IrishOboe

Now that I know I’m coming back, I’m getting terribly excited about going home to see everyone, watch my friend get married, chill out at the Maggie, talk late into the night with my mommy, eat dinner as a family, etc. etc.  I don’t think I’ll be thinking about it much this last week, however.  It’s my day of rest and I still feel the weight of decisions and planning and preparation that must be done for my return before I leave.  Maybe I just like being in a perpetual state of worry.  It’s a habit at least, and no sooner does God prove himself faithful in one thing than I turn and start to worry that I’ll mess up the next thing.  On my barefoot run today I was surprised that I could go over two miles with nothing hurting (feet, muscles, knee) and realized that I’ve not been doing much but a little here and there is the perfect formula for growth.  Is there anything in nature that doesn’t build up slowly over time?  Sure, destruction can happen quite suddenly, but something constructive?  It all takes the tiniest bit by bit over time.  So, if that’s how God designed nature, then why should he not work the same way with us?  The point is I can’t expect wild leaps of permanent progress but should simply be faithful in the daily, seemingly insignificant trials and trust that God will use them to build up a true daughter of God.

One such little thing is misplaced passion and my tendency to rant.  Stephan was right that I overreacted to Dobson’s dating advice, and though I appreciate the essay’s I’ve received I think it put a focus and a spin on the discussion that wasn’t necessary.  I think I knew it as I typed it up, but I wanted to rant and I wanted to want to rant.  It scares me and makes me incredibly sad to know that there are a number of times a day that I don’t actually want to want to do what I fear God is asking me to do (or not do).  It’s funny what games my mind can play so that I don’t fully realize it until it’s too late, but I started writing to give you an update not another look into my psyche.  I’m taking baby steps, though, and to avoid going on a rant I’m going to tell you that I want to rant but I’ll do my best not to.  You can rate my performance on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 is best) and give me your helpful comments.  I predict my family will rate me higher since this is one topic they might have more passion for than I do: children and church.  The blood is running from my arms already, I do not know how to be fair!

Due to the long and separate nature of the essay I’ve decided to give it its own post.  Please see this to read and give your rating.

I was going to say I don’t have time to respond to the interesting debates on this blog yet and don’t want to get behind with my updates, but since I just took to hours to write about children in church you’ll see that it is a lame excuse.  Thank you all for writing, and when I take the time (which I want to, really!) I will respond.  Still, now I need to write about the busy week!

Monday (June 11) I had a great rehearsal with Anne for my audition.  She was impressed with the progress I made.  Progress is what I do best.  Too bad you can’t show that in an audition or job interview.  That evening I went to the first non-early music concert at the Musik-Akademie.  My friend Sarah was playing harp in the Debussy trio (flute, viola, harp) and it was fun to watch her.  She played beautifully and it was a fun piece.  As for the rest of the concert, I’m afraid I still find old music more interesting than kinda-old music, though both are better than kina-new music.  It was my intelligent way of speaking that got me into grad school. ;)

One of those days I stopped to watch an amazing Swiss sight at Bankverein, a busy intersection of trams, cars, bikes, and people.  The whole center was ripped up except the actually tram tracks and about fifteen men were working in and around it while traffic flowed nearly the same as usual!  When a tram came (which was at least every minute) they all hopped out of their wholes to let it pass then hopped right in again afterwards.  The whole situation of construction and traffic control was fascinating.  I’m glad I waited around because my old friend Val from my first inlingua class saw me and we arranged to meet for coffee before I left.  We enjoyed that Thursday.

While I’m talking about Swissness, a hip teenager boarded my tram with his cell phone blasting music.  He got the stare but nothing changed for a few stops.  Then a man boarded and promptly went to the youngster and said something that I could not repeat but understood perfectly (it only doesn’t work with taxi drivers in Paris, but I haven’t written that up yet, have I?).  The boy promptly turned down his music.  So far, excepting that I was in a tram and the exchange wasn’t in English, the scene could have happened in America.  As I predicted, after the old man sat down the boy pulled out his phone again and adjusted the volume, only instead of turning it right back up like an American teen would have done, he turned it off!  Wow, it must be tough to be a rebel in Switzerland.

Wednesday my harp lesson was only so-so and the same for my fiddle lesson with Baptiste.  It was so-so because of my playing and it put a little extra pressure on me.  I let it all go in dance class and at the beautiful medieval concert afterwards.  I sat there dreaming whether I’d ever give a concert in that place.  At the time I didn’t know.  I suppose I still don’t really know for sure.

Thursday I played a run through of my pieces for CY and he seemed quite pleased and helped me pick the order for the audition.  I actually played everything nearly the best I’d ever had and was quite pleased with myself.  I knew I shouldn’t get too cocky, but CY wore this grin the whole time . . .

Sadly I didn’t play that well on the audition Friday, but considering that consistency is the last thing to come when becoming skilled at an instrument, I played as well as I could have hoped.  I had a bit of a panic in the harp room before hand because I couldn’t get the harp tuned and it all took longer than I expected.  Remember, I’m not seasoned in the routine of preparation for these instruments!  I know what I need to do with oboe, but . . .  Praise God nothing catastrophic happened and I was able to focus on playing and not on technical problems.  Fiddle went quite well, but harp was a bit interesting.  Perhaps then it wasn’t so unfortunate that Heidi was stuck at customs for an hour.  The Swiss just decided to flex their muscles and even though she left plenty of time to arrive from her home in Germany she just arrived as I finished my harp pieces.  I played alright, but I had to do some improvising around some mistakes.  It just wasn’t as solid as I’d played for CY, but I laughed quietly to myself and kept going.

