Feb 10, 2007 06:48
So, in about three weeks is the annual Music Festival at DSU, where music teachers judge the music you perform and give you a rating (Superior, Excellent, Good, Fare, Poor). If you get a Superior three years in a row, then you are eligible for a "gold" cup. The first year I got a Superior on solos and an Excellent on my concerto. Last year I took an Excellent on solos and a Superior in duets. Having a bad year last year has thrown off my chance of getting a cup, but I think I have a good chance of getting superiors on my solos and duets, and possibly my concerto. This year I have Mozart's Concerto No. 21, a Sonata by Haydn, a long solo by some modern french guy, a duet by Brahms, and a duet by another modern guy. Altogether it's close to forty pages of music, thirty of which have to be memorized. I've noticed over the last six months or so that the sustaining pedal on the piano was no longer sustaining well. It's gotten much worse recently, and I need it to be it's top so I can practice well on it right now, so mom called the tuner to come look at it. Turns out, it was just a loose! So he fixed that, tuned it, took care of some sticky keys, and my!-it's like having a whole new piano! It sounds much better, it plays much better, and the pedal is just GLORIOUS. It has awesome sound, feel, everything....and I'm SO HAPPY.:-D The guy told mom that for my level I should probably have a better piano to practice on. Know what that means? I NEED a BABY GRAND.:-D Unfortunately, those things cost about 15,000 (at least). Maybe I could win one somehow...
I entered a music competition this month. I'm to compose a song, which some lady in Vally City will critique over the next few months and give me tips on. As of May, winners are selected and perform in VC. I think this should be pretty cool. I'm not a great composer, but I want to learn, and this looks like a good way to start. I was going to submit my symphony on Dante's Divine Comedy, but it's written in my head as a symphony, not a piano piece, and my piano teacher wouldn't let me submit it because she said she didn't have a symphony to play it if I won. No fair.
Also on the subject of music... The Little Family Singers will be singing at a benefit dinner next Sunday for the Unruh family. Tibors took one hour of entertainment and Littles the other, so it looks like we'll be doing Irish music and musicals, with Dad accompanying us on guitar for some of the Irish stuff.
Also, we sing Ash Wednesday this year....which there should be lots of good music for, so that should be nice. Now let's just see if we can avoid singing heretical songs like "Ashes" while we're at it...
Meanwhile, students are doing well. Mary is being a pain, and I'm seriously considering dropping her. She's always disobeying me, thinks it's funny, insists I'm wrong in everything, and altogether causes me more grief than the rest of the kids combined.
Other than that life is fine. Up until this week, I was still sleeping poorly, but I got four good days and I'm feeling much better. I don't seem to be sleeping tonight though. I've been in and out of the doctors all week for a possibly unrelated to sleep pain... We'll see. Sibs are doing well, busy with school. Tim is very focused on getting in all academic requirements for Notre Dame so he can go there in a few years, and he often doesn't finish school until late in the evening. I'm tired so I think I'll try to sleep again.
This has been your Little news update. Ronky, signing off.
music,
unruh,
festival,
sleep,
competition