Choral Orchestral Goodness Explosion Happy Fun Times

We finished the Ravel Daphnis et Chloe concert recently and boy am I glad it's over - I didn't find it too thrilling to sing, save the last section where it sounds like the wind in a storm (I didn't read the synopsis of the ballet, bad musician that I am, so I don't know what it's SUPPOSED to be, but let me tell you, I have never heard a better musical hurricane). The piece itself, though, is rockin'. As our director said (and I paraphrase) "There's not a movie composer who can touch Ravel's FEET." It is by turns ethereal, threatening, gorgeous, comic, dramatic, wild and perfect.

This time I also became very aware of something I've thought of in passing before - how unique and delightfully amazing an experience it is to sit on stage behind the musicians. It's 3-4 opportunities to watch and hear the process in its entirety. When you're performing you can't drift off like you can in the audience - even if you're composing the weekend's grocery lists in your head (a common occurrence) you have to be at least present enough to track where you are in the score so you can stand up and sing on time. And if you take the opportunity to pay attention you learn it better, hear it better, notice something new, every time.

I love that you can hear something new on Thursday and anticipate it every performance following. Every night I add something new to look forward to and to thrill at when it arrives.

I love that I can see the conductor's face and not just his back. Seeing their back from the audience you think, "What, they're waving a stick? What do you need them for?" But when you can really watch what they do from the front, it's unbelievable - you'd never again ask why orchestras and choirs need a conductor (and believe me, several people have asked me that question).

I love that I have the chance to watch new musicians every night - tonight the horns, tonight the bass, tonight the bassoon... I've actually come to enjoy instruments that never interested me much one way or the other because now I see them, hear them, now I can focus on them and know them. How AMAZING and clear and rousing is the trumpet when it's played with skill? And how can you NOT like the bassoon in all it's deep, yet nerdy and even kooky character - seriously? Timpani are not just some low drums that go boom - have you ever really watched someone play them who knows what they're doing? So fascinating! What a deft touch it takes. And I always thought flutes were kind of dippy and bland - NO. Spectacular and agile and soothing and flirty and piercing. In Daphnis et Chloe they're bird songs at sunrise.

Sigh.

Yar, I loves me books!

It has been years since I read the Little House series and as of recently, I own them all again and am really excited to reread them. Last weekend my roommate and I went to a used and new children's book store (I want to live in there and be that woman) and I was absolutely thrilled to find a complete set. I know you can buy them new easily at just about any bookstore, but this was both a matched set (came in a "fancy" cardboard box with illustrations on the sides) and an OLD set - it was the old blue covers I remember from childhood (we had a mix of yellow and blue covers). And the paper was all browned and it smelled like the used books we always bought when I was a kid. Big deal, right? Well, if you know me, you know my dark secret: I'm really particular about my books. It is almost painful to me to own a series of books if they're not all the same edition or if I don't like the edition. I will make do - I'm not quite hardcore (or wealthy) enough - to replace books I already own for the sake of matching a set, but I will try my very very hardest to buy the right edition. I have two sets (two of my favorite children's series, incidentally) where I have one that is out of place. It KILLS me. I also am pretty controlling about the condition. When I lend people hardcover books, I usually keep the dust jacket so nothing happens to it. I refuse to dog-ear pages and it's still hard for me to underline or write in books - even text books I don't like. I have a set of books I have owned since at least early high school, if not before, and they look brand new even though I've read them about 10 times each. Add to that a heavy dose of nostalgia (I LOVED my childhood books) and you've got a girl who has wanted this series for years but refused to buy a shiny plastic-wrapped set from Borders. When I have children, I may end up buying them their own copies of books I already have so that they don't scribble in them or get food on them or bend the corners of the pages. I will be the worst mother. But the best book mother.