It's almost time for me to go to bed. I got up in Singapore 32 hours ago. I got some sleep on the way home; but sleeping in the economy class section in a contorted sitting position just isn't the same as lying down in a bed. The problem with arriving home early in the morning is forcing the adjustment back to the local time - I've stayed up all day so that I can go to bed at a somewhat early but still normal bed time.
I tried playing the cello this afternoon and it was quite the out-of-body experience. I didn't sound as bad as I thought I would after not playing for a week and being exhausted, but maybe this was because my expectations were very low (or that my brain is so tired that I wasn't listening very well). I did get some amazing head rushes while trying to remember and then play what my teacher wanted me to practice before my next lesson (and then gave up). I missed my cello while I was traveling and am happy to be home with time this weekend to play it!
Friday, September 26, 2008
There's No Place Like Home
It sure was fun to be in Singapore. The people are so friendly and it is my favorite place to eat. Even the hotel food for the event that I attended was spectacular. None of the usual chicken breast with some sauce. The service at the hotel was exceptional. I finally gave up trying to get myself a cup of coffee during the breaks; the serving people who were supposed to get the coffee/tea for us would get very upset if we tried to get it ourselves, so we quit trying.
I'm trying to work now, but after flying for 17 hours (thank goodness it's faster to fly east) and arriving home about 10am this morning...I find that my concentration is slipping. Good thing I don't have any presentations to make today!
I did get some amusing pictures in the Tokyo airport - of the vending machine with the bottled water "Pocari Sweat" and of the high tech toilet with its volume level controls for "Flushing Sound".
I'm trying to work now, but after flying for 17 hours (thank goodness it's faster to fly east) and arriving home about 10am this morning...I find that my concentration is slipping. Good thing I don't have any presentations to make today!
I did get some amusing pictures in the Tokyo airport - of the vending machine with the bottled water "Pocari Sweat" and of the high tech toilet with its volume level controls for "Flushing Sound".
Friday, September 19, 2008
Singapore!
I arrived about 10 hours ago! I'd forgotten how brutal flying to Singapore is - first the 11-hour flight to Tokyo, then the 8-hour flight from Tokyo to Singapore. I arrived at 1:30am local time and love the efficiency - I didn't check any luggage, so got through customs, changed money, and was in a taxi on my way to the hotel within 15 minutes. This is the view from my hotel room:
I love visiting here; I'm stayed at this hotel many times before. It has been at least 5 years since I've visited, but I still remembered how to take the route through 2 shopping malls and an underground link to get to the MRT transit system (took a memory walk this morning - even after the flights I didn't sleep well last night)
I am looking forward to eating here!!! Yum yum!!!!
I love visiting here; I'm stayed at this hotel many times before. It has been at least 5 years since I've visited, but I still remembered how to take the route through 2 shopping malls and an underground link to get to the MRT transit system (took a memory walk this morning - even after the flights I didn't sleep well last night)
I am looking forward to eating here!!! Yum yum!!!!
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Ziggy at Work
Ziggy, hard at work
thank goodness for digital cameras....for every 1 shot with the hat on there were 10 where the hat was in the air or on the floor.
for more amusing pictures, check out stuff on my cat
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Sight Reading Tips
I was wondering what had happened to the wonderful teacher I had for the 3 years that I studied fortepiano while in college.
A fortepiano is a piano, but in this case it was a piano that had been built in 1811 by Broadwood of London. Pianos have changed and developed quite a bit since its invention in 1700. The piano as we know it today came into its glory in the middle of the 19th century. So this 6-foot grand piano that I played, a twin to the one that Broadwood sent to the deaf Beethoven, has some significant differences in both construction and sound. For one, there is no iron frame (Steinway's patented cross-strung frame for their grand pianos was a major invention and greatly increased the piano's sound volume) and in fact no metal frame whatsoever. The next significant difference is that the hammers are covered with leather. Felt-covered hammers were introduced in 1826. Leather is harder than felt, so the timbre of sound from this fortepiano is not as lush as a modern piano, and the sound decayed very quickly. Whenever I played the fortepiano I finally understood why piano players regularly broke strings and how delicate the instrument was. And Beethoven's 'Moonlight' sonata on a period instrument...ahh..that's a topic for another post.
