the undisputed guide to making tea

new site

2007-01-30T04:40:00.000-08:00

hi. my site is up now so please change your links:

http://teamaking.noseround.org/

new site

2007-01-29T16:41:00.000-08:00

hi all. i decided to put noseround.org to better use since i decided to renew it.

check out the new undisputed guide: the undisputed guide to teamaking v2

it isn't complete. i worked on it all day. it's my own design and my own coding with the help of adobe golive (it really makes life easier).

talk soon.

today----i met an artist.

2007-01-25T10:30:00.000-08:00

after another boring seminar (this time on the highbrow interest in the study of autographs, particularly of j. hayden), i was invited to the pub by some of my classmates, however i declined because i wanted something substantial. my friend said, "you should go to planejts orgaifjd." not quite understanding at first i said, "what?" she repeated, "planet organic." i said, after a pause, "oh yeah. i know that place. good food. i think i will."

i don't know if what i ordered is of any importance but it was some vegetarian lasagne, steamed broccoli, brown rice, and a bit of roasted potatoes. not bad for £5.50. it was pretty good, actually and all organic.

i sat at one of the tables against the windows so i had a view of the street. i sat alone but not for long. a young blonde woman walked over and asked me if the seat was taken across from me. afterall, it was a table with three chairs and i was sitting alone, huddled in the corner.

naturally, i told her she could sit down. she looked like she was in her mid-thirties and she was really quite a beautiful woman with soft features that sort of said youthfulness but also gave off a sense of serious intensity that made me feel as though she was a very intelligent person.

it took us a while before we managed to say anything to each other. i mainly looked up and gave her a cheek-full-of-food kind of smile which i tried to hide with my hand. eventually though, i brought up the weather.

"it's been pretty cold lately." it is a relief to know that the weather is more universal than the so-called "universal mores" i learned about in sociology 101.

from there it was smooth sailing. i asked her what she was doing in london, how long she had been here and how she was liking it. as it turns out, she is an artist from austria and she has been here just little over a month. she was in the area because she was going to the library to do some research for a class called "how to write a phd" at birbeck college. she said she was trying to get back into the theory of art, which i found interesting.

i told her that i was studying ethnomusicology and she asked me what that meant. i explained to her that it was a "cultural study of music" and she said, "ah." but i was more interested in the fact that she was a painter. i have never really known a visual artist before so i was really interested to learn about her perspectives on art.

at first, i thought of the right questions to ask. i didn't want to ask one of those questions that non-musicians ask like, "what genre do you write?" or "who is your favorite classical composer?" stuff like that. so instead i tried to word my questions so i came across at least thoughtful, "do you paint in a particular style? or follow a sort of way of painting?" luckily, she didn't seem to think my question was a silly question and she responded that she worked basically in contemporary art. she then explained more of her process, or rather approach to her paintings.

she says she goes to different art galleries and takes a video camera. with that she records what she sees and then later on plays them back and finds what she likes and then takes that and puts it in her paintings. i thought that was really great. she was taking other peoples ideas and making them her own.

we had a nice conversation about art galleries in london and mentioned that i was doing a write-up on an art gallery when i had no real experience with contemporary art. she told me about a gallery where her works are and also told me that i should go to the east end or white chapel. apparently it's a big artist area and there are just rows of galleries. it is an area of london that is mid-way through gentrification and for a moment we lamented the fact that the bangledeshis and poles living in the area would eventually be pushed out of the area, however we concluded that it was just something that just happens. especially since, i think we both realised at that point that it was likely that we were both people who make gentrification happen because we were the types of people who would move into an area like that.

in the end i took down her name and the name of the gallery where her work is currently on display. you can see an example of her work here: http://www.wilkinsongallery.com/pastexhibitions/06steckholzer/info.html and also http://www.meyerkainer.at/exhibitions/ex_steck.htm

she left without ever finding out my name and we did not exchange contact information. it was nice just to be strangers passing the time over a quick meal.

philip glass got it, so why can't you?

2007-01-24T03:22:00.000-08:00

i had to give a presentation in a class that i'm not actually enrolled in...nonetheless it was on glass's einstein on the beach. i checked out his book opera on the beach and found some kind words. glass was really influenced by brecht when he was living in paris and he realised the importance of the audience in theatre and music. he realised that to complete the performance there had to be an audience. well, when i read that i was really happy because for once someone was speaking my language.

nail-biting, brain numbing...life in academia.

2007-01-21T15:35:00.000-08:00

if you see a girl sitting in class trying to keep her mind off of the subject that is probably me. the reason being because i can't stand the subject and the only way to keep myself from losing control is by pretending i am not hearing the lecture. it's the only way i can make it through some seminars.

i recently got tenative approval on my new dissertation topic. i'm planning on doing an ethnography of women cantors in the synagogue in the los angeles and nyc areas this summer, starting in april and going until whenever my deadline is in september.

currently i'm listening to lloyd rodger's the prince. for me, it's positive reinforcement. it's really an optimistic piece of music. i need some hope for music before the establishment steals my fire.

come on baby light my fire...

ps. my computer has been at the apple store's genius bar for three weeks now. i am hoping to get it back before the co2 in the the atmosphere rises to unbearable levels so that we run out of oxygen to breathe.

colbert v. o'reilly

2007-01-19T08:54:00.000-08:00

here are the full clips in case you missed it (like me because i'm in england):

stephen on the o'reilly factor:
o'reilly factor

o'reilly on the colbert report:
colbert report

good stuff.

sour patch kids of negativity

2007-01-07T05:46:00.000-08:00

i like it. let's see. i've been a part of the "cool kids club" the "bad news bears" and now the "sour patch kids of negativity". it doesn't get any better than that.

a web site called, "News Busters: Exposing and Combating Liberal Media Bias" published them own somwhat bias report on findings from the CMPA's research on the Daily Show. http://newsbusters.org/node/9795

i like it.

the litvenenko connection

2006-12-20T01:04:00.000-08:00

well, my mother and sister are currently flying over the middle of the united states, on their way to london to visit me. yesterday i was talking to my mom, trying to find out the details of the flight and the hotel they booked, and she gave me the name of the hotel they were staying at. as it turns out, the hotel is called "millennium hotel" which is located in london's posh mayfair area. the hotel is a lovely hotel, i have to admit. however, i had this strange feeling as i glanced through the hotel's website. suddenly i saw it...the hotel has a sushi bar. i turned to carl and said, "wasn't that the hotel where litvenenko was poisoned?" he said, "i don't know. check google." i searched the news articles and found that i was right. my family is staying at the hotel where not just one person was poisoned, but at least 10 people were poisoned. how lovely. i guess i should warn her against drinking the water. i told carl they should ask for a discount since it's a health risk being there!!

so...as for six degrees of separation go....

attali

2006-12-12T14:27:00.000-08:00

“Fetishized as a commodity, music is illustrative of the evolution of our entire society: deritualize a social form, repress an activity of the body, specialize its practice, sell it as a spectacle, generalize its consumption, then see to it that it is stockpiled until it loses meaning.”
--- Jacques Attali, Noise: The Political Economy of Music

so true...

atonality/post-tonality destroy the bourgeois?

