singing in any ensemble or really anywhere outside of my car until last year... until I thought about it and realized there were a few really good reasons for me to try out.
1. I'm going to be a music major, and don't music majors have to take some classes that involve singing? And wouldn't it be embarassing if I had to sing in front of people and I had never really done it before? Because I have NEVER really done it before, unless you count the solo I had in the second grade play.
2. I think it will really help me with ear training and intervals and stuff... I'm not really doing any formal ear training, but more and more when I hear an interval, I try to figure out what it is, and when I hear a chord, I try to figure out what kind of chord it is, and WHAT chord it is relative to the key, etc. etc., and I'm getting better and better at it. And I think I would be EVEN better at it if I approached it from a different angle, that being my voice. Does this make any sense? Oh well, it does to me.
3. Our choir is REALLY GOOD. I like playing with people who are really good, because a.) Well, it sounds good, and b.) it's a challenge. So I assume that it'll be fun singing with people who are really good, and under a really good director.
I'm going to cut this off and finish it tomorrow, because I should really go to bed...
"What other exciting musical things are you participating in this year, Clare?" Oh, I'm glad you asked! Because this year, I'm in CHOIR!
Me, to two of my friends last year: "I'm thinking of being in choir next year."
Them: "Wait, so you would.....sing?"
Me: "Um, yeah...."
They bursted out laughing uncontrollably.
Yeah, I never really considered singing in any ensemble or really anywhere outside of my car until last year... until I thought about it and realized there were a few really good reasons for me to try out.
1. I'm going to be a music major, and don't music majors have to take some classes that involve singing? And wouldn't it be embarassing if I had to sing in front of people and I had never really done it before? Because I have NEVER really done it before, unless you count the solo I had in the second grade play.
2. I think it will really help me with ear training and intervals and stuff... I'm not really doing any formal ear training, but more and more when I hear an interval, I try to figure out what it is, and when I hear a chord, I try to figure out what kind of chord it is, and WHAT chord it is relative to the key, etc. etc., and I'm getting better and better at it. And I think I would be EVEN better at it if I approached it from a different angle, that being my voice. Does this make any sense? Oh well, it does to me.
3. Our choir is REALLY GOOD. I like playing with people who are really good, because a.) Well, it sounds good, and b.) it's a challenge. So I assume that it'll be fun singing with people who are really good, and under a really good director.
I'm going to cut this off and finish it tomorrow, because I should really go to bed...
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
:)
:)
I guess I don't have that much to write about. I haven't posted in a while though.
"How is your summer going, Clare?"
It's going great, thanks for asking! I went to Wenatchee, where three of my friends and I went to the waterslides. Well, the waterslides were actually in Chelan, but we stayed at Natalie's grandma's house in Wenatchee. She goes over there all the time, because a bunch of her family lives there, and this time she convinced her mom to take us along. It was fun. I got this ridiculous looking sunburn on my back, because my friend Natalie (this is a different Natalie; 2 of my best friends have that name) did not do a very good job with the sunscreen.
Me: "Are you SURE you got it all?"
Natalie: "I'm POSITIVE. If you get burned, you can slap me."
I did end up slapping her, but I was lying on the ground at a weird angle and she was standing up so it was more of a weird awkward pat.
Oh, and Natalie C's grandma doesn't speak English, so that was a liiiittle awkward... her mom speaks both English and Spanish; I'm pretty sure she came to America when she was 12 or so. Her mom, not her.
Speaking of grandparents, mine got here today from Kansas! They drove up here and visited some places on the way, and they're giving us their blue van and flying back in a few days.. or a week.. actually I have no idea how long. And buying a new car. We might sell our red minivan... I hope not though, because then I can drive it and my mom can have my grandparents' car. :) Well actually I already drive it, but I can't some of the time because it's my mom's car. I'm going to start teaching piano lessons soon, so I could pay for gas.
Anyway, about a week ago my sister and I got back from the East Coast. Usually our whole family goes, but we couldn't afford it this year with the house remodel and the economy and all. We weren't going to go at all, but my two aunts have frequent flier miles that they said my sister and I could use. (Apparently you can give them to people? I have no clue how it works.) But they offered to fly us over there, so we did. My dad's family all lives on the East Coast, and they have a beach house on the Jersey shore. So we went there for a few days, and then my aunt took us to NYC and we saw South Pacific!! It was amazing. We ate dinner there and then my aunt drove us to her house in Philly. She lives a few blocks from the Liberty Bell, and her house was in the movie National Treasure! You know the part where they're being chased and they're running on top of the houses? It's one of those.
So, now I'm back, and I'm not doing much for the rest of the summer, except for BAND CAMP!! :P Oh, and I'm working on my piece. I'm making progress, but I still have a really long way to go.
Oh, I saw INCEPTION!! AMAZING MOVIE. SEE IT. I've seen it twice, and it was even better the second time. Mostly because the plot is really confusing and I caught a lot more of the details the second time around. I am seeing for the third time later today. :D
Oh, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt? You are ridiculously attractive. Juuuust sayin'.
Okay, my friends should be here any minute so I better go. This post has actually been stretched out over a long period of time, and I'm just now finishing it.
I guess I don't have that much to write about. I haven't posted in a while though.
"How is your summer going, Clare?"
It's going great, thanks for asking! I went to Wenatchee, where three of my friends and I went to the waterslides. Well, the waterslides were actually in Chelan, but we stayed at Natalie's grandma's house in Wenatchee. She goes over there all the time, because a bunch of her family lives there, and this time she convinced her mom to take us along. It was fun. I got this ridiculous looking sunburn on my back, because my friend Natalie (this is a different Natalie; 2 of my best friends have that name) did not do a very good job with the sunscreen.
Me: "Are you SURE you got it all?"
Natalie: "I'm POSITIVE. If you get burned, you can slap me."
I did end up slapping her, but I was lying on the ground at a weird angle and she was standing up so it was more of a weird awkward pat.
Oh, and Natalie C's grandma doesn't speak English, so that was a liiiittle awkward... her mom speaks both English and Spanish; I'm pretty sure she came to America when she was 12 or so. Her mom, not her.
Speaking of grandparents, mine got here today from Kansas! They drove up here and visited some places on the way, and they're giving us their blue van and flying back in a few days.. or a week.. actually I have no idea how long. And buying a new car. We might sell our red minivan... I hope not though, because then I can drive it and my mom can have my grandparents' car. :) Well actually I already drive it, but I can't some of the time because it's my mom's car. I'm going to start teaching piano lessons soon, so I could pay for gas.
Anyway, about a week ago my sister and I got back from the East Coast. Usually our whole family goes, but we couldn't afford it this year with the house remodel and the economy and all. We weren't going to go at all, but my two aunts have frequent flier miles that they said my sister and I could use. (Apparently you can give them to people? I have no clue how it works.) But they offered to fly us over there, so we did. My dad's family all lives on the East Coast, and they have a beach house on the Jersey shore. So we went there for a few days, and then my aunt took us to NYC and we saw South Pacific!! It was amazing. We ate dinner there and then my aunt drove us to her house in Philly. She lives a few blocks from the Liberty Bell, and her house was in the movie National Treasure! You know the part where they're being chased and they're running on top of the houses? It's one of those.
So, now I'm back, and I'm not doing much for the rest of the summer, except for BAND CAMP!! :P Oh, and I'm working on my piece. I'm making progress, but I still have a really long way to go.
Oh, I saw INCEPTION!! AMAZING MOVIE. SEE IT. I've seen it twice, and it was even better the second time. Mostly because the plot is really confusing and I caught a lot more of the details the second time around. I am seeing for the third time later today. :D
Oh, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt? You are ridiculously attractive. Juuuust sayin'.
Okay, my friends should be here any minute so I better go. This post has actually been stretched out over a long period of time, and I'm just now finishing it.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
I REALLY should be finishing my essay.
It's about the history of the Pledge of Allegiance. Already it is six pages, and I haven't double-spaced it yet, and I am only up to the 1960s. I've been writing it all day and I am not feeling very motivated to write much more. Plus, I only have to get through three days this week, and then,
SUMMER!!!!!
So this is my last big stay-up-till-the-wee-hours-of-the-morning-and-get-an-essay-done-that-you-procrastinated night of the school year! Pretty exciting.
