Week 16: December 8

All the Conservatory orchestra’s regular concerts are finished for the semester, but the orchestra has a few other interesting functions as well. On Monday some of us were assigned to read for the orchestration class and conducting class. There were five students in the orchestration class, meaning five different orchestrations of the same piano sonata by Hummel (a student of Mozart’s). It was really interesting to read all of them and see the solutions each kid had found; each one had sections that worked and sections that didn’t. Some textures were idiomatic, proportioning the orchestra nicely; others were pretty clunky, and each kid had at least one really stupid-sounding moment. It was a new experience, and I found it fascinating to examine what it is that makes an orchestration work (or not).

Anecdote from the life of an Ian student: Tuesday I went up to the sixth floor for my lesson. Ian’s office opens onto the terrace, and when I knocked on the door, Ian came out and promptly instructed the previous student to walk around on the terrace while playing her piece (Wieniawski f# minor). The pianist was stuck in the room of course, but Ian left the door open (it was not a warm day) and the girl walking round and round, stepping up onto the benches and playing her heart out, with Ian all casual on the bench opposite, occasionally shouting encouragements, was a fine sight. Laugh all you want, but I tell you she sounded fantastic.

I seem to take a lot of SF vista shots while caching, but oh well, here are a few more. The GGB is quite pretty when lit, despite the blurry photo (can’t figure out how to make camera take night shots).

Sunset

Sun gone

I played in the last studio recital of the semester on Friday night, having contracted pinkeye the day before. It did not hurt, and since I always play shut-eyed anyways, it didn’t affect my performance at all – in fact I felt both movements were reasonably successful. However the eye looked quite dreadful even though it was mostly painless, and I received a lot of sympathy from my colleagues, which I appreciated. Myself, I found the whole business rather funny. (If anyone has tips on getting eye drops to actually drip into your eye, I’d appreciate them.)

Yesterday I was at the library, and as I walked past the travel section I had a whim to look through some of the Canada travel guides, just for kicks. I picked up some useful bits of info such as “Cars are driven on the right side of the road. Steering wheels are on the left side” and found a priceless description of Calgary which proclaimed that we are “blessed with a pleasant climate – low humidity, lots of sunshine and moderately cold winters, tempered by warm chinook winds” Chuckle, snort, guffaw. Whoever wrote that has obviously never visited Cowtown during winter. Or, as friend J put it: “It’s a very pleasant climate if you stay indoors”

Here, have a picture. This is the preface to a book of solo instrumental works, some written for cello and some for viola – or “tenor violin”. These were written back in the day when violists really were the underdogs in pretty much every genre, a stereotype they retain to varying degrees, and which leads to the phenomena known as Viola Jokes.

 - Antisocial Violinist