She-Twinkles

blank, or focused?

When I told Tess this morning that she would be having a group lesson this evening she said, and I quote, "Woo-hoo!  Yippee!!!"   So, yes, the girl loves her group lessons.  Today I could tell that she was really watching Alicia's bow arm.  They were playing simpler pieces like Rhody and O Come Little Children and Twinkles, so she didn't have to worry at all about the left hand and I saw her really making her bow arm open up.  It looked very graceful, and I think the 'sink/float' thing was looking pretty nice, compared to how she's been doing with home practice.  I am very bad at helping her actually learn pieces and much better at reminding her about form issues. Sometimes she gets a faraway look, like a soldier with a 20 yard stare, but I think she really observes well and gets a lot out of watching her teacher play. 

Every time you ask Tess what she wants to be when she grows up she says "A violin teacher!"  It warms the cockles of my heart, whatever cockles are.

Red Queen's Race

I can't believe how long it has been since I've posted.  Life has been so busy, and there haven't been many violin related excitements recently.

I feel like we are running the Red Queen's race from Alice in Wonderland: "Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"

Tess is basically in "polishing" mode.  And she is doing exercises with her wrist for quick string crossings, in preparation for Minuet Two.  This week Alicia was in New York, so we did not have a lesson.  Last Friday, we had group lesson, which went well.  Tess led the group on Song of the Wind and did fine, so Alicia asked her to play it again... The next time Alicia started playing the duet part and Tess got all hung up because instead of leading she was watching Alicia. 

With no lesson this week, Tess has been weaseling out of practice (and I've let her because I had to grade a bunch of papers and write up a midterm exam).  But piano is going well, I think. 

Wednesday night Dave and I saw Wilco at the Fox theater in Detroit.  It was a great show, and the audience STOOD UP!  So that made me happy, but poor Dave had been up so early to round that morning he was really wilting.  My favorite song was "Shot in the Arm", although they played a lot of new one's from Sky Blue Sky that I don't know as well, and they were very good.  The opening act-- Andrew Bird, played violin and looped it so he could also play guitar.  It was sort of interesting.  He joined Wilco on a couple of songs at the end, but I couldn't really hear his violin underneath all the guitar...

Free Burma

been out of town

We returned Sunday night from a trip to Whitefish, Montana, where Dave had a surgery conference.  It was beautiful out there, as you can see from this little shot taken at Glacier National Park.

Jules had a viola lesson with Wendy on Friday (even though I was out of town), and she is starting to learn French Folk Song.  The girls got some of their practice time in, even though the grandparents were here taking care of them in our absence.  Tess mostly did review, since we are not starting to learn the next piece yet (Minuet 2).  Alicia was getting Tess prepared for quick string crossings by making her do a little wrist exercise. I'm sure she slacked on that while I was away. I am also worried about how their piano lessons will go this week.  There's only so much I can do!  When I called home Saturday and asked Julien if she had done her piano practice yet she said no and started crying.  She hates to be told what to do.

At dinner, on the last night of the conference, we were seated with some other couples from UofM hospital.  One of the ladies kept insisting that she knew me from somewhere... eventually, as we talked, she made the connection-- both of our kids are in Alicia Doudna's violin studio!  It was really funny to finally realize this. 

Other non-violin related news:  Julien got the part of "Clara Puppet" in the Ann Arbor Ballet Theatre performance of the Nutcracker this year!  She will be dancing on pointe, and this is a big role for a nine year old. I am SO proud of her.  The Power Center is a big venue to have all eyes on you.  She is happy because being Clara Puppet means she gets her own dressing room space with mirror, and she gets to come onstage for the final curtain call.  And I get to schlepp her to all the many rehearsals on the weekends between now and Christmas  :-)

lousy photo, lousy lesson

So if you didn't know this was Ryan Adams with yours truly, you'd never be able to tell.  oh well. 

Graham's cello lesson today was disastrous.  He was a total subversive.  I am too miffed to give the details.  This teacher was not a good fit for him-- you could tell he was supremely inexperienced in dealing with little folks.  Graham told me he hates the cello and he just wants to play the violin.  Well, we will give it some more time.

Tess played astonishingly well tonight.  I had to say Kreisler highway about thirty times, as usual, but her left hand was on fire!

It's 1:16am and I am still grading Kierkegaard papers. MUST PRESS ON.

