Been a Few Days
WOW Grad school is BUSY!! But it's so nice to be busy after being so bored for so long. ^^v Let me see, where to start?
Monday I was annoyed because there were no practice rooms open after orchestra. After all that crap I go through for a key, and BOTH my practice rooms are occupied. Sometimes I really hate sharing, lol. As I wondered what to do for the four hours between orchestra and history, Cyrus called. We chat for a while, then he had to go to class. I started walking towards main campus, which is about a 10 minute walk. As I walked, I called a friend from the Yoshiki forum who is also doing her masters at CSULB. She had time to kill before class at 7 as well, so we met up and talked and had dinner! It was fun! I was a few minutes late for class, more because it takes a good 25 minutes to walk across campus and I keep forgetting this fact. I mean, at Crane in about 10 minutes you could walk from one end of campus to the other (provided the ground wasn't iced over). My history teacher's one of the coolest people ever, though, so he didn't really care. Oh yeah, he plays violin and was playing with the orch on Monday. He watched me play for a bit and liked what I can do. Yay! ::warm fuzzies::
Tuesday Cyrus came over for a bit and hung out before I had to record a narrative for work. The guy I recorded was really nice, but he wrote an HOUR LONG narrative on J.S. Bach. Now, this would be great except my boss wanted it to be 7 minutes. O_o Enter Rin with her happy delete button!! I managed to get the whole thing down to 25 minutes (there was SO MUCH unnecessary information!) and I get to meet with my boss tomorrow to see what else we can cut from it. I recommended to my boss that, in the future, we have the guy send the narrative to us so we can edit it before recording so we don't waste time. He liked the idea. ^^v Afterwards I went to class and talked with everyone else about the articles we read. This teacher is also cool, so even though it SOUNDS unbearable it's not. There's also a cellist and violist in the class (it's a combined undergrad/grad class) so I talked with them for a bit afterwards.
Wednesday I watched this week's movie, "The Rules of the Game." It's old and French and didn't make much sense XD but I watched it. Then I went to our first quintet rehearsal. I was pleasantly surprised that EVERYONE had practiced their parts, could PLAY their parts, and wanted to work together. ^^v YAY I got put in a good chamber group!!! Then we went to orchestra, which I'm slowly warming up towards, though the conductor does MANY things that irk me. I just keep reminding myself that he's NOT the real conductor and will NOT be conducting the orchestra after this semester. I worked out after orchestra then had to finish my analysis homework before bed. AND I had to practice, for my first lesson was on Thursday!
By Thursday I was exhausted, but I got up at 6 and got ready, then warmed up before leaving for my lesson. My lesson is at 9:30 am. My brain doesn't function well in the morning, so asking me to play and sound prepared is asking a LOT at that time of day. Luckily adrenaline was on my side this week. XD I like my new teacher, except for ONE thing...she's trying to reshape my left hand. Her reasoning is it'll be stronger, and I'll use my hand for strength and not my fingers, but the position is not entirely natural and actually kind of hurts a bit. When I told her the latter part, she conceded that I should try it, and if it doesn't work I don't have to do it. We spent most of my lesson on scales, which is good because I needed a warm up anyway, and boy do I have it now. Scales and arpeggios in one octave on each string, followed by a three octave scale and arpeggios, followed by a four octave scale in broken thirds, a chromatic three octave scale, and a scale in double stop thirds. Whee. Then she gave me an etude to help with the new hand position (ugh Kreutzer) and we started working on the fugue from Bach's G Minor Solo Sonata. Then I asked about the concerto competition, which isn't until the fall, so I'll be preparing a concerto for that! YAY!! I get to choose from Prokofiev, Sibelius, or Glazunov. I'm leaning towards Glazunov because it's a piece many don't perform and it's pretty. I do LOVE Prokofiev, though....and if I won with Sibelius I could invite Yoshiki to the performance and use the piece as a bargaining chip, ha ha ha. But I'm not sure I could PLAY the Sibelius.
After my lesson I went to the practice room and tried the hand position. I've learned that it works for double stops and actually relaxes my hand when I play those, but playing single note passages doesn't sound as good. I'm going to see if I can work it into my brain to do one hand position for double stops and one for everything else. ::evil laughter:: I ate lunch, then watched "The Rules of the Game" once again. It was better the second time around. In the middle of the viewing, Cyrus called, and since the movie is subtitled and I was only paying attention to music, we talked for a while. I finished the movie and went to analysis class, which is really interesting and it amuses me to see everyone get flustered because they think too deeply about what's going on. But it's cool that there are so many ways to view a piece of music. ^^v
Today I only had to go to orchestra, so I slept in and practiced before leaving. I stopped at the post office to pick up my NEW DIR EN GREY ALBUM but they'd already taken it to try and deliver it again. >_< I drove up to orchestra, rehearsed, then came back home to work out and find another "pick up your package at the post office" slip >_< so I have to go tomorrow before work to get my pretty new Diru album. I'm expecting it to be like "Agitated Screams of Maggots" and "Clever Sleazoid" were: at first I'm like, O_o WHAT did I just listen to?! then I listen to it again and again and then I'm addicted. ^^v
Oh yeah, only TWO WEEKS until I see Dir en grey TWICE IN TWO NIGHTS!!!!!!
And now, here I sit, recapping my week for your enjoyment. Or just to alleviate boredom. I'm not sure yet. Whatever, I have to leave for CYOSC in about a half hour anyway. Maybe I'll do some homework. Hmm...
