Music I Love #1

So, in my blog resolutions, I promised more posts, and about one per week about music.  Talk about fail - I haven't even done one yet! So here is the first one.

This is the Serenade by Richard Strauss.  It's written for an ensemble of thirteen instruments (two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, and contrabassoon or string bass), and is usually performed without conductor.  This is one of my favorite pieces of music, and I've been fortunate enough to play it a couple times already.  The first time, it was my first time playing anything with other serious musicians, even though we were all in high school at the time, and thus it was unforgettable.  The second time, I played it at the Youth Orchestra of the Americas in one of their chamber concerts.  It was really fun to play together with musicians I had only played with previously in orchestral settings.  And finally, one of my chamber ensembles is hoping to add a few people and perform this, maybe later this semester or next year sometime.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! Listen for my favorite part at 8:00.  How I love the way those melodies overlap...

Until next time!

Lauren

What I've been doing in the past two weeks

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been super busy in the past few weeks, which is why I haven't had a chance to write anything.  Here's what I was doing:

Shortly after my last post from northern Virginia, I took an all-day train back to New Haven.

The next day, I had to get up bright and early to take the commuter rail train to New York for an audition for a summer festival.  I took the excuse to visit for a while with one of my best friends, D, who I don't get to see very often.

Then, classes started that Monday.  This semester I'm super busy.  First, I'm working seven hours per week at two different public elementary schools, which doesn't sound like that much, but it's all super early in the morning - I have to leave my house before 7:30 or I'm late for work.  I also work as a TA for one of the School of Music classes, so that's another three hours per week. Then there's my classes, which together amount to five hours.  I'm taking two real classes this semester: instrumental arranging and Portuguese poetry.  The arranging class will be quite a bit of work, but should be fun - I really like making arrangements! I'm not that interested in poetry, but I love Portuguese, so I relish any opportunity to practice it.  Finally, I have a ton of rehearsals.  In addition to orchestra, which rehearses about eight hours per week, this semester I am in two chamber groups, so I have another six hours for that.  I hate to complain about this because I signed up for it myself, and I love all the activities I'm taking part in, but it still is a lot of work.

Then the auditions started again for real last weekend.  On Saturday, I had another audition in New York City.  Because a bunch of other Yale students were auditioning for it as well, I had company on the train ride down.  Afterwards, I was lucky enough to meet up with D again.  We enjoyed some delicious miniature beverages, but soon I had to be on my way.  I had to get back down to DC that night, because of the impending Inauguration Day traffic.  I got to relax and spend a lot of quality time with my parents on Sunday and Monday in preparation for my first doctoral audition on Tuesday, at the University of Maryland.  It was so nice to be at home with just my parents.  I can't even remember the last time I was home and neither of my sisters was!

My audition on Tuesday went pretty well, but I'm notoriously bad about judging my own playing, so really who knows.  On Thursday I had University of Georgia, and then on Thursday night I flew back to New York and took the train to New Haven.  I got back to my dorm room literally as the clock struck 4am.  I also had a concert on Friday night, yet somehow managed not to die of a caffiene overdose!

Now I have a few weeks off of auditions, though I still have all my normal school work to take care of.  My next audition isn't untill February 2.  But don't worry, I'll write again before then!

Until next time!

Lauren

5 Things I Learned in 5 Hours in Georgia

Hey, guys! I know I haven't posted in a long time, but I'll get to that later.  Right now I'm in Athens, Georgia, for an audition I'm taking tomorrow.  I have barely spent any time in the south, so there were a number of interesting things that I discovered even in just a few hours here.

1. There are chains everywhere!  You know those signs on the side of the highway that say what gas and fast food is available at each exit? I swear, at every exit on the highways I took to get here, they had to have two whole signs because there were so many different places.  And now there are a ton of different chains surrounding my hotel for at least a mile in every direction.  I'm going to take advantage of this tomorrow.  I'm definitely eating some Chick Fil A for lunch, since we don't have it in Northern Virginia or in Connecticut!

