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Well, I'm back in Boulder. i had such a fun trip! It was pretty intense meeting people for only two weeks and then leaving. Things I missed the most while I was away was my own bed (yessss - no more air mattress!) and my own transportation (bike and car). It was such a pain having to either always wait for a bus or walk all over town!

Sunday was kind-of surreal. When I woke up everyone who was there the night before had left the Academy! Only a handful of people were left, but most of them left on Sunday too. Kate was also leaving on Monday - we walked down to A&W for lunch, and I used my free root beer coupon :). I slept all afternoon!! I was really exhauseted from the festival I guess. I woke up for dinner - I walked to a mexican restaurant with Kate, Brandon and Michiko. The food was pretty good, but the service was so slow! I spent the night packing.

On Monday I got up around 5:30 to get a ride to the bus stop. It was the chairman of the music festival who gave me a ride! I had fortunately remembered to stop at an ATM the day before to take out enough cash for my bus fare. Michiko also was taking the bus. I slept through most of the ride, so wasn't keeping my eyes peeled for whales like last time. Blast! So, no whale sightings for this trip. Maybe I'll have to come back next summer to continue the watch. The bus was late for the second ferry, and we had to wait two hours for the next one! Some people on the bus missed their flights. I got to the airport in timeto get through customs. They made me open my bow case and unscrew the bow at security - I never had to do that before! I had a layover at San Fransisco. Everything went pretty smoothly, except that they checked my bass onto the next flight after mine for some reason. They gave me a meal voucher, so I went and grabbed some Burger King with Jeremiah while we waited for the bass ot get in. Jeremiah was really great to come pick me up from the airport, my flight didn't get in until 11pm and then we had to wait for the bass. It was such a long travel day - I was really exhausted!

Local Loco's / Concert

Saturday was great, but also kind-of sad since it was the last day that I saw everybody. In the morning we got up and bussed over to the complex for our Mahler dress rehearsal. After rehearsal I had a lesson with Katinka the cello teacher! Here is a picture of me and Katinka after the concert. She had some great comments - I played the first movement of the Eccles Sonata for her.

Oh yeah - They put a picture of me in the loacl paper - the Powell River Peak. Click on the Photo Galery to see it. The festival also finally put up the roster for the opera orchestra. They should be putting up a photo gallery sometime soon, too. They took a bunch of pictures.

After the lesson I met some people at Local Loco's (where I went with some people on Wednesday for open mic night). I brought my bass with me! I had to walk for 20 minutes through the forest with it and a stool. It was worth it, though - I played bass for awhile for the people there. They seemed to enjoy it - nobody had ever heard a solo bass before. I played Eccles and also the Scherzando from David Anderson's Four Short Pieces. Patrick and Jenna also improvised some stuff - it sounded really good! Here they are - someone took a picture of me playing but I never got a copy of it. Maybe they will email it to me and I can put it up?

After I played I walked back to the complex with my bass - I got Patrick to carry the stool for me (thanks!), but going back was uphill so I had to take a bunch of breaks. On one of them I took a picture of my bass in the forest.

After I dropped off my bass I walked from the complex back to the academy to change into my tux. That was a long walk, too! I met up with Hessica and Christine there, who were getting a ride back to the complex, so at least I didn't have to walk back!

The concert went really well I thought. Mark said that he really enjoyed it and thought the basses were awesome. The picture below is the bass section after the concert with Mark. From left to right: Jared, Robin, Mark, Eric, Ray, Me and Kate.

After the concert the festival had a party for us at the Beach Gardens hotel. If I go back to this festival next summer I'm definitely staying at this place! They gave us a free beer and a bunch of food. I danced some - Christine had taught me how to salsa earlier in the week, so I made an attempt at that - haha - I'm not very good at it.Below is a picture of Kate, Mark and Ray at the party.

Masterclass / Faculty Concert

Yesterday morning we had a masterclass with Mark. Robin, Ray and Eric played. Mark had interesting things to say as usual. He was asking us how we did our thumb position vibrato - he's trying to make his wider. He's experimenting with keeping his thumb down or lifting it while vibrating.

We had Mahler rehearsal after lunch - it's starting to sound better but is still pretty rough. Hopefully it will come together for the concert!

After dinner was the faculty recital - it was really good. They played the Prokofiev Quintet, which is for violin, viola, bass, oboe and clarinet. It was soo cool - it really featured the bass quite a bit and Mark sounded so good on it. I think that I will order the music when I get back. They also played the Mozart Gran Partita Serenade, which also used bass (no other strings). The faculty here is really quite good!