What was that last post about, you ask? (Because I know hundreds of people are reading this and asking that.)
Well, I really don't feel like talking about it right now. :/ Tomorrow I will know much more. I will leave it at for now, and maybe post tomorrow.
I guess I should go write a little more. :(
SUMMER!!!!!
So this is my last big stay-up-till-the-wee-hours-of-the-morning-and-get-an-essay-done-that-you-procrastinated night of the school year! Pretty exciting.
What was that last post about, you ask? (Because I know hundreds of people are reading this and asking that.)
Well, I really don't feel like talking about it right now. :/ Tomorrow I will know much more. I will leave it at for now, and maybe post tomorrow.
I guess I should go write a little more. :(
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Well, I'm glad that I'm OK enough to tell when I'm not OK.
In other words, I'm glad I decided not to publish what I wrote last night.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Ummm...
I don't really have much to write a post about right now... but I'm bored. I've made some progress on the piece that I'm composing for the band, but this computer (the one with the actual good version of finale, not the free trial version) just got installed and my dad forgot to install the speakers, and I don't know where they are or how to hook them up, so I can't put anything on Finale yet.
Oh wait, he just got home.
Well, I might as well post this anyway.
Oh wait, he just got home.
Well, I might as well post this anyway.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
I should REALLY be doing my chemistry review.
..But I'll do it tomorrow in class. I'll sit by Charlie, because he doesn't distract me and he's really good at chemistry. My final is on Friday, ughhhh.
I am trying out for drum major on Friday! Today after school, I got together with two of my friends who are also trying out, and we went to Natalie's house and worked for a solid two hours. There's this list of commands that we have to give... some of them are commands like "left hace!" and some of them are whistle commands. We have to give the commands to the band... and we also have to conduct one of the pep songs. We worked on other stuff, too, that wasn't even on the list, so we'll be super-prepared.
Up until this year, I didn't even want to be drum major. I liked playing my sax at games and parades. I still do, but this year I feel like.. okay, this sounds dumb, but I feel like I HAVE to be drum major, or at least try out. I feel like there was never really a choice. Probably because this year, I have become much more of a leader. A month or so ago I led a whole hour and a half clarinet sectional all by myself, and I don't even play clarinet! Not that it would have made it that much easier if I did, but I had a completely different part from all of them, and I was able to look at and listen to the three clarinet parts, and figure out how they fit together, and help everyone with them. It was this tricky part that only the clarinets (and maybe the flutes, I can't remember) had, with these super-fast triplets. But I'm not proud of myself as much because I was able to understand how the parts fit together and figure out the rhythms. It was more because I was deciding what parts we would practice, and deciding what tempo would be best for everyone, and they were looking to ME to make these decisions. It's not so much the musical aspect, but it's what the music had enabled me to do.
Like something that happened on the band trip. We were staying in a nice hotel (it was 21 stories.. two working elevators... 60 0r 70 band kids... you could either wait 5-10 minutes for an elevator or run up and down 19 flights of stairs. Anyway..) with a grand piano in the lobby. Half an hour before we had to be on the bus to go to the amusement park, I went down to the lobby with Bailey and Kevin because I wanted to play the grand piano. I started playing, and after a while I noticed that these two guys from another band were talking to Bailey and Kevin. (I think Collin also showed up...) When I finished my song more people had showed up, and people started clapping. They asked me to play something else, so I did, and when I finished one of the people from the other band was like, "You are amazing," and asked me if I had made all that up. (It was my solo from jazz band... it's just Bb blues, so I played the solo and then just kinda improvised for a few more minutes.) And I said I had, and this girl was like, "Didn't you see her yesterday?" I was confused for a minute, but then I realized they were talking about the jazz band performance the day before. I got up from the piano.. and Kevin and one of the guys I didn't know were sitting talking to each other on opposite ends of this couch. There was a little space in the middle, and I just plopped by butt down between them on the couch and started chatting away with them. Now, you have to understand that this is NOT something I would normally do. I don't even know Kevin that well, and I'm usually shy around people I don't know. That other guy wasn't too bad looking either. :P But after like a minute, Bailey made me get up and play again and then we had to leave. Now, I'm NOT trying to brag about my piano playing abilities. My point is that because I'm confident playing in front of people, I was more confident talking to them too.
I love how music is influencing my life :)
I wish I could write more, but I'm still sick and I don't want to be exhausted tomorrow.
So... goodnight :)
I am trying out for drum major on Friday! Today after school, I got together with two of my friends who are also trying out, and we went to Natalie's house and worked for a solid two hours. There's this list of commands that we have to give... some of them are commands like "left hace!" and some of them are whistle commands. We have to give the commands to the band... and we also have to conduct one of the pep songs. We worked on other stuff, too, that wasn't even on the list, so we'll be super-prepared.
Up until this year, I didn't even want to be drum major. I liked playing my sax at games and parades. I still do, but this year I feel like.. okay, this sounds dumb, but I feel like I HAVE to be drum major, or at least try out. I feel like there was never really a choice. Probably because this year, I have become much more of a leader. A month or so ago I led a whole hour and a half clarinet sectional all by myself, and I don't even play clarinet! Not that it would have made it that much easier if I did, but I had a completely different part from all of them, and I was able to look at and listen to the three clarinet parts, and figure out how they fit together, and help everyone with them. It was this tricky part that only the clarinets (and maybe the flutes, I can't remember) had, with these super-fast triplets. But I'm not proud of myself as much because I was able to understand how the parts fit together and figure out the rhythms. It was more because I was deciding what parts we would practice, and deciding what tempo would be best for everyone, and they were looking to ME to make these decisions. It's not so much the musical aspect, but it's what the music had enabled me to do.
Like something that happened on the band trip. We were staying in a nice hotel (it was 21 stories.. two working elevators... 60 0r 70 band kids... you could either wait 5-10 minutes for an elevator or run up and down 19 flights of stairs. Anyway..) with a grand piano in the lobby. Half an hour before we had to be on the bus to go to the amusement park, I went down to the lobby with Bailey and Kevin because I wanted to play the grand piano. I started playing, and after a while I noticed that these two guys from another band were talking to Bailey and Kevin. (I think Collin also showed up...) When I finished my song more people had showed up, and people started clapping. They asked me to play something else, so I did, and when I finished one of the people from the other band was like, "You are amazing," and asked me if I had made all that up. (It was my solo from jazz band... it's just Bb blues, so I played the solo and then just kinda improvised for a few more minutes.) And I said I had, and this girl was like, "Didn't you see her yesterday?" I was confused for a minute, but then I realized they were talking about the jazz band performance the day before. I got up from the piano.. and Kevin and one of the guys I didn't know were sitting talking to each other on opposite ends of this couch. There was a little space in the middle, and I just plopped by butt down between them on the couch and started chatting away with them. Now, you have to understand that this is NOT something I would normally do. I don't even know Kevin that well, and I'm usually shy around people I don't know. That other guy wasn't too bad looking either. :P But after like a minute, Bailey made me get up and play again and then we had to leave. Now, I'm NOT trying to brag about my piano playing abilities. My point is that because I'm confident playing in front of people, I was more confident talking to them too.
I love how music is influencing my life :)
I wish I could write more, but I'm still sick and I don't want to be exhausted tomorrow.
So... goodnight :)
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Hey, Look, A Blog Post!
Took the SAT today. I feel like I did pretty well, but I probably just jinxed it. It was LONG, and near the end of the test I was really starting to space out. It was the most ridiculous thing... you had to copy this statement that was basically like, "I certify that I am the person whose name appears on this test" only it was the LONGEST possible way of saying that, and we had to copy the whole thing in CURSIVE! Which I haven't used since third grade... apparently no one else had either, because it took pretty much everyone in the room like five minutes to copy the statement down. I hate pointless things like that... a signed statement is a signed statement, whether it's written in cursive or not! Besides, where do you draw the line... ? Suppose someone's cursive was just really bad, and it looked a lot like regular writing... are you going to punish them just for having crappy cursive handwriting?
My stomach hurts... probably because I ate a cupcake and a brownie and a huge cup of chili at Relay for Life, but it also might have to do with the fact that I'm sick. I'm sick because of the band trip... (OH MY GOSH, the band trip! I'll talk about that in more detail in a minute.) someone was sick when we left, and now probably literally like half the band is infected.