I would have brought a Brautigan to give him

I didn't intend to walk over to the crowd gathered behind Ryan Adams' tour bus after the show last night, but I do lots of things I don't intend, thankfully.  He was so gracious and patient--signed my EMU paystub that I'd fished out of the glovebox, and waited for me to get a picture with him before slipping back onto the bus to do whatever rock star music geniuses do after a show.  I can't seem to download the picture off my cell phone.  It would have been worth a few hundred words, if not a thousand (no flash!) So will you indulge me while I spin a tale about my concert experience?

I'm one of those old timey folks who thinks that it is insulting to the performer if the audience at a rock concert stays seated.  The crowd tonight sat, so I sat.  Turned out to be appropriate to the feel of the songs anyway.  And often I closed my eyes and tried not to be aware of the uncomfortable couple seated to my right-- on a date that appeared to be not clicking-- and the stiff dressed up guys in front of me who seemed not to recognize the music -- and the older lady behind me who kept singing along. What is it with a crowd anyway, who won't be a crowd, but just a bunch of disparate points of pleasure-seeking all happening to be in the same place at the same time, but not connecting with each other?   So there's communal experience at the football game I suppose (we GAVE AWAY great tickets a bigwig gave David to the UM Notre Dame game last time because we HATE FOOTBALL)... and people seem to still hope to get that at concerts.  I felt very lonely at the concert tonight, which was partly an effect of the music and partly because I felt hostile to the crowd. I kept thinking about the arc of the performance and the process of getting drawn in. How do I do this in my philosophy classes with the kids?  Teaching about consciousness and anguish has a certain charm, irrespective of the teacher, but I'd like to think my shtick is authentic. Anyway, being at the show reminded me of a time I was in Munich.  Walking down a busy street I saw a man standing on the sidewalk facing the street. He was wearing a bowler hat and a crisp white shirt.  He had a funny look on his face and I saw a leather case by his feet.  It was almost creepy, like I'd seen a thin character from A Clockwork Orange.  I looked at him and he looked at me and I thought: "What is he going to do?"  He grinned and I kept walking. But just a few moments later he composed himself and began a street performance -- juggling and joking -- and had a couple hundred people stopping and watching him.  I had caught his eye in the few moments before he began to do his "weird charismatic thing"... in the moments of gathering his nerve to stop foot traffic and garner the attention of strangers.  I watched and fell in love-- not with what he was doing--  what he was doing was rather odd and unmemorable.  I can't even remember now whether he was speaking in English or German.  But charisma, yes, he had it. 

Anyway, the concert was fantastic but it turned a corner into perfection for me when he sang "Peaceful Valley." 

"All my life I've longed for forgiveness / But I can never seem to get enough / All my life I've been locked into the darkness / With a gun to my head / Trying to find a peaceful song / Trying to find a peaceful song / To sing when everything goes wrong / Till the peaceful valley calls me home"

Singing that song extended a hand into the souls of the audience in a unique way.   Now I have to go to iTunes and find Peace in the Valley-- Johnny Cash, Mahalia, Elvis.  I always loved that song as a kid but haven't heard it in ages. Maybe I'll try to sing it at Vespers next time.

In a Richard Brautigan poem are these lines...

A friend came over to the house a few days ago and read one of my poems. He came back today and asked to read the same poem over again. After he finished reading it, he said, “It makes me want to write poetry.”

That's it-- how you know something is inspired, because it literally inspires you.  Watching a performance is one thing, but having it reach into your gut is something divine.  An audience is stuck not being able to give back what it gets from a performer, and that, I think, is why the crowds at Ryan Adams' shows are usually so awful.  Perhaps that doesn't make any sense. 

As for violin-- Tess and I had a wonderful LONG practice yesterday afternoon, and she was tireless in her efforts. 

rough start

We got Graham's cello.  He was very excited and wanted to try dragging the bow across the strings.  I left him in his room with Tess for a minute.  Tess had been told to talk to him about the parts she could name: scroll, bridge, pegs, etc.. From down the hallway I hear him say "I want to play by myself!"  Tess, knowing not to leave him alone with it, tried to take the instrument from him and he got up out of his seat.  Then he fell over holding the cello and when they landed the bridge popped off.  MAYHEM ensues.  Wailing and gnashing of teeth.  A call to the new teacher.  Reassurance. 

