I went to Boston today. Four hours there and four hours back. You could spend that many hours on a transatlantic flight. But I went to Boston. Where there was a Nor'easter in progress. So I left my umbrella in a crumpled heap in a trash can in the Park Street T Station. I was so glad to discover that South Station had a bar so that I could effectively complete my post-audition beer ritual. The weather put me in such a foul mood (it was SUCH foul weather).
But now I'm back in NYC, ready for another day of oboe-ing! Today was my NRO audition. I had high hopes, but I played the Mozart concerto so badly that I'm afraid I'll be disqualified as an incompetent oboist... My excerpts went well. Really well, actually. I wish I had recorded them myself. The Scala di Seta excerpts were fine, really. I was especially pleased, however, with the Shostakovich excerpt, even though I took a few breaths more than I meant to. I played it deliberately and musically, so I hope Mr. Topilow (the conductor and director) will listen for that in my audition...if he gets past the Mozart. My English horn excerpt was fun. I played the Rodrigo Guitar Concerto excerpt, which I'd never done in an audition before. I think I played it really well, but my intonation was a little questionable. It's such a great piece and it's so easy to play musically!
With that said, I should move on. I am going to take the Nashville Symphony principal oboe audition at the end of the semester, I think. It conflicts with the opera at MSM, so that kind of sucks...but I'll live if I don't get to play in it this semester. I do get to play in Carnegie, and I'm thrilled about that!
Tomorrow I have my first coaching with Frank Morelli (bassoon), and we are playing the Nielsen quintet. I also have a repertoire class on Mozart's Symphony No. 35 and Prokofiev's Classical Symphony (which I played in the fall with the Orpheus Institute orchestra). Then we have our second to last rehearsal on the Ravel and the Berlioz! It's going to be a CRAZY week!
I don't have anything to review because I haven't been to a concert! I played in a piano concerto reading at MSM, and I just remembered what a good piece Mozart's 20th piano concerto is (d minor). The closing theme of the exposition is my favorite part of the concerto, but the whole piece is great (see 2:15 of this video).
Monday, January 25, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
Julie and Julia
I have just finished watching "Julie and Julia," which inspired me to update my blog, among other things. Those other things include eating, of course, and drinking a kir. Rachel tells me daily about how glorious Paris is...she tells me about the bread and the cheap wine, and she describes the fresh produce and the chocolate tarts, and she sends me pictures of the beautiful things she sees every day. In short, I find myself jealous for the hour a day that we are on Skype. And to make things even more irresistible, she is living in the apartment I once inhabited, cooking in my old kitchen, sleeping in my old bed. It's tough, because I want to spend time reminiscing, but I also want to let her have her own experience. So I hold my tongue as much as I can and I smile, letting her describe to me everything she is learning and discovering. (Maybe that's what it feels like to be a parent...I don't know. Whatever it is, it's a wonderful feeling.)
My heart is in Paris right now, with Rachel. She says, "But you have a whole life there!" No, babe, I keep myself busy here. I am making connections and spend every day working toward a career. But I don't have a life. My Friday night was spent at a reedmaking party, then stage managing a vocal recital, then (briefly) at a friend's house, where we watched a movie I'd seen already and didn't really interact with each other. My Saturday...well, let's just say that I got dressed around 6:30 to go to the grocery store and came straight home to make dinner. And then I watched that delicious movie. The food porn was lovely (all that boeuf bourguignon!), and the story was cute. Meryl Streep was again fantastic.
This semester has gotten busy. Our Sondheim concert last Monday was a roaring success! Completely sold out, Angela Lansbury was in the house as a guest with hundreds of New York socialites and musical theater buffs. I was so excited to be onstage behind such amazing Broadway singers and with Paul Gemignani conducting. He was down to business, rehearsing only until it barely held together (like dough), then leaving the pieces so they felt extremely fresh when we performed. I liked his style, and his band was incredible--Paul Ford is an incredible Sondheim pianist. Marin Mazzie was my favorite of the three women who sang; she gave a truly impassioned performance of "Not a Day Goes By" from Merrily We Roll Along. The oboe and English horn parts in Sondheim's music are often wonderful! The orchestration allows the oboe to cut through almost every time it plays, so Monday's concert was pretty rewarding...
Upcoming concerts: Next Thursday, Ravel Daphnis and Chloe (EH), and Berlioz Overture to Le Corsaire (Oboe 1), MSM Symphony. February 1, Strauss Serenade with Windscape (Oboe 2 to Randall Ellis), MSM. Feb 18, varied pieces including Bolero, Youth Orchestra of the Americas and students from MSM and El Sistema, Carnegie Hall! March 25, Mahler Resurrection Symphony, MSM Symphony, Cathedral of St. John the Divine.
Overall, it's shaping up to be a good semester!