But it was SOOO worth it. We went to Vancouver and both bands and both jazz bands played in a heritage festival, and the next day we marched in a parade. It was raining... like the whole time. But we're BAND KIDS, and rain cannot stop band kids from having fun! The second night we went to an amusement park, which they shut down for all the bands (and orchestras and choirs) at the festival. They had an awards ceremony there, where they announced the results of our performances the day before, which had been adjudicated. I wasn't expecting us to win much, if anything at all... there were these Seattle schools that kept winning everything. There were different divisions, depending on how big your school is, and it was divided up, obviously, into band, orchestra, and choir. So there were lots of categories of awards. When they got to concert bands... WIND ENSEMBLE GOT SECOND PLACE! And then they got to jazz bands... and WE GOT FIRST PLACE!! And later on, jazz band got some kind of adjudicators' award for .... I'm pretty sure it was for scoring the highest out of ANY instrumental group there! Anddd, we got this OTHER award that had to do with our combined scores for all our groups.
And THEN. I thought they were pretty much finished with the awards, but then the announcer said that they had another award, and it was for individual students who they thought did particularly well in the performances. He was like, "if your name is called, please make your way to the front of the stage." He announced like four or five people. And then, "From [OUR SCHOOL] Jazz I, Clare [MY LAST NAME]"!!!!!!!!!! And THEN, "From [OUR SCHOOL AGAIN] Wind Ensemble, [Bailey______] and [Collin ______] (our drum majors!) " !!!!! I was standing with some of my friends, and I was like, shocked! So I went up there and stood on the stage, and they handed me this trophy, maybe like a foot tall, that has a wooden platform thing with a gold star. It's called a Maestro Award. :) There were eight or so of us altogether that got one, out of a whole bunch of bands and orchestras and choirs. :) I'm not trying to brag, but I've never won an award for something like that before!!
After the ceremony, my director came up and congratulated me, and he told me that the judges were really impressed with my piano solo at the beginning of one of the jazz band songs. They had told him this like five minutes before the ceremony, and had told him that Bailey and Collin and I were going to get awards. Bailey's and Collin's were for drum majoring in the parade, and I'm pretty sure Collin's was also for his trombone solo, in one of the tunes that was a trombone feature. We were all SO HAPPY :) I worked SO HARD on that solo.
:) Well, I better go to bed. I have lots of homework tomorrow.. ugh. I can't believe school is out in a week and a half!!
My stomach hurts... probably because I ate a cupcake and a brownie and a huge cup of chili at Relay for Life, but it also might have to do with the fact that I'm sick. I'm sick because of the band trip... (OH MY GOSH, the band trip! I'll talk about that in more detail in a minute.) someone was sick when we left, and now probably literally like half the band is infected.
But it was SOOO worth it. We went to Vancouver and both bands and both jazz bands played in a heritage festival, and the next day we marched in a parade. It was raining... like the whole time. But we're BAND KIDS, and rain cannot stop band kids from having fun! The second night we went to an amusement park, which they shut down for all the bands (and orchestras and choirs) at the festival. They had an awards ceremony there, where they announced the results of our performances the day before, which had been adjudicated. I wasn't expecting us to win much, if anything at all... there were these Seattle schools that kept winning everything. There were different divisions, depending on how big your school is, and it was divided up, obviously, into band, orchestra, and choir. So there were lots of categories of awards. When they got to concert bands... WIND ENSEMBLE GOT SECOND PLACE! And then they got to jazz bands... and WE GOT FIRST PLACE!! And later on, jazz band got some kind of adjudicators' award for .... I'm pretty sure it was for scoring the highest out of ANY instrumental group there! Anddd, we got this OTHER award that had to do with our combined scores for all our groups.
And THEN. I thought they were pretty much finished with the awards, but then the announcer said that they had another award, and it was for individual students who they thought did particularly well in the performances. He was like, "if your name is called, please make your way to the front of the stage." He announced like four or five people. And then, "From [OUR SCHOOL] Jazz I, Clare [MY LAST NAME]"!!!!!!!!!! And THEN, "From [OUR SCHOOL AGAIN] Wind Ensemble, [Bailey______] and [Collin ______] (our drum majors!) " !!!!! I was standing with some of my friends, and I was like, shocked! So I went up there and stood on the stage, and they handed me this trophy, maybe like a foot tall, that has a wooden platform thing with a gold star. It's called a Maestro Award. :) There were eight or so of us altogether that got one, out of a whole bunch of bands and orchestras and choirs. :) I'm not trying to brag, but I've never won an award for something like that before!!
After the ceremony, my director came up and congratulated me, and he told me that the judges were really impressed with my piano solo at the beginning of one of the jazz band songs. They had told him this like five minutes before the ceremony, and had told him that Bailey and Collin and I were going to get awards. Bailey's and Collin's were for drum majoring in the parade, and I'm pretty sure Collin's was also for his trombone solo, in one of the tunes that was a trombone feature. We were all SO HAPPY :) I worked SO HARD on that solo.
:) Well, I better go to bed. I have lots of homework tomorrow.. ugh. I can't believe school is out in a week and a half!!
Sunday, March 14, 2010
I now (almost) officially have a senior project!
I talked to my band director, and he's letting me do it! I'm going to compose a song for our band, and we're going to play it. I'm ridiculously exicted.
It's funny because I was so nervous to ask him. I had to have my dad talk to him with me. When I told him my idea, he was literally like, "Ok!" And he lent me a bunch of books about composition and music and stuff. I started reading this one called "Score Reading" and it was CRAZY, cause there are all these examples in it from scores, and I came across 4 pieces that I've played just from reading it today! They are: Chopin's Minute Waltz, Beethoven's Leonore Overture, Wagner's Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, and Schubert's Unfinished Symphony in... I believe it's b minor... lemme check...
Yep, Symphony No. 8 in b minor. I love that one.
So yeah, I'm excited. :)
I had a youth symphony concert yesterday afternoon, and one the night before, too. The Friday night one was SO much better. We played Sibelius's 2nd symphony, which is pretty much the hardest thing we've ever played, but the Friday night performance went really well. Saturday was a different story. Maybe we thought we didn't have to try as hard since we pulled it off Friday night, but people weren't watching our conductor, and everyone was getting ahead and it just wasn't that good. At least the Sibelius wasn't.
Also, there was the fact that I almost passed out... I hadn't had anything to eat all day, and I think that that's mostly what caused it. When you play the oboe you get used to being lightheaded all the time, but this was way worse. During the first movement, I started getting lightheaded after pretty much every part where I played, and my head started hurting really badly, and I was like... ...This isn't good. I have a pretty big solo in the third movement (we didn't play the second one... maybe because it was a long program anyway, maybe because the other three were already so difficult) so at the beginning of the third movement when I rest for while I breathed in and out really deeply. It sucks because with the exception of the last movement, pretty much everything I play is really exposed, so I can't just drop out or there'll be this huge gap. So I came in where I was supposed to, and we hadn't gotten to my solo yet and it wasn't getting any better. I was nervous too, not because it was a hard solo, but because I was worried I wouldn't be able to play it. So that didn't help.
Anyway, I started playing my solo, and it got really bad. I was lightheaded and my hands and feet were really tingly. Then I started shaking, and least it felt like I did but I'm not completely sure, and my vision wouldn't focus and I almost felt like I was dreaming. This last part only lasted for a few seconds, and it was really scary and really hard to explain. But the whole time, even when it felt like I was dreaming, notes were still coming out of my oboe, and I was still aware of how they sounded. They sounded bad. After those few seconds, I stopped playing. I actually had a few seconds where I didn't need to play, and I sort of recovered, and I was actually sort of able to play the rest of my solo. But it sounded like crap, and there were parts where I had to drop out. The only other time that's really happened was when I was playing Schubert's unfinished symphony, during this part at the beginning where there's an oboe/clarinet solo. I'm pretty sure not eating combinied with nervousness is what causes it. I don't know how I know, but I think that's the reason.
Ok, well, I should really go to bed now... time for another week...
