Solfège des Solfèges, Miracle of Miracles

Well, just had a fight with a blueberry bagel and lost. But I'm eating it anyway.

Annnyway. I've been in a surprisingly good mood today, considering I have NO good reeds and just got back from a two hour dress rehearsal. May have had something to do with the epic progress Caroline and I made musically today!

We rehearsed Baroque stuff together right after my studio class (Caroline plays violin; we're doing Baroque chamber music together and we're the only two students in the Musicianship 7 class). Sitting next to each other without harpsichord, all of the sudden we could actually play in tune! It was miraculous. Something to do with finally having a decent reed, something to do with us having time to practice this week and feeling like we actually had time to prepare, something to do with sitting next to each other so we could actually hear each other and adjust. In Baroque music, I feel like once one thing falls into place, everything else comes and starts to settle along with it. So we made great progress on style as well, feeling larger beats and understanding the rhetoric more and more.

Then, after a luxurious dinner at Quiznos, we sightsang for about 15 minutes from the third book. SO many grace notes and silly little trills. It was so much fun to be extra dramatic about them.

Our chamber coaching went really well, and I wasn't frustrated the entire time and cringing at my intonation through it, which usually happens. Towards the end, I was getting sharp, but my lips were practically falling off, soooo...I forgive myself.

Afterwards, Caroline and I dedicated a solid, very productive chunk of time to rhythm. We're working on ridiculous subdivisions of the beat - 64ths and stuff (you know, hemidemisemiquavers and such things hehehehehe). But we were really getting the tough exercises that have different rhythms tapped and vocalized. And then we did some Bach, naming chords and inversions as Caroline read through, and then singing through again on scale degrees in the soprano. It's so much fun to work on this stuff with another person, especially when she's as nerdy about it as I am. Legitimately fun. I mean, I say it's fun anyway, but I mean fun like crossword puzzles or reading a novel fun. Practicing music exercises with other people is actually board games or charades fun. Okay, I'm babbling now.

I'm glad I could focus on the positive in this post and not just complain about my reeds the entire time.

Catching Up

So it's been two months, I've been quite delinquent, I think it's time to bring the blog back. Life has always seemed much less hectic when I've kept a journal or blog of sorts. It's a good thing to reflect on the day's activities and thoughts. The Pythagoreans lived under a strict discipline that incorporated review and reflection; upon waking, the Pythagorean would review the events of the previous day and plan for the day ahead before taking a meditative solitary morning walk.

Back at Vanderbilt and quite in the thick of things. Tonight I performed a Partita by Hertel on Baroque oboe with Professor Smith on his harpsichord recital, quite the honor. I played on modern oboe with organ at his church a few weeks back as well.

I'll bring the blog up to speed with a quick summary of my projects for this semester and prospects for the next.

I'm the orchestra manager for the Vanderbilt Orchestra China tour this December. We'll be gone from about December 20-January 3 or so. I have to deal with the visa applications, vaccination paperwork, bus scheduling, etcetera etcetera. This Wednesday I made a list of everyone's full legal name and passport number. 95 people, 9 digits for each passport number.

That's 855 digits that had to be perfect. Not a low-stress job, and with the harpsichord concert today, it's been a rather rough week.

Also, I'm helping Professor Ploger with her research. Right now I am compiling an extensive survey of the literature that has been written on musical intervals, from 500 B.C. to the present. For each article, I am also either copy/pasting the abstract or writing a brief summary. So far the document is a hefty double spaced 80 pages, and I have miles to go. But I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel - now when I look through the bibliographies at the ends of the articles, they're mostly articles I already have with only one or two new possibilities to look into.

I've decided to do a thesis next semester, so I'm talking with Dr. Rose (who will be my adviser) this semester and doing some preliminary research. The thesis will be in the spirit of my independent study last year, pulling together trends in philosophy, visual art, literature, and poetry with musical modernism. Still need to pick a central piece to focus on...

Oboe lessons as usual, musicianship as usual, performance class as usual, recital attendance as usual, orchestra as usual, Alexander technique as usual, reed class as usual...

Chamber music, but not as usual - Baroque chamber music! Caroline (violin) and I are working in a trio with Lillian, a staff accompanist. It's been a lot of fun, but I've been so frustrated with reeds (fixed now, thanks to the pressure of the CSmith recital and Prof Hauser's help) and finding the time to practice Baroque oboe. It's a bear switching back and forth, but I need to face that a little more boldly.

I'm in conducting class as well this semester. I feel silly.

And lastly but not leastly, my philosophy class is Phenomenology. We're reading Heidegger's Being and Time and Levinas' Existence and Existents. I absolutely love it, have been doing extra work by accident (of course), and the professor is SO cool. She's brilliant and lets me write papers connecting Heidegger's thought to music instead of just summarizing/explaining his concepts, which is the weekly assignment. I've only done one paper so far along those lines, relating H's concepts of Understanding, Interpretation, and Meaning to music performance, but

I'm looking forward to a 5-7 page paper every two weeks doing this sort of thing. It's fun!

And the Morgan is fabulous with Valerie and Shelby of course. Shelby and I came out victorious in a bidding war on ebay today for an antique toaster. Bear and 'Pard (aka Cleanser aka Sluggo) doing well, as you can see in the photo.

Now that we're up to speed, I'll start posting more interesting things!

L

Do It Yourself Oboe

So I've been taking a few days off to do silly things - read House of Leaves, watched cycle 16 of ANTM, started on a painting but failed to get anywhere with it. But in that time, I did do some shopping around for some key oboe supplies that I needed to do some essential things maintenance-wise.

The other side of knowing how to play oboe is knowing how to take care of the oboe. So much of reed making and oboe maintenance is actually a very creative and inventive thing - there isn't one way to fix every problem, and there aren't tools designed for every problem either. Half the time it seems, our tools come from the hardware store or the craft store, and we have to come up with solutions ourselves.

The problem with all this of course, is that the modern instrument is extremely delicate. A half a turn of one screw can throw off an entire mechanism. A bent rod can be beyond the means of an individual to repair. And if anything is too messed up and can't be righted by the individual player, the oboe has to be sent off to a professional repair person, which not only costs $$$ but also, you lose your oboe for a few weeks or even a month or two. So any move made on the instrument must be very, very careful and command the repair person's entire awareness.