2006-12-12T04:12:00.000-08:00

i was just thinking...if schoenberg was tried to destroy the "decaying tonal music" of the bourgeois...did he succeed? i have a feeling that if i look at the events schedule for any philharmonic i will find the answer. in a sad way i think all he did was force people to cling that that "decaying" form of music even tighter than they had in the past.

no one ever really talks about whether schoenberg succeeded in destroying the music of the bourgeois, they just say that was his goal. i don't know why. it would be interesting if someone did some compelling musicological research into the effect of schoenberg's music on "bourgeois" music. maybe someone has and i just don't know about it?

...i always thought that wagner was an ugly antisemite but now i think he was just jealous. according to my opera studies professor, wagner borrowed quite a lot, in regard to musical elements, from halevy and when he was a poor and starving young composer he used to arrange halevy's operas for voice and piano. of course, i imagine, at the time it was quite fashionable to hate jews.

just a few days before carl arrives in london. i can hardly work on my fieldwork proposal, all i can think about is the moment when carl walks into the waiting area of heathrow airport with his shaggy amish beard and square glasses. woohoo.

honestly dishonest

2006-12-11T11:32:00.000-08:00

(my apologies, this isn't music related at all)

well, my sister had to do an assignment for u.s. history where she had to come up with an political party with its own platform, name, and motto. i tried to make her take a extremist platform...for example, i suggested that on the issue of abortion we should just "kill the babies" but unfortunately, that was just "too sad," according to my sister. however, she did use my motto when i told her that platforms didn't matter since politicians never do what they say anyhow. so as a result she came up with the "Honestly Dishonest Party" and the motto (which i suggested although after that i suggested the motto "the revolution is dead, long live the revolution!) "we're all lies, at least we're honest." however, perhaps the best part of her assignment is the last bit of it where she had to write a "messsage from our founder" which you can see posted below:

Our party was founded on the idea that not everything said is kept, which in the end leads the people into believing that their government lied to them. To stop any further thought of being cheated by the United States, we offer our nations people the right to believe that everything we have said here is an honest lie. In the end if it turns out that we actually do keep to our word, instead of feeling cheated, the people will be happy in knowing that the lying party they voted for can actually tell the truth. We would also like to acknowledge some famous words from an equally dishonest man. If you can trust in it that is.

“You can always trust an honest man to be dishonest. Honestly, it’s the honest ones you have to look after.”
That would have been our motto, but it turned out to be too long, but in all honesty our new one is better. And that is the honest truth.

yes...she has in fact quoted a fictional pirate named jack sparrow...i'm so proud of that brat!

chopin and mulled wine

2006-12-09T15:46:00.000-08:00

i tasted mulled wine for the first time, this evening. it wasn't spectacular.

i checked out a few books of piano music. a collection of six sonatinas for piano and a compilation of chopin piano pieces, which according to the editor are the easiest of all of his works. they're easy enough for me to play through very slowly at least. despite the fact that i am not a pro at the piano i still had a great time in the practice room playing chopin. i haven't really had a chance to just play alone. it's such a nice experience. i really miss playing music. hopefully i will be getting some decent reeds from carl this week so i can start playing oboe again. i'm really glad that there is still something inside me that has a strong desire to play music. in class a professor warned against losing focus of the music in our essays. we mustn't lose focus of music as part of our life, either.

i find this funny. i always had a hard time calling myself a musician because i felt so unlike my friends who were obsessed with their horns. but i should just face the facts, i am a musician. i love to play music and perform. i really can't live without being able to express myself musically. at least i've discovered something new about myself.

i have a proposal due on wedsnesday for "techniques of ethnomusicology". i'm planning on doing my fieldwork project on the buskers in the underground. i want to take a look at how performing somewhere outside of the conventions of Western music affects the making of music in a Western society that promotes the capitalist music venue (i.e. the concert hall, opera house, etc.) over something as equalizing as busking. to be exact, i want to focus on reception of the music that is being performed. music in the underground is a bit different from in the subways of New York where performers are allowed to play on platforms. people can't really stop to listen to the music since the buskers generally perform in the tunnels that connect the platform to the escalators and to other platforms. as a matter of fact, i think it would be really dangerous if people actually did stop to listen. so i want to see how that affects musicking.

another interesting aspect of this is that the underground has tried to regulate busking by setting up spots in certain areas of the tunnel for music performance. buskers have to apply for a license and go through an audition that is organized by carling, the beer company. which sort of destroys an element of spontaneity, doesn't it? also, it makes it less equalizing since buskers must audition and are then given a time slot. i'll have to focus on this as well in my ethnography.

i miss twoj's and mr. t's. i miss new york, too. i' m having a hard time finding the new art music scene. ha ha. i mean, at least i could listen to john zorn in new york at a club. i can't find the equivalent in london. does anyone know where i can go?

net neutrality

2006-12-08T02:13:00.000-08:00

Save the Internet | Rock the Vote

"freedom isn't free, it costs folks like you and me...freedom costs a buck o five!"

colbert and stewart, part 2

2006-12-01T04:40:00.000-08:00

(part 2 of 2)

which leads me back to something else i read in the interview. stewart, in a way, laments the fact that we are a two party system and a majority of people will vote based on the party line rather than on what is really best for the nation. i think that is true. everyone tells you, "don't vote green party, it's like throwing your vote away." that is deceiving. i used to believe that but now i don't. i don't think it is throwing a vote away to vote for a candidate of another party. if more people realised that they were not throwing their vote away, i think third parties would have a greater opportunity to make their voice heard.

i think we are too obsessed with having our voices count. maybe if we just stopped caring about voting for "the lesser of the two evils because we really don't have a choice" then maybe we would find ourselves with more options. of course, it's difficult to make 200 million people think this way.

since i arrived in the UK, i've found myself constantly having to defend myself because i am an american (or as my friend from chili says, "not american. you are from the united states." so decided to call myself, "united statesean"). i often find myself having to tell people that yes, america has a history (someone once had the nerve to claim that we had no history). yes, we did rape the native americans, but i didn't do it personally. and yes, our president's administration is taking the lead role in destroying the world.

however.

while i have to say, yes and yes and yes. i also comeback by saying, "and what about your country? blair is no better. he is worse. he chooses to wait on hand and foot and do whatever the US administration says." i find it difficult when people feel they have to tell me that my country is very bad and doing very wrong things when their country isn't innocent of doing wrong, either. however, at least their country doesn't deny global warming.

