Month: March 2011

On Saturday night, we went to yet another Minnesota Orchestra concert (I don’t believe I’ve ever gone to see so many professional ensembles in one season). I am so fortunate to live in a city with such a great orchestra. I know that one will find some tremendous ensembles in any big city, but I believe the Minnesota Orchestra has to be one of the better orchestras in the country. 
Listening to this concert led me to remember the last one we attended, in which Lisa Batiashvili performed as the soloist. I’ve had some trouble legitimizing performing in my life, but her performance began to change my mind. I started to consider how I would be as a performer were I to be good enough to be a member of this orchestra. I’ve played in orchestras before, but I never have considered myself a very strong classical violinist. I wondered whether I’d improve simply by being in the other players’ presence. I imagine I would. I have had so many experiences in which the level of ability of the people surrounding me has directly influenced how I perform within that experience, on that day. Of course I remembered past choirs and musical ensembles in which I’ve been, but I also looked back on the various sports teams on which I’ve competed, too. I remember one day when I was playing volleyball on my league team. Our team was good, but not the best in our pool and certainly not even close to the worst. For whatever reason, on this day, we played really tightly together and communicated well. I attribute this to the other team’s being among the best in the tournament. I don’t recall whether we won the match, but I know we won at least one of the games. 
These reflections led me, somehow, to consider how the orchestra functions as a community. There are different sections of instruments who contribute their unique qualities and capabilities and who fill distinct roles. Depending on how one defines the term “language,” every community has one. And certain communities are large enough to manipulate their language in such a way that a dialect is used. One can learn the dialect when he or she spends enough time within that community, just like I might be able to pick up the nuances of a professional, classical violinist if I were allowed time in his or her community of instrumentalists.
If only I were good enough to be granted a stay. 😉
Does anyone else experience this performance phenomenon?


Band: Talking Heads.

Is there anyone out there who has a few suggestions as to how to go about starting to teach music lessons?
And, if you like Rainn Wilson, you might like the website he co-created with two friends of his called SoulPancake. You can find it at soulpancake.com.
Do any of you use Twitter? I am trying to convince myself to start using it, but I still haven’t. 


Band: Dearling Physique.

I was really sorry to learn about the earthquake that hit Japan. I followed the story on the BBC and on the New York Times site this morning, but I haven’t kept up with it since. I am also thinking of my friends in Oregon and hope that their weather doesn’t do damage. 


Band: Tennis.

I was fortunate and surprised to see a friend of mine who is also a music therapist in the cafe at my workplace today. She works in hospice, and will work with some of the residents I see at work. She and her sister are starting an artists’ workshop (all creative medium) soon, and I am already brainstorming about what kind of art I’ll bring to the first meeting. Ideally, I’ll bring songs I write, but that seems too intimidating for me at the moment. What is so great about the conversation I had with this friend today is that she reminded me that, when it comes to creating something (and I think it’s true that every part of your day is a creation of yours to some degree), someone puts out a lot of junk in the experimentation process before he or she achieves success with that particular project. I need that reminder on a daily basis, I think. A songwriter friend of mine back in Portland told me once, “You gotta start somewhere.” Of course. 

I enjoy scheduling my days very rigidly, and then becoming upset with myself if and when I do not follow my schedule. Today, for instance, I worked a half day. I have decided a few weeks ago to use my Wednesday afternoons to learn a certain number of songs and to work on my guitar technique. I seriously fashion a calendar in my head that has slots for what I do on an hourly basis. There are a few days when I accomplish my schedule, so to speak, but today I was really tired. So instead of reading for an hour I fell asleep and now everything is screwed up and I almost feel like the day is a loss and that I have to shift my schedule to fit everything in at all. Because I “write” a calendar that is almost impossible to keep, I find it very easy to be disappointed when I don’t accomplish it. But, how does a person get everything done when he or she doesn’t do several things in any given day? How does one get ahead? How does a person get everything done every day? (And I don’t even have kids. Or a pet.)