All this being said, you can imagine that young players are deterred from touching the instrument's mechanisms or trying to fix it in any way. At least I was, and understandably so. But my mom's paranoia made a much bigger imprint on me than it should have, and I am WAY behind in knowing my instrument as I should. I mean, that's part of the oboist's job, and sometimes one has to clean an octave vent before going on stage for a solo or fix a crack on the airplane. So my goal for this year is to shake off that residual fear and get some hands on experience. As I mentioned before, I was hoping to take the keys off my oboe during this stint at home. I still plan to do that, maybe tomorrow.

But before I could get around to that, a problem posed itself to me, forcing me to face the mechanics and take matters into my own hands. I took my modern oboe out a few days ago for the first time since Longy (didn't take it with me to Boston, hadn't played it in almost two weeks), and the octave key didn't work! Old me would have immediately sent it off to Carlos. New proactive me took the key off to see what was going on, and figured out the problem (I'll spare you the technical talk). I also talked to Jared and Carlos the next day, and both came to the same conclusion - the wood had shrunk. I tried the humidifier, but no luck so far. I might end up having to send it off to Carlos anyway, or maybe there's something Jared can do. But the point is, I was very proud of myself for getting my hands dirty and checking the problem out with no other oboists around! Bravery! And I didn't mess anything up, so I have a little more confidence now to build on.

The other do it yourself event I've been working on is the Baroque oboe staples. Baroque oboe, being much less widespread than modern, has even less tools designed for it, and thus even more of the do it yourself aspect to being a player. In one sense. In another sense, there aren't any keys you have to doodle around with, so that's certainly a relief. But, for instance, the staples I got came just as metal tubes. I had to prepare them myself (ie put string around them). But basically I had to figure out the method for doing so myself, and figure out where the string needed to be thinner or thicker or whatever in order to fit snugly in the oboe. Gonzalo talked through it once, pretty quickly, so I wasn't entirely sure what I was doing, but I think they ended up fitting very nicely and looking very lovely. I mean, not that it was a difficult sort of thing to figure out, but still, old me would have waited to get to Vandy so Jared could show me, despite the simplicity of the task. New me forged ahead and conquered!

Just to give you an idea of some of the weird things we oboists need as tools, I'll write up a list of the odds and ends I've been on a treasure hunt for in the past few days:

Teflon tape (I found pink!)

sandpaper

pipe cleaners

cotton thread (didn't end up using it, I found the nylon thread was a lot easier to work with)

beeswax

calipers

jeweler's screwdriver set

Yeah, it's really awkward explaining to the people at Lowe's or Michael's what I need all this for. Really, I promise that it's better not to ask...

Winding and Unwinding

Home! Got home on Sunday night. I've been taking some time to unwind a little. Things unrelated to music that I've accomplished: finished Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell and finished cycle 16 of America's Next Top Model.

I love that show.

It inspired me to photoshop a picture of myself with various short pixie hair cuts, but I concluded that I don't think I could pull it off. :(

The final concert of IBIL was amazing! I had so much fun, particularly playing in the orchestra. I actually have felt that of all my playing so far, my playing has been best in orchestra. I feel that is true on modern oboe a lot too...I'm definitely a team player, and the extra push of inspiration and pressure I get from having to give the other musicians with whom I'm playing a really strong performance out of respect for their skill and practice time and dedication pushes me to places I wouldn't reach otherwise.

Fantastic after party at Cambridge Commons.

Since being home, I've played a couple hours each day of Baroque oboe. Yesterday, I again practiced while watching ANTM. I wouldn't normally EVER do such a thing where my attention is divided between practicing and something else, but I thought I'd give it a try for some specific skills and lo, it did have some positive effects. I think the biggest thing was that it gave self 1 something to do and talk about while self 2 took over the playing. I didn't work at all with music, just exercises. Primary exercise (basically a scalar long tone type exercise), scales in thirds, and then repetitive practice for some awkward issues, like B to C, Bb to A, Bb to C, F to E, etc. So the controlling, gossipy, negative part of my brain was focused on forming opinions on models and guessing who was going to be eliminated, while the part of my brain that can hear intonation very well and regulates my playing was paying attention to my intervals and finger motion. I definitely was not practicing without awareness. In fact, I'd say in many ways, there was a much more pure awareness. I never let an interval go out of tune without going back and fixing it, and overall, the pitch was fairly decent. And having the controlling part of my brain distracted, I could do some things much better - for instance, letting go of the reed in a way I've not been able to previously achieve, and getting a much cleaner finger control with very relaxed fingers. Of course, I can't rely on being distracted, and it's not a type of practicing I am going to do anymore, except on special occasions if I want to revisit the feeling of the good things that were happening. But I paid attention to how it felt when things were going very well, and when I was most both precise and relaxed, and now that I have identified the feeling, I will be able to regain it in my practicing (sans ANTM).

Interesting little experiment.

Started working on music today, spent a good portion of practice time on solfege (in French violin clef, hooray!). Also, tied two blanks and started scraping them, and shaped five pieces of cane. Probably about two of them are good, two of them decent, and one might possibly make a good reed. Too narrow at the throat, but still, I'll give it a shot for the practice scraping. These pieces of cane are three bucks each. Eww. Ridiculous.

I need to make a shopping trip to the hardware store before I can actually get a good jump into reedmaking.

Hmm, in other news, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell was a really fabulous book. I needed to read something fun. Not sure what I'm going to read next, but I did make a goodreads account! I listed as many books as I could remember since high school and the best ones from before that, but I left a lot out that I had from childhood on living social a while back. Woot.

If you don't get it, the title of this post, "winding and unwinding," refers to winding thread around reads and unwinding from a long week of hard work. Get it? Hardy har. I hate naming these things.

IBIL Update

I survived the concert last night! Hooray! I'm establishing a good pre-performance routine that includes Alexander and meditation.

I ended up basically making the reed I played on right before I went on stage - not making it entirely, but finishing it, at least. I feel independent! How did I suddenly develop the ability to make good reeds? I am still astounded how it suddenly clicked in May. Like, the mathematician works for days, but then the solution comes as a bolt from the blue when he's sitting at the bus stop thinking about something else entirely...finally, three long years of dedicated, frustrated reed making are paying off. Of course I'll have my future slumps and new frustrations, but I'm suddenly at an unprecedented level of comfort and ease, and it's a little bizarre. But I'm cerrrtainly not complaining.

I guess I finally have a little time to update about many of the adventures in Baroque of the last week. Tonight is the faculty concert, and there was a chamber concert at lunch today as well, but other than that, nothing in the afternoon. I'm fairly exhausted.

