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I played Barber 1st movement with my school orchestra. Between my very uneven playing and my orchestra's unfortunately frequent problems, it was a shaky performance at best. At least I can now let the piece rest for a while. I just finished my 1st year university recital today! I played the entire E major Partita by Bach, Brahms Sonata No.2, Mendelssohn violin concerto and Bartok Romanian Folk Dances.

It was, in a word, a BLAST! I'm so happy and pleased with how it went!! I feel so loved and supported by my friends and family and I had so much fun despite the enormity of what I was playing. It was really just an incredible experience for me and I wish I could live it over again!

not for me yet...:( My CO *just* finished our "Pirates!" Concert to a full house. We had two guys come up from Salem - Chumbucket & Capt'n Slappy, or something like that. The did some skits with the audience between pieces.

There were sooooo many kids that attended. Many of whom were also dressed up like pirates.

I must say, the most the most fun I've had playing in a very long time! The audience also had a blast.

The Spring Studio recital is coming up, so I can't comment yet on the results... Gosh, I had so many end of semester recitals, it was crazy. I played on a student composer's recital, my pianist's junior recital and a studio recital, among others. I think the most rewarding performance, though, was leading my college orchestra as concertmaster on a program featuring Berlioz, Tchaik 5, and the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto (with Brian Lewis). It was a really exhilarating and rewarding experience. I was at Kelsey's recital yesterday. She played fabulously! I'm impressed that Kelsey could learn that much music up to performance standard in less than a year. She played with great confidence and a lovely fluid bowing arm. Nice dynamics, good balance with the pianists, amazing ringing pizzicatos and great energy. Excellent contrasting program choices, which not only showed off a lot of technical skills but also gave Kelsey the opportunity to evoke a variety of emotions in the audience members. Well done! I'll vote tommorow. I have a concert with David Zinman tommorow! WOOHOO Thank you so much Jen! my youth orchestra played with yo-yo ma as a soloist last week! there are no words...

so yes, it went very well. :)

My kids play violin and viola, and their concerts and recitals went fine. But on Friday I got to watch my youngest daughter, a 14-year-old violist, play the role of Sarah in a fully-staged production of "Guys and Dolls". Since I hadn't heard any of the rehearsals, she doesn't have a private voice coach, and she was feeling that the play was under-rehearsed, I didn't know how it would go...but she was fantastic. I think all those years of musical training on violin and viola (as well as dance) have given her a lot of poise, and her acting was excellent. I play at a local nursing home once a month, and today's performance was less than stellar. I played an arrangement of Haydn's Serenade; Bach's Siciliano in C minor; Faure's Apres Un Reve; and Vivaldi's Concerto in A minor. I am having a great deal of difficulty controlling my bow arm and the fingers on my left hand, resulting in many missed notes and a skipping bow. This is due mostly to MS, and it's very frustrating, as well as worrisome; I don't know whether the difficulty I'm experiencing will become permanent, or whether there is anything I can do to overcome it. Everyone did very well! We had a Bar-B-Que at Washington Park for our teachers to thank them for their hard work and also as a send off to their new job in Texas at Sam Houston. Our chamber orchestra played a concert yesterday afternoon. A few things could have gone better, but all in all, that was about as well as we play, so I was happy. My mom sat in on the rehearsal prior to the concert and was surprised we played so well (after hearing us in rehearsal, she was dreading what was to come). One of the orchestra members hosted a party at her house afterwards, and some of us played quartets in the backyard. Our conductor, who is a cellist with the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra and CBC Radio Orchestra, sat in on a few numbers, which was a giant thrill for me.

Our concert program was really fun: a Handel Passacaile, 2nd movement of the Suk Serenade, Joplin's Heliotrope Bouquet, Highlights from the Sound of Music, Shostakovich's Romance from the Gadfly, Grieg's Holberg Suite and Bizet's Farandole. I had played the Holberg Suite at music camp a few years ago and was really excited to have the opportunity to play it again.