Class-less girl

Wooohooo!!!! I just finished my last class for my doctorate! I can't believe it. I can't quite accept it and have a weird feeling that I will suddenly remember a class I forgot to take and will have to start all over in the fall. Haha. 

Just because classes are finished doesn't mean I am out of the woods yet. I still have to do a few things next week and play a final jury and hopefully my lecture recital the week after. But it's super exciting to have finished my classes! So excited for summer break!!!

Coming soon!

Shivers!

Whoa Nelly, it got cold!  I don't know what happened because the last few days have been in the upper 30's, which felt like it was in the 60s after our previous cold spell.  Even this morning it was 39 degrees, but something happened while I was at work and it is COLD again - 19 degrees to be exact.  There is a far cry between 39 and 19.  Sitting in my room and listening to the wind howl down the street doesn't help things either.  When it even sounds cold...it's cold.

On a warmer note, I am playing with the New Amsterdam Symphony in concert this Friday!  We are playing the Brahms Requiem, which is a piece I have loved for years.  It is one of those that I got a hold of in undergrad and wore it out for a while. Nerdy factoid: Brahms' Requiem was first presented to the world on February 18 - my birthday!  A few years before I was born (112), but still...
What I love about this piece is the gorgeous choral writing and harmonies.  The clarinet part itself is kind of boring and exhausting to play (a lot of LONG notes a.k.a. good exercise), but I just play along and listen to all the beautiful sounds that surround me.  I've always loved Brahms...

Title-less Blog Post about Music and Opera

I am having a very 'musical' weekend.  I love when I get to have these, because in general I spend too much time at a desk and not enough time being musical.  Yesterday was a very nice day.   I did some teaching, followed up by a yummy vegetarian lunch, then did some roaming around in The Strand bookstore, some coffee, and lots of practicing.  That's a pretty nice way to spend a day...in my opinion.

This morning I got the day rolling with a book and a cup of coffee.  On the dock for today is an audition this afternoon and tonight I am going to see an opera at the Met!  I am meeting friends to see Nixon in China.  I'm very excited to see this opera because I love the music of John Adams and he will be conducting the original Peter Sellers production.  I went to a panel discussion earlier this week that included Mr. Adams and Sellers, among others from the cast and creative team, and learned  a lot about the creation and development of the opera.  I think the more you know about a work of art, the more you enjoy seeing it.  I also think there is a certain energy and excitement that comes with 'new' music where the people who actually came up with all the ideas are right there creating it again in front of my eyes.  Good stuff!

The Big Event

I'm excited.  I've been sick this week, but I'm still excited.  Because Monday night is Opening Night at the Metropolitan Opera!  It's time for our new season to start.  I'm sure I've mentioned before that it gets slow working for a performing arts organization during the summer months when there are no performances.  One of the big perks for working where I do is that I get to attend amazing performances.  I stay busy with other things throughout the summer, but it is always a welcomed day when the fall brings a new season to experience.  I rather enjoy opening night because it is usually something new and exciting...last year was a new production of Tosca, which many people hated.  But oh it was fun to be there and experience the hate first hand.  I love being a part of the drama.  This year we are premiering Das Rheingold, the first opera of our new production of Wagner's Ring Cycle.  If ever there is a thing to be loved or hated, it is a new production for a Ring Cycle.  People are PASSIONATE about this thing and they all loved the old production (as did I - it's the one I 'grew up' on).  But I'm open minded about the new one.  It could be cool, it could be fabulous, it could be silly.  We'll see.  But I'm super excited to be there on Monday night when it is introduced to the world for the first time.  Should I stuff my handbag with tomatoes to throw, just in case I find it appalling?  Possibly...that could be fun.  Mostly I just love to sit back and watch the crowd, dressed to the nines, taking part in this spectacular event.  My gown and heels are ready to go!

Nothing like a little drama...

So you want to know what I've been spending a lot of my time with lately? Opera. Yes - opera. Last year I worked at Carnegie Hall and I was able to see several concerts there. I am currently working for the Metropolitan Opera and have seen a lot of opera. Before I started working there I had a friend who took me all the time, so this little opera affair has been going on for most of 2009. A significant difference between going to a concert at a venue like Carnegie Hall and seeing an opera is the amount of time that it takes. You can go to Carnegie and be out in an hour and a half. An opera is just getting started at an hour and a half! Attending an opera requires an entire evening - it is an event. Which is great! But, it does take up a chunk of time.

