Last Concerts of the Season

Just a few concerts left to finish this year's orchestra season for me. The first is this weekend. It's an amazing concert with Brahms Symphony No.4 and the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto performed by Midori!

http://www.arkansassymphony.org/concerts/midori-tchaikovsky/



Come one, come all. If you ask me I can probably get you in for free. You definitely don't want to miss this one!!!

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The other concert coming up the weekend after this is in Bartlesville OK with the Bartlesville Symphony Orchestra. We'll be performing works by Beethoven, C.P.E. Bach, and more.

Come join us next weekend and support the classical arts!!

http://bartlesvillesymphony.org/2012/05/altaft/



SEE YOU THERE :-)

Back in the Saddle

It's been over a year since my accident out in California. Here is a picture to remind you of my New Year's Eve in 2011. And no, I still don't remember any of it; just what my friend tells me. And I have no scar on my shoulder either, so it's just the lack of a few hours of my life and the pictures to remind me.



I've done some road biking since, but haven't hit the trails. Until this week!

A friend in the symphony in Little Rock found out I mountain bike and asked me to go riding. Of course I agreed and was excited to go back out on the trail.

So after a month of travel I returned to Little Rock and for the last three days we've been plowing through the pain, the exhaustion, the puddles and the rock gardens. It's been so much fun and I'm so glad to be back out there. Even doing Insanity workouts every day my body had forgotten how to be in mountain biking shape and I'm being brutally reminded :-/

But after everything, I've had the best time and today we stopped for a photo op at a beautiful covered bridge.

It's been a wonderful few days of hard riding and I'm getting back into the hang of things although my body is still trying to recover from the abrupt reminder of the single track. Hopefully the beginning of next week will provide one more opportunity to go out and hit the trail as hard as I can! 

And let's not forget the mud, blood and guts...ok, maybe just the mud :)

A New Venture into the BACKROADS

Much has happened since my last post.

I went snorkeling. I went cave exploring. I went boating. I went ATVing. I got badly sunburned.  I went swimming on a nude beach. I had a surprise stay in NYC. I lost two potential jobs. I stayed up for nearly 3 days straight. I helped fall a tree and saw it into firewood with a bow saw. I improved my 5 mile runs to under 10 min/mi. I did my taxes. I lost an accompanist. I made new friends. I lost a friend.

Yes, lots has happened. And it all seems a blur and a whirlwind of insanity until now.

I am submitting my application to what I hope will be my job for years to come; a trip leader for BACKROADS. It's an outdoor vacation company and they're hiring trip leaders for hikes, biking trips, and more. Everyone (no, I'm not exaggerating) that I've talked about applying for this job has said this sounds like the perfect job for me; exactly what I'd be great at doing.

So with all my eggs in this one basket, I will either have a summer job or my life will go in some direction I can not possibly fathom at this time. Although I can imagine it won't be ideal for me.

So here's to hoping and praying that in the next few weeks (up to three), Backroads will read my application and reference letters and also agree with all my friends ~ that this is the job for me and then this summer I'll be who knows where doing who knows what with who knows who!

I couldn't imagine a better summer!!!

Sure is nice to have the time to practice and practice and practice...

This will be a summary of the last several days. Next time I post there will be more interesting things to post about. Planning some excursions and time spent other than practice. It will be good to give my limbs a bit less work time and more play time. At least, that is what they are trying to tell me everyday now.

For the most part I've spent my days practicing, reading, sleeping, eating, and working out.

I've had the fortune though, to do a few other fun and lively activites.

Below is a picture from my latest zip lining adventure. It wasn't nearly as fun as the zipline in Hoonah AK, but the company was fun and it is always exciting to try something new. Not that this was my first time ziplining, but it was my first of this kind or relay.

Then it was an afternoon at the beach; a bright sunshiny day with a siesta rainfall to make us all run for cover. But even with the short downpour I managed a good game of smash ball (thanks to my good friend Tony who gave me the water set) on the sand and then in the ocean. Nothing like playing smash ball on the beaches in the Caribbean! Now if I can just get into a beach volleyball game!!!

Otherwise, it has been a daily routing of morning practice, and afternoon practicing and evening working out and reading.

Anyway not much else to write about at this time.

The show is my big focus.