I've gone through a LOT of rep this week. 2-4 brand new movements per day, ornaments and everything, to be played in masterclass the next morning. On top of actually getting to know the instrument, making a type of reed I've never made before, and warming up every day. And learning the chamber and orchestra music, and reading duets and things for fun. Solfege has been really invaluable, and in my initial practice sessions with new pieces, I spent a lot of time at the harpsichord singing (not that the harpsichords have actually been in tune by the time I get to them, but at least I get a starting pitch and can check the general vicinity of intervalic relationships (that last phrase was absolute nonsense, but I'm going to leave it in here anyway because I kinda like it)).

I've also bought a lot of drinks at Starbucks. It's across the street from the dorm I'm staying in, on the way to the music building...

Other fun activities - orchestra, oboe band. Two chamber music groups. It's been incredibly busy, but I think it has felt that way mostly since until today, I spent nearly every free moment (before 9am, lunch and after orchestra at 5) practicing. Although we have had coffee and pastry breaks every day at 10:30 between master classes and chamber, which has been really excellent. Except for the lack of caffeinated tea. This herbal stuff just doesn't cut it.

Oh, and we had Wednesday afternoon off. There was a fabulous bowling outing involved.

I've had such trouble sleeping the past few nights because I've been so excited about early music. And music in general. And grad school. I have so many grand plans for next year, including an early music extravaganza recital in the spring. I have a ton of verrry exciting ideas. The most difficult bit I think is going to be getting some key people on board. Probably obvious who I am talking about, specifically........

Anyway. I think a nap might be in order.

Meditation on Intonation

Scale degree 7 is not a leading tone.

Scale degree 7 is the third of the dominant chord.

Scale degree 7 is not a leading tone.

Scale degree 7 is the third of the dominant chord.

Scale degree 7 is not a leading tone.

Scale degree 7 is the third of the dominant chord.

Maybe if I repeat this to myself over and over between now and 8pm, my fa sharps will be in tune during the concert tonight.

Why are there ants all over my computer for the third time this summer? I don't understand.

So, topic for today, topic for this week, and for the rest of my life and yours: intonation. I'm struggling, and I suspect it is because I care too much and consequently am trying to control too much. That is, self 1 is trying to control too much and not allowing self 2 to do its thing, if I may use some Inner Game language.

I am going to make a list of things I know are true, but somehow when I play, I am prevented from trusting these truisms by the lack of trust I have in myself:

-There is a place on the reed where if I am using proper support and air speed, all my notes will be placed exactly where I want them to be.

-I know where I want every note to be. I know that I know this because I can sing them over a drone in tune. And when I sing a note over the drone and then immediately play it, it is immediately or very quickly, exactly where I just sang it and in tune.

-Scale degree 7 is not a leading tone. Scale degree seven is the third of the dominant chord.

-This does NOT mean it is a lowered third. Because that would imply that it is lowered relative to some arbitrary pitch value governed by a universal fudge factor. It means that scale degree 7 is a pure third above the dominant. Which means I will NOT think of trying to play "flat" every time I see an F# tonight. This means that I will simply match the third in the overtone series of re.

-Hiding my sound will not make me seem more in tune. Actually, it will make me sound more out of tune. Particularly, biting the reed will not hide my sound or my intonation. It will make my pitch obscenely sharp.

-If I keep an embouchure that is equally open and cushiony for all the intervals while voicing the correct pitch, I will play in tune.

-I will play ALWAYS on a G on the reed. This does not change across the range of the instrument. There are no high notes on the Baroque oboe. The Ab-Bb-C-Db exercise is for the modern oboe only. Forgettabout it right now.

Now, I know there's the right way to play the oboe where things are in tune, and I know that I know where things should be. At the same time though, I just found this spot today in my adventure with drones. The lips on the reed and the cavity of the mouth and the sympathetic resonance (that's a Gonzaloism) all have to be exactly right for the fa sharp in particular to be just so, and my body and mind are not trained to always find that spot right away on Baroque oboe yet. Gonzalo has told me over and over to be patient, fa sharp is the last note I will feel like I have conquered. I mean, for goodness' sakes, there are five fingerings for the lower octave fa sharp and seven fingerings for the upper fa sharp. I have been playing Baroque oboe for a month, and I am playing on reeds completely made by myself, literally zero adjustments by Gonzalo or anyone else. These are not excuses, and thinking these things over is not making excuses, and I should not beat myself over the head for "making excuses" if I think these things. It's placing myself as firmly as I can in reality so that I maintain a good relationship with my coach and my coach continues to help me and stay out of the way when it needs to.

Of course it's going to be frustrating that my conductors and chamber coaches keep telling me certain notes are sharp or flat when I know they are sharp or flat. It's embarrassing to think that perhaps the coaches and conductors think I can't hear that this or that note is out of tune, because I can hear it (which makes it feel much worse). The problem is, I hear it after I play it. I need to hear it before I play it.

But observing. Nonjudgementally. Observing nonjudgmentally when a note is sharp or flat is what I need to be attending to. And not worrying about what the coaches or conductors are thinking is the problem. And I shall.

So much of this is the mindset. There's nothing to be afraid of. There is literally no reason to be anxious about playing out of tune or rushing such and such a spot. Today in chamber rehearsal, people (including myself) kept making remarks to that degree - "I'm worried I am going to rush this spot" etcetera. Finally I said something about it - that if we know how we want to play it, there is no reason to hypothesize about what could go wrong. Someone else said that it wasn't so much fear as professional concern. I mean, I know what she meant, and she's right to the extent that we do need to be involved (duh). But since the word "concern" can have two meanings, and one of those meanings is emotionally charged, I don't entirely approve of the terminology. I know that's awfully picky, but this is important to me in my own quest for mental discipline right now, to think about these things in just the right way so that I fully comprehend them, and when I'm teaching in the future, I want to communicate my personal philosophy about performing in the clearest, most concise way possible. "Engaged" or perhaps "highly conscious" or "highly aware" works a lot better for me than "concerned." Instead of "I'm worried we are going to rush here, let's run this spot and try not to rush," I think the better approach is, "Let's be extra conscious of the tempo and pulse here, we want it to be precise and energetic." There's no negative emotion or positive emotion in this latter approach, merely a statement of the goal and a call to notice how that goal might be better achieved. Chances are, that spot will be in tempo next time and not rush. If it does rush, this can be stated without a value judgement.