2. Most people don't have southern accents.  I kind of expected that everyone would, but really they don't! Even the people at the hotel have generic accents, and only a few of the radio announcers I heard on the way here had even the slightest drawl.

3. Kroger is the best!  My hotel room for some reason has a microwave in it, but that's great for me! Instead of going out to eat, I went to the grocery store and picked up some dinner, plus some snacks and fruit for tomorrow.  Kroger was the best grocery store I've ever been to! It was like, normal grocery store mixed with Whole Foods.  They had everything you could imagine, plus lots of types of prepared foods.

4. You totally need a car here.  It took me an hour and a half to get here from the airport and there wasn't much on the way.  Even here in the "big city" of Athens, there is only a 5x5 block of "downtown."  When I'm in New Haven, I always complain about not having a car, but at least I can get around to everything I need to!  Here I really don't know how anyone could live without a car. You would even need one to go to the grocery store!


5. You know that G symbol that I thought was for some pro sports thing?  Apparently it's the logo of the University of Georgia.  Even though I'm applying to go here for a doctorate, I had no idea that that G was for Georgia until I saw it on an ad for UGA in the Atlanta airport.  Oops... I guess if I do end up living here, I will learn a lot about sports.

Hope that gives you a little insight into my feelings on my trip to Athens, Georgia!  I'll try to post more regularly, but I have a lot more auditions in the next few weeks, so I can't make any promises.

Until next time!

Lauren

Making Pasta

The other day I went over my friend T's house to make homemade pasta! I'd never done it before, but I really enjoyed it, and the pasta tasted absolutely incredible!

 T had made the pasta dough ahead of time.  If memory serves, she said it's basically just flour and water, but you can find tons of recipes for pasta dough online.  She had to let it set for a while before it was ready to roll out.  By the time S and I got there, it was all ready to go.

T was in charge of rolling the dough out with the rolling pin, as you can see in the picture, and S and I were in charge of pressing it in the pasta machine.  Please excuse my somewhat crazed look in the photo on the left.  There were many different thicknesses possible with the pasta machine roller setting.  We started with 1 (the thickest setting), and gradually moved up to 4.  We rolled each section of the dough three times on each setting, and only twice on #4.

After that, it was time to cut the actual pasta.  We rolled it through another part of the pasta making machine to cut it into strips.  It was definitely a three person job! I am very impressed but thankful that S was able to take a picture at this point.

The pasta needed to dry for a few minutes before it was ready to cook.  We used a staple of every woman's laundry room for this purpose.

Finally, the noodles were ready to cook! Here they are alongside the delicious homemade tomato sauce we cooked.

Ready to eat!


















And for your animal friend of the day, here is a picture of T's beautiful dog! She is a wiry haired Ibizan hound - not a breed you see every day!

Until next time!

Lauren

What to Expect in 2013

I just wanted to you know what to expect from my blog in this year of 2013.

-I'll post about once per week about what's going on in my life in a general way.

-I'll also do separate posts once per week about recommended music to listen to, with embedded videos.

-I will be doing about two posts per month about my "25 things" goals for this year.

-Once I start training, you'll see updates about my progress towards running a 5K

-When I travel, you will see blog posts about what I'm doing, hopefully with lots of pictures! I don't know yet if I'll be going anywhere but I hope at least one more Brazil trip is in my future.

Do you have any other suggestions about what could be nice to see on this blog?

A cute little piggie to brighten your day:

Lauren

A Look Back at 2012

Ok, I know I already posted my New Year's Eve post yesterday, but I thought it might be interesting to write a little snippet about what happened each month this year.  (AKA, I know I'll forget promptly what I did, so it would be good to write down at least some of it for posterity.)

Visiting NYC with Yuri in January

January -  Yuri was still visiting me for most of this month.  We were living in my dorm room in New Haven, where it was super cold, and doing tourist things in NYC, and eating out a lot.  I was very happy to have him there, but very sad because I knew he would be leaving very soon.

