Update from Florida

This is just a brief update on my doings here in Tallahasse. I started it last week, but it needed some tweaking before publication. It was an email in it's original form, so I've made it a bit more general for the "masses" so to speak, in some cases, and a bit more fleshed out in others. I hope it starts to give you an idea of what life in school is like for me, at least a little bit.

Dennis is doing well and taking care of Mom in Rexburg, the 4-plex, and anything else he can make mischief with. ::giggle:: Most recently he installed an invisible fence around our property to keep Cassie, our mini-schnauzer dog, ON our property. Next he has to train her about how to respond to it. We talk to each other over the Internet with video calls through MSN Messenger. Technology is wonderful even if it sometimes takes a 1/2 hour to make the connection work. He's coming to visit me next month for my birthday in about 3 more weeks. We're both looking forward to it. YAY!!

My classes are very interesting. I'm taking a German Lied class focused on Schubert, where I'm learning much about Schubert and his precursors. It's fascinating to hear the progression of the musical relationships and I really enjoy the format of the class. In addition to the lectures on the lives and music of one new composer each class period, we also get to sing to each other! I was assigned to be the first to sing for the semester. I guess they thought that because I was older and had so much more experience, that I wouldn't mind going first, and they were right. The song was "Rastlose Liebe" by Johann Reichardt. I had never heard it before, but I did know the Schubert version on the same text, so it wasn't too hard. Next, I sang "Der Wachtelschlag" by Beethoven. It was a little more difficult, but not too much. It was much harder for my accompanist, but she did well. The skill level of all the students here is VERY high, especially for the post-graduate degrees. The standards for entrance ensure that. My next assignment is to sing a piece by Schubert called "Epistel: An Joseph von Spaun, Assessor in Linz" and it's a doosey of a farcical, humorous/dramatic aria-like song on text that says "So why haven't you written us?" There are several sections to it: a big recitative, a lyrical melodic section, and then a fast coloratura section with 3 high-Cs! I guess it's my own fault. I asked the instructor to challenge me. ::grin::

I'm also taking a class in Vocal Forms. It's a Music Theory based class that is expanding my vocabulary beyond AB, ABA, AABA, and through composed, though every thing beyond that seems to be some derivative therefrom. It's a hard class mainly because it assumes much about the student's comprehension and understanding of basic and advanced Theory. I'm doing okay, but there are some vague and seemingly undefinable contextual terms that I can't quite get a handle on, e.g., just exactly how this teacher is using the word "phrase" in a very specialized way that seems to be synonymous with "musical sentence" that is very specifically made up of "segments" which he also call "phrases" that come in packages of 2+2+4 (referring to "phrase" or "segment" length in measures) or some multiple thereof. ::gasping for air, then continuing in fast speech:: Then there's the concept of musical "periods" that is made up of at least two of those phrase packages that are connected in either a contrasting or parallel manner. (Aside: I wish I could really understand what a "Bar Form" is...) Other than that, the Theory part I'm fine with. The teacher's mind is BRILLIANT, but he has trouble slowing it down enough to complete a sentence. So, it seems like he's mumbling most of the time. It makes it pretty hard to follow what he's trying to illustrate in his lectures. Add that to the constant struggle with the technology in the room (he's a technophobe) and you've got some real communication problems. The man's been teaching for 31 years (he told us that), and he really does have a lot to offer. It's just up to the students to find a way to coax it out of him. He's great one on one, but rolls his eyes when I ask for the seventeenth time about just exactly what HE means by the word "phrase." ::giggle::

The Vocal Area Coordinator waived my Vocal Pedagogy requirement, but I'm sitting in on the class anyway. I still have to include that number of credits on my program, but I can take some other class to fill them instead of Vocal Ped. I'll probably fill them with credits for German or Czech or...!) I think it's this teacher's first time teaching pedagogy, and I know exactly what he's up against, so I'm just having private study groups with individuals, as they ask for it, to try to help as best I can.

My voice lessons take up 4 credits of my maximum 9 credit load paid for by my assistantship. Can you believe it? That shows what a premium they place on it in this program. I'm really enjoying working with Stanford Olsen, but it has taken a while for me to get my voice back in shape well enough to really starting singing like I want to. It's coming though. He's introduced me to some music that I'm having a lot of fun learning. It's a Handel aria from Rinaldo called "Parolette, vezzi e sguardi" that has much coloratura work. He calls it "a bone that Handel threw to the subrette." That's ME! It sits well in my voice and will be the opener for my Diagnostic Recital that will be held on Nov. 14th.

I will be receiving my research and writing topic this coming week for the paper that I must submit before my diagnostic recital will be heard. They want to see if I can do those things: research and write. Most likely it will be something on French Literature because that's what came up lacking on my timed written diagnostic test that I mentioned in my last post. Yes, it was a timed test, which I haven't had to take for 20 years or so. Soooo, my skills in taking tests of that type are rusty, I admit. The French section was the last on the test and I simply ran out of time before I could write an "essay" on each term that I was supposed to define. Oh well. I'll get better at these timed tests with practice, besides, I was planning on taking the French Literature course anyway.

What I really enjoy though is when I get to teach my students. I have a couple that really need help getting into their head voice: one of whom must rejury at the end of this semester or she will be kicked out of the school of music! (Aarrgghh!) She's supposed to graduate with her BA in Music in the Spring. If she doesn't pass this jury, she won't graduate. There's not much compassion exhibited on her behalf by the faculty here. They assume that it's her own fault or lack of "talent". As I work with her, I believe, at least so far, that it's because nobody ever diagnosed the real problem. All her jury sheets just keep talking about bad intonation and opening the throat, but not one of them suggest that the problem could be her inability to access her head voice. They just failed her last jury and that was that. There is a nod to the fact that she's been with three different teachers since she came and that her last one wasn't really very good, but it's still the student's fault for not learning what she was supposed to. So, I guess that's why I'm her teacher this semester. I know what to do to help her and we've begun, but time will tell at the end of the semester whether it was her fault before now or the lack of good teaching that she wasn't allowed. I hope I can make a difference for her, but she does have to do her part.

Well, there it is. An update from Florida, even if it wasn't so brief. Stay tuned for more...!