The Big Reveal!

Before we get to what we have all been waiting for, let me tell you about our concert last night.

It went amazingly well. Giora played beautifully and the crowd cheered and applauded for what had to have been at least 5 min, which led Giora to play an encore. He played a Serenade in Bb by Bach; there were many tearing eyes in the crowd. The rest of the concert went great and the crowd gave us another standing ovation which we all appreciated. If there is one thing I can say about Fairbanks it would be that they love their classical music.

Now for the baby. First of all we got this brochure from the imaging place giving Beth step by step instructions for the day. She had to relieve her bladder at 11:30; check. One thing that Beth is good at is going. She constantly has to go to the bathroom (even before she was pregnant). Which made the next part of the instructions seemingly impossible. Drink 32oz of water over the next hour without relieving her bladder; she needed a full bladder for the ultrasound (apparently this forces the baby's head out of the birth canal).

So Beth comes to my school to pick me up, she is holding my Nalgene water-bottle and wearing a painful expression, kind of like a wince. We eventually made it to the waiting room, Beth sweating and walking like a penguin, trying to hold back the flood waters with all her might; and succeeding! We got there at 12:30, the appointment was for 1:00. For half of an hour Beth tried all the tricks in the book to hold it in. Pacing, crossing her legs, tapping her foot, cursing....the works.

1:00 finally roles around and Beth is starting to get angry. Sweat is dripping down her face and she is ready to cry. At this point she isn't even sure if she could make it to the bathroom. The nurse finally called our name at 1:10 and let is into a room, Beth laid down, got a belly-full of lube, and relished quietly in her success.

The actual ultrasound went great. Helga (not her real name but it fits her well) the technician went to work and ignored all the questions we asked her. The baby never stopped moving while we were taking a peak; a real performer. We got about 11 or 12 print-outs showing us the head, arms and legs, feet, a creepy face shot, and hands with beautiful long fingers. Well I guess you can't really say beautiful because it was like looking at a tiny skeleton hand, but baby parts are generally pretty cute.

Beth used the bathroom three times before we left the exam room (impressive), and headed to Denny's for a quick bite before I had to be back to work.

Oh yeah...its a boy. I have the pictures to prove it, but I don't think pictures of his junk should end up on the Internet before he's even out of the womb...it just seems wrong.

Cello, Baby, Names, and Lessons

One week from today Beth and I get to find out the sex of our baby. Until then, we remain in limbo and Beth remains unable to buy everything the baby could ever need (and more) in the appropriate color combinations.

As of right now, we have decided that the baby will sleep upstairs in our loft with us instead of the spare room. The spare room is currently my practice room, our craft room, and our library. Beth informed me that she is thinking about taking my room from me and giving it to the baby. I don't think so. It's very nice to be able to close the door to that room and work out all of the difficult passages on my own without having to worry about offending people's ears. I can play as bad, or as slow, as need be. Plus, I have no idea where our book cases, desk, sewing machine, etc. would go.

Cello is going well as of late. Minna has been traveling back and forth from New York preparing for a recital of her own which has resulted in the canceling of basiclly everyother lesson. This has been ok with me since my practice time has been limited by long hours at work. I feel that Minna expects a lot from me since I have a degree in performance, and I have been trying to live up to those expectations to no avail. Although I think I am gaining ground. At my last lesson she told me that "lessons were going very well," I'll take that for now. The good thing about taking private lessons is that you get to work one-on-one with a great artist who sees all of your faults and helps you to correct them. This in turn leads you to focus on what you do wrong and ignore the things you are doing right. So its always nice to get a compliment from someone who knows.

By the way, we're looking for a few good boy names. We have two girls names (Piper and Maya) and only one boys name (Owen). If you have any ideas, please leave it in a comment or shoot me an email.

My Snowball

Here is a recording of the Allemande from Bach's first suite. I haven't played this piece in 2 years so ignore the wrong notes. This is just a test for the Snowball mic that I got for christmas from my Father-in-law. Pretty good sound.

Internet Frustrations! (rant-tastic)

It has now been one month since the Internet guys over at Acetekk said they would come out and hook us up...they still haven't. We were told they would definitely be in our neighborhood on Friday. They better be hooking us up while in my neighborhood.

The weather gods have turned their smiles into frowns. +30 degrees last week, -26 degrees today. The temperature changes here are more than extreme here...I can't take this anymore. Two more summers to go, then I'm out of here.

On a different note, we have an ACO (Arctic Chamber Orchestra) concert Saturday at 8. I'll be happy for it to be over simply for the fact that there are just too many rehearsals packed into 2 weeks. I'm ready to get back to one a week with the FSO (Fairbanks Symphony Orchestra) next week. We have Giora Schmidt coming up for our next FSO concert. If you don't know who he is check out the video of him playing the Kreisler Recitative and Scherzo for solo violin on You-Tube. Come to the concert. He'll be playing the Brahms Concerto in D.

The ACO concert will be good as well, we have Massimo Mercelli who came all the way from Italy to play the flute with us.