interestingly enough, i found myself in a reverse role recently. i was talking to an acquaintance about the bush administration. it was the first time, in a long time, that i had allowed myself to be part of a heated political discussion. this guy, who was the same age me, was defending the president for going into iraq and toppling the hussein regime. i said, "yes but what about the 600,000 some-odd civilians that were reported dead as a result of the occupation?" anyhow, i won't go into detail about the argument but he couldn't see how appointing tony snow as the press secretary was wrong. he also thought that the people in the middle east just wanted to blow things up. all i could say was that i was sorry that he felt the way he did about my government and i also mentioned that my "forefathers" wrote that if we didn't like our government, we could overthrow it (unlike in england where they celebrate guy fawkes day, where they burn an effigy of the man who tried to overthrow parliament) and start a new one.

it is funny, but it seems like i do a lot more talking about the US administration outside of the country than when i was in the country. i feel like i walk around with a sign that says, "tell me why my country is wrong. i am dumb and ignorant and need to be enlightened."

returning to colbert and stewart, though, i sometimes find myself so surprised at how influential they have become. i used to watch the daily show back when kilborn was the host. in those days i always confused, colbert, roco, and carrell. of course, i was just a middle school kid then and i would only catch the next day reruns when i was home sick from school. when stewart took over the show, i was upset. i thought kilborn was really funny and i didn't think that stewart was funny at all. i remember the advertisements during this "transitional period" and for some reason he was in a helicopter...

needless to say, after a while he really grew on me. although, i was always a casual viewer, watching a rerun here or there. i suppose like everyone else, there was a point when i realised that the news wasn't really news at all. it was all a game and i was being played by the media machine. so i gave up on television news. then i rediscovered the daily show and soon after the colbert report was born, and i realised that fake news was really the only reliable news source on television because they didn't care and they don't care still.

i guess that goes back to what i was saying about caring about voting and making your voice heard. maybe we think we have a lot to lose but we really don't. if at this point we feel like our vote doesn't matter, then what does it matter if it seems like we are just "throwing away" our votes? we're already doing it by voting for someone we don't really care for.

so the moral of the story is...stop caring. have a nice day.

colbert and stewart

2006-12-01T03:13:00.000-08:00

you may have noticed that i like to post youtube clips of the colbert report and the daily show, and so you may not be surprised that i am able to write a post related to the two men.

i just read the main feature in rolling stones magazine about the two men. it must have been close to 5,000 words, including the interview at the end. the slant of the article is that the two men have really become some of the most trusted names in television news even though they are only "fake news" correspondents and pundits.

in the article, stewart talks about what the current generation is doing for the younger one. he says, "I don't worry about this generation of young people. They seem to be far more sophisticated and interesting than I remember myself being at that age. I'm more worrying about my generation. We're digging such a hole for these cats, they will have to be exceptional just to get out of it."

at least he thinks we're "interesting and sophisticated." i think we're all just apathetic. sometimes i think that all young generations are living in the shadow of the generations of the sixities and seventies. maybe those young generations of the eighties didn't have much to worry about, nor of the nineties. the gulf war was quick and was in and out of the collective conscious in no time. however, those of living in today's generation, it seems that we have this large shadow. we are too apathetic to be like those of the past.

perhaps that sounds ridiculous and self-indulgent. to think that we are unique because of the current social/political/economical climate may be incorrect. but i wonder how far from true that really is?

they say to us, "well if you want to make difference go out and vote. run for office. become the next president!" i scoff at such remarks. "yeah, i'd rather not be assassinated," is one of my favorite responses.

in passing, i read somewhere a remark about the recent mid-term elections. specifically related to california. someone made a comment, maybe it was advertising an event, but essentially it poked fun at the fact that voting in california's mid-term election was pointless and was not a way to make your "voice heard," on a national level. perhaps because california is always going to lean democratic. perhaps it is because we all know that arnold is the terminator and bush is the decider and we are the hollywood sodomites (to quote colbert) who are always going to vote one way, despite the orange county conservatives attempts to disenfranchise their "minorities" voice. in a funny way, you can always count on our vote or not count on it, depending on which party you belong to.

(part 1 of 2)

RHUL Gamelan

2006-11-30T15:40:00.001-08:00

RHUL Gamelan, not taken with my camera., originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

That's a photo of the ensemble. I didn't take the picture so that's why it doesn't look as good as my other photos because it's not taken with my camera.

Our performance tonight went pretty well. It wasn't perfect and like Simon said (the director of the group), if it was perfect we wouldn't be having rehearsal next week, now would we?

This is just a reminder for myself, but in my next post I am going to talk about "authenticity" in music and in a general social context. I've been thinking about it a lot because it is something that we have been talking about a lot, recently, in my seminars. I'm too tired at the moment to discuss it, but I will eventually.

post 102!

2006-11-30T01:25:00.000-08:00

well, i should have celebrated at post 100 but i didn't know that i had reached so many posts until i switched to blogger beta yesterday. let's pop out a bottle of champagne!

i'm only posting because i thought this was pretty interesting...read it in a nytimes article:

The average Wal-Mart shopper lives in the suburbs, is roughly 5-foot-2 and wears a size 14 — making them poor candidates for the skinny jeans that were a popular, tight-fitting fashion in urban markets.

insane.

it's beginning to look a lot like fall

2006-11-29T02:06:00.000-08:00

well things are going a bit better for me in regard to my courses.

sometimes i wish i would have stayed around fullerton a few extra years and studied composition but then at the same time i think that i would have shot myself if i had said there longer. when i applied to fullerton i applied to study composition (for those of you who didn't know) and i used to do advisement with lloyd for a while until i switched to oboe and realised i would not reach the 300 level for ages and that meant i would be at fullerton for six years. i never wanted to teach so that is why i decided to do music history and theory because it was the next best thing. i should go back there and do a masters with lloyd in comp. ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. but then, i could just see them making me take lessons with pamela madsen instead. i would quit. i would withdraw from the university the very next day.

sadly, i haven't read anything particularly interesting. we were supposed to have a lecture on tibetan music. or well, it seemed like tibetan protest music since the articles were all about communism in china and tibet's use of music as protest. of course, i love music that has a political motivation. but the lecturer was an hour late to the seminar because she thought it was at 4pm instead of 2pm and she didn't actually talk about the readings. so it was a bit of a waste.

in ethno, we've mostly been reading about issues related to the field, to doing "field work" or as one ethnomusicologist wrote, "field experience." however they have been less than remarkable. we read a slobin article for this week's seminar about ethics in ethnomusicology. i think that he made some good points, about possible ethical problems. he also said that ethnomusicology has only begun to acknowledge this problems. it seems like a lot of ethnomusicologists were not particularly interested in that subject.