Eating Louis' Lunch in February

February -  This was a tough month.  Yuri had just left and I was in the throes of a lot of difficult schoolwork for my music history and Portuguese classes.  The weather outside really was frightful and I felt very gloomy and alone in New Haven. :(  I did, however, discover a wonderful New Haven establishment known as Louis' Lunch.  Louis' Lunch is the home of the first ever hamburger.  They cook it on vertical griddles and have strict restrictions about what toppings you are allowed to use.  They won't even let you put ketchup on! But rightly so, because they are the most delicious hamburgers I have ever had the privilege of eating.

Visiting NEOJIBA in March

March -  March was much better than February for me.  I took off a few days from school on either end of our two-week spring break and went to Brazil for three weeks.  Whenever I go, I work for an El-Sistema program there called NEOJIBA, teaching, performing with the orchestra, and doing other various musical tasks.  I really like working with my students, but of course the best thing was to visit Yuri.  Pictured here are the permanent horn teacher and the horn players from the younger of the two orchestras in NEOJIBA.

My older sister getting married in April

April - This was a super exciting month because it is the month when my older sister got married!  She and her husband had been dating for about three years before they got engaged, much of it long distance.  After the engagement, he moved to Germany, where she has a job, and the planned the whole wedding from Frankfurt! The wedding took place in Virginia.  We were all really happy that they got married, though I didn't like my bridesmaid dress at all.  They seem really happy with married life, so that's really sweet, but I haven't seen them since the wedding, because my brother-in-law is trying to sort out his visa status, and thus can't come to the US until it's all figured out, and my sister is so busy with her job that she couldn't even get time off to come visit us for Christmas!

Visiting Brazil, Yuri, and NEOJIBA in May

May - I left Yale on the first day after I finished my exams and went to my parents' house for less than 24 hours, and then flew back to Brazil for six more weeks.  There, I did pretty much the same thing as I did when I visited in March, except they also had me go visit a new "nucleo" very far from where I lived, to help with the beginning horn students there.  I had a great time as usual, though I worked my butt off!  In this picture, Yuri and I were enjoying our daily relaxed coffee.

The horn section of Music Academy of the West 2012
with one of our teachers in June

June - After my time with NEOJIBA was up, I flew to my parents' house, again for under 24 hours.  Then I was off to Santa Barbara, California, to participate in the Music Academy of the West.  During this eight-week program, I learned a lot through orchestral playing, chamber music, and private lessons.  I would highly recommend this program for anyone serious about making a career in classical music! I'm just sad I can't go back this summer - it conflicts with the summer chamber music workshop I'm starting in my hometown.

On the bus with MAW friends in July

July - In July, I was still at Music Academy of the West.  I got to be really good friends with two trumpet players, and we hung out a lot.  This picture was taken on the bus after we watched the fireworks on Independence Day from the pier in downtown Santa Barbara.  I think in July is when Music Academy got so busy.  By the end, I felt like it was another semester of school because it was so many weeks long, and so much work! I was usually playing from 9 am until 6 or 7 pm with very few breaks.

Harbison Quintet performance at MAW in August

August - In August, Music Academy came to a close, but not before I had two important performances within two days!  First, I had a solo performance of the Hindemith Sonata in E-flat, and the next day, my wind quintet performed the Harbison Quintet.  Both performances were very successful, which made a great conclusion to my time at MAW.  Afterwards, I went home for the last week of August, for the first week of true relaxation since before Yuri arrived the previous December.  In late August, Yuri and I decided to break up.  It was a mutual decision because the long distance was becoming way too hard for us to keep up.  Also, both of us were getting some great career opportunities and felt like we needed to be able to pursue them without outside influences.