It's funny because I was so nervous to ask him. I had to have my dad talk to him with me. When I told him my idea, he was literally like, "Ok!" And he lent me a bunch of books about composition and music and stuff. I started reading this one called "Score Reading" and it was CRAZY, cause there are all these examples in it from scores, and I came across 4 pieces that I've played just from reading it today! They are: Chopin's Minute Waltz, Beethoven's Leonore Overture, Wagner's Prelude to Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, and Schubert's Unfinished Symphony in... I believe it's b minor... lemme check...
Yep, Symphony No. 8 in b minor. I love that one.
So yeah, I'm excited. :)
I had a youth symphony concert yesterday afternoon, and one the night before, too. The Friday night one was SO much better. We played Sibelius's 2nd symphony, which is pretty much the hardest thing we've ever played, but the Friday night performance went really well. Saturday was a different story. Maybe we thought we didn't have to try as hard since we pulled it off Friday night, but people weren't watching our conductor, and everyone was getting ahead and it just wasn't that good. At least the Sibelius wasn't.
Also, there was the fact that I almost passed out... I hadn't had anything to eat all day, and I think that that's mostly what caused it. When you play the oboe you get used to being lightheaded all the time, but this was way worse. During the first movement, I started getting lightheaded after pretty much every part where I played, and my head started hurting really badly, and I was like... ...This isn't good. I have a pretty big solo in the third movement (we didn't play the second one... maybe because it was a long program anyway, maybe because the other three were already so difficult) so at the beginning of the third movement when I rest for while I breathed in and out really deeply. It sucks because with the exception of the last movement, pretty much everything I play is really exposed, so I can't just drop out or there'll be this huge gap. So I came in where I was supposed to, and we hadn't gotten to my solo yet and it wasn't getting any better. I was nervous too, not because it was a hard solo, but because I was worried I wouldn't be able to play it. So that didn't help.
Anyway, I started playing my solo, and it got really bad. I was lightheaded and my hands and feet were really tingly. Then I started shaking, and least it felt like I did but I'm not completely sure, and my vision wouldn't focus and I almost felt like I was dreaming. This last part only lasted for a few seconds, and it was really scary and really hard to explain. But the whole time, even when it felt like I was dreaming, notes were still coming out of my oboe, and I was still aware of how they sounded. They sounded bad. After those few seconds, I stopped playing. I actually had a few seconds where I didn't need to play, and I sort of recovered, and I was actually sort of able to play the rest of my solo. But it sounded like crap, and there were parts where I had to drop out. The only other time that's really happened was when I was playing Schubert's unfinished symphony, during this part at the beginning where there's an oboe/clarinet solo. I'm pretty sure not eating combinied with nervousness is what causes it. I don't know how I know, but I think that's the reason.
Ok, well, I should really go to bed now... time for another week...
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Thank God it's Thursday.
...and that I don't have school tomorrow. I was planning on sleeping in until I honestly felt like getting out of bed, which, in all truthfulness, would probably be sometime around noon. But I have to get up around 10 and drive my sister to the school for a rehearsal, because my mom's working tonight and she gets back and goes to bed at about 8 in the morning, and my dad's going to be at work. I know, I know, 10 is plently late, but I love the feeling of being able to get up WHENEVER I want.
So, for this Goals Essay thing, we have to do research on some kind of college-related thing and put it in our paper. Yesterday our class went to the career center to do the research... I spent most of the time looking at University of Michigan, which I've heard has a really good music program. Do I want to go all the way to Michigan? I don't know. I think I want to get out of Washington. I LOVE Washington, but I've lived here my whole life, and I just think it would be really interesting and a great experience to live somewhere else. Plus, a good music program is a good music program. Anyway, I was looking at their website.
"All composition applicants must perform an audition on their principal instrument or voice."
Requirements for pianists applying to degrees other than performance:
Prepare:
a baroque work
a quick tempo movement of a classical sonata
19th- or 20th-Century solo of your choice
Memorization is preferred.
Ok, not so bad.
"In addition, submit up to seven scores of your musical compositions with recordings of each work on indexed compact disc."
Recordings?? Like, recordings of actual people playing them? SEVEN? I'll be lucky if I can manage ONE recording of an actual group of people acutally playing a piece I've composed.
Then, I checked out the Admissions FAQ.
"I would like to recieve a brochure. How can I be placed on your mailing list?"
"How do I sign up for an audition or interview?"
"Can I send a recorded audition?"
Too bad there were no answers to the questions I'd most like to ask.
AM I GOOD ENOUGH TO DO THIS?
WILL I GO CRAZY STUDYING MUSIC FOR 4 YEARS? WILL IT NOT BE FUN ANYMORE?
I'm not THAT good. But that is what I want to go to college for. And I really think I have potential, even if there are some days where I doubt that.
Looking at this stuff, thinking about it, is just stressing me out. I know that is normal. But right now, most people I know are like, "I have NO idea what I want to do." Well I have an idea, an idea that's actually been cemented in my head since around middle school. But what if I'm wrong?? When I went to All-State a few weeks ago, there was a time when we got to ask our conductor (he was AMAZING) questions. Someone asked him what his favorite age group to work with was, and he said that honestly, it was our age. He said that older musicians have sometimes become... I believe the word he used was "jaded." He basically said that some of them have lost the passion and enthusiasm that we still have. Well, what if that happens to me? Who's to say it won't?
That's the hard thing about making these decisions NOW. I'm pretty sure NOW that this is the right decision, but what if it isn't??
Oh well. We'll just have to see.
On the bright side, my sister just told me she's not going, so I can get up whenever I want tomorrow. Well-deservedly.
So, for this Goals Essay thing, we have to do research on some kind of college-related thing and put it in our paper. Yesterday our class went to the career center to do the research... I spent most of the time looking at University of Michigan, which I've heard has a really good music program. Do I want to go all the way to Michigan? I don't know. I think I want to get out of Washington. I LOVE Washington, but I've lived here my whole life, and I just think it would be really interesting and a great experience to live somewhere else. Plus, a good music program is a good music program. Anyway, I was looking at their website.
"All composition applicants must perform an audition on their principal instrument or voice."
Requirements for pianists applying to degrees other than performance:
Prepare:
a baroque work
a quick tempo movement of a classical sonata
19th- or 20th-Century solo of your choice
Memorization is preferred.
Ok, not so bad.
"In addition, submit up to seven scores of your musical compositions with recordings of each work on indexed compact disc."
Recordings?? Like, recordings of actual people playing them? SEVEN? I'll be lucky if I can manage ONE recording of an actual group of people acutally playing a piece I've composed.
Then, I checked out the Admissions FAQ.
"I would like to recieve a brochure. How can I be placed on your mailing list?"
"How do I sign up for an audition or interview?"
"Can I send a recorded audition?"
Too bad there were no answers to the questions I'd most like to ask.
AM I GOOD ENOUGH TO DO THIS?
WILL I GO CRAZY STUDYING MUSIC FOR 4 YEARS? WILL IT NOT BE FUN ANYMORE?
I'm not THAT good. But that is what I want to go to college for. And I really think I have potential, even if there are some days where I doubt that.
Looking at this stuff, thinking about it, is just stressing me out. I know that is normal. But right now, most people I know are like, "I have NO idea what I want to do." Well I have an idea, an idea that's actually been cemented in my head since around middle school. But what if I'm wrong?? When I went to All-State a few weeks ago, there was a time when we got to ask our conductor (he was AMAZING) questions. Someone asked him what his favorite age group to work with was, and he said that honestly, it was our age. He said that older musicians have sometimes become... I believe the word he used was "jaded." He basically said that some of them have lost the passion and enthusiasm that we still have. Well, what if that happens to me? Who's to say it won't?
That's the hard thing about making these decisions NOW. I'm pretty sure NOW that this is the right decision, but what if it isn't??
Oh well. We'll just have to see.
On the bright side, my sister just told me she's not going, so I can get up whenever I want tomorrow. Well-deservedly.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
God, I'm exhausted.
:(
I didn't feel like doing homework, and don't have any due tomorrow (I do have a whole review
for a test on Monday that's gonna have to get done over the weekend now), so I googled competitions and scholarships for composition. All the competitions I read about sounded HARDCORE, and not something that I would even want to enter, and that made me realize that I should really start composing more stuff. So I went to the piano and started messing around with the Locrian mode. I played for what I think was a really long time, and came up with some stuff that I like but that I'm not sure anyone else would.