of course, i am. i think i may be too overly concerned with the ethics part of the job of being an ethnomusicology. i can't help it. i was raised to be conscious. my father was an activist in the sixties and seventies and he raised me to be one, too. i think he may have tried to raise all of his kids this way but somehow...i was the only one that ate it all up. i remember a story one of my older sisters told me about when they were younger. she said they would sit around the tv waiting for the presidential election results to come up and when it showed who was victorious she would ask my dad, "how come we always lose, dad?"

i guess i'm starting to realise that no field is perfect and that in every field there is going to be ideas that one might find entirely ridiculous, useless, or completely incorrect. however, not everything that is done within that field is going to be bad. it's just that i wonder where all the good stuff is? and what is good stuff? i don't even know.

i watched "the draughtsman's contract" recently and the music, beside the film, was really great. i was always a mild fan of michael nyman but i really liked the score. it reminded me a lot of lloyd's music, actually. but also, it reminded me of albinoni. i think because when we played albinoni in scratch we used to say that it was hard not to smile after that one.

i'm guilty of not playing my oboe. i miss it a lot. but i haven't had time to make reeds or attempt to make reeds. maybe i should ask carl to buy some reeds for me from rdg's in hollywood. it's not that i'm not being a performer at all because i am playing in the gamelan and that is a lot of fun. i just miss what i used to be able to do on the oboe. i guess i feel like i need to be more than just an academic---i need to be a musician.

well, speaking of performing, this thursday i will be peforming with gamelan in the drama department's production of "the law of java." i think it's going to be a lot of fun. gamelan is the closest thing i have to scratch, which is saying a lot because it's nothing like scratch. i guess i just enjoy playing in it as much as i did in scratch.

that's some wall

2006-11-18T10:28:00.000-08:00

this must happen to a lot of people.

you know that wall? we'll i've hit it. lately i've been feeling really anti-academia. it isn't that i think intellectualism is a bad idea. i'm no dubya. it's just that sometimes i feel like the academics lose touch with reality and i'm stuck trying to cope.

i wrote thirteen pages of critical analysis of an article by Arnold Whittall recently. i think it was during the hours that i was writing that paper that i came to despise everything musicological.

what is the point of my paper? nothing. i go through the article and pick out the flaws in his argument. in the end, i propose my own idea about how interpretative musicology can work by allowing a one-angle approach that still creates a multivalent interpretation, overall. sounds boring? are you wondering where the life went, where the music went? hm. i wondered the same.

i sat through a techniques of ethnomusicology seminar on tuesday that was a real waste of time. the two professors sat and talked about their experiences out in the "field." we also talked about an article that one of the professors really could not stand. it was really frustrating. she could not let the article go. i would go into it, but there really is no point.

at this point, i feel like my seminars are useless to some extent. i really enjoy opera studies, that is true. music from the americas is alright. but ethnomusicology has been disappointing. i want to partake in ethnomusicological activities. i want to get on with my research, i guess.

when this year is up, i'm going to need a serious break from the university. i think i want to join the real world for a while.

in other news, i applied for a research assistant position in New York City. i know i am pretty qualified for the position because the research is based in NYC and is on some Jewish oreinted popular music. i've been to NYC to do research, i did my research in Jewish music---i'm good to go. however, i don't think i'll get the position since i doubt they want to spend all of their funds flying me back and forth from london. they said that pay is negotiable so i said that if they just paid for my flight and a place to stay while i was there i wouldn't ask for anything else. of course, that might be asking for a lot already.

and in other news i had my first news feature published in the london student newspaper. they gave me a whole page for it. i would link to it online but they haven't updated the site in a while. also went to a press screening last night. that was pretty nice. they served up free drinks and some snacks so i had a glass of white wine. it was pretty nice wine. there were about 10 of us from the press at the screening. we met at a small studio off of oxford street. i have to say that i am enjoying being a journalist than a student right now.

all in all, i'm doing great. :)

2006-11-17T05:26:00.000-08:00

Stephen Colbert and Paul Dinello

i thought this was cute and musician related. so enjoy.

Why I'll never use Microsoft again

2006-11-05T03:44:00.000-08:00

Pathway, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

I can run X11 on a Mac. Oh....my....

I will never ever use Windows. EVER. Honestly. I love my MacBook Pro. I'm starting to get into the geek stuff again because Mac OSX is built on UNIX so I can finally be a geek again and still be artistic. I recently downloaded a program (suggested by my father!!) called REALBasic, which is like Visual Basic, only you can use it on a Mac. I learned how to program in VB when I was a kid but I also learned how to program in C++ at university so hopefully I can put that to good use and write some scripts (I also learned some shell programming...mm..yeah, so that's what I was doing when I wasn't in the Music building and instead headed to the CS/Engineering building).

Aside from being geeky about computers, I have a few papers I need to write for my seminars. One is on how music in Latin American countries creates a place for political discourse that is not generally allowed outside of music. The other is a 'critical reading' of a theoretical musicological article. I have to criticisize and point out holes in the argument. I hope I find something I can really tear apart.

Hang Saddam?

2006-11-05T02:14:00.000-08:00

Saddam Hussein Is Sentenced to Death - New York Times

I don't know how everyone else feels about this but I just don't see the justice. What about all of the Iraqi civilians that have died at the hands of the US and UK government? Hussein will die for the death of 148 people. Who will hang for the death of 600,000 Iraqi civilians?! That is what I want to know.

Also, notice the bit about Hussein's attorny being thrown out of court. On what basis? Contempt? How was he in contempt? (The article does not say it was on contempt but I can't see how he was out of line otherwise other than calling the trial a sham)

Terrorism will not be done with when Hussein is dead and this is not a US victory.

where?

2006-10-29T04:30:00.000-08:00

sorry i haven't posted lately. been somewhat busy but also this past week was less than exciting as my seminars sort met at unusual times and locations (attended british library for a stupid useless introductio to the library and then went to pitt rivers museum in oxford and that was also a bit silly). i suppose i could elaborate. maybe i will in another post. i'm kind of tired at the moment.

yesterday i had my first andean band performance, in brighton. it was fun.

sorry for the lack of photo updates but i am waiting for my battery charger to come in the post. i forgot it at home and my mother had to mail it to me.

happy halloween.

An unclear line

2006-10-20T05:06:00.000-07:00

"Well, I suppose you aren't pro-Israeli?"
"Sorry?"
"Are you Pro-Israel or Pro-Lebanon?"
"Oh. Uhm...I think I would have to say I'm not pro either country."
"I guess that is a good place to be."

Interesting how a conversation about being senior reporter for the London Student can take a rapid and serious turn. I attended an event sponsored by UJS (Union for Jewish Students) called "Israel: After the Conflict." It was an interesting discussion. Actually, it was an interesting atmosphere.