When I first walked into the room (okay, so it took several trips with harp, stool, music, fiddle etc.) the head of the medieval department introduced himself to me in German I responded in kind, only I haven’t done introductions recently so I kind of hid not knowing what to say in a mumble.  It apparently worked since he said I spoke good German and thereafter the whole interview was conducted in German except once when I felt I couldn’t express an ideal well enough in German.  For the record, the judges other were my harp teacher, my fiddle teacher, CY, Ken, and a student.

After playing my pieces CY asked me to identify some intervals he played on the lute.  I botched the first one, but I got the rest (and he made sure to include a number of the one I missed again to show that I really could tell a minor sixth from a screaming cat).  I sang intervals attentively, but correctly and only missed one note in the dictation, which was thankfully only melodic.  Then came the questions, and I didn’t really give a good global picture of my goals because, well, I was just trying to answer the questions and it was in German!  They seemed satisfied enough, and I did try to ask that I have a double hauptfach in fiddle and harp rather than having to choose one as my main.  I’ve yet to know how that will turn out.

So that was that, I stopped by a chocolate store to buy a treat for myself and went home to update my faithful blog community on the situation.  I think it’s not so hard to leave an ocean away and then I think about doing it without internet and it’s unimaginable.

I helped Catharine clean the blinds of her school for a bit, but didn’t do much before I had to go to Friday night worship/prayer time.  I decided to check my email at the school and lo and behold CY had sent an email three hours after my audition to let me know I’d been accepted!  To think I left my house only minutes before he sent the email and spent two hours with the information sitting in cyberspace.  I’m not complaining, though.  I remember running out to the mailbox everyday waiting to hear from Eastman . . .

Full of the good news which still hasn’t really sunk in yet, I biked to worship and enjoyed singing the praises of God.  Mary had brought me cookies to celebrate.  She knows me too well. :)  I felt very loved.

Saturday was the big Allgemeine Schule parade in the city.  Tax dollars fund the school (community education part of the Musik-Akademie) so they’re required to show the city once a year where the money is going.  Every class paraded around the city and stopped to perform in various places.  I joined my renaissance dance class for the second dance performance of my life.  The first was in my last year of college with my Irish dance class.  As you can see from the picture, the costume was nearly as ridiculous . . .

Here we are dancing the “Caccia d’Amore” and I am chasing my partner who is running from me.  In the end my magnificent manly charms win her back.  Oh, the purple hat and pink feather didn’t make you think I was a man? 

It was a fun time and we did alright.  I’ve really enjoyed the class for a number of reasons, but I particularly enjoy it because it is one of the few consistent connections I have with the Swiss community.  I’ll need to make a conscious and early effort to get involved in something when I come back so I don’t live in a school-church bubble.  I’ll miss those guys.

After the fun was over I went to dinner with two families from church and we had a lovely time eating a barbeque outside and chatting.  It was nice to relax without a care.

Today (Happy Father’s Day!) I played in church and I’ve already written about the service, but it was very sweet that during the announcements of who’s leaving the pastor mentioned that I’d be leaving but coming back because I passed my audition and the church broke out in applause.  I feel loved.

After church I went with Nigel to the home of another church family and had quite a lovely time.  The Romanian mother really pulled out all the stops for us so I felt bad that I hadn’t brought anything for them only was allowed to help a little with the serving and washing up until I spent nearly an hour with one of their sons playing music.  It was great fun for all of us and I’m reminded again why I love to teach.  I’d just love to earn my keep here in Basel teaching.  The seven-year old boy played a piece for me called Es Schneit.  He started piano earlier this year, so imagine four quarter notes against a whole-note left hand and played in the irregular and pounding way most students play and you have a good picture of what I heard.  I couldn’t resist seeing how he’d respond to some musical instruction (not note and technical instruction).  I can never remember exactly what I do when I’m teaching nor how ideas come to me, but I talked about how the song was about snow and what snow might sound like and played the piece a few different ways asking him which one sounded like snow.  I asked him to give it a try and after a few tries he was able to break his old way of playing and experiment playing detached and light.  I think asked how hail would sound like or thunder and very creatively changed octaves and articulation to match.  It’s easy to teach when you have a good student.  We played around with different piece and different ideas and I was pleasantly surprised how he always played more in time and more beautifully when he had an idea in his head rather than just playing the piece.  It made a world of difference!  Of course he was silly sometimes, but mostly I kept this 7-year-olds attention as we discovered the possibilities of music together while the family looked on.  I could get elated at how fun and easy it is to teach, but the kid has talent.  He learned the first bit of Für Elise by ear and often when I was working on style with him he’d look away from the music and his hands and stare at me while he played.  I told his parents not to worry that he doesn’t like to read music too much but spends his time composing and playing by ear.  Oh that all music teachers valued play and composition!

Well, we had other good times, but I’ve written enough.  I’ll just say that the Romanian mother had been stuck in Romania with her father and brother for four years before some pressure from the US allowed them to leave and join their mother in Switzerland.  It was good to be reminded that the US actually has done some good things, but even more moving to meet someone in person who was affected by communism.

When I got home I went for a barefoot run, which was lovely aside from the strange black gunk that attached to my feet . . .  Now I’ve spend about three hours typing at the computer.  Looks like the France trip I never wrote up will have to wait until I’m back in the states.  I’m just managing to keep up to date and I’d prefer to comment on the great discussions that are going on then try to decipher my notes from weeks ago . . .

Blessings!

P.S.  All you smart people.  What is going on up there?