I only make such a big deal out of this because the extent to which I have engaged in this type of thinking is the extent to which I have improved both my musicianship and my emotional health, particularly over the past year. The discipline that I lack in this area (as evidenced by my recent freak out moments/rehearsals about intonation) leads to physical tension and a worsening of the problem.

After I said the bit in rehearsal today about not being "afraid" of anything, I suddenly played 300% more in tune. Surprise surprise.

Today's Entry

I'm posting two entries at once - don't be confused, the last entry I wrote yesterday but couldn't post until just now because I didn't have the internet.

Played in my first Baroque orchestra today! Eee! It was...so. cool. I'm a little frustrated with myself because I know I was playing scared - it's hard not to do when everyone sounds so much better than you and the ornaments are coming at you waaaay too fast to read. But I've learned so much from the experience already; just sitting next to the verrrry good bassoonist is extraordinarily enlightening.

F#, I am playing so scared of F#. Least favorite note.

I survived the sonata in master class! I played the first three movements, and all things considered, it wasn't terrible! I'm polishing a little more but also taking on some new music, including music in French violin clef. Yay! The ornaments are surprisingly hard in FVC, I'm not sure why they should be. I'm reading by interval. But somehow the ornament part of my brain is wired to the treble clef, seeing the notes on the page. WWPD? (What would Ploger do?) I'm not visualizing the ornaments probably. Should visualize the ornaments probably.

Mmm, popcorn.

Baroque dance class continues. There was a lot of hopping around today. I was pretty ungainly. Baroque French dance, and subsequently the music, requires a good deal of elegance, poise, and grace, none of which are inherent aspects of my...person. My mother will certainly attest to this.

But tonight, what an excellent surprise! I was practicing, and Gonzalo and company came in to the room I was in because they needed to use the harpsichord to read some Couperin. They invited me to stay and listen, which I did (DUH). It was beyond amazing. I absorbed so much from just listening and following along with the score. Gosh, the ornaments. All in the fingers, not the wind, Lindsey. Remember that. Blarrrrg and the harmony, it was just soooo good.

Also we worked on reeds today. I tied two blanks. I'll keep you updated on how those turn out...this is a very unorganized blog entry. My brain is kind of unorganized but filled with intense French Baroque ornaments right now. Whee.

Yesterday's Post (I didn't have internet)

Well, no internet yet tonight, so I won’t be posting this until tomorrow at least.

So I have arrived in Boston! Specifically, Cambridge. I’m here for the International Baroque Institute at Longy (aka IBIL) for the next week.

After orientation, we met in sections. Gonzalo handed me a French sonata and said, “Here, you can play this in masterclass tomorrow.” This was at 9pm. And there are only three of us, so the slots of time are pretty big – meaning, more than one movement. Meaning, he and I are expecting me to have the entire thing learned by 9am tomorrow.

So! Perfect study in Learning Music Quickly, a point of extreme interest for this blog. So I can’t resist writing about what I’ve done so far tonight, even though I really need to get to bed (if I wake up at 6, I can be practicing by 7:30…).

I practiced a lot yesterday, so it was actually a very good thing that pre-orientation I had only practiced about an hour, because by the end of the second hour, my chops were a little eeeh and I was biting a little (eeeeeh). Probably more than a little. (That’s bad, if you don’t play oboe and don’t know what I’m talking about.) So that second hour started at 9:15ish, when the oboe meeting was over and I was left standing in the room with this sonata by Andre Cheron. Immediate fight or flight response (choosing fight of course) was to dive irresponsibly straight into trying to play the music at tempo with all the ornaments. Dumb of course. But I was saved actually, by the harpsichord maintenance team, or whoever they were, who came in after about five minutes to put together a harpsichord in that room, and I moved rooms. It was enough time to clear my head and say to myself, “Here’s an opportunity to learn something quickly the correct way, so take it.” Luckily, there was a fully functional (but radically out of tune, alas) harpsichord in this new room (much easier than playing a half step lower than you are singing solfege on the piano).

So I sang through movement by movement, and in logical chunks, I’d go through the rhythm, sing it (using the piano to check intervals I wasn’t totally sure of, but surprise, I wasn’t ever off, I don’t think), and then attempt to play it. I made it through the entire piece like this, leaving off the ornaments, and on the fast movements often playing something slowly once and then speeding it up. Then I started to go back to the beginning and work on first shaping the phrase the way I wanted it (still starting with singing the solfege until it sounded the way I wanted, then playing it), and then adding in some ornaments. But I didn’t even make it past the first half of the first page when the security guard came in and told me the practice rooms were closing.

It was 10pm. What? What kind of practice rooms close at 10pm??? I take Blair for granted, I guess.

So I came back to the dorm (about a ten minute walk, I was impressed that I can already navigate around here, haven’t gotten lost yet. Well, the first time I set foot in the town doesn’t count, but I’m just saying that every time I’ve had a general idea of where I wanted to go after that, I haven’t been lost). I went through each movement all the way through, two times each for just singing rhythm without the ornaments (including the inegalite, which I sure hope I am using appropriately, probably not). After that, I spoke solfege in rhythm, without ornaments. The solfege is really important for getting the groupings and the phrasings just right – things suddenly make sense, which they don’t do if I just start playing on the instrument and barrel through, trying to get the right notes. So then I spoke through with ornaments, which is a bit more of a challenge. That’s the hard part. It is particularly challenging because it is a matter of both getting the rhetoric correct and getting the fingers to be extremely graceful and not blurble or slam down or wind a note at the end of a gesture because it is a cross fingering, and it might not come out…or something.

So hopefully this will all pay off tomorrow, and I won’t be so dead tired that I can’t function. I woke up at 4:45 this morning to head to the airport. Had some rough sleep on the plane (but long sleep, almost the entire three hour flight, surprising for me) and then napped when I got here for about two hours. We shall see. Luckily, there’s a Starbucks across the street.

Oh yes, the other thing I have been meaning to write about. So yesterday I was watching America’s Next Top Model. You laugh, but this is very relevant! (I was also practicing Baroque oboe at the same time, which might not have been entirely healthy, but we can discuss that later…). So (cycle 16, if you’re interested) one of the first challenges for the girls was with a prominent acting coach. The challenge was basically, to face the “inner critic.” When I heard this, I had to laugh because this is such a familiar concept to us musicians (at least us musicians at Blair and us musicians who have read Inner Game of Tennis and probably everyone else). In The Inner Game of Tennis, the author talks about Self 1 and Self 2, Self 1 being the voice that rambles on and on, trying to control everything and getting in the way of the performance (tennis, music, anything really). Professor Ploger’s name for it is the “coach,” that is, pretty much the same thing – the berating voice that is the biggest obstacle for any performer.