When I stopped playing, I realized that I had been mad, and sad. And that that was coming out in my music. The Locrian mode is dissonant - if you start on the 7th degree of a major scale and play a scale using the same key signature, that's Locrian. So, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B would be B Locrian, in case anyone cares, but I was using A Locrian, so A, Bb, C, D, Eb, F, G, A. Anyway, music theory tangent over. I realized that I had been creating all these dissonances that didn't resolve, that would never resolve, and chords that went anywhere but where you would expect them to. And I realized that I am dissatisfied. I am dissatisfied with myself, I am dissatisfied with many of the people in my life, and I am dissatisfied with the human race in general. And there are "dissonances" in my life that were coming out as dissonances in my music.
Then I thought about it more, and realized this wasn't quite accurate.
The music I was creating wasn't just ALL over the place. It did have somewhat of a melody. But the chords, the harmony under the melody was what I was trying to make as ugly and as filled with this sense of dread as possible.
I lie to myself. I pretend that I am happy with everything because I WANT to be happy with everything. I want life to be this happy, safe, relatively predictable little melody. Of course, tension keeps things interesting, but it's all fine as long as I know the tension WILL resolve in the way I expect it to. When things don't happen that way, I tell myself that it's all fine. But the chords I was using in my song WEREN'T fine, they were just semi-fine, and they just KIND of went where you (or at least I) wanted them to go, but not all the way, and they were NO excuse for proper resolutions. Does this make sense to anyone but me? On the surface, my life is fine, but underneath it's really not. This is weird because there's nothing big that's wrong, just a bunch of little things that I'm not really content with. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm really tired, and I'll probably have a much more optimistic outlook tomorrow.
I don't know if any of that really made sense, but I definitely see the parallel. Wow, I just spelled "parallel" wrong and had to correct it, I am REALLY tired. And I cannot be held accountable for anything I write, or DO for that matter, when I am this tired. It's cause of the basketball game last night, it was the last playoff game and band got home pretty late. But I'm not complaning, it was worth it.
:)
I didn't feel like doing homework, and don't have any due tomorrow (I do have a whole review
for a test on Monday that's gonna have to get done over the weekend now), so I googled competitions and scholarships for composition. All the competitions I read about sounded HARDCORE, and not something that I would even want to enter, and that made me realize that I should really start composing more stuff. So I went to the piano and started messing around with the Locrian mode. I played for what I think was a really long time, and came up with some stuff that I like but that I'm not sure anyone else would.
When I stopped playing, I realized that I had been mad, and sad. And that that was coming out in my music. The Locrian mode is dissonant - if you start on the 7th degree of a major scale and play a scale using the same key signature, that's Locrian. So, B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B would be B Locrian, in case anyone cares, but I was using A Locrian, so A, Bb, C, D, Eb, F, G, A. Anyway, music theory tangent over. I realized that I had been creating all these dissonances that didn't resolve, that would never resolve, and chords that went anywhere but where you would expect them to. And I realized that I am dissatisfied. I am dissatisfied with myself, I am dissatisfied with many of the people in my life, and I am dissatisfied with the human race in general. And there are "dissonances" in my life that were coming out as dissonances in my music.
Then I thought about it more, and realized this wasn't quite accurate.
The music I was creating wasn't just ALL over the place. It did have somewhat of a melody. But the chords, the harmony under the melody was what I was trying to make as ugly and as filled with this sense of dread as possible.
I lie to myself. I pretend that I am happy with everything because I WANT to be happy with everything. I want life to be this happy, safe, relatively predictable little melody. Of course, tension keeps things interesting, but it's all fine as long as I know the tension WILL resolve in the way I expect it to. When things don't happen that way, I tell myself that it's all fine. But the chords I was using in my song WEREN'T fine, they were just semi-fine, and they just KIND of went where you (or at least I) wanted them to go, but not all the way, and they were NO excuse for proper resolutions. Does this make sense to anyone but me? On the surface, my life is fine, but underneath it's really not. This is weird because there's nothing big that's wrong, just a bunch of little things that I'm not really content with. Of course, it doesn't help that I'm really tired, and I'll probably have a much more optimistic outlook tomorrow.
I don't know if any of that really made sense, but I definitely see the parallel. Wow, I just spelled "parallel" wrong and had to correct it, I am REALLY tired. And I cannot be held accountable for anything I write, or DO for that matter, when I am this tired. It's cause of the basketball game last night, it was the last playoff game and band got home pretty late. But I'm not complaning, it was worth it.
:)
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Why do I sleep till noon every day on weekends?
Oh yeah... it's because I'm forced to get up BETWEEN 5:30 AND 6 EVERY WEEKDAY, a few minutes after 6 if I'm lucky (if I oversleep my alarm), and endure 6 1/2 hours of school plus after school stuff when all I really want to do is SLEEP!!
Still, it makes it kinda hard to be tired Sunday nights, and then I can't get to bed until it's late, starting the whole sleep-deprivation cycle over.
Ysjlkscjfmsmlfj;lacslkfds.
Yesterday was FUN... instead of going to a movie, we went skating. I hadn't been in forever and neither had anyone else that went. There were 7 of us, all band people. We had a great time.
On the bus to the game we pissed off the cheerleaders... when I heard on Friday that we'd be riding down with them, I was like, "...that's NOT the best idea.." Before we left the parking lot, someone did this weird annoying little laugh thing, and the second time he did it one of the cheerleaders' (Julia's) boyfriend, who's a trainer or something, was like, "Shut up!" And Collin yelled back, "You shut up!" and we were all like, "He could kick your ass..." We didn't say it that loudly though. And I'm pretty sure all of them were pissed at us the whole time.
It's sad though, cause I used to be best friends with Julia. We've known each other since I was 6 months old, and we used to hang out ALL the time. It's not like we hate each other now, we don't even dislike each other. We're still pretty much friends, but we hang out with NONE of the same people and we don't talk to each other that much. She went to the Catholic school until high school, but in middle school she started hanging out with people from my school that I didn't dislike, but they were kind of the "popular" kids and I wasn't. It really wasn't as clique-y as it might sound, and they were never mean to me. But if you've ever lost a friend that way, that shit is NOT fun. There was a period in eighth grade when I cried every night for weeks about it. She was on our middle school track team and she would never hang out with me at practices, always with her other friends. I don't think she was avoiding me and I know she wasn't trying to make me feel left out. But it hurt because we used to be SO close, and now it was like she didn't want to be my friend anymore. I've always found that people don't really gravitate towards me, it's usually me that has to take the initiative..
Ugh. Well, at least I have stable friendships, and I'm becoming closer to a group of people who I really like.
We have to write a Goals Essay that is required for graduation. The topic is: "Who Are You, Where Are You Going, and How Are You Going to Get There?" Everyone is complaining about it, but I'm definitely not as upset as most people. I would much rather write an essay about who I am than about most other topics. And I've made up my mind that I'm not going to B.S. my way though this one, I'm actually going to try my 100% best and make it really good. Essay writing comes naturally to me, and I usually don't have to try that hard to get good grades on them. I have to TRY, but definitely not my best. But this one, I AM going to try, and I'm going to be a perfectionist about it. I've already got a pretty good opening paragraph.
Wellll, I better at least attempt to sleep if I want to have any amount of fun tomorrow. :/ Good night!
Still, it makes it kinda hard to be tired Sunday nights, and then I can't get to bed until it's late, starting the whole sleep-deprivation cycle over.
Ysjlkscjfmsmlfj;lacslkfds.
Yesterday was FUN... instead of going to a movie, we went skating. I hadn't been in forever and neither had anyone else that went. There were 7 of us, all band people. We had a great time.
On the bus to the game we pissed off the cheerleaders... when I heard on Friday that we'd be riding down with them, I was like, "...that's NOT the best idea.." Before we left the parking lot, someone did this weird annoying little laugh thing, and the second time he did it one of the cheerleaders' (Julia's) boyfriend, who's a trainer or something, was like, "Shut up!" And Collin yelled back, "You shut up!" and we were all like, "He could kick your ass..." We didn't say it that loudly though. And I'm pretty sure all of them were pissed at us the whole time.