Ok - I'm going to write about today tomorrow - I have to go back to the Academy quickly and change / take a shower before the concert!

Mock Audition / Beach Party

Thursday morning was free time for me because other people were getting private lessons (I had my lesson Tuesday morning). I practiced all morning for the Mahler and the excerpts for the mock audition. After lunch we had another Mahler rehearsal - it's not really sounding so great. The symphony is really difficult! Before dinner the clarinet, viola and cello sections gave a concert. The violas played a peice that was actually written for 5 violas - it wasn't a transcription! The cello section played a really interesting piece written by Pablo Casals originally for vocalists and then transcribed for cello.

After the concert and dinner were the mock auditions. We did them combined with the cellos - that was really interesting. There were 6 basses and 7 cellos. We drew lots to decide who whould play when - they intermixed the cellos and the basses. The first seven people played while the remaining six listened and wrote comments with Mark and Katinka (the cello teacher) - then the remaining six played while the first seven listened. I didn't win the audition but Mark told me that I played really well. After the audition we all went to the Beach Gardens (the hotel where some of the students and faculty are staying) for a bass/cello party. Mark and Katinka bought us beer - it was a good time. I asked Katinka if she could give me a lesson before the festival is over - she said that she would. She plays cello with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. I've never taken a lesson with a cellist before - I hope that there's time to fit it in!

Sectional / Workshop

Today was a less intense day of playing - I could have spent some more time practicing but I decided to take it easy for today. I practiced for about an hour in the morning and then we had a sectional (like a group lesson with Mark on the Mahler). Bass sectionals are always dissapointing - you don't really realize how out-of-tune the section is until you isolate us. I think that bad intonation in the bass section doesn't tend to come across to the audience like it would in other sections, but still, it would be nice if everyone could play in tune with eachother. During the sectional we also worked on spiccato, which is a certain bouncing bow stroke that is notoriously hard to do. Mark had an interesting approach to it where you focus on what your elbow is doing - I think that I'll play around with it more when I get home.

Mark played with the bass section during Mahler rehearsal today - that was pretty fun! It was great to have him there to give us comments on the spot. He's the only faculty member that has been playing with the orchestra - it's nice of him to do it! (he has played with us in a few rehearsals now when he is not rehearsing for the faculty recital)

After dinner was a workshop where the faculty as a group answered people's questons about auditioning and told stories from their own experiences, both auditioning and hearing auditions. It was really interesing, even though I'll probably never take a professional orchestral audition. Well, who knows ;). They also talked about the importance of stretching and exercising and being conscious of how you breath and tesnion in your muscles while you play. Then one of the violin teachers took us outside and showed us some yoga stuff - that was fun. After the workshop I walked with Isabel and Patrick to a coffee shop that was having an open mic night. They brought a cello and played some music - the people there really liked it! Especially the bach cello suites. I didn't bring my bass since we walked there, but maybe I will on Saturday when we go back - they are having some event there for Canada Day.

Woo - it's late! Time for bed :)

Third Lesson / Opera!

Tuesday morning was my third and last private lesson with Mark. We worked on the excerpts that I'm playing on the mock audition Thursday. It was a really great lesson - we really covered alot of topics and made alot of progress. It was nice to study with someone again for a little while!

Tuesday afternoon was another Mahler rehearsal, and I did a better job sight reading than on Monday. I still haven't had a chance to practice the Mahler on my own yet - I've been keeping so busy with other music! I'm trying to focus more on preparing the mock audition right now and will worry about the Mahler later in the week - I have to prioritize :).

Tuesday night was the opera performance! It was really fun - I think it went well. After the show the conductor had a cast party at his house and invited the orchestra. He had lots of good food and wine there! It was a good time, and I got to talk more with the vocalists. Another late night though - I'm getting exhausted! I'll have time to catch-up on sleep when I get back to Boulder, so I'm not too worried about it.

Audition / Crazy Opera Day

Monday was a pretty crazy day! I got up early to practice for my seating audition - around 6am. I had just started looking at the excerpts from Mahler the night before and was trying to continue to drill them into my head. When the bus got to the complex I had to audition right away because they scheduled an opera rehearsal to start a half hour after the auditions started. I think I played pretty well considering my lack of preparation - I had never played those excerpts before the night before the audition - haha! I ended up 5th - Mark told me that he wanted to rotate the section and put me in the back since I was a strong player.