In the past year, while I was practicing at school, I had been focusing on building a better relationship with my coach. We were really on bad terms, and I hadn’t even been noticing how mean my inner coach was being to me, how much it was affecting not only my playing, but my overall happiness. I spent a lot of time, particularly first semester, both paying attention in order to notice my coach’s negativity, and literally having conversations (mostly in my head, sometimes out loud, don’t institutionalize me haha) with my coach. I was forgiving, made offerings of friendship, was gentle. In years before, when trying to deal with the negative voice, the (inappropriate) response I gave was always equally negative; I knew thinking these things were not doing me any good, but I didn’t know how to fix it – “Don’t be stupid, why are you thinking like that? If you think like that, you’re never going to be any good. Now play it right this time and stop beating yourself up.” Ironically of course, just another form of beating myself up.

But the gentler, patient approach worked really, really well. I’d say my coach and I have an excellent relationship now. Except sometimes the coach is lazy. Well, okay, a lot of times the coach is lazy. So that’s my challenge now, and particularly for the next year – I’ve gotten the coach to stop hurting me, but the coach doesn’t always put out the effort to help me in the way I know it can. And that’s largely on me. I think more Alexander and possibly (hopefully) yoga are in order here.

I do want to finish describing the ANTM challenge though! Because I think I will do it sometime possibly, it sounds like a good idea. So the acting coach had an easel with poster paper and markers set up behind each girl, and after he described the concept of the inner critic and they all understood it, he told them to turn around – 15 minutes to draw their inner critic. Then each went up on stage to face their inner critic in front of the other girls (the acting coach held up the poster and played the part of the critic while the girls had to confront the inner coach and tell it what’s what). Good idea I thought.

Which reminds me of something else I should mention, since the girls definitely weren’t gentle with their inner coach. There does have to be a definite degree of dominance – gentle, yes, but firm first. Resolute. Stare it down. Let it know you are in charge, and you won’t be putting up with its nonsense anymore.

Recommended Reading: The Inner Game of Tennis

Recommended Viewing: ANTM

Harnoncourt, Leonhardt, and Acrylics

Today has been quite the fabulous day.

Got to work on my painting almost immediately after waking up. Scrounged around in the garage and found the easel and set everything up outside next to the pool. It was unbelievably hot outside, loved every second of it. Hooked up Naxos on my computer into the patio speakers and blasted recordings of Bach and Rameau featuring Harnoncourt and Leonhardt. I worked until the heat was unbearable, then I jumped in the pool. Perfect temperature. Not too cold that I had to ease my way in, but not uncomfortably tepid either. Got out worked some more, went back in the pool, etc. My mom came home after a while, but predictably, as soon as she put her bathing suit on, the clouds came out and the daily afternoon thunderstorm started threatening.

Moved back inside, and I've spent most of the rest of the day listening to the recordings of reed class and oboe class from BPI and taking notes on them. I've only made it through the first two days, but listening back has been so beneficial. First of all, to objectively see the progress that was made in such a short amount of time is really astounding. When I was actually working on learning the instrument that first week, it felt like I wasn't making any progress, like nothing good was happening. But looking back, I can hear all of the good things that were happening, and happening very quickly. I can hear myself fixing tons of tiny little details I probably didn't even consciously think about when I was playing the second time around. Secondly, I was noticing listening back how immediately and comprehensively I notice what was going on, which notes were sharp or flat, what musical critiques Marc was about to give in the recording. So...if I can hear that quickly and correctly listening to a recording, why I am not hearing that quickly and correctly when I am practicing? I mean, I do hear a lot. But not as much as just now when I was listening to the recording. The answer, I think, is that when I am practicing, I think way too much. I also care way too much. I think both of those things, overthinking and overcaring, get in the way of allowing my self to trust my ear and do its thing as it has been trained (overtrained in fact) to do. Etcetera etcetera.

Practiced Baroque oboe for a little while in between listening to the recordings. Was a good thing to do, with a lot of the basic info fresh in my mind. I'm still hung up on scales and long tones, but I really don't want to play music with less than fabulous support/technique/articulation.

Crazy thunderstorm this afternoon. I think lightning actually hit our roof at one point, I definitely heard something creak or crack.

I edited a clip of Kill Bill last night to make a reed making spoof, but then Facebook wouldn't let me upload it because of copyright infringement. Sad. Oh well, I'm probably the only one who would find it amusing anyway...

Georgia On My Mind

Hi guys! I finished BPI (Baroque Performance Institute) last Sunday, so I haven't been updating. I had originally intended to just blog for those two weeks, but I think I will keep it up. I've actually heard from some people that they were reading this blog for real, which is really cool! I had no idea anyone would actually check it out, much less follow it! How exciting!

I'll definitely have a lot of interesting things to write about - right now I am at an oboe camp in Georgia for a week, and in a couple of weeks, I'll be attending the International Baroque Institute at Longy. This Baroque thing is kind of addictive. Next year I'll definitely be keeping up with the Baroque oboe, so I'll keep everybody updated on that. And I'll have grad school lessons and auditions, so it might be kind of cool for those a year or more younger than me to see what that process is like. I'm also hoping to put on a big Baroque historical performance recital at Blair next year, so I'll write about what those struggles as well.

So let me go back a little and wrap up BPI! The final concert went really well - I performed in a trio sonata, a piece (supposedly) by Handel. And we opened the concert with our dance class performing the minuet that we had learned. Kanad (my lovely dance partner) and I rocked that minuet. My second lesson also went very well - Gonzalo is really a fantastic teacher.

After that final (again four hour) concert, there was a small get together in this crazy house with crazy cats. Pictures on facebook eventually. Crazy gamba collection.

I've been at Oxford Oboes since Sunday. It's an oboe camp for middle and high schoolers, and each day there are masterclasses, reed class, and chamber music. During the masterclasses, some students split off into smaller assigned groups for different classes (like English horn class) or have individual lessons. I've had so much fun here so far. Most mornings I've been in the masterclasses. When younger kids are playing in the masterclasses, I I only hear a little that I haven't heard before about oboe playing, but it has been such a great educational experience in pedagogy. I find myself really paying attention to how the professors approach different aspects in the music, what kinds of explanations work best for different ages, that sort of thing. Really important stuff for when I'm teaching later. When I was playing in the masterclass, the professors often brought up something I did well and explained/demonstrated it for the kids, a really good tactic, I think.