Review:
Last Saturday, I went to a concert by The Knights. Grace Johnson, a recent MSM grad and now associate oboe teacher, was subbing with the group and invited all of the MSM oboists. It was an all winds program, featuring the Strauss Serenade and Mozart's Gran Partita for winds. The group started to play, and I was shocked by how good they were. Their intonation was incredible, their musical intentions clear, and their phrasings good. The clarinets were outstanding, offering beautiful interpretations as well as impressive technical work throughout the evening. The horn section sounded like any professional horn section, easily blending with each other and creating a solid foundation. Principal oboist Adam Hollander sounded fantastic in the Mozart, where he effectively maintained a balance between the role of the delicate soprano soloist and the strong high voice. The program was well suited to the group, allowing the strongest sections to display their talents, although there is hardly a weak link. I look forward to hearing The Knights in concert as a full orchestra in the future.
My heart is in Paris right now, with Rachel. She says, "But you have a whole life there!" No, babe, I keep myself busy here. I am making connections and spend every day working toward a career. But I don't have a life. My Friday night was spent at a reedmaking party, then stage managing a vocal recital, then (briefly) at a friend's house, where we watched a movie I'd seen already and didn't really interact with each other. My Saturday...well, let's just say that I got dressed around 6:30 to go to the grocery store and came straight home to make dinner. And then I watched that delicious movie. The food porn was lovely (all that boeuf bourguignon!), and the story was cute. Meryl Streep was again fantastic.
This semester has gotten busy. Our Sondheim concert last Monday was a roaring success! Completely sold out, Angela Lansbury was in the house as a guest with hundreds of New York socialites and musical theater buffs. I was so excited to be onstage behind such amazing Broadway singers and with Paul Gemignani conducting. He was down to business, rehearsing only until it barely held together (like dough), then leaving the pieces so they felt extremely fresh when we performed. I liked his style, and his band was incredible--Paul Ford is an incredible Sondheim pianist. Marin Mazzie was my favorite of the three women who sang; she gave a truly impassioned performance of "Not a Day Goes By" from Merrily We Roll Along. The oboe and English horn parts in Sondheim's music are often wonderful! The orchestration allows the oboe to cut through almost every time it plays, so Monday's concert was pretty rewarding...
Upcoming concerts: Next Thursday, Ravel Daphnis and Chloe (EH), and Berlioz Overture to Le Corsaire (Oboe 1), MSM Symphony. February 1, Strauss Serenade with Windscape (Oboe 2 to Randall Ellis), MSM. Feb 18, varied pieces including Bolero, Youth Orchestra of the Americas and students from MSM and El Sistema, Carnegie Hall! March 25, Mahler Resurrection Symphony, MSM Symphony, Cathedral of St. John the Divine.
Overall, it's shaping up to be a good semester!
Review:
Last Saturday, I went to a concert by The Knights. Grace Johnson, a recent MSM grad and now associate oboe teacher, was subbing with the group and invited all of the MSM oboists. It was an all winds program, featuring the Strauss Serenade and Mozart's Gran Partita for winds. The group started to play, and I was shocked by how good they were. Their intonation was incredible, their musical intentions clear, and their phrasings good. The clarinets were outstanding, offering beautiful interpretations as well as impressive technical work throughout the evening. The horn section sounded like any professional horn section, easily blending with each other and creating a solid foundation. Principal oboist Adam Hollander sounded fantastic in the Mozart, where he effectively maintained a balance between the role of the delicate soprano soloist and the strong high voice. The program was well suited to the group, allowing the strongest sections to display their talents, although there is hardly a weak link. I look forward to hearing The Knights in concert as a full orchestra in the future.
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
A New Semester
I remembered today how much I like to write. And I have been meaning to start a new blog. And it's the start of another semester. So here we are.
I saw Rachel off today at JFK, which is a LONG way from Manhattan. We took public transit because we had time and it was cheap, and it took us an hour from my apartment in East midtown. Her flight is in the air now, on the way to Paris, and I am reminiscing jealously. Rachel going to France may also have had something to do with my decision to start a blog...I so enjoyed writing blog posts while I was there, and I'm thinking about France a lot these days.
This is the first time I have felt the sadness and jealousy that a lot of people seem to have felt immediately after graduation. It makes me a little bit sad that I feel more attached to Paris than I do to Brown, but I think it's true. I miss the life I led in Paris. I am so jealous that my girlfriend gets to go and start out there with a blank slate! For me, the city is filled with memories and so many different moods. I spent so much time evaluating myself and putting my life together there in the spring of 2008; the city has seen the best and worst of me. I spent a great deal of energy scraping together my life after it fell apart around me, and I think I picked up a few pieces of Paris along with the scraps. It feels like an integral part of me; it makes me who I am.
I digress. The beginning of the semester means placement auditions have just occurred. Normally, that would mean that I couldn't possibly have a rehearsal until placements had been announced, but we have an all Sondheim concert next Monday, and so assignments were made in December. I am playing Oboe/EH in about half of the songs on the concert--the reed books were split, so sax and clarinet players will be covering the other half. There's a bit of nice solo oboe writing (thanks mainly to Jonathan Tunick, Sondheim's excellent orchestrator on so many shows), but a lot of what we are doing is fast and has few wind solos.
