November 5, 2004 at 2:33 AM

I've done it! I've debuted on viola! *bows* I played my Schubert Sonata! I sat through two hours of begginers and then, finally, after 48 other students, I got to play! I was last on the program. Sitting for all that time certaintly gave me enough time to get nervous. I don't get nervous very often at all, but this was a new experience for me and I knew of several things that could go wrong. Overall, I felt happy with my performance. I mucked up a few things and missed a clef change in one spot which momentarily gave the pianist a bit of a solo but I was generally pleased with my performance. The best part was my violin (also viola) teacher stayed for the whole concert to hear me play. I think she knew I was nervous. I got kind of fidgety in the last couple of kids before me, and she came and told me just before I went up to have fun and to announce that I was playing viola not violin. Looking in the program, I was in fact down playing violin. Hmm....So I thanked everyone for staying to the end (about 80% of the audience left during the course of the concert) and announced that I would be playing the viola as opposed to the violin.

My violin lesson yesterday was really good! We worked on the Kulesha Caprice that I had monkeyed around with a bit a couple months back. There is a concert here every year where Canadian Music is promoted, and though most of the kids are playing fairly basic songs by some of the most famous of Canadian composers, there are usually a few senior students who play something a little more off the beaten track. My teacher is able to submit one of her students and there is a fairly strict time limit. The Kulesha Caprice fits into that time limit and should be playable in the couple of weeks I have to prepare it. It's a wonderful little work. My teacher had never heard of it before I brought the score to my lesson one time so we are both having a lot of fun discovering this work and I hope the audience enjoys it as much as I am enjoying it so far! We also worked on the Barber concerto a fair bit. I was very pleased with what I managed to do, sound wise in the lesson. I hadn't had a lesson in nearly a month and I have been very focused on my technique and sound production the past while and just really focusing on long, slow, powerful clean bow strokes and I was able to make that come off pretty good in my lesson, which made me really happy! *sigh* such a nice feeling when things start to click!

This weekend (starting tomorrow) I have a symphony tour. It's a "lighter fare" set of concerts featuring a jazz vocalist. The entire program is jazz favorites which looks like a really good mix of stuff but sadly the violin part I'm playing has some rather awkwardly and rhytmically challenging stuff in it. It will be good to go to rehearsals tomorrow and see how it all fits together. On Monday, after the concerts are all done, I'm playing viola in a string quintet! We are just going to be sight-reading through a bunch of stuff. I love evenings of chamber music! I wish I could do that more often.

Well off to piano/history. Yes, music history again....interesting, but so much stuff to absorb, and so little time.

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November 5, 2004 at 2:33 AM

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