Love that the professors play the accompaniment (on oboe, often a bass line) along with the kids playing the solos. I can really hear in their sounds a huge increase in confidence, and they take more risks. In my lesson with Dr. O, we ended by playing through an entire Barrett sonata movement together, and I found myself gaining a lot of confidence and taking more risks as well. And just having so much fun! Wish I had recorded that.

Today I coached a sextet of beginning middle school oboists.

Yeah, you try that sometime. You can't even imagine.

But what an interesting experience, trying to figure out what they can relate to, trying to figure out what ideas are most important for them to be exposed to, not wanting to talk way above or below their level, but slightly above it, or at least at the ceiling, to challenge them but to keep them interested...teaching is hard. I've also been working with the students often at reed class, and it's really crazy having to dissect something you've been doing so long that it's permanent muscle memory in order to explain it to an ADHD middle schooler. ie tying reeds. And I didn't really realize how far I have come in reed making until seeing the beginners and intermediates. Reed making is one of those things that is so frustrating because it feels like I'm never making any progress (oboe playing too, for that matter). But to see how awkward it is for the beginners to hold a reed in one hand and a knife in the other reminds me of how natural it is for me to hold a knife or scrape a reed.

What a weird thing to be good at. Life is weird.

Oh yeah, and the other thing. Chamber music. Thirteen oboes in my chamber group, and I am the appointed leader. Why does this keep happening to me? Haha. Not complaining though, I guess somebody has to do it. I was so worried that we weren't even going to be able to stay together for the first rehearsals, but somehow miraculously around Wednesday, things started to really shape up. These rehearsals have been so much work. A very different kind of work than I am used to in rehearsals. First off, keeping everyone focused. Come on guys, every time we stop playing is not an opportunity for you to practice your part on your own or tell your neighbor a story...and I don't wanna be the bad guy or the band director. It's a very difficult balance to find!

But everyone has simmered down a lot since the first day, and there's a lot less chatter and a lot more focus. It's weird to go from group discussion of purely musical elements and subtleties like in college to directing people on how to play rhythms and things like that. There were a lot of transitions and things that we had to work through together, and a lot of spot work that took up a lot of time. The first two rehearsals, we had a professor come in for part of it, which was really helpful. I was particularly thankful not to have to be the bad guy for the entire rehearsal and to have someone with authority backing up what I was saying. I mean, I technically have authority officially, but it is an odd thing to only be a few years older than the oldest of the group. Particularly since I how I look could still pass for 17 or 18 if one didn't know I was actually old.

Gosh I feel really old here. There's an incoming college freshman here who was born in 1994. What's up with that? Sooo old.

But anyway, I suppose I'm doing an all right job organizing and waving my arms around a lot. The piece is coming together nicely, and we are even playing dynamics now! And sometimes we look at each other! Little steps.

So that seems like enough for now. Kind of a long post, but I haven't updated in a while. But I will continue to update from now on, expect a new blog every 1-3 days! Good to hear a few of you out there are reading it! :)

Keep Going

Hooray! Just came back from a beautiful performance of the St. Matthew. Three hours long. I'd really like to get to know this Passion better - so much music all at once for the first time is difficult to digest.

Why did they remove the non-functional microwave in the kitchen and replace it with a different non-functional microwave? I want popcorn.

Had a lesson with Marc today. It was so helpful to work on my ensemble piece with him. The piece is really coming together I think, but it is a little rough that I haven't really practiced it outside of ensembles. But with a little TLC before the concert tomorrow...it should be fine. It's really just those dang trills and ornaments. (You know, only like one of the most important aspects of Baroque music, so annoying :P)

I also need to practice my choreography for tomorrow's show. Yes, that's right, I am dancing the minuet in front of people. Haha! This week of dance class has really been a lot of fun. Somehow everything is a lot easier when we have choreography to learn, instead of just learning steps. Then, learning the different steps in context reinforces them a lot. New teacher this week - she pushed us a lot harder.

Baroque reeds! I have made three of them! Two of which were pieces of cane that I hand shaped! At lunch yesterday, I shaped three pieces, but only two of them came out okay. Which is fine really, because I don't have very many staples...anyway, I made them into reeds this morning, and one of them turned out really well! The other one that I made that turned out really well was from a piece that Gonzalo shaped. I'm not sure about the third one, I think it was too short (my shaping caused me to have to tie it on a lot shorter than is desirable), and perhaps I scraped too much out of it. But I'm getting better at getting a thinner tip - that goes for modern and Baroque reeds. Hope the Arkansas stone waiting at home for me will help.

Oh, home. I can't wait to go home. I really need some time for my brain to recuperate. I can't quite comprehend that I still have another week in Georgia to go.

Uh, I feel like I had a lot more to say, but I am kind of brain dead right now.

What do I have tomorrow?

dress rehearsal 10:45

lesson 10:45

Yeah, I have to figure that one out.

dance rehearsal 1:00

concert 2:00 (but I probably won't be playing until around 5:00...)

So before 10:30 am, I need to practice new stuff for my lesson.

Need to practice dance before 1.

Other things to remember:

turn in your dang lesson cards

transfer the recordings/change recorder batteries

Crash

It's been two days and already equal temperament makes me uncomfortable.

So, I completely crashed today. Napped three and a half hours. Straight through dance class (well, my alarm went off in time, but there was no way I was getting up at that point). But I really needed it. I haven't gotten a full night's sleep in three weeks now. This morning was a real struggle, especially during the Music of Bach lecture, at which point I almost fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. Had been a little irritable all morning and not really accomplishing what I wanted to be accomplishing with Baroque oboe in class.

I keep wanting to complain to myself that it's impossible to play stylistically correct while I'm still worried about the mechanics of the instrument. But I know that's an excuse, and that kind of thinking is NOT going to help me. When so many notes inegales start coming all at once though, my brain turns on panic mode, I get all tense, and nothing works mechanically. Wait, that isn't true. It's not true that nothing works mechanically. I just don't sound as beautiful as I would sound were I relaxed, open, and resonant. Hopefully, I will get to bed early tonight, and start mornings off with some Alexander from now on.

One of the major challenges for me with technical passages - in Baroque oboe playing, you don't blow equal air into all the notes. On modern oboe, a good, fast, steady stream of air will get me nicely through any crazy passage. But on Baroque, that strategy breaks down. In fact, it seems easier to get all the notes out if the beginning of a difficult phrase of inegalite is really lengthened and blown through, but the subsequent notes are played on hardly any air, relatively speaking. It also sounds better, not forced or driven. It's difficult to get into this mindset, but I just have to keep gently reminding myself.