Now, I would say the average opera clocks in at around 3 hours. That includes an intermission where you can walk around, mingle, show off your fancy earrings and eat an over-priced cookie. Some operas are a little longer, some a little shorter. But there is this special phenomenon that happens every now and then called the Ring Cycle. I don't want to get into it too much, BUT basically, for those who don't know, Wagner wrote this series of operas (4) that make up the cycle. These operas take huge orchestras (HUGE - he even created instruments specifically for this thing!) and require major productions and are performed (usually) within the span of a week. AND they are much longer than "regular" operas. The Met is currently in the midst of Ring season. This happens every few years - people flock from all over the world to spend night after night at the opera house watching these performances. The first one is only about 2 1/2 hours long and they increase until the last one is a whopping 6 hours long. Ring fans are a breed of their own. These are serious fans. You'd have to be, right? In order to devote about 15 hours to one opera? In one week? Yes, it is broken into four nights, but it's really one huge story. Think Lord of the Rings, opera style. Everyone knows some of the Ring. Click on this to be reminded:


If you are not a serious Wagner fan, the only reason you would put yourself through all this madness is that you are either curious or crazy - or some combination of the three. Anyway - the whole reason I am blabbing about Wagner and Ring Cycle is that today I accomplished the task of watching the entire final opera. All 6 hours of it! Yikes! It was the final dress rehearsal before the Saturday opening performance and they gave us tickets. I was only going to go to the first act (11:00-1:00), but got sucked in and didn't end up leaving until the final curtain at 5:15. Wow. It was pretty amazing and I can add that to my list to say "I've done it". It was great and so epic - the end of the world kind of a thing. But 6 hours! Come on! And just in case you are wondering, I have also seen the first two operas of the cycle. Missed the third, but it will come around again and I will probably catch it just so I can insanely claim to have seen the entire Ring Cycle.

Enough. I leave you with a picture taken 4 years ago. I was visiting New York and had my picture taken in front of the opera house. I had no idea what was to come - I hadn't even been in the building yet...

Back to the Music

It's Opening Niiiiight!!!!

I've been working at Carnegie Hall since May. At first I got to see several concerts for free - which was my favorite part of the job. Well, summer came and the season ended. We had a couple of JVC Jazz things that came through in early summer, but it's been pretty dry since then. Actually, completely dry. Drought kind of dry. They were doing some renovations on the building, so nobody was there except the workers and of course us in the rat-race of marketing/sales, etc...

Anyway - I am excited because tonight the season opens! From now until next summer the hall will be "alive, with the sound of music." Tonight I am going to hear the San Fransisco Symphony with a bunch of all-stars like Yo-Yo Ma performing a concert of music by Leonard Bernstein. Bring it on.

I did get a little preview of music seasons starting yesterday. Last night I saw half of a concert in Bryant Park. Musicians from the NY Philharmonic played the Mozart Clarinet Quintet. This is the last year for the principal clarinetist of the philharmonic, so they are featuring him. Not only is this his final year, but it is also his 60th year. SIXTY years with the orchestra. Wow. He was appointed when he was only 19 years old by Bernstein himself. What a life. Anyway, after hearing some clarinet I jetted back to Carnegie Hall to hear a solo violin recital by Philippe Quint. This guy left his Stradavarius violin in a Newark cab a while back. Ooops! Luckily he got it back and gave comp tickets to last nights performance to the driver who returned the instrument and his family. The encore was even dedicated to the cabbie. What a story! The performance was really nice. Solo violin music can be so fun and flashy, plus this guy added a touch of Russian schmooze, which I tend to fall for, so fun was had. Hearing all of this great music makes me itch to practice. That's definitely not a bad thing.

city life

Wow - it has been a crazy week or so since I have posted! I am back in New York and have been going ten billion miles a minute. It feels like I have been here much longer than one week. I guess it is good to be busy, but I am having quite a time getting adjusted! As soon as I got back here I had a week of rehearsals, performances, apartment hunts and job searches! Crazy! Everything worked out fine and I am ready to take on the new week. The reward for this week is that I get to go to Carnegie Hall on Friday night for an amazing concert. The Chicago Symphony will be playing Shostakovich's 4th symphony! I can't wait! I love being in a city where I can be so involved in the arts. There is SO much going on at any given moment. I have been able to play quite a bit - doing some pretty random gigs here and there. Ah, a musician's life...