It's sad though, cause I used to be best friends with Julia. We've known each other since I was 6 months old, and we used to hang out ALL the time. It's not like we hate each other now, we don't even dislike each other. We're still pretty much friends, but we hang out with NONE of the same people and we don't talk to each other that much. She went to the Catholic school until high school, but in middle school she started hanging out with people from my school that I didn't dislike, but they were kind of the "popular" kids and I wasn't. It really wasn't as clique-y as it might sound, and they were never mean to me. But if you've ever lost a friend that way, that shit is NOT fun. There was a period in eighth grade when I cried every night for weeks about it. She was on our middle school track team and she would never hang out with me at practices, always with her other friends. I don't think she was avoiding me and I know she wasn't trying to make me feel left out. But it hurt because we used to be SO close, and now it was like she didn't want to be my friend anymore. I've always found that people don't really gravitate towards me, it's usually me that has to take the initiative..
Ugh. Well, at least I have stable friendships, and I'm becoming closer to a group of people who I really like.
We have to write a Goals Essay that is required for graduation. The topic is: "Who Are You, Where Are You Going, and How Are You Going to Get There?" Everyone is complaining about it, but I'm definitely not as upset as most people. I would much rather write an essay about who I am than about most other topics. And I've made up my mind that I'm not going to B.S. my way though this one, I'm actually going to try my 100% best and make it really good. Essay writing comes naturally to me, and I usually don't have to try that hard to get good grades on them. I have to TRY, but definitely not my best. But this one, I AM going to try, and I'm going to be a perfectionist about it. I've already got a pretty good opening paragraph.
Wellll, I better at least attempt to sleep if I want to have any amount of fun tomorrow. :/ Good night!
Friday, February 26, 2010
Basketball game tomorrow. :)
The boys are in the playoffs, and my band director informed us today that there is a game tomorrow an hour away, and that we are going. Then he asked how many people for sure wouldn't be able to go, and like 75% of the band (the upperclassman band...not the freshmen) raised their hands. I didn't because I'm not doing anything else tomorrow afternoon, oh and also, band is pretty much my FIRST PRIORITY. I was disappointed by how few people were coming... but I'm pretty sure more people will actually come than the amount that said they would.
I can't really think right now because the Olympics are on... I would take the laptop into my room but something's wrong with the internet, so it has to be plugged into the little thingy that allows us to have internet, which is by the computer in the living room. I wish my mom and sister would turn the TV off. Not that the Olympics aren't cool but I feel like writing now, and I've been planning on it ever since I got home...
Anyway, we're getting back from the game at around 3:45, and then I'm hanging out with my friend Natalie, and then later I might see a movie with some band people. Well, actually so far it's just me and Bailey (Bailey and me...whatever) but we're probably going to get some more people. I want to either see When in Rome or Sherlock Holmes... uhh, for the third time. Hey, it is THAT good. I love that movie sooooo much... the first time I saw it was when I went to an honor band in Tacoma with Emma, and my dad came down the night before the concert and took us to see it. I think what I liked most about it was the intricate detail in the plot... I like movies that actually make you use your brain. I didn't understand a lot of it, and I still don't understand a few parts of it after seeing it a second time (on my birthday), but that makes me appreciate it even more... SO much thought must have went into coming up with the storyline, but I still understood enough of the details for it to make sense. Plus, it was hilarious and had a good soundtrack. SUCH a good movie.
STUPID TV! Grrrr. "Right after this race we're going to bed." They better. All I want is a few minutes of silence so I can write! Is that too much to ask?
I love Emma too. She is a sophomore, a year younger than me, and she plays the tuba. Emma understands a part of me that almost NO one else does... the I AM AN INTENSE MUSIC GEEK part. I've known her since elementary school, and our parents know each other, but we didn't really become closer until the honor band thing. Her mom was going to pick us up at around 5 after play practice and drive us down to Tacoma, but it turned out she had to go to Emma's brother's basketball game. So me and Emma (Emma and I...)waited in the band room together. I found one of our band director's scores, and brought it over to the piano and started trying to pick out parts and put them together. I had to transpose some of the parts... it was FUN. Emma had gone to the bathroom and she came back and saw what I was doing, and she came over and we started figuring things out together. We turned to this AWESOME part, and I figured out the flute and clarinet parts, and she figured out the lower voices, and then we put them together and it was SO COOL! We played it over and over and we had it stuck in our heads all weekend. While we were there, there was a 2 hour period before our concert where we could pretty much do anything, so we went into one of the practice rooms with a (REALLY NICE) piano and just played for the whole time. We composed part of a song, and we also recorded ourselves playing the song from band on her phone. And she was JUST as excited about it as I was!! My friends all know that I'm like this, but Emma UNDERSTANDS.
I better go to bed, I have to get up at like 7 tomorrow for the game. Ugh. Well, I'm gonna be with band people all day so I guess it's worth it. :)
I can't really think right now because the Olympics are on... I would take the laptop into my room but something's wrong with the internet, so it has to be plugged into the little thingy that allows us to have internet, which is by the computer in the living room. I wish my mom and sister would turn the TV off. Not that the Olympics aren't cool but I feel like writing now, and I've been planning on it ever since I got home...
Anyway, we're getting back from the game at around 3:45, and then I'm hanging out with my friend Natalie, and then later I might see a movie with some band people. Well, actually so far it's just me and Bailey (Bailey and me...whatever) but we're probably going to get some more people. I want to either see When in Rome or Sherlock Holmes... uhh, for the third time. Hey, it is THAT good. I love that movie sooooo much... the first time I saw it was when I went to an honor band in Tacoma with Emma, and my dad came down the night before the concert and took us to see it. I think what I liked most about it was the intricate detail in the plot... I like movies that actually make you use your brain. I didn't understand a lot of it, and I still don't understand a few parts of it after seeing it a second time (on my birthday), but that makes me appreciate it even more... SO much thought must have went into coming up with the storyline, but I still understood enough of the details for it to make sense. Plus, it was hilarious and had a good soundtrack. SUCH a good movie.
STUPID TV! Grrrr. "Right after this race we're going to bed." They better. All I want is a few minutes of silence so I can write! Is that too much to ask?
I love Emma too. She is a sophomore, a year younger than me, and she plays the tuba. Emma understands a part of me that almost NO one else does... the I AM AN INTENSE MUSIC GEEK part. I've known her since elementary school, and our parents know each other, but we didn't really become closer until the honor band thing. Her mom was going to pick us up at around 5 after play practice and drive us down to Tacoma, but it turned out she had to go to Emma's brother's basketball game. So me and Emma (Emma and I...)waited in the band room together. I found one of our band director's scores, and brought it over to the piano and started trying to pick out parts and put them together. I had to transpose some of the parts... it was FUN. Emma had gone to the bathroom and she came back and saw what I was doing, and she came over and we started figuring things out together. We turned to this AWESOME part, and I figured out the flute and clarinet parts, and she figured out the lower voices, and then we put them together and it was SO COOL! We played it over and over and we had it stuck in our heads all weekend. While we were there, there was a 2 hour period before our concert where we could pretty much do anything, so we went into one of the practice rooms with a (REALLY NICE) piano and just played for the whole time. We composed part of a song, and we also recorded ourselves playing the song from band on her phone. And she was JUST as excited about it as I was!! My friends all know that I'm like this, but Emma UNDERSTANDS.
I better go to bed, I have to get up at like 7 tomorrow for the game. Ugh. Well, I'm gonna be with band people all day so I guess it's worth it. :)
Thursday, February 25, 2010
You know you're a band geek when...
- You leave the band room still holding your band folder and new box of reeds because you're in a hurry, and when you get to your next class you don't bother putting them in your backpack; you just leave them on your desk the whole period. You think you're SO badass.
- Your friend texts you to tell you that there is a cloud in the sky that is the exact shape of an eighth note.
- You have to miss things for music-related events. (Usually the things you are missing are music-related events too.)
- You have detailed discussions with your friends about band songs.
- The table you sit at at lunch is called the "band island." (I didn't make this up... Sharon did... but I WISH I did!!)
- Most of your friends are dating/have dated someone in band.
Haha, I like this, I think I'm going to do more in the future. :D
But I have to go now, I'm going to youth symphony. And missing the WWU basketball game that our band is playing at! :(
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
I need to be more creative with my titles.