Now he *may* have some respect for the instrument.  I hope a lesson has been learned here.  I know I learned one!  Now I have to drag the darned thing over to Shar and have them make sure the sound post is not at all dislodged and set up the bridge again. 

On the practice front-- all is well. Julien is very serious about learning Lightly Row.  Tess has been reinvigorated by group lesson.  The sounds coming out of the piano lately have been fun-- Yankee Doodle for Tess and Music Box Dancer for Jules. 

Kathryn Goodson played piano for us at Vespers on Tuesday.  Afterward I gave her some music for a song I'd like to sing next month and we worked on it a bit.  She had to transpose to get it into a key I could sing.  I've never done that before, so it was interesting and fun.  She is just wonderful.

cashew or pistachio?

It turns out that Julien had some girlfriends who wanted her to do cello and she thought she might switch.  However, today she finally had the "fitting" with the Marshall Music folks who come to the schools.  They let her try a cello (which she said was out of tune!)  It was not fun, she says.  She couldn't control the bow and she couldn't see what she felt she needed to see.  So, she is going to stay with her original choice of viola, thankfully.   Tonight we had a good practice of twinkle variations.  Wendy had a cancellation and is fitting us in for a lesson tomorrow. 

Tessie's practice tonight was pretty good, despite the late hour.  She started out being totally wild with her bowing.  I don't know what got into her.  I really had to talk her into focusing.  We did everything Alicia told us to do, so A+ for us. 

There's a new guy in town starting a studio for cello.  I could put Graham in on Monday afternoons.  What to do???  He would be fine to start, I think.  This would make summer institute so much more fun, if all the kids were playing an instrument.  But I just complained yesterday about how overbooked we are (I am!)  I must be nuts to even think of it.

making noises

Tess had her first lesson of the new term with Alicia this afternoon.  It was great to see her again and get back in the swing of things.  She has a lovely new home and she looked great!  (She never reads my blog, so I am not sucking up!  :-) 

As you can tell by the lack of regular blogging here, our practices have been so lousy lately.  It was really embarassing for me for Alicia to see how little progress I made with Tess over the long summer.  Wendy taught Tess Minuet One but we have not been "polishing" the piece in any constructive way over the past few weeks.  But I am resolved to get off to a good start.  The problem is that with all the afterschool activities and church activities, it is always so late when the kids are ready to practice.  Tess gets so tired and sometimes I just know we've waited too long and that even bothering to get the instrument out would be a waste of our time.  I am really worried about our time management in this family.  It's my fault... but I am not seeing alternatives.  I feel like I've done the best I can, and its not good enough.  Anyway, I need to cut out all the committments I have that are just basically, as David, calls them, "Time-Sucks". And I need to listen to my mom's advice when she reminds me "You can say NO!" 

Julien is in a state of confusion about her instrument choice for orchestra.  The school is "fitting" children for instruments-- letting them see all the options.  Perhaps I was because I told Julien that finding a cello teacher would be easier, she is now making noises about possibly just switching to cello.  I don't know what to think about this. I don't really care that much about it, although I do feel that i am more able to help her if she chooses viola because of my time spent with Tess already.  But it is ultimately up to her.  She says she will decide ASAP. She knows that I lose patience with indecision.

School starts tomorrow

Even though it was Labor Day here, the kids still had their piano lessons.  Tess is supposed to work more on memorizing note names.  Jules was assigned a new song.  Progress continues, slow but steady on that front. 

We didn't get to the strings until after dinner.  Jules is doing better with all her Twinkle variations.  Tess was not into practicing tonight.  Her technique was pathetic at times, and whenever I gave her a helpful bit of advice like "Hey, watch your bow!" she would  **ROLL HER EYES** at me.  Good grief.  She is seven going on thirteen I suppose.  But doesn't she look like an angel with me here?...

Anyway, they are all just excited about the first day of school and minds were elsewhere.  Poor Jules has to get up at 6:30am now, so it will be very difficult getting the kids to wake early tomorrow, after spending a summer sleeping in till all hours.

Graham goes back to preschool on Thursday, when my teaching at EMU begins again.  He is sad because his "girlfriend" Hayley graduated from preschool to Kindergarten and he is going to miss her.  He's hoping to find a new lady love right away though.  Such a Casanova.