On yet a different note, we had our first ultrasound last week and everything looked great. There is only one baby in there (**few**) and it is very active. It wouldn't stop moving the whole time the doctor was probing. Less than a month until we get to find out if its a boy or a girl. I'll keep you updated.

Saint-Saens Concerto

I have two weeks between lessons and a lot to accomplish in that amount of time. Although its double the amount of time, I know it will pass in a flash. I wish I could go back to the days of practicing 4 hours a day, then I would have this piece in no time.

I now have less than a month until I get to go home to Yakima for Christmas break. Unfortunately, since my cello is still unisured, it will have to stay here for the holidays. I am supposed to have a lesson with Kevin, which is going to be difficult if I don't have a cello to play and practice on. Not to mention I hate going anywhere for a long period of time without my cello. Its kind of scary leaving it behind, who knows what could happen to it.

Back to the concerto: I am working on sections F through H which starts the fast section. If you have heard or have played the concerto berore, then you know the section Im talking about. Im supposed to have it learned by the 8th. Wish me luck.

A life after work?

I work from 7:45am to 5:00pm, play in the Symphony, give cello lessons, take cello lessons, and play in weddings. I just realized that there is no way I could possibly do anything else like skate, or play on an indoor soccer team. At least Im making money and playing my cello I guess.

Now What?

The year is done. College is done. Its hard to believe that after 17 years of school Im finally done! The senior recital went well and now its time to prepare for auditions. Im also currently working on repertoire for a recording that I could use as a kind of calling card. Any suggestions? Oh yeah, im driving to Alaska in a week (I'll let you know how that goes).

Winner!

I finally picked a cello... and now the mammoth task of actually paying for it. It has an awesome bass register thanks to the Montagnana body style. The wood and the primary cut comes from Bulgaria, but it was finished in New Mexico. I got a great deal on it (it sounds like a much more expensive intstrument) and it is a lot of fun to play.

Cello Trials

I brought 2 cellos back from Seattle with me: a Joseph Fiedler made in 2006 and a Bernd Dimbad made in 2005. I picked these 2 after trying out at least 12 differnt cellos and driving almost 10 hrs total. Kevin played them and decided that neither one was worth the money. So basically I wasted a weekend. Here is a pic of the Fiedler.

On the Eve of Spring Break

It's finally friday! Midterms and auditions are done and Im getting out of Spokane as soon as possible. Im headed up to Seattle with Beth to try out some new, very expensive cellos; it's going to be sweet! We're also going to go to the EMP or the Zoo and do the normal amount of site seeing that you have to do while in Sea-town.

The weather is great today, so get out and do something!

Anxiety, Bus Rides, Panic & Relief!

Last night I decided that I should have a good night's sleep so that I would be totally ready for the audition...but of course I couldn't have slept for more than 3hrs. I finally woke up (got out of bed) and rushed out of the door, without the breakfast I had planned on eating, to the bus stop with my guitar, cello, and messenger bag. I barely made it through the bus doors becasuse of all of that luggage I was carrying, and when I eventually sat down I took up 4 seats.

When I finally got to school I let myself in to the practice rooms and set to work trying to practice all of my difficult sections. I finished 10min before I was to start the audition. It was at this point that I realized that I had left the programs at home and was forced to go upstairs and type out a new one.

The new program ended up having 3 typos and I left out two movements of the Bach. I ran downstairs and handed out the mediocre programs, sat down and, since my pianist wasn't there yet, statrted with the Bach. ( Now, at my last lesson, we decided that the Bach would go in the middle of the program because it is really hard to play when your nervous and your hands are tense, so naturally it went first )

Greg eventually showed up and we played the rest of the music. I tryed to do my best impression of a virtuoso cellist while still concentrating on hitting the notes, well...most of them. They deliberated for about 10min, then Kevin brought me into his office, and with a cold stare on his face, told me that I passed.

I still have a lot to work on but at least this stupid audition is out of the way. The Recital is set for Apr 21st, 2007 at 1:00pm...its official.

Audition Looming!

The audition for my Senior Recital is less than 24hrs away and I am getting a little nervous. I think that I know the music well enough, but my pianist and I have only had one rehearsal together. Its an hour-long recital and an hour-long rehearsal is not enough time for us to get everything together the way I would like it be.

I had a lesson with Kevin today, and he told me that I need to "come out of my shell." I have been trying to do that to the best of my abilities, but it takes very little for me to revert back to old ways. I really do want to actually play music rather than just the notes, and I know that I have done this before; I think that it has to do with the extent that I know the music.

Confidence. Confidence. Confidence.

On a lighter and much more pleasant note, after the Symphony Orchestra concert monday night I recieved a very nice compliment on my playing from my stand partner(whom I respect very much). I got another one from an exceptional cellist who works in the Music Office here on my playing of a duet in Debussy's La Mer.

I've been practicing for over 4hrs a day for the last 3 weeks, so I better be ready for tomorrow. Wish me luck!