But I can't really think of a title that sums up the past week or so... or even today. Everything's been just kind of... random. I've been really mood-swingy lately. I was really tired this morning, and then after school I was suddenly in a really good mood. And then suddenly I was exhausted, until 10 minutes or so ago when I got on Facebook.
I went to All-State band this weekenend. It was really fun. Our conductor was amazing...not only was he a REALLY good conductor, he knew how to lead a rehearsal so that we got stuff done but we didn't get tired out. Like, after we rehearsed every couple songs he would have us get up and stretch. Just that probably helped us have a lot more energy than we would have.
He also talked about all these concepts that I had never really thought about before. Like, he talked about the consonants you use to articulate your notes. You can use a "T", or a "D", or in some cases even a "Th". I'd thought about different articulations before, obviously, but I'd never really thought about them in terms of consonants. And then he talked about vowels. So a note can be a "Ta" or a "Dee" or a "Dooo", or any kind of combination. There was other stuff, too. But I can't remember it all right now. He was REALLY smart, though.
Ugh, I always plan theses elaborate posts, and then I forget what I was going to talk about, or just don't feel like talking about it anymore.
UGHH, now I'm really tired! I'm gonna go to bed, everything else is going to have to wait for tomorrow.
I went to All-State band this weekenend. It was really fun. Our conductor was amazing...not only was he a REALLY good conductor, he knew how to lead a rehearsal so that we got stuff done but we didn't get tired out. Like, after we rehearsed every couple songs he would have us get up and stretch. Just that probably helped us have a lot more energy than we would have.
He also talked about all these concepts that I had never really thought about before. Like, he talked about the consonants you use to articulate your notes. You can use a "T", or a "D", or in some cases even a "Th". I'd thought about different articulations before, obviously, but I'd never really thought about them in terms of consonants. And then he talked about vowels. So a note can be a "Ta" or a "Dee" or a "Dooo", or any kind of combination. There was other stuff, too. But I can't remember it all right now. He was REALLY smart, though.
Ugh, I always plan theses elaborate posts, and then I forget what I was going to talk about, or just don't feel like talking about it anymore.
UGHH, now I'm really tired! I'm gonna go to bed, everything else is going to have to wait for tomorrow.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
I love life :)
I'm in a (probably temporary) good mood. I think it has something to do with the fact that I overslept for almost an hour today. The being in a rush part wasn't so fun, but the extra hour of sleep was definitely worth it. If they would just start school ONE hour later, I'd be SO much happer, ALL the time. I'm definitely willing to go to school till 3 if we would start at 8:30 instead of 7:30.
Anyway, I got a break from the EXHAUSTION that I usually feel during the first half of the day, if not ALL day. And I got my homework done, and I practiced oboe for the first time in WAYYY too long. I looked at my All-State music that I should have looked at at least a month ago, seeing as All-State is in about a week, but didn't because of the play...apparently 11/8 and 13/8 are time signatures. Yeahhh... should've gotten on that. But again, I had NO free time.
Some people are really overachievers. Like, my friend Natalie. She's planning on taking FOUR, possibly FIVE, AP classes next year. I'll probably end up taking 2 or so. We were talking about it today in precalculus. She was like, "I don't know if I'm gonna take physics... I REALLY don't want to... do colleges want physics?" She's in AP chemistry right now, she's going to take AP biology next year, and she's wondering if colleges will want her to take physics?? And then she said something about honors physics, and I think I asked her if she was going to take it instead of regular physics, and she was like, "Well if I'm going to take physics it's going to be honors." And I'm like, "Whyyy??" And she's like, "That's a good question, I should probably think about that." And I'm like, "Yeahhh. You should." I didn't say that, though. And THEN, I was like, "What if one of the AP classes is during band?" And she's like, "That would suck..." And I'm thinking, "No. The correct answer is, 'Screw that class, band is SO MUCH MORE IMPORTANT!!'" I have this "Band Is First Priority" attitude that I'm sure pisses people off sometimes... anyway, I'm not sure if she meant that not taking the class would suck, or not being in band would suck, or making the decision would suck. But does she want to be MISERABLE? Because she WILL BE!! Personally, I don't want my senior year to be miserable.
Speaking of band, I found out recently that instead of voting for drum major, we're going to have to try out... I'm not sure how I feel about this. I'm one of the few people that know, and I think a lot of people are going to be pissed when they find out. I've spent a good amount of time trying to analyze how likely it would be that I'd win, so it was kind of a shock when I found out. I'm not sure if this increases my chances of winning or not, because I'm not exactly sure what we have to do in our audition. He said something about conducting and giving commands, but that doesn't give me a very good idea. I'm not even 100% sure I WANT to be drum major, anyway. Well, I want to, but I'm not sure if I'd be good at it. I'm not very good at... commanding people, which is kind of essential. Haha. But maybe being drum major would make me better at it... I don't know.... okay, I'm going to stop rambling now.
I was going to write more, but I'm getting really tired... I better go to bed if I don't want to oversleep again tomorrow. Goodnight. :)
Anyway, I got a break from the EXHAUSTION that I usually feel during the first half of the day, if not ALL day. And I got my homework done, and I practiced oboe for the first time in WAYYY too long. I looked at my All-State music that I should have looked at at least a month ago, seeing as All-State is in about a week, but didn't because of the play...apparently 11/8 and 13/8 are time signatures. Yeahhh... should've gotten on that. But again, I had NO free time.
Some people are really overachievers. Like, my friend Natalie. She's planning on taking FOUR, possibly FIVE, AP classes next year. I'll probably end up taking 2 or so. We were talking about it today in precalculus. She was like, "I don't know if I'm gonna take physics... I REALLY don't want to... do colleges want physics?" She's in AP chemistry right now, she's going to take AP biology next year, and she's wondering if colleges will want her to take physics?? And then she said something about honors physics, and I think I asked her if she was going to take it instead of regular physics, and she was like, "Well if I'm going to take physics it's going to be honors." And I'm like, "Whyyy??" And she's like, "That's a good question, I should probably think about that." And I'm like, "Yeahhh. You should." I didn't say that, though. And THEN, I was like, "What if one of the AP classes is during band?" And she's like, "That would suck..." And I'm thinking, "No. The correct answer is, 'Screw that class, band is SO MUCH MORE IMPORTANT!!'" I have this "Band Is First Priority" attitude that I'm sure pisses people off sometimes... anyway, I'm not sure if she meant that not taking the class would suck, or not being in band would suck, or making the decision would suck. But does she want to be MISERABLE? Because she WILL BE!! Personally, I don't want my senior year to be miserable.
Speaking of band, I found out recently that instead of voting for drum major, we're going to have to try out... I'm not sure how I feel about this. I'm one of the few people that know, and I think a lot of people are going to be pissed when they find out. I've spent a good amount of time trying to analyze how likely it would be that I'd win, so it was kind of a shock when I found out. I'm not sure if this increases my chances of winning or not, because I'm not exactly sure what we have to do in our audition. He said something about conducting and giving commands, but that doesn't give me a very good idea. I'm not even 100% sure I WANT to be drum major, anyway. Well, I want to, but I'm not sure if I'd be good at it. I'm not very good at... commanding people, which is kind of essential. Haha. But maybe being drum major would make me better at it... I don't know.... okay, I'm going to stop rambling now.
I was going to write more, but I'm getting really tired... I better go to bed if I don't want to oversleep again tomorrow. Goodnight. :)
Sunday, January 31, 2010
School tomorrow...
But there's no way I'm getting to sleep until at least midnight, because I slept till noon today, to make up for six days of getting up at around 6. I had to get up early on Saturday to go to Solo and Ensemble. I didn't actually play anything of my own... I was accompanying my friend, who sang something. I also watched some people perform, mostly choir people. They all did amazing. I WISH I COULD SING!! I am so, so jealous of people that can. Like, you have no idea. I'm sooo jealous.
I really wanted to enter this year, but I just didn't have the time. I've wanted to enter since I was a freshman, actually, but the last two years MC didn't get on it fast enough. And this year, with the play and all, I didn't have time to learn anything on oboe. If there was any possible way I could have done it, I would have. But there just wasn't. Why did it have to be right in the middle of all this play stuff? I was even thinking about learning something on piano, which might have taken a little less time, but I didn't even have time to take something I already knew and perfect it. But I'm still really frustrated that I couldn't do it.