I was happily greeted by other students eagar to know my name, where I was studying, and what I was studying. I sat at a table next to the girl who let me into the building (for security reasons, you have to be buzzed in first). She apologised for ignoring me because she was reading for a course. I told her she shouldn't worry about it, at all. I do it all the time to other people. She then suggested that if I was bored I could read a newspaper she had with her. I asked her which newspaper it was. I think it was London Lite or something similar. I said, "Oh yeah. I wouldn't mind. I saw someone reading that on the train and I saw a bit on Irwin's daughter that I wanted to read." It was only a few paragraphs about how the little sprite would continue doing her Discovery channel show without her father.

"Actually, I have a newspaper in my backpack." I said after I finished reading the blurb. The girl said, "Oh I imagine it's probably a more serious newspaper than the Lite." I said, "I guess. It's the Guaridan." She seemed to think it was a slightly better newspaper but then she said something else that caught me a bit off.

"It's a bit liberal." I said, "I guess so." In my head I was thinking, "Good. I'm glad I picked the right paper." Then she said, "I wonder how much of what they print is really true." I thought, "What? What is she talking about?" Then I said, "Well I guess it's hard to say what is really true in any of the papers we read." She agreed.

Strange. Where did that come from? I think that about Rupert Murdoch owned papers, not papers like the Guardian! That was the start of what would become a slow realisation that my understanding of Israel within the context of English society was really off.

The talk was good. They had someone come out from the Israeli Embassy and talk about the 'government' stance. That was, of course, very strongly behind Israel's decision. He skirted the issue of cluster bombs by saying that there is no international law that makes the use illegal and therefore if there is a problem, it should be taken up internationally. Fine. Drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes are both legal but also very bad for your health. Just because it is legal, it doesn't make it the best choice, does it? I didn't bring that up in the question and answer. I decided to ask a very safe question.

"Is Israel doing anything, diplomatically, in terms of working with Lebanon to remove Hezbollah from Lebanon--without the killing of people on either side, that is?" His response was that Israel had tried before and that he supposed the door for such talks was still open, should Lebanon wish to pursue such talks.

So that was last night. Today I got a phone call from the News Editor for the London Student about being a Senior Reporter for Royal Holloway (RHUL apparently does not have one at the moment). We talked about what the job would entail. I then remembered something that was mentioned last night. The wife of one of the Israeli soliders that was captured (and is still being kept away somewhere by Hezbollah) was making a visit to England to give some talks and share her story. She was looking to talk to students and I imagine that UJS will be putting something on for that to happen.

I mentioned that to the News Editor and I got an strange response which led into the quoted discussion at the start of this post. British society thinks Israel should not exist. People tend to see the Israeli army as terrorists. Was she saying that it wouldn't be a good idea to do a report on her visit? I am not sure. Apparently the media in England tends to focus mostly on the people that Israel's government attacks. They say Israel is racist and terrorists. I told her that we've never really heard anyone say that in the states before. Generally, the media is very pro-Israeli.

No wonder the vast majority of Jews out here are so pro-Israel. What a world.

And These Are The Days My Friends

2006-10-18T04:09:00.000-07:00

The Pub, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

I got a copy of 'Einstein On The Beach' from the library today. I had not listened to the opera before but it's always been a title floating around in my head. So I decided to have a listen.

I don't have a comment on it yet. Sometimes it makes me laugh especially when one of the voices is keeping count. I like "Knee Play 2" at the moment.

I wonder if I should be frightening my classmates with my comments. Haha. I am pretty awful. Yesterday I said that Mark Slobin was a jerk and everyone was shocked that I could have said that about someone. I guess my idea of jerk is not the same idea as everyone else. Ah well, it is always fun to get a rise out of people.

I don't know how I feel about my seminars, to be quite honest. The discussion starts off when us trying to piece together what the articles were about and then discussing certain ideas in the articles. "What's your opinion on so and so?"

My goal is to say something that will make people argue against me. I generally try to get to the controversial point of the argument of the writer because I know at least then, hopefully, it will spark a discussion. However it doesn't always work and I feel like I am sometimes hogging to the discussion.

Actually, there was a point where a debate involved the entire class. It was mostly about what place Ethnomusicology has in today's academic world. However, we had to cut that discussion short because it was going off from this week's main discussion.

The other day I spoke to someone who thought that Reich was hardly accessible. That was interesting. I don't think I have ever met anyone who didn't think Reich was easy to listen to and enjoy. I guess that might be saying something about taste more than anything. I would say that it is because I am an academic musician that he is highly accessible to me but I know people who aren't even musicians who can enjoy Reich. So I don't know.

If you want to know an interesting fact about Ethnomusicology, here it is: Ethnomusicology comes out of a field known as 'Comparative Musicology' that originated in Europe, specifically Germany and then more so in Berlin, that was school of academics/scholars/scientists that were not actually musicians but had degrees in other fields like Chemistry and many of them had degrees in Psychology.

I find that to be rather interesting. Ethnomusicology is more credited to a guy named Hornbostel than Bartok even though Bartok was more of an Ethnomusicologist than Hornbostel could ever be.

We like Bartok.

Swimming is good for you. Caffeine is bad.

2006-10-16T04:42:00.000-07:00

Budgens, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

I went swimming this weekend. I spent the entire weekend away from my readings. I think I probably needed the break after having such a busy week!

Swimming was really nice. We went to a fitness centre in Guildford where Richard had guest passes to. There was a sauna, jacuzzi, and steam room as well so I really got to unwind! The steam room was so great.

After having a relaxing afternoon we decided to head over to the high street to eat dinner. We ate at a restaurant that was not really specifically any sort of asian food but a mixture of all types. I pretty much ate my usual Thai Basil style dinner. Veggie spring rolls, vegetable yellow curry, and fried rice. The pad thai wasn't vegetarian so I didn't get any of that. The curry was a bit spicy for me but it was good. I topped it off with a pot of soothing jasmine green tea.

So I thought it was soothing! I have been having problems with caffeine lately that perhaps I have always had (as I can at least recall a few other occasions where I have reacted this way to caffeine when i was younger and there is a reason why I cut out coffee from my diet when I was 17) but have simply ignored because it has not always been such a serious problem.

Caffeine makes me feel agitated and anxious. My thought process gets cloudy and I am highly fidgety. My heart starts beating rapidly and I feel like running away from whatever I am doing at the moment. I have no idea that this is being caused by the caffeine in my drink when I'm at the peak of the...I don't know what to call it--reaction? It's not any fun.

So I ended all tense by the end of the night! What a way to end what started out as a relaxing day.

It's Monday now and I am reading for my seminars this week. We got our schedulel of deadlines for the rest of the year and my first assignment is due on the 31st October. I have to do a couple of transcriptions of 'non-western' music and present my findings to the class. I am finding that it doesn't matter how accurate you are, actually. Mostly what you got out of it. Should be easy.

My least favorite seminar is "Techniques of Performance Studies" but I am going to attend the seminar even though I find it annoying because I imagine there must be something I can get out of the lectures and discussions. I am not required to do any assignments for the course since I am just auditing it.