Tubing with friends in September

September - On the first weekend of September, I chaperoned a trip of the youth group I used to belong to when I was in high school.  We went to a river house owned by one of the other chaperones. It was a pretty fun trip; one of my best friends from high school was also chaperoning  so we hung out a lot.  There was a lot of playing of board games and tubing on the river!  The next week, I went back to school, where I had to get down to business preparing for an audition for a professional orchestra that I was going to take in October.

Dressed as Tetris pieces in October

October - In October, my wind octet at school grew very close, and we ended up deciding to make a group costume for Halloween!  We made life-size Tetris costumes, and wore them to a couple parties.  They were super popular.  Also, at the end of the month, I did my first audition for a professional orchestra, in New Orleans.  I advanced to the second round, which was my goal, but didn't get any further because I was so stressed out about all the airports being shut down for Hurricane Sandy!  I ended up getting stuck in Louisiana for a week, during which some friends of an acquaintance of my sister took me in.  Coincidentally, the husband of this couple that I stayed with, is best friends with one of my good friends from both years I did YOA, and he had his recital while I was there!  It was great to reunite with an old friend, make so many new friends, and get to know a city I'd never previously visited during my week there!

Soup cooked by Sarah and me in November

November - In November, I did a lot of school work and preparation for my recital, which was in December.  I had a lot of makeup work from missing a whole week of school while stranded in New Orleans.  I was also very busy preparing for my degree recital, which took place in December.  Sarah was living with me for five weeks because of major issues with her apartment, and we started cooking together regularly, resulting in some delicious French Onion Soup and many nights of all-yellow dinners (macaroni and cheese, scrambled eggs, bananas, and orange juice).  At the end of the month, it was my birthday, so Sarah and I had a joint party - me for my birthday, and Sarah for finally resolving her living situation and getting a room in the same dorm where I live.

My recital in December

December - I started off December with my degree recital, in which I performed a huge variety of repertoire.  I think it went pretty well, but I have yet to receive my recording, so I'm not really sure yet.  A few days before this I restarted this blog, which I had pretty much neglected since 2010.  After one more week of classes, I returned to my parent's house once more, where I celebrated Christmas and New Year's, as you read about in previous posts.





So that was my year in an extremely large nutshell! Thanks for bearing with me.  Your reward for getting through this super long post is this photo of a guinea pig wearing a sombrero!

Until next time!

Lauren

New Year's 2013!

Well, here I am now, still at my parent's house, and missing my human friend,who left early this morning. Barfy, my dog friend, goes home tonight and I will be very sad.

New Year's Eve 2013 was the most calm one I've ever had.  But first let's recap my New Year's Eves since the end of high school.

2012 - My then-boyfriend Yuri came to visit.  We had been dating long distance (from Boston to Brazil) for about a year and a half at that point, and due to circumstances beyond our control, the only flight he could get arrived at Dulles at about 11:15pm on New Year's Eve.  We made it home just in time to run to the TV and watch the ball drop.  He was exhausted from over 24 hours of travel so we went to bed right away (thus the lack of photographic evidence).

New Year's 2011 in Salvador, Brazil

2011 - I was in Brazil visiting said ex-boyfriend for three weeks, arriving just after Christmas and staying until MLK Day.  We'd only known each other a short time at that point, with our relationship almost entirely over Skype, but we had an amazing time! I got to know his city, family, and more of his friends than I had met the first time I went to Brazil.  It was summer there, which meant it was super hot, around 100 degrees every day.  We went to a house party at this amazingly beautiful apartment overlooking the most beautiful bay in the entire world, and watched fireworks from the balcony at midnight.

New Year's 2010 in Guangzhou, China

2010 - I was in China with the World Orchestra of Jeunesses Musicales.  We took a 6-1/2-week tour all over the country, though sadly we didn't get to see Macau (one of the places I most want to visit), Hong Kong, or the terracotta soldiers.  We went to some very... unusual... cities on our tour.  For example, we spent Christmas about 2 hours away from the nearest interesting tourist attraction or medium-sized city.  But on New Year's, we were in Guangzhou, a city on the southeastern coast that has the third largest population, after Beijing and Shanghai.  Because the WOJM was based in Spain at that time, a majority of the orchestra was from Spain, so we followed a Spanish tradition at midnight - eating twelve grapes.  You have to eat each one as the clock strikes, and you get good luck for a month for each one you eat! As you can see, the grapes they provided were enormous, so I missed one or two.