My friend Natalie went, with her clarinet trio. :D I left before they performed, but apparently they did really well, and my band director said he was surprised they're not going to state. And Danny, who's in the trio, also played a solo. I watched him, and he did pretty well. Natalie... well, sort of has a thing for Danny, and I think it's really cute. And this girl in band, Sara, who ALSO plays clarinet, is not-so-subtly trying to set them up. Ah, band love. I hope he asks her to prom or something. They're pretty good friends, so I could see it happening.
I hope Krystal (the friend I accompanied) makes it to state, so I can go and watch all the people that made it! I'm not sure if she's found out yet, but I'm pretty sure she will tomorrow if she hasn't already, because I know some people that know they got in.
Ugh. I better at least try to get some sleep. This was a really short post...
I really wanted to enter this year, but I just didn't have the time. I've wanted to enter since I was a freshman, actually, but the last two years MC didn't get on it fast enough. And this year, with the play and all, I didn't have time to learn anything on oboe. If there was any possible way I could have done it, I would have. But there just wasn't. Why did it have to be right in the middle of all this play stuff? I was even thinking about learning something on piano, which might have taken a little less time, but I didn't even have time to take something I already knew and perfect it. But I'm still really frustrated that I couldn't do it.
My friend Natalie went, with her clarinet trio. :D I left before they performed, but apparently they did really well, and my band director said he was surprised they're not going to state. And Danny, who's in the trio, also played a solo. I watched him, and he did pretty well. Natalie... well, sort of has a thing for Danny, and I think it's really cute. And this girl in band, Sara, who ALSO plays clarinet, is not-so-subtly trying to set them up. Ah, band love. I hope he asks her to prom or something. They're pretty good friends, so I could see it happening.
I hope Krystal (the friend I accompanied) makes it to state, so I can go and watch all the people that made it! I'm not sure if she's found out yet, but I'm pretty sure she will tomorrow if she hasn't already, because I know some people that know they got in.
Ugh. I better at least try to get some sleep. This was a really short post...
Friday, January 22, 2010
The semester is OVER.
And I haven't written in this thing for months because I've been sooooo busy. Mostly because of the school play, The Music Man... I'm the piano accompanist. I just got back from a hellish rehearsal... we open in less than a week, and some people STILL don't know their lines, and some of the stuff just isn't coming together. Anyway, there's a whole pit orchestra with like 15 or 20 people (when they all show up...) that I'm in, and the actors just started rehearsing with us. I've actually been going to rehearals for more than a month, though, because they needed music to practice with and it wasn't really necessary for the whole orchestra to come every day. So I've been going to both the orchestra rehearsals AND all the play rehearsals. Anyway, this rehearsal was actually going pretty well until we got to one of the dances. The dances...they're all LONG, and HARD, and they DON'T make any musical sense. (Well.. actually they're not QUITE as long, because we cut out lots of parts, and not quite so hard because I've figured out ways to make some of my parts simpler. I feel like being an accompanist is 25% actually being able to read music well (not really my strong point), and 75% knowing how to B.S. your way through things. I take pride in my ability to B.S. my way though things... it takes a good amount of knowledge about chords and stuff, which I have. I LOVE music theory. Anyway.) And they're starting to make a little more musical sense now that people can actually play their parts. But we get to the Marian the Librarian dance, and they dance, and we come to the part where Nathaniel, our lead, is supposed to come in singing again. Only he doesn't come in. No big deal, right?
Wrong. Mr. Zickler (the director) stops everyone, and he's PISSED. Apparently there's supposed to be a LOT more music for them to dance to before Nathaniel comes back in. You see, the music for this dance goes on FOREVER, so we cut some of it out. We worked out that we'd skip from beat 3 of measure 40 to beat 4 of measure 156, where he starts to sing. We rehearsed it yesterday, and that's what we did, and it all worked out and he came in at the right time. But today, somehow, there miraculously isn't enough music. And apparently it's not them who are screwing up. So Zickler comes over and starts ranting about how this is IMPOSSIBLE, the cut HAS to be somewhere else. Even though we ALL have it written it from measure 40 to 156, and that's exactly what we played yesterday. So finally Zickler agrees to just do it again and see if it fixes itself. It doesn't. Hell ensues. Zickler is really frustrated, and so is Mr. Scherr, the band director, because they're both SURE that they're right. I show Zickler my accompanist score with all the parts in it so he can look at where we cut and try to figure out what's wrong. He keeps insisting that it CAN'T be right, and you can tell him and Scherr are pissed at each other. He looks at where I marked in the cut, and he's like, "This can't be where it is," and I'm like, "I'm positive." And I'm trying to figure out what went wrong, and it's all STRESS, and FRUSTRATION. I must've looked pretty freaked out or something, because Scherr's like, "Clare." And I look over and he's like, "It's okay, don't worry about it." And Zickler tells me that I MUST have marked in the cut wrong, and Scherr says something in my defense, and no one can figure anything out. So Zickler has us play from a certain part in the dance to measure 40 so he can look at the music and imagine what's going on in the dance. And FINALLY he figures it out. He says something about how yesterday we thought we were at the part in the music where they started dancing, but actually, we were at Marian's entrance, or something like that, and by this time my brain isn't processing things very well so I don't quite understand what he's saying, or how we could've been doing it wrong all along but still having it work. I still don't really get it... but it wasn't our fault.
Now, we have to figure out what we're going to DO, since it would be really hard to re-choreograph the dance and take out like 12 measures of dancing. So finally we decide to just repeat a certain part of the music instead of learning more of it, because it is HARD. So we try that, and it WORKS!! By then it's already 20 minutes past when rehearsal was supposed to end, so we get out of there fast. Ughh.
Well, at least it's fixed now. I'm gonna go watch a movie!
Wrong. Mr. Zickler (the director) stops everyone, and he's PISSED. Apparently there's supposed to be a LOT more music for them to dance to before Nathaniel comes back in. You see, the music for this dance goes on FOREVER, so we cut some of it out. We worked out that we'd skip from beat 3 of measure 40 to beat 4 of measure 156, where he starts to sing. We rehearsed it yesterday, and that's what we did, and it all worked out and he came in at the right time. But today, somehow, there miraculously isn't enough music. And apparently it's not them who are screwing up. So Zickler comes over and starts ranting about how this is IMPOSSIBLE, the cut HAS to be somewhere else. Even though we ALL have it written it from measure 40 to 156, and that's exactly what we played yesterday. So finally Zickler agrees to just do it again and see if it fixes itself. It doesn't. Hell ensues. Zickler is really frustrated, and so is Mr. Scherr, the band director, because they're both SURE that they're right. I show Zickler my accompanist score with all the parts in it so he can look at where we cut and try to figure out what's wrong. He keeps insisting that it CAN'T be right, and you can tell him and Scherr are pissed at each other. He looks at where I marked in the cut, and he's like, "This can't be where it is," and I'm like, "I'm positive." And I'm trying to figure out what went wrong, and it's all STRESS, and FRUSTRATION. I must've looked pretty freaked out or something, because Scherr's like, "Clare." And I look over and he's like, "It's okay, don't worry about it." And Zickler tells me that I MUST have marked in the cut wrong, and Scherr says something in my defense, and no one can figure anything out. So Zickler has us play from a certain part in the dance to measure 40 so he can look at the music and imagine what's going on in the dance. And FINALLY he figures it out. He says something about how yesterday we thought we were at the part in the music where they started dancing, but actually, we were at Marian's entrance, or something like that, and by this time my brain isn't processing things very well so I don't quite understand what he's saying, or how we could've been doing it wrong all along but still having it work. I still don't really get it... but it wasn't our fault.
Now, we have to figure out what we're going to DO, since it would be really hard to re-choreograph the dance and take out like 12 measures of dancing. So finally we decide to just repeat a certain part of the music instead of learning more of it, because it is HARD. So we try that, and it WORKS!! By then it's already 20 minutes past when rehearsal was supposed to end, so we get out of there fast. Ughh.
Well, at least it's fixed now. I'm gonna go watch a movie!
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