My most favorite is probably "Techniques of Opera Studies" because we actually talk about operas that I like. We've gone over Kurt Weill operas, Monteverdi operas, and this week we are going to even discuss some Steve Reich stuff and John Adams' "Nixon In China." That is going to rock. I remember talking about that with Lloyd in composition class once. We were talking about text setting and I brought up how the libretto to Nixon in China seemed so cumbersome for Adams to have set.

Carl, that's what the Budgen's in Egham looks like. It's a "quickstop" that is why it looks like a liquor store and not a supermarket. Egham is tiny, everything is either "express," "metro" or "quickstop."

Cheers all.

Avoiding already?

2006-10-11T14:05:00.000-07:00

I am listening to some Radiohead b-sides while I avoid my reading. I know. It's only the third week and already I am procrastinating? Well, it is just that I made a mistake today and photo-copied the same chapter I had photo-copied earlier this week and now I have to risk being late to a course I am auditing called 'Techniques in Performance Studies' and possibly not even finishing the reading in time for my 'Music and Muisicology' course. I guess I am feeling a bit down about it. Also, some of the reading is really boring as it tends to get caught up in theories about expression in performance and making it all quite scientific. I really have no care to read about that. It does not make me a better oboe player. What makes me a better performer is performing in ensembles and well, practicing, and listening.

Anyhow, performance studies isn't about performing it's about STUDYING performances, recordings, etc. What rubbish. Yeah, I am feeling a bit negative about my courses at the moment and I suppose it really just stems from a bad day (never again will I believe my fellow students when they tell me that they know for sure the train will get us there on time when I know for a fact they are wrong) and waking up to absolutely no view of the sky due to a very thick layer of gray clouds and then pouring rain, thunder, and even lightening. However, by the time I got into London the rain had cleared and the sky seemed to show up. It was actually warm enough so that I took off my jacket and walked around in a short-sleeved blouse. I read that London is really feeling the effects of global warming and can be anywhere from 7-9 degrees celcius warmer than usual. Sounds bad.

Right now I feel like I don't care about my courses but usually when I sit in the lecture/seminar I feel much better about them. I get a bit frustrated with my classmates who don't always say anything good or really they don't say anything. I don't know what I am expecting. I don't even want to talk to my classmates anymore. I am being too harsh on them and too judgmental. I should really lighten up.

Well, I should really get back to my articles and get to bed as I have a seriously long day tomorrow.

About The Reich Concert

2006-10-11T04:48:00.000-07:00

The concert went quite well on Sunday. The Barbican encourages it's concert goers to bring their drinks into the hall so I was more than pleased to buy a vodka tonic at the bar and take it at the start of the performance.

The concert began with Reich's new Cello Counterpoint. It was interesting to see that he had chosen to add a visaul element to his piece. The visual element was a pre-recording of Maya Beiser on cello as she performed the various cello accompainment to her live part. It was, in typical Reich style, in phases across the screen. I can't remember how many images were used but I would say around 6-8 clips of Beiser were used in the visual portion. In other words, as I realise I am being unclear, the screen was divided up into 6-8 parts and in each part a recording of Beiser playing a different part of the piece was being displayed. So it was very much an obvious take on Reich's ideas of phasing in music and just putting it to video. It was alright. It was easier to watch that than Beiser on stage.

Nonetheless, the piece was good. It is interesting to hear how Reich has changed musically but still kept to his original ideas that made his as famous as he is today. I wish I could give a better description of the music but as it is already Wednesday and I do not have access to the recording, I can't give you specifics.

The second peice was the Daniel Varations. According to the program notes it was also the World Premiere of the piece. Lucky for us living in the London area that we got to be a part of the World Premiere! It was a very sincere and compassionate piece of music. I do not really recall hearing much dissonance in Reich's works but in the Daniel Varations there is quite a lot of it, the piece really begins on a diminished chord (I suppose...from what I could tell). The text setting was nice and clear and certainly in the traditional minimalist style. What I could perhaps make out that was different from old Reich works was that there seemed to be more a prevelant melodic line or melodic idea that floated above the rest of the music or maybe not floated, but interweaved.

After the intermission, or as they say in England, "interval", Music for 18 Musicians was performed. It was quite a site to see and it was just such a good piece of music. It is nice when music came at least seem a bit timeless. Certainly we can hear it and date it just by the style. It reminds me so much of his other counterpoint works of that era, especially New York Counterpoint. it was really a wonderful 65 minutes of music and perhaps the most fun was in being able to see Reich perform with his friends on stage. It makes me smile in a way. I think it is really important that composers are also performers although many composers these days would disagree with me.

Minimalism is dead. Long live miminalism.

Elephants gone mad....?

2006-10-09T04:13:00.000-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/08/magazine/08elephant.html

Worth a read. It is long but it's detailed and fairly well written. I hope to post more about the Reich concert soon. I am just busy with reading for my courses and later on I have to go sell books at my professors 'book launch' in London.

Cheers all.

Today Amongst Other Days

2006-10-08T03:53:00.000-07:00

Steve Reich, originally uploaded by vansgirl12. Photo credit: Wonge Bergmann

So I am getting very excited over the tonights concert. It is entitled, "Quintessential Reich" and I don't know why but I feel like a small child going to the fair on a warm summer day. Where is the cotton candy? Ice cream? Sodas? Well, none of that will be at the Barbican, I am sure of it. I suppose this what happens when you get a bit older. Nonetheless, I am excited. I suppose I am so excited because Steve Reich is acutally going to be on stage and he is a part of my young musical past that is coming to life right from the pages of the scores, the music books, the recordings. It's is going to be live! Wow. How exciting. I got to see Terry Riley last year and now Steve Reich.

Alright, that is more of my inner self than I should ever like to reveal about those secret idolizations of old-time composers. Perhaps you are more interested in what is going to be performed. I would be. Firstly, Maya Beiser (whom I saw doing a really annoying sound check yesterday before the Gamelan performance--she is the epitomy of ego-driven performance practice that Plato rightly attacked), Steve Reich & Musicians with Synergy Vocals, and Brad Lubman will be performing. I don't know who Brad Lubman is, perhaps he is the director of Synergy Vocals? I am sounding ignorant now because I know someone who is reading this knows. The pieces are as follows: The Daniel Variations, Cello Counterpoint, and Music for 18 Musicians.

At 6:45pm on the Free stage there will be a performance of several shorter pieces by the Bang On A Can All-Stars. Who needs to live in America when you have the Barbican to extract all the familiarities and bring them to my door step? (If only they would invite PBE, then I would be really happy!) BOACAS is going to be performing the following (by the way is a free performance that is held in the lobby): Michael Nyman's Manhatta, Julia Wolfe's Believing, Evan Ziporyn's Music from Shadowbang, and Louis Andriessen's Worker's Union.