I practice the songs everyday, sing the songs in my head the rest of the day and if I had audio recordings I'd be listening to them as well. One thing I look forward to again is steady free internet to research notes for the pieces and watch all the production videos I can. Show show show!

The ziplines were a bit too short to do much craziness but I did my best anyway :)

My morning practice room unless it's too cold and then I move to a more cramped but warmer spot.

My afternoon practice space. Nice natural light and big open space without too much echo.

Roller Coaster Ride

You are all envisioning a post of my first amazing roller coaster ride no doubt, but that is not the purpose of this entry.

In the last few days I've finally reboarded a cruise ship: the place I feel at home, the place I love to be, and the places I get to see.

I'd forgotten the turbulent roller coaster ride on which I would be riding however. On land, you see, it's just me and all my problems, usually living in a hotel room, brooding silently or via this blog. On a ship it is much different. You are in such close contact with everyone that you can't escape the dominoe effect of them to you and you to them. It's understandable why some employees I've known have spent their entire days (aside from working at night) holed away, curtain closed, earbuds playing. It blocks out everything.

But if you block out everything, yes, you will miss the bottom pit of the roller coaster where you heart sinks and the sun is invisible, but you will also miss the sky where you heart is so high it's out of your body and the sun is bathing you in its warmest glow.

It's been three days since I boarded. Today we reach our first port of call, San Juan Pureto Rico. We don't get there until later in the afternoon so there won't be too much time to go wandering around, but it will be nice to get out and see some of the sights. If only to remind myself of how much I love living on a cruise ship when I return to the pier and catch my first glimpse that makes my heart and face smile. Relief that I made it home, and that home is still waiting for me too! :)

If nothing else, I'm just happy to be where it's nice and warm instead of bitterly cold!

This is actually the ship I'm on btw~

The beginnings of NY NY

I've performed the song, famously sung by Sinatra, many many times...New York, New York.

Until today I'd only visited once and didn't see many of the sights or do much touristy. Didn't even stay very long in fact.

This trip is not much different. I'm only here for a few days and I'm not forking over lots of dough to go party and live the high life, but I am getting to visit old and new friends alike, see a few sights, and walk lots and lots and lots :)

I arrived at LGA this afternoon and lugged my suitcase, violin with attached 25lb music bag, and carry on around NY to visit a couple of friend already.

Now snug as a bug, I'm happily content in another wonderful friends home and a very comfy bed and after a nice long chit chat to start catching each other up on our lives.

These next few days should be busy, exhausting, and most importantly, FUN!

Tomorrow is all about more friends, more food, and contra dancing. You thought you wouldn't read about contra dancing in a NY entry, but you were wrong :)  I go contra dancing any time I can and after researching ahead of time I discovered that I would be here for a great dance and that is tomorrow night!!

Then it is a day of sight seeing with more friends, partying with even more friends, catching up with all the friends, and collapsing before joining my next cruise ship on Monday.

Whew, I'm feeling tired just writing it all down. I suppose I should since I've been up for 19 hrs straight and that is on only 5 hrs of sleep the night before. But I'm also excited and eager to go out there, meet people, visit places, try things, and just live life.

Bisectional

Last weekend I performed with the Texarkana Symphony Concert at the historic Perot Theater. It's a beautiful hall and we had a fabulous night of Spanish inspired music.

The program included works such as the Carmen Suite by Bizet,  and a classical guitar concerto by Rodrigo performed by grammy award winning artist, Sharon Isbon.

But like usual, my life can never go as normal, nor as planned...

NEWSFLASH:

I'm now officially confused... *nobody laugh here*

This concert my music stand was as much in the percussion section as the violin section.

One good thing about this placement is that I never had any problem, whatsoever, in any way, determining where the beat was :)  One bad thing about this placement is that I can no longer hear out of my left ear...

The percussion section was great and all were a good sport to take the picture with me. You can see that my music stand was indeed in line to the right of all the other percussion music stands. One of the players stood right next to me and usually backed up to avoid being poked by my bow, but I couldn't move any further to the right because I was already partially blocking the entrance/exit off stage.

The concert was a lot of fun. There were a lot of laughs and a lot of bow tapping on percussion instruments and percussion fingers strumming violin strings!  It was a hoot!!!