But that was a long digression, but into one of my favorite topics (the history of the piano is absolutely fascinating, at least in my opinion!). I Googled my former teacher's name and one of the first things that came up was a link to some videos she's recorded recently. I've linked to one on sight reading tips, because listening to it reminded me of the lessons I had with her and it was so nice to see her!
A fortepiano is a piano, but in this case it was a piano that had been built in 1811 by Broadwood of London. Pianos have changed and developed quite a bit since its invention in 1700. The piano as we know it today came into its glory in the middle of the 19th century. So this 6-foot grand piano that I played, a twin to the one that Broadwood sent to the deaf Beethoven, has some significant differences in both construction and sound. For one, there is no iron frame (Steinway's patented cross-strung frame for their grand pianos was a major invention and greatly increased the piano's sound volume) and in fact no metal frame whatsoever. The next significant difference is that the hammers are covered with leather. Felt-covered hammers were introduced in 1826. Leather is harder than felt, so the timbre of sound from this fortepiano is not as lush as a modern piano, and the sound decayed very quickly. Whenever I played the fortepiano I finally understood why piano players regularly broke strings and how delicate the instrument was. And Beethoven's 'Moonlight' sonata on a period instrument...ahh..that's a topic for another post.
But that was a long digression, but into one of my favorite topics (the history of the piano is absolutely fascinating, at least in my opinion!). I Googled my former teacher's name and one of the first things that came up was a link to some videos she's recorded recently. I've linked to one on sight reading tips, because listening to it reminded me of the lessons I had with her and it was so nice to see her!
Gig Report, and it's been a while since I posted!
We had a great time at our gig last night!
We've been rotating around to people's houses - last night was at our house. I have a music room and we squeezed into it, but everyone liked it because you could hear us throughout the house, but people were free to move around, eat, and talk while we were playing. That was the way chamber music was played - at people's homes, not a formal concert setting, and not as the main activity of the evening. A friend of mine brought 2 of her kids and 2 of their friends, and the kids had a good time running around or standing outside the room listening to us. One of the little girls plays the violin, and I think it's cool for them to see adults playing music for fun (not forced to perform at a recital!)
We played 2 different tangos (those were very fun to play); our other cellist and I did the Vivaldi double cello concerto (we were really happy with the way we played together!); Vivaldi's Autumn; a movement from a Schubert quartet (only 4 of the group played - I sat out so I could do some hostessing type duties); Handel's Entrance to the Queen of Sheba, and we closed with one of our violinists playing Bach Violin Concerto in A minor. I played the piano for "Autumn" and the Bach - I spent a reasonable amount of time practicing the Bach (normally I don't have much time these days to practice the piano, but needed to do some work to get it ready...)...we had fun and the next gig will be close to the holidays.
My Saturday chamber group met this morning, and I was tired but ready when everyone showed up. We had a quintet, 2 violins, viola, and 2 cellos, so we played 2 quintets I found in the public domain sites - a Carl Goldmark quintet and another by Ethyl Smyth. They were both very nice, especially the Goldmark quintet. Last week we had a piano quartet, so we played the Schumann Piano Quartet and the 3rd Brahms Piano Quartet (c minor - has a gorgeous cello solo in the slow movement).
I had my lesson today instead of last night because of the gig, and now I'm working on placing my fingers down accurately - no wiggling or edging into the right pitch - I'm especially inaccurate when I shift down. I showed my teacher some of the exercises I made up and he gave me some pointers and wants me to work on some of the exercises in Sevcik op 8. I'm modifying the exercise to stop and check that I've actually placed my fingers in the right place (when you put down all of your fingers you can't tell whether all of your fingers in the right place unless you remove some of the fingers and check, which is what I've been doing). Who would have thought that half steps and whole steps would be so hard?