My Bandathaday: The Thermals.

I am happy that I am finding a small sense of comfort at work. I am becoming more able to use similar session plans for each group throughout the day (I simply do not have time to write different ones for each group) and am more able to adapt them for level of ability. And I smile. That works so well, so surprisingly well. One of my music therapy instructors commented that I had an uplifting and powerful smile, and it turns out I do. I will use it to my advantage– another tool, like my guitar. Honestly, Tuesdays are really long for me and my voice and body are tired, but I was able to pull through today. That’s progress– last week I was sick. Any tips for challenging days?
Happy Mardi Gras.

My Band o’ the Day: April Smith & The Great Picture Show.

I had the distinct pleasure to go downhill skiing this weekend, one day with my family, and the other day with friends of Thomas. I have been only a handful of times over a period of probably eight years, and teaching myself to do it again on Saturday was absolutely frustrating. On Sunday, however, I felt much better about my ability. I am very sore, but I am also preparing to run a race in a couple of weeks, so I had to run today after work. I’ve gotten to the point, luckily, where I consider running and physical activity to be more for my mental health; I feel so accomplished once I finish with whatever physical experience I’m doing. 

Drowning the beer bottles in cleaner

This weekend we also made some progress on our beer-brewing attempt. We are essentially done with our secondary fermentation and have started preparing the bottles for the bottling process. 
I’ve come across another blog I like, thanks to Thomas. The writer of “Dilbert,” Scott Adams, writes a pretty good blog (at least the few posts I’ve read have been interesting). It’s called, simply, “The Scott Adams Blog,” and you can find it at http://dilbert.com/blog/. Anyone out there read any good blogs? 


My Band of the Day: The Generationalists.

A few posts ago, I mentioned that I was curious about how I came to be a musician, as I don’t seem to be very musically inclined. Today I was surprised to remember that I like to perform. I had to be the “entertainer” for a couple of hours at work, as the hired performer who comes in from elsewhere could not make it. I was pleased with how it went, both musically and energetically. I don’t get much chance to perform, as music therapy is absolutely not music performance. But, as I am getting over a cold and it’s been a long week, my voice is really tired now.

On another note, March is (apparently) Music Involvement Month. And next week (I think) is Music Therapy Awareness Week. I had fun with some music therapist friends last night, leaving me even more excited to help create monthly song-shares and get-togethers with them. I’m somewhat lonesome as a professional.

I remember learning to reign as a horseback rider when I was younger. The most important piece of information to consider when reigning is how to distribute your weight, or at least that’s what I took away from my experience. The horse I had was very sensitive, and I remember that the best way to indicate to it that I wanted to slow down was to sit down, so to speak, on the saddle. To slow the horse down, I needed to relax my weight into the saddle, and even lean back a small amount, too. I love when I can generalize skills learned in entirely different contexts so that they may help me in current circumstances. Like today, I had a full day of sessions to lead, and though my voice is getting stronger, I still feel ill. So I decided that, instead of stressing out about session planning, I would take what I already have at hand and lead with it. Sit down and relax, in effect. That’s what I did, and the group about which I was most worried turned out to be the most fun and most interactive. I am happily surprised. I will hopefully continuously come prepared, but be able to relax into my ability once I’m ready.

I have gone a long, long time without being sick, and I’m glad for that; I feel completely useless when I’m like this. My voice is affected, and I could hardly do anything with my clients today because of it. Let’s see, I’ve been drinking nothing but water, I’ve been sleeping, taking NyQuil and Robitussin, I’ve been using ibuprofen for my headache, and have been consistently taking zinc and B complex vitamins. I am frustrated– because I (luckily) never get sick, or at least don’t lose much of my voice, I’m not very practiced in remedies. I catastrophize; I wonder if I’ll ever get my voice back. 🙂 I imagine I will… right?