I'll find out what concert cycles I am scheduled to play in on Monday. I'm crossing my fingers about the Mahler 2 concert--it'd be really wonderful to play in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and there are four oboes...
My next exciting gig is the Strauss Serenade, Opus 7, for 13 wind instruments with the quintet Windscape. I'll be playing second oboe to Randall Ellis, a wonderful freelancer around New York. I'm pretty thrilled about this opportunity! These are great musicians, and I'm sure the opportunity to rehearse and perform with them will be spectacular.
Now for a mini-review: Rachel and I saw Turandot at the Met last week, the famous Zeffirelli production, and we both thought it was gorgeous. The sets and costumes are SO ornate and SO elaborate! The piece itself isn't my favorite--I think Puccini could have tinkered a bit more with the libretto before he started composition. I only found two characters likable: Liù, the loyal servant, and the blind master, Timur. Both singers gave beautiful accounts of the roles. Maija Kovalevska as Liù was clearly the star of the night, as the audience applauded her loudly at all of her many curtain calls. Hao Jiang Tian's rich deep voice offered superb characterization to the role of Timur. I was not unsatisfied with Lise Lindstrom as the Princess Turandot, but I found her voice piercing and sometimes shrill in the highest register, although extremely clear. Salvatore Licitra sang Calaf, the tenor role, and although he sang convincingly throughout the piece, he cracked the high note in Nessun dorma and did not receive any applause (due to a combination, I think, of displeasure with the crack and to the audience not knowing that the aria was over). As an oboist, I think it necessary to note that Nathan Hughes sounded lovely playing principal oboe, but I also want to mention Denis Bouriakov, the Met's brilliant new flute player. The brass had a few dicey entrances, which I think were the fault of the conductor, but overall, the orchestra offered a beautiful account of Puccini's lush score.
I saw Rachel off today at JFK, which is a LONG way from Manhattan. We took public transit because we had time and it was cheap, and it took us an hour from my apartment in East midtown. Her flight is in the air now, on the way to Paris, and I am reminiscing jealously. Rachel going to France may also have had something to do with my decision to start a blog...I so enjoyed writing blog posts while I was there, and I'm thinking about France a lot these days.
This is the first time I have felt the sadness and jealousy that a lot of people seem to have felt immediately after graduation. It makes me a little bit sad that I feel more attached to Paris than I do to Brown, but I think it's true. I miss the life I led in Paris. I am so jealous that my girlfriend gets to go and start out there with a blank slate! For me, the city is filled with memories and so many different moods. I spent so much time evaluating myself and putting my life together there in the spring of 2008; the city has seen the best and worst of me. I spent a great deal of energy scraping together my life after it fell apart around me, and I think I picked up a few pieces of Paris along with the scraps. It feels like an integral part of me; it makes me who I am.
I digress. The beginning of the semester means placement auditions have just occurred. Normally, that would mean that I couldn't possibly have a rehearsal until placements had been announced, but we have an all Sondheim concert next Monday, and so assignments were made in December. I am playing Oboe/EH in about half of the songs on the concert--the reed books were split, so sax and clarinet players will be covering the other half. There's a bit of nice solo oboe writing (thanks mainly to Jonathan Tunick, Sondheim's excellent orchestrator on so many shows), but a lot of what we are doing is fast and has few wind solos.
I'll find out what concert cycles I am scheduled to play in on Monday. I'm crossing my fingers about the Mahler 2 concert--it'd be really wonderful to play in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine and there are four oboes...
My next exciting gig is the Strauss Serenade, Opus 7, for 13 wind instruments with the quintet Windscape. I'll be playing second oboe to Randall Ellis, a wonderful freelancer around New York. I'm pretty thrilled about this opportunity! These are great musicians, and I'm sure the opportunity to rehearse and perform with them will be spectacular.
Now for a mini-review: Rachel and I saw Turandot at the Met last week, the famous Zeffirelli production, and we both thought it was gorgeous. The sets and costumes are SO ornate and SO elaborate! The piece itself isn't my favorite--I think Puccini could have tinkered a bit more with the libretto before he started composition. I only found two characters likable: Liù, the loyal servant, and the blind master, Timur. Both singers gave beautiful accounts of the roles. Maija Kovalevska as Liù was clearly the star of the night, as the audience applauded her loudly at all of her many curtain calls. Hao Jiang Tian's rich deep voice offered superb characterization to the role of Timur. I was not unsatisfied with Lise Lindstrom as the Princess Turandot, but I found her voice piercing and sometimes shrill in the highest register, although extremely clear. Salvatore Licitra sang Calaf, the tenor role, and although he sang convincingly throughout the piece, he cracked the high note in Nessun dorma and did not receive any applause (due to a combination, I think, of displeasure with the crack and to the audience not knowing that the aria was over). As an oboist, I think it necessary to note that Nathan Hughes sounded lovely playing principal oboe, but I also want to mention Denis Bouriakov, the Met's brilliant new flute player. The brass had a few dicey entrances, which I think were the fault of the conductor, but overall, the orchestra offered a beautiful account of Puccini's lush score.
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