A few weeks ago for fun I tried playing the violin! Our versatile member of my Sunday group who plays violin, viola, and cello, handed me a viola and a violin after one of our practices and showed me how to play them. The viola was pretty big; and on both instruments my bow was wandering all over the place. So one day we had 2 cellos, 1 violin, and 1 viola and we wanted to go through the Schubert we played for the gig. So I volunteered to play violin II. It was pretty funny, I even played it twice through. The quartet was Schubert's first; he wrote it when he was 16. It really was a violin I solo with accompaniment from the other parts, which worked out well for me trying to play the violin part. The note/patterns were repetitive and didn't change to often, which gave me time to think ahead of time about which string and where my fingers were supposed to go (and fortunately I didn't have to get out of 1st position either). Of course when I shifted back to the cello I couldn't play it for a few minutes while my brain was trying to shift back to where my fingers were supposed to go. I've never had problems bouncing around between the piano and the cello and it must be because the instruments are so different, or that I've played the piano for so long ...
We've been rotating around to people's houses - last night was at our house. I have a music room and we squeezed into it, but everyone liked it because you could hear us throughout the house, but people were free to move around, eat, and talk while we were playing. That was the way chamber music was played - at people's homes, not a formal concert setting, and not as the main activity of the evening. A friend of mine brought 2 of her kids and 2 of their friends, and the kids had a good time running around or standing outside the room listening to us. One of the little girls plays the violin, and I think it's cool for them to see adults playing music for fun (not forced to perform at a recital!)
We played 2 different tangos (those were very fun to play); our other cellist and I did the Vivaldi double cello concerto (we were really happy with the way we played together!); Vivaldi's Autumn; a movement from a Schubert quartet (only 4 of the group played - I sat out so I could do some hostessing type duties); Handel's Entrance to the Queen of Sheba, and we closed with one of our violinists playing Bach Violin Concerto in A minor. I played the piano for "Autumn" and the Bach - I spent a reasonable amount of time practicing the Bach (normally I don't have much time these days to practice the piano, but needed to do some work to get it ready...)...we had fun and the next gig will be close to the holidays.
My Saturday chamber group met this morning, and I was tired but ready when everyone showed up. We had a quintet, 2 violins, viola, and 2 cellos, so we played 2 quintets I found in the public domain sites - a Carl Goldmark quintet and another by Ethyl Smyth. They were both very nice, especially the Goldmark quintet. Last week we had a piano quartet, so we played the Schumann Piano Quartet and the 3rd Brahms Piano Quartet (c minor - has a gorgeous cello solo in the slow movement).
I had my lesson today instead of last night because of the gig, and now I'm working on placing my fingers down accurately - no wiggling or edging into the right pitch - I'm especially inaccurate when I shift down. I showed my teacher some of the exercises I made up and he gave me some pointers and wants me to work on some of the exercises in Sevcik op 8. I'm modifying the exercise to stop and check that I've actually placed my fingers in the right place (when you put down all of your fingers you can't tell whether all of your fingers in the right place unless you remove some of the fingers and check, which is what I've been doing). Who would have thought that half steps and whole steps would be so hard?
A few weeks ago for fun I tried playing the violin! Our versatile member of my Sunday group who plays violin, viola, and cello, handed me a viola and a violin after one of our practices and showed me how to play them. The viola was pretty big; and on both instruments my bow was wandering all over the place. So one day we had 2 cellos, 1 violin, and 1 viola and we wanted to go through the Schubert we played for the gig. So I volunteered to play violin II. It was pretty funny, I even played it twice through. The quartet was Schubert's first; he wrote it when he was 16. It really was a violin I solo with accompaniment from the other parts, which worked out well for me trying to play the violin part. The note/patterns were repetitive and didn't change to often, which gave me time to think ahead of time about which string and where my fingers were supposed to go (and fortunately I didn't have to get out of 1st position either). Of course when I shifted back to the cello I couldn't play it for a few minutes while my brain was trying to shift back to where my fingers were supposed to go. I've never had problems bouncing around between the piano and the cello and it must be because the instruments are so different, or that I've played the piano for so long ...
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