Overall, I think I have been doing a pretty good job of being non-judgmental about my playing in practice and class. Class is much more of a challenge to achieve this state of mind for me because there is an external judge (my teacher) who does place value judgments on my triumphs and failures. The importance to me of his approval sometimes gets in the way of actually doing something the way he wants it to be done. I will focus more on being wholly observational in class of my own playing the way I am in the practice room. The real danger in the practice room is unconsciousness. There's so much to think about in playing this music on this instrument that instead of keeping an awareness of everything, I focus too narrowly on one skill to the neglect of other, basic skills. Or I just space out. Spacing out = not good. But I suspect that largely has to do with my lack of sleep, since it is not normally a problem for me.

Bach in a Minuet

Just got back from my first ever Baroque dance class. So hilarious, so much fun. It's amazing how difficult the simplest small, graceful movements prove so difficult. It just goes to show for me how unaware we really are in general. I mean, as adults, we have full motor coordination, and we do things every day that are totally amazing feats of balance and coordination, but we aren't aware of our own capacities, in such a way that prevents us from trusting our own bodies. The dance teacher is also an Alexander teacher! We did some fancy ballet type warm up things, then learned the basic minuet step. So helpful for playing minuets - I feel like I have a much better idea now of the phrase motion and groupings. The step occurs over the course of six beats, not three: two bar phrases. The heel goes down on three and the plié is on six. Three four five six one two three... Etc. I mean you do learn these things in lessons or in music history class, but the kinesthetic comprehension is so enormously valuable. Can't wait to go practice my minuet movement later tonight with this new understanding!

Had a great masterclass/lesson/reed time thing today. There's only two of us oboists, and the other student has had more experience than me, but not a lot, and she hasn't worked with a professional before. So in many ways, we are on a similar plane, which is great. I was a little concerned I might be holding someone back, but I think we will both have a lot to learn from each other.

My room has no air conditioning. Eurgh.

Finally got a reed designed for my type of instrument (or rather, Hauser's type of instrument, I'm borrowing it). That is, Saxon Baroque oboe. It's so much easier to play in tune now, I have to do much less manipulation, and the cross fingerings are about a thousand times easier. My teacher seems impressed about some things I seem to be able to do right away but sometimes people can't do after years, for example, play notes a half step down without changing the fingering. (Thank you Caldwell Ab-Bb-C-Db exercise.) It's encouraging to know I have a somewhat natural affinity for the instrument and that I really can hear intonation. Really, really well, actually. As long as I listen and don't try to control, it's there, and it's correct. Somehow Baroque oboe allows me to let go and trust myself in that way. I think it is partly because there is such a wild range of possible intonations that the only solution is to observe - because I don't know the instrument at all, I can't predict whether I will need to lip up or down like I can on my modern oboe, whose tendencies I know so well. And surprise surprise, when I simply allow myself to observe the pitch rather than try to guess at where it is, I place it correctly, right on target.

We started playing music today, some Boismortier duets. Talked about some basic performance practice concepts - breathing and phrasing, rhetoric, and inégalité. For those of you who aren't familiar with inégalité, I'll include here a short paragraph from an essay I wrote in Smith's class on it.

In French Baroque tradition, a group of two notes that is notated equally may be played in a number of different unequal rhythms, a custom known as inégalité. The performance practice was understated enough so that composers did not indicate it with standard notation, and one contemporary authority recommends the notes “should be dotted with such restraint that it is not obvious.” The degree of inequality varied from “mild and lilting to sharp and vigorous,” but by no means the ratio of long to short a strictly geometric relationship; the proportion was left to the discretion of the performer and was a means for expressive, musical effect. Primarily, the principles of inequality or equality were determined by the style of the piece, styles with which contemporary performers were quite familiar and comfortable.

So basically, a slight dotting of notes that appear equal on the page. It's tricky to get just right in performance, but when it's right, it's SO right. It sounds as if that is what it should sound like. Natural, like speech.

All right, maybe getting a little too technical here.

Gamba class this morning was excellent. I simply could not believe the amount of improvement that happened overnight. I practiced for about twenty minutes last night, and this morning, I wasn't hitting extra strings (every once in a while, of course). Holding the viol and holding the bow felt natural. I would have predicted that it would have taken me at least a month to feel natural holding a bow. And today when the teacher came around the room to check in on us individually while everyone was scratching away at the fourth string, practicing continuous bow strokes, she had no corrections to make for me! She said, "Excellent! And you're not a string player?" GO ME!

One more general thing I'd like to mention about my time here - recording. I've decided to record all of the lessons, masterclasses, and lectures that I attend instead of taking notes. That way, I'll have everything. But even more importantly, I am really going for an implicit sense of trusting in myself and my brain's capacity to remember and record. Taking notes takes energy away from the present moment and the experience of learning in the now. As long as we are truly dedicating our full awareness to a teacher, I believe we have the ability to remember what he or she is saying. So I am concentrating on attaining a very full, intense focus during these critical days of learning new skills (and of course, ideally, all the time).

I think I am getting much better at not using vibrato and not driving through notes. Ahhh.

Firsts

All right, so first day and a half. I'm already so behind on this blog because I've already assimilated so much new information! Unbelievable!

So, travel day yesterday was pretty overwhelming. Last night of Hot Springs, stayed up with my friend Natalie until 4 am, which yielded 2 hours of sleep that night. Slept an hour and a half on the plane, but that was it. Got into Oberlin at 5:15, orientation at 6, and "audition" at 7:20. So no time to play oboe that day, and I was a little concerned that I would have to play a Baroque piece on modern oboe for the teacher (haven't recently worked on anything I would want to play for a professional Baroque performer ie I'm not about to play unaccompanied Bach for an expert).

But of course I didn't have to play anything, and the professor is super friendly. He wrote me out a fingering chart and sent me on my way. He was a little shocked at first, I think, that I had never even played more than a few notes on Baroque oboe. Possibly slightly concerned. But I think that after he considered it a little and noted my genuine enthusiasm, he started to get a little excited that I was a clean slate. No reed at this point yet.