I am hoping to get there in time for the free show. According to the Barbican web site, the show Reich show is sold out. I was lucky to get the tickets when I did! Cost me 25 pounds for a ticket which is a pretty dollar but hopefully worth it. I would never spend that much on Bach. 6 pounds for a nosebleed for a Bach performance, thanks. Not that I do not like Bach, it is just that Bach is dead.

It is a nice day so I will take my camera with me to London and hopefully get some nice shots. I need to remind my mother to post me my battery charger for my camera because it is about to die on me.

Cheers!

2006-10-07T15:16:00.000-07:00

Responsible drinking

Ok. One more! This is just too good not to share.

2006-10-07T14:46:00.000-07:00

Can't pass this one up.

While I could comment on my past few days here in England, I thought I should post this gem of a find, instead. When in Rome...

rain rain here to stay

2006-10-05T05:26:00.000-07:00

well it is raining at the moment, here in london. i am sitting in the computer lab of the Bedford Square campus in London. this is the satellite campus, if you will, that postgrads must trek to for courses because of reasons i otherwise do not know understand. alas, though, here i am.

the rain is a bitter rain, is probably how i could describe it. it is bitter in the sense that it probably makes the average person a bit bitter from having to deal with it but it is also bitter in a way that it seems to have a bitter attitude toward everything else. it comes with a bit of wind so it is pointless to use an umbrella. it also comes down in a slightly annoying steady sprinkle. it just feels bitter. evil rain.

i am just around the corner from the british museum bit it is unlikely that i will be visiting that mamoth of a place anytime soon. classes have been going fine, stressful at times, and time consuming at other times. first days are always rough and i am no exception to them. if i have some free time, i will post more about how my classes went. in the meantime, just know that they were all equally filled with surprises of all sorts.

i am in a bit of an irritated mood and i can really only say that it is probably because of the gloomy rain. i'm not used to it raining every single day. it sun does come out but i mean, even if it was a beautiful day it will still rain at night. the floor is generally always wet. i'm surprised the whole of england doesn't just disappear under alll this water.

i am currently waiting for my 'music and musicology' course to begin. i am debating whether or not i should audit the 'techniques of theory and analysis' course because the first portion is all on schenkerian analysis. the second portion seems more interesting but it seems that schenker will never really leave the course. i guess it is worth learning how to do it properly so that i can teach MUS419 better than certain persons at CSUF.

speaking of such figures, i alighted (a popular british term) at russells square behind a couple from spain. one of them looked a lot like lloyd rodgers and i sort of followed him with a it of a smile because he was so much like lloyd! it was fun. i found out that his name was carlos when his wife said, 'carlos?' and he just nodded.

well that is all for now. so i don't have a picture to accompany this entry but i haven't taken out my camera lately as i've been busy with reading materials and courses. hopefully i'll get some new ones this weekend!

Sci-Fi thrillers and first day nerves

2006-10-03T05:27:00.000-07:00

Barbican Centre, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

Last night I saw the 1925 silent film 'Metropolis' at the Barbican. The score was performed live by the famous german film orchestra, Orchestra Babelsberg. It was really awesome. Fritz Lang put together a really great film it had just the right amount of sci-fi, love, struggle, drama, etc. The score was nice as well as it was a perfect example of what a good film score is! Obviously, if it is a silent film then the score is essential to the film. It was just nice to hear a good score for a change.

This weekend I am going to experience some more music at the Barbican Centre. It's the birthday celebration for Steve Reich out here (somehow he has becomed the most loved American minimalist in London). It's a week long celebration versus the one day concert I attended at UCLA for Terry Riley. It is also probably a less relaxed atmosphere than the Riley concert. There are quite a few free stage events going on as well that tie to the series so I'll be attending as much of those this weekend, as well. Apparently there is a concert at 5pm that features Glenn Branca and I thought of the Paul v. Glenn deathmatch. Good times!

I am going to audit the Techniques of Opera Studies at 2pm because I figure I should take advantage of all of the courses available to me. For all the courses I audit, I am only required to read the weekly articles---no exams. So that is nice. I suppose I will spend Thursdays in Bedford Square auditing other classes as well. Pack a lunch!

Today my first official course begins at 4pm. That is my Techniques of Ethnomusicology course. I am excited. I have my notebook ready to go. I have misplaced my eraser though, so I am bummed about that. I did the reading, I chose some Nigerian musics to listen to and I'm ready to go! I hope I don't make a fool of myself on the first day.

The weather has been great today, sunny and no rain! Let's see how long that lasts...it always rains in England.

In the picture above, do you see the man standing under the light? I didn't know he was there until after I took the shot.

A nicer evening

2006-09-29T12:59:00.000-07:00

View from the A30 crossing, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

Today is a less exciting day for me and I am happy. I need to rest and stay in. Although, as a result of staying in, I am a bit lonely. Normally if I am not planning to do anything Carl usually comes over and we watch TV or talk or do something that does not require leaving the bedroom. That is always the nicest thing for me, just staying home with someone I really enjoy being around.

Here however, if I want to spend time with people I have to go out to the bar on campus and that is just too much for me. I cannot be drinking all the time and spending time with so many people! It's too much trouble.

This weekend I am going to have my first rehearsal for a play that I am in. It is called "Hay Fever" and it is supposed to be a British comedy from the 1920's. On Sunday I have my first training day with the Basketball society. Should be fun. I am looking forward to the much needed exercise! I am out of shape!

I don't have a lot to say today. My room light is still out so all I have is my table lamp. I am looking forward to my courses starting up next week because I'll be able to go into London a lot and I will something to do other than wander around RHUL with Hughes.

Bye bye.

Enrolment

2006-09-28T11:42:00.000-07:00

Statue, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

I am finally an official RHUL student. I still have to switch my temp. college card but I was too lazy to do it today. I attended the Freshers Fayre and I joined the Basketball Society so I can stay in shape! This one guy saw my camera as I was in the queue and he said I had to join the photography club. There are a lot of geeky societies on campus like Sci-Fi reinactment society.

I didn't do a lot today. After spending some time on campus I went with Hughes and his housemates to his house to see where they live. They live at least 20 minutes west of campus. Plus the 15 minutes it takes to get down to the high street and the station--they have a long walk. Their house is nice, though. They have a lot of open space. Hughes wants to barbecue so I suppose we might do that sometime next week. I told him to let me know when so I could buy some veggies at the farmers market on Tuesday (it's on campus!!!).

Today is a nice and slow day. Everyday prior has been too busy and too social for me. Yesterday Richard took the train into Egham for dinner and we stayed out quite late. Well, I got home around 11:30pm. We ate dinner at an Italian restaurant and he ordered a bottle of red wine which we finished between ourselves. I didn't realize we have finished it until I looked to see how much was left! After that we walked over to a pub called the Red Lion and chatted for a bit until his train arrived. All in all, it was a nice evening.