After the audition was opera rehearsal and lunch. Then we rehearsed the Mahler in orchestra for the first time - it is so hard!! We had dinner down on the beach - it was pretty good! Here is a picture of us out near the ocean. We had ANOTHER opera rehearsal after dinner! We were getting ready for the performance on Tuesday.

I think I played for more than 10 hours Monday - I was totally exhausted. I'm lucky that I'm not having pain/soreness problems - alot of other people here are having problems with their arms, wrists and shoulders.

I never eneded-up finding my watch :(. I went to look for it on Sunday morning but I think the tide took it.

Day Off!! (Almost)

I'm getting behind on my posts! I'm writing now about Sunday. In the morning we had an opera rehearsal, which was so bad!! I was really out of it, and I think the rest of the orchestra was, too. I got up early and did a load of laundry, so I wore my pajama pants to rehearsal - haha! It was the first rehearsal with the singers. We aren't doing the whole opera actually - we are cutting the recitatives. The orchestra is on stage on the side and the opera is staged on the other side. Putting an opera together in 8 days is pretty nuts! The singers just got their parts two weeks before they got here.

On the bus ride to the academy from rehearsal we were talking with Ali - she was organizing a kayaking trip for later in the day! I was thinking of practicing for my seating audition instead (it was today - Monday), but decided to go kayaing instead. A group of eight of us went. The guy who drove the bus let us borrow his van to drive there! It was in Lund, which is a little north of Powell River. The picture on the left is Ray and Jared (bass players), and on the right is Ali, Patrick, Marissa and Laura (flute, cello, harp, trombone). We got four double Kayaks - it cost about $25 Canadian for three hours. The kayaks were really nice - they had rudders that worked with foot pedals. Here is us trying out the kayaks on land (I didn't bring my camera 'cause I didn't want to get it wet). In the right kayak is Christine - she drove the van also (and plays violin). Kayaking was so much fun! I was in the back, so I steered the rudder with my feet. Christine and I were really good at paddling - we kept on getting ahead of everyone :). We saw tons of jellyfish (we were kayaking in a cove in the ocean), crabs, seals (just their heads popped up), and bald eagles! We went around some small islands in the cove and then came back.

After kayaking we drove to the Laughing Oyster - it was a really nice restaurant in Lund. I had salmon and prawns, some Chilean red wine, and pecan pie for desert. It was so good! The restaurant had a great view of the sunset over the mountains/ocean, too. Here is a picture of us after dinner. I always get such bad red-eye!

After we got back I practiced for a few hours for my audition. I'll write about that tomorrow - It's late and I'm tired!

Concert!

Yesterday was our concert - it went really well! I'm kind-of disappointed that we're not going to play Shostakovich anymore, but now we'll start on Mahler, so it's ok :). Before we played the Shostakovich the conductor gave a really funny speech about it and the Mozart opera - he sounded really scatterbrained. I thought that the bass section sounded really in-tune for the most part, which was nice. Earlier in the day we had a dress rehearsal and were also going to have an opera rehearsal, but the conductor decided to put it off until today. At lunch I did some yoga with the cello section - it felt good to stretch some. I got pretty tan from spending so much time outside. I took the afternoon off from practicing and walked into town some - bought some liquor for after the concert ;). Last night I walked to the beach with some people (the ones in the picture below - that was at dinner before the concert - it is Patrick, Jessica and Christine) - there was no sand - it was all rocks about the size of my fist. I went in the water up to my knees - it was really cold!! I think I might have left my watch there - I'm going to go back today sometime to see if I can find it :(.

Masterclass / Easier Day

Today was a little less intense than usual. This morning I practiced for an hour and then we had a masterclass with Mark. A masterclass is like a lesson but everyone else form the studio watches. On this class Jared played the Bourees from Bach's third cello suite, Kate played excerpts from Don Juan and Brahms' 2nd Symphony, and I played the recitative from Beethoven's 9th and the first page of Mozart's 39th. I thought I played pretty well and got some great feedback from Mark.

I'm starting to really despise the stool that I'm sitting on - there is no padding at all and spending so many hours on it a day is really starting to hurt. I've been stretching during breaks, so my back and shoulders feel better than they have been. At the end of rehearsal today a photographer from the local paper took a picture of me and Kate playing bass - it should be in the arts section of the paper on Wednesday?

After dinner was the first faculty concert. It was really good! Mark played on a piece composed by the trumpet teacher and a Nonet by Spohr.