So. Pushing the Nerf ball up the hill. Sat in my bed for a long time with the Baroque oboe and the fingering chart. Visualized the keyboard. Solfege syllables on keyboard. Arranged my fingers correctly. Thought about the staff too, but not as much since that's clef dependent. Was as intentional as possible! And I looked at the chart as little as possible, focusing on the fingerings that are different from modern oboe. I went through the entire range chromatically several times, saying each solfege syllable out loud as I fingered the note and visualized it on the keyboard. I made a point to consider all the enharmonic spellings as well, and did some fake reading of Modus Novus, just to get some practice reading crazy intervals I'll probably never see playing Baroque oboe. But hey, if I can quickly process that, I can read anything. And then as I was falling asleep, I went through all the notes in my mind again. First thing in the morning, I reviewed. After viol class, reviewed again, this time with oboe in hand. By the time oboe reed class rolled around, I could easily play anything he asked me to do (scales, thirds, etc). So that Nerf ball is up! And since I will be playing every day from now on, it will stay up easily. (Until I start having to learn alternate fingerings).

8am every morning - viol class. I have a bass!!! Even just carrying it around last night after it was issued to me was a little overwhelming. Such a huge instrument! You have to be careful turning around in the hallway with it! And there's a BOW. I've only really even held a string instrument twice that I can think of offhand. And gamba of all things. Class was hilarious though, and we made some really awful noises. The class situation was odd for me - the lack of personal attention resulted in a lot more doubt than I am used to. But I got over that quickly, and took more risks to see what sorts of things worked and what sorts of things didn't (I'm thinking specifically of the bow grip). I need to do that more in my modern oboe practicing. I think that because Jared is such a good teacher, I am a little too dependent on him to point out areas I could improve. How often do I take risks with how I think about embouchure or air in order to experiment with different tones? Not very often. Occasionally, but nothing has ever really come of it.

I was forced to do that today with the Baroque oboe. In reed class, he gave me a reed, a little bit of guidance on embouchure, and instruction on how to overblow notes, but that was really it. We spent the majority of the time discussing reeds. He gave us some exercises to work on (ocatves, scales in thirds). So in my hour and a half or so of practicing today, I really had to figure out for myself how to make the instrument sound the way I wanted it to sound (not that I've accomplished that yet). I had to hear what I wanted in my head first before I played. Same for intonation. Button pushing is literally impossible on Baroque oboe, and it really reveals how much button pushing actually does go on, even when I am conscious of notes and intervals. Without really hearing it first, nothing works. I even tried an exercise in thirds where I alternated between singing and playing notes. And surprise! The intonation was nearly perfect! Some of the more difficult notes were a little warbly, but considering that without listening first, they were almost a half step off, I think it was a major improvement...

So one interesting challenge is going to not only be intonation regarding the instrument, but how I listen for intonation. The pure intervals apparently are going to take precedence over scale degree function: that's why my teacher recommended scales in thirds instead of scales. Practicing this let me know I really do know how intonation should sound! Because I could sing what I wanted very easily. Need to trust myself!

Dang cross fingerings are a beast to tune.

Well, I feel like I'm skipping a lot, but like I said, a lot happened. A bit on the Bach chorales. The institute is performing St. Matthew Passion, and they are going to have us in the audience sing the chorales (kind of like a flash mob, but you know, with Bach chorales. Kind of). Like this...

Handel Flash Oratorio

Um, anyway, so we rehearsed two chorales last night, and it was one of the most beautiful musical experiences I have ever had. I've never actually sung a chorale in German - only in solfege syllables or scale degrees or what have you. But to actually immediately comprehend the word painting in real time was such a different experience than merely pointing it out after or even before the fact. The physical feeling of singing a tritone on "Missetaten" and understanding what it means immediately was incomparable. It was so great that the musical director had us sing every part before putting all our parts together; even with all my struggle with the German language, I got a nice picture of the part writing. It was a lot to wrap my head around though, considering I don't even reeeally know how to pronounce German. I guess I have a decent idea, but you try tracking on the keyboard while struggling to read a language you've never spoken aloud before...so of course, as soon as it was over, I was eager as a beaver to go contemplate some intervals and notate some heptachord shift. Played two parts at a time today a little. Goal is to be able to play all these chorales on the piano before we actually perform them! I want to really understand what is going on as I sing them.

Well I suppose that's really enough for now. Gonna go practice, sing some more Bach chorales. Maybe some gamba practice? <.<

Baroque Adventures

I arrived yesterday at Oberlin, where I will be for the next two weeks for the Baroque Performance Institute. Besides Carl Smith's "Historical Traditions in Performance Practice and Composition," which was a fantastic class I took last fall (playing in class on modern oboe), I have absolutely no experience in Historically Informed Performance. Oh, and that paper I wrote for Lowe, but I got an A- on that. I'm still a little bitter. :P

It sure feels right now as if I am the only person here with NO experience. Of course, I think a lot of people only have minimal background, but still - let's just say the total notes I had ever played on a Baroque oboe before today was approximately 3. And there's a huge group of people here who have been doing it for decades and are totally involved. So the bad news is, I know nothing. But the good news is, I know nothing!

That starting from scratch feeling is so different. After a certain age, we don't start from scratch anymore; sure, I'll learn a new sonata or a nifty beveling knife technique for reed making, but I don't learn through the child's perspective anymore. Not like learning how to talk or learning how to walk. And of course, I'm not starting from scratch with Baroque oboe, either. About half the fingerings are the same as the modern oboe, I know how to read music, I know how to make modern oboe reeds. But Baroque oboe is an entirely different animal than modern oboe. Additionally, I'll be taking beginning viol and Baroque dance classes. Particularly with the viol, these are things that are way far out of my comfort zone. And I love it!

I'm very interested in how exactly people - and me, in particular - handle such a 180 degree turn, especially in a situation such as this where I will be totally immersed in a new skill set. I don't plan on playing my modern oboe at all for two weeks. It's mind boggling. So I decided to keep a blog where I will make observations about how I learn, what obstacles I face, and how I overcome them. I hope to understand better how adults might regain that magical easy feeling of creativity and learning that comes with childhood. I think of this as a situation where I can clearly observe the learning phenomenon, easier to be cognizant of in this immersion than in the more general and subtle learning of the every day, and even college. But I'd like to apply my discoveries to my every day learning, and to my teaching, when that happens some day. I also hope to explore how my training in the Ploger method works with learning new skills on my own - there will be a lot of that spattered throughout, but I won't get too technical.

So, I plan on updating at least once a day. The posts will include an outline of my activities for the day, and an introspective analysis of my mental states and learning processes. I'll try to keep it interesting, just in case anyone else wants to read (my mom probably will, at least).