Laters!!!
Monday I was annoyed because there were no practice rooms open after orchestra. After all that crap I go through for a key, and BOTH my practice rooms are occupied. Sometimes I really hate sharing, lol. As I wondered what to do for the four hours between orchestra and history, Cyrus called. We chat for a while, then he had to go to class. I started walking towards main campus, which is about a 10 minute walk. As I walked, I called a friend from the Yoshiki forum who is also doing her masters at CSULB. She had time to kill before class at 7 as well, so we met up and talked and had dinner! It was fun! I was a few minutes late for class, more because it takes a good 25 minutes to walk across campus and I keep forgetting this fact. I mean, at Crane in about 10 minutes you could walk from one end of campus to the other (provided the ground wasn't iced over). My history teacher's one of the coolest people ever, though, so he didn't really care. Oh yeah, he plays violin and was playing with the orch on Monday. He watched me play for a bit and liked what I can do. Yay! ::warm fuzzies::
Tuesday Cyrus came over for a bit and hung out before I had to record a narrative for work. The guy I recorded was really nice, but he wrote an HOUR LONG narrative on J.S. Bach. Now, this would be great except my boss wanted it to be 7 minutes. O_o Enter Rin with her happy delete button!! I managed to get the whole thing down to 25 minutes (there was SO MUCH unnecessary information!) and I get to meet with my boss tomorrow to see what else we can cut from it. I recommended to my boss that, in the future, we have the guy send the narrative to us so we can edit it before recording so we don't waste time. He liked the idea. ^^v Afterwards I went to class and talked with everyone else about the articles we read. This teacher is also cool, so even though it SOUNDS unbearable it's not. There's also a cellist and violist in the class (it's a combined undergrad/grad class) so I talked with them for a bit afterwards.
Wednesday I watched this week's movie, "The Rules of the Game." It's old and French and didn't make much sense XD but I watched it. Then I went to our first quintet rehearsal. I was pleasantly surprised that EVERYONE had practiced their parts, could PLAY their parts, and wanted to work together. ^^v YAY I got put in a good chamber group!!! Then we went to orchestra, which I'm slowly warming up towards, though the conductor does MANY things that irk me. I just keep reminding myself that he's NOT the real conductor and will NOT be conducting the orchestra after this semester. I worked out after orchestra then had to finish my analysis homework before bed. AND I had to practice, for my first lesson was on Thursday!
By Thursday I was exhausted, but I got up at 6 and got ready, then warmed up before leaving for my lesson. My lesson is at 9:30 am. My brain doesn't function well in the morning, so asking me to play and sound prepared is asking a LOT at that time of day. Luckily adrenaline was on my side this week. XD I like my new teacher, except for ONE thing...she's trying to reshape my left hand. Her reasoning is it'll be stronger, and I'll use my hand for strength and not my fingers, but the position is not entirely natural and actually kind of hurts a bit. When I told her the latter part, she conceded that I should try it, and if it doesn't work I don't have to do it. We spent most of my lesson on scales, which is good because I needed a warm up anyway, and boy do I have it now. Scales and arpeggios in one octave on each string, followed by a three octave scale and arpeggios, followed by a four octave scale in broken thirds, a chromatic three octave scale, and a scale in double stop thirds. Whee. Then she gave me an etude to help with the new hand position (ugh Kreutzer) and we started working on the fugue from Bach's G Minor Solo Sonata. Then I asked about the concerto competition, which isn't until the fall, so I'll be preparing a concerto for that! YAY!! I get to choose from Prokofiev, Sibelius, or Glazunov. I'm leaning towards Glazunov because it's a piece many don't perform and it's pretty. I do LOVE Prokofiev, though....and if I won with Sibelius I could invite Yoshiki to the performance and use the piece as a bargaining chip, ha ha ha. But I'm not sure I could PLAY the Sibelius.
After my lesson I went to the practice room and tried the hand position. I've learned that it works for double stops and actually relaxes my hand when I play those, but playing single note passages doesn't sound as good. I'm going to see if I can work it into my brain to do one hand position for double stops and one for everything else. ::evil laughter:: I ate lunch, then watched "The Rules of the Game" once again. It was better the second time around. In the middle of the viewing, Cyrus called, and since the movie is subtitled and I was only paying attention to music, we talked for a while. I finished the movie and went to analysis class, which is really interesting and it amuses me to see everyone get flustered because they think too deeply about what's going on. But it's cool that there are so many ways to view a piece of music. ^^v
Today I only had to go to orchestra, so I slept in and practiced before leaving. I stopped at the post office to pick up my NEW DIR EN GREY ALBUM but they'd already taken it to try and deliver it again. >_< I drove up to orchestra, rehearsed, then came back home to work out and find another "pick up your package at the post office" slip >_< so I have to go tomorrow before work to get my pretty new Diru album. I'm expecting it to be like "Agitated Screams of Maggots" and "Clever Sleazoid" were: at first I'm like, O_o WHAT did I just listen to?! then I listen to it again and again and then I'm addicted. ^^v
Oh yeah, only TWO WEEKS until I see Dir en grey TWICE IN TWO NIGHTS!!!!!!
And now, here I sit, recapping my week for your enjoyment. Or just to alleviate boredom. I'm not sure yet. Whatever, I have to leave for CYOSC in about a half hour anyway. Maybe I'll do some homework. Hmm...
Laters!!!