The madness lessens
Whew, I made it through the first few weeks of Feburary alive. Now I'm done with UA Honor Band, All-State Orchestra and I've turned in all necessary scholarships.
All-State was a lot of fun. I went up last Thurs. with the strings kids, Dr. Boyd and Mr. Thomas (chaperone dad) at about 10am, so we got to Tuscaloosa around noon. Then, the strings kids had to audition for chairs, but I didn't because I'd already been placed, so I moseyed around, and chatted with Dr. Boyd and Mr. Thomas. Strings teachers are soo funny; they're very gossipy. By talking with Dr. Boyd, I got the low-down on every strings teacher in the state. "That guy had a nervous breakdown, that lady hates me and tried to have me fired, he used to be fat," and so on. It was really quite amusing.
There was quite a bit of rehearsing. We weren't as good as the Festival Wind Ensemble from the previous week that I had been in. Our conductor, Professor Keith Brown of Indiana University was pretty nice. He reminded me of David the Gnome though, so that was great for laughs. We play the Brahms Tragic Overture, 3 Bavarian Dances by Elgar, this cruddy arrangement of Mars, and premiered this new piece called Journeys. It wasn't too shabby, but it certainly wasn't great. We had a "Meet the Composer" session on Fri. and she told us about her past. She was like "I've never had any formal composition training whatsoever." It showed. Parts sounded like she had sneezed notes onto the page.
Other than that, it was a pretty fun. It was great to get to hang out with more kids like me, in that they are good, and interested in it. Like the principal oboe, Arthur, he and I were the only ones from both weekends, so it was great to have someone to chat with about how insanely cool Dr. Welker is, and how awesome his group is. It was kinda a bummer because Dr. Bridges was gone the whole weekend, but I did get to talk to Daniel, Principla 2nd of the UA Wind ensemble so that was good.
Now I'm as confuzzed as ever about where to go to college. I love it at UA, but is Ohio State better for me in the long run? Gah, I'm so confuzzed.
All-State was a lot of fun. I went up last Thurs. with the strings kids, Dr. Boyd and Mr. Thomas (chaperone dad) at about 10am, so we got to Tuscaloosa around noon. Then, the strings kids had to audition for chairs, but I didn't because I'd already been placed, so I moseyed around, and chatted with Dr. Boyd and Mr. Thomas. Strings teachers are soo funny; they're very gossipy. By talking with Dr. Boyd, I got the low-down on every strings teacher in the state. "That guy had a nervous breakdown, that lady hates me and tried to have me fired, he used to be fat," and so on. It was really quite amusing.
There was quite a bit of rehearsing. We weren't as good as the Festival Wind Ensemble from the previous week that I had been in. Our conductor, Professor Keith Brown of Indiana University was pretty nice. He reminded me of David the Gnome though, so that was great for laughs. We play the Brahms Tragic Overture, 3 Bavarian Dances by Elgar, this cruddy arrangement of Mars, and premiered this new piece called Journeys. It wasn't too shabby, but it certainly wasn't great. We had a "Meet the Composer" session on Fri. and she told us about her past. She was like "I've never had any formal composition training whatsoever." It showed. Parts sounded like she had sneezed notes onto the page.
Other than that, it was a pretty fun. It was great to get to hang out with more kids like me, in that they are good, and interested in it. Like the principal oboe, Arthur, he and I were the only ones from both weekends, so it was great to have someone to chat with about how insanely cool Dr. Welker is, and how awesome his group is. It was kinda a bummer because Dr. Bridges was gone the whole weekend, but I did get to talk to Daniel, Principla 2nd of the UA Wind ensemble so that was good.
Now I'm as confuzzed as ever about where to go to college. I love it at UA, but is Ohio State better for me in the long run? Gah, I'm so confuzzed.