New Year's 2009 in Puerto Rico

2009 - I was traveling with my family in Puerto Rico.  If my memory serves, we didn't do anything special on New Year's because we were all exhausted from the myriad hikes my mother "encouraged" us to do.  Here is a picture of me and my two sisters on one of those hikes.  I'm on the right.  I was trying to look tall...

2008 - For once, I was at home in Northern Virginia.  My friend Maria, who now lives in Germany, had a get-together at her house.  It was fun to hang out with all my high school friends again, and at that point, none of us were old enough to go out anywhere.  We had a really great time being silly and playing board games.  Somewhere I have some pretty bizarre photos of me from this night, but I can't currently find any of them.

New Year's 2007 in Costa Rica

2007 - I was traveling with my family in Costa Rica. It was pretty much the same as in Puerto Rico, where we did a lot of hikes and tourist things, and didn't celebrate Christmas or New Year's. This photo is the one my mom sent out on her "January cards" (they were sent out after Christmas, but otherwise were basically Christmas cards).

After that nice retrospective, let's return to this year. So what did I do for New Year's 2013? I stayed at home, had one friend come over to play board games, watch children's movies, and play with the dog and hamster.  This was in addition to the friend who was already visiting me.  So we played a modified version of Cranium (I won, yeah!) and then watched the first part of ParaNorman, meanwhile scarfing down homemade guacamole, pita chips with hummus, and leftover Christmas cookies.  At midnight we watched the ball drop, then polished off a bottle of the finest champagne $15 can buy.  My friend had to go home before 1 because she had to go home from her parents' house in the morning, so after that it was just a normal night.  I had a nice time, though I didn't take any pictures at all.  I hope a nice and relaxed New Year's celebration bodes well for a calm year ahead.

Normally, I don't do New Year's resolutions.  I think it's such an arbitrary day to start something new, thus the start of my 25 Things the day after my birthday.  But this year, I do have a few small, possibly a bit silly-seeming resolutions.

1. I resolve to keep my email inbox clutter free.  I always sign up for those email newsletters, thinking I will read them and then educate myself about whatever it is, but the end result is that I have to go through and delete dozens of junk emails every single morning when I wake up.  I have already started the process of unsubscribing from everything, and those that don't have an unsubscribe option are being directed straight into the trash can.

2. I will get a job this year.  I know this isn't necessarily something that I can control, but I really hope I can make something work out before 2014!  I mean, 2014 is the future, right? And yes, I do already have a job, working as a musician and teaching artist in public schools in Connecticut, but by job I mean a job performing music that pays at least half of my living expenses, and is not work-study or a stipend from a school I'm attending.  This is not totally unrealistic - though I've only done one audition for a professional orchestra so far, I did advance to the second round of three, and I had a lot of circumstances against me in the second round, which I'm using as an excuse for why I didn't advance to the finals.  I hope next time to make the finals, and by the end of the year, to win something!

Balalaikas

3. Become part of the blogging community.  I have been an avid reader of various blogs for the past few years, but I'm mostly a lurker.  I'm going to try to comment more instead of just reading and going on to the next one, and also get my own blog out there to try to increase my readership.  So please pass the address along to friends! (By the way, Beanilika is pronounced bean-uh-LIKE-uh, and was a nickname given to me by a friend in high school, since I was a vegetarian = beans and a musician who was interested in Russia = balalaika - a Russian instrument.)






I'll check back in about these in a few months and see how things are going!  Until next time!

Lauren

PS. By popular demand, here is a cute hamster photo:

That's what came up when I googled "New Year hamster".  Take of that what you will.