Tomorrow I am going to collect all of my reading material for next week's lectures. I want to be prepared! I definately do not want to give off the impression that I am some idiot American. My Music and Musicology class should be boring. Our first lecture is called "Introduction to Musicology: Writing and Presenting". Although I know it will be very helpful in the long run. Luckily our reading isn't a lot. I can't complain really, what else do I have to do at this point? Just reading!

By the way, resturants are too expensive in England. I am never buying food at a restaurant again. I am only eating in. The only outside food I will buy is fast food at Mark and Spencers. The meal between Richard and myself was literally 80 dollars. I...just...can't fathom. Well, the bottle of wine was 20 dollars. But still. It's just too expensive to eat out a lot around here. Best to just stop at the local fish and chip shop if you're hungry or else Mark and Spencers is really good for quick food and it's way cheaper.

If anyone wants to send me a care package...please include those tiny jawbreakers from the Sweet Factory. Those are good!

Idomeno canceled in Germany

2006-09-27T04:36:00.000-07:00

Allegedly, Idomeno's performance in a German opera house was canceled due to possible Muslim backlash. However, the scene in question (according to the article I am linking in this post) also shows the severed head of Jesus so what is the big deal?

Berlin opera canceled after religious threats

Sounds to me like the director was too proud to get rid of her own added ended to Mozart's original ending of the opera. He reason is that no religious figurehead as brought peace. It seems to me that she is really trying to make some sort of political artistic statemet by canceling her own opera over possible threats. All she has to do is take out the heads of Muhammad, Jesus, and Bhuddha (I can't believe she is beheading Bhuddha she's really ignorant) and just leave the head of Poseidon. It seems like it is just an excuse to foment more ideas of Muslims who will turn to violence over such things, amongst non-Muslims in the Western world.

In other German news, I read that some of Hitler's alledged watercolors were being auctioned off in Cornwall today and that the auction was crashed by a funny British comedian and a man dressed as Hitler offering 'six millon as the painting was a Mussolini.' In otherwords, it is likely that these amateur watercolors are in fact fake. Yeah...I really want a watercolor by Adolf Hitler hanging in my hall way. Definately good for conversation at the dinner table.

Hidden trails and Ethno students

2006-09-26T12:10:00.000-07:00

Hidden House, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

I finally met the person I found on MySpace at our Computer Centre induction. She seems alright but I don't think we hit it off quite well. I told her she could come back to my place because she had to wait 3 hours before our Music department induction took place. We got back to my place and ate a late breakfast afterward I showed her my room but she wanted to go outside somewhere to sit so I went along with her (even though I would have preferred to stay locked up in my room) and went in search of a place to sit.

Needless to say, we did not find a place to see really but we found a hidden away trail that leads around an area that maintains several greenhouses. It was quite cool. Afterward I brought her back to my commons area and she took a nap. I got bored and she probably sensed it so she basically let me go on my way.

After that we had our induction for the department which was a long 3 hour introduction to the programme. That was alright up until one of the professors went off on a tangent about research catalogues like RILM ad JSTOR (catalogues that I am more than enough familar with).

At one point we were asked to talk about our Special Study dissertation topic. Seeing as I didn't have a clear idea otherwise, I talked about what I wrote up in my proposal and that seemed to hit it off quite well as the professor didn't ask me a single question. I guess I came off appearing as if I knew what I was talking about! Other people were being asked loads of questions as their topics were quite broad or else a bit unsure. There are three Americans in the MMus pathway, including myself. One I believe might be Opera Studies and the other is a bit wishy washy and I wonder if she will last through the programme (she is going part-time as well).

I spoke to someone who did the MMus programme in Ethno and who is now starting his PhD at RHUL. He is being fully funded (well you really shouldn't do a PhD if you can't be fully funded) and its seems that I have to figure it out by January if I want to do the PhD programme next year or else wait a year. I might do it. It's a 3-4 year programme depending on how long you take which is not really bad.

I still have a cold but cold medicine helps wonders. Tomorrow is a free day for me so I hope to get some rest. This morning we had a fire alarm go off at 7:30am which was not exactly the nicest thing but at least it didn't go off at 4 in the morning.

Monday I have booked a ticket to see a live musical performance of a SciFi film called Metropolis. That is, the score will be performed live to the film. Should be a nice experience. It was brought to my attention via the Film Music expert at the department so I figure I should take advantage of anything that comes my way while I am here.

Currently I am waiting for my mac and cheese to cook in the oven so I can eat dinner! Yum!

My first cooked meal

2006-09-25T09:05:00.000-07:00

My first cooked meal, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

today i picked up my temporary college card and then picked up my student union card. i get my permanent college card on thursday when i am officially enrolled.

afterward i took the train to a 'london borough' calles hounslow so i could go shopping for cooking stuff.

hounslow was interesting. i wish i had taken my camera with me but i was trying to travel light as i was about to purchase a lot of items. it's sort of a poorer area of London and there are a lot of Muslims and South Asians. Many of them dressed in traditional clothing. It was quite something to see!

While i was in Hounslow I got a new cover for my phone as the keypad on the phone had worn with use by the previous owner. After that I shopped at a place called 'Wilkinson' which is basically the equivalent to a Pic'n'Save. I went there because they sell stuff for really cheap.

I have yet to buy groceries but I am going to do that this evening. My plan was to take the bus down to the high street and shop at Tesco but I just met one of my hallmates and he has a car! He just got here this afternoon and is currently unpacking but he is planning on going into Staines to the Sainsbury (a better grocery store than Tesco) there to do his grocery shopping so I will be catching a ride with me. This is good news as my feet are tired and I've caught what people out here call the "Freshers flu". I just have a sore throat and I feel a bit under-the-weather but I am ok otherwise. I figure I'll buy some Theraflu.

Tonight we have a hall meeting. Sounds like a real informal get together so we can meet and greet over soft drinks and 'nibbles'. Tommarow is my Music departmnet induction which means I'll probably find out where I am supposed to go for my classes next week.

I bought a Young Persons Railcard today, as well. It gives me a discount on rail fare for 20 quid/year.

I am having a nice time but today I felt a bit lonely. I haven't met a lot of people yet as classes have not officially begun and the students in my hall are slowly trickling in. The accommodation is broken up into Blocks (which are the buildings) and then within each block are floors and then within the floors are flats. So I am in a flat with 5 other students and we share a kitchen that has two tiny refridgerators and one stove.

In other news...our television is missing! I wonder if someone put it in their room...I had just fixed the reception too.

england

2006-09-24T16:24:00.000-07:00

Outside my window, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

well, i made it. the flight went smoothly and i arrived without much problem. the weather has been surprisingly warm and i cannot complain. i went into london today where i met my friend for lunch. we pretty much wandered around london all day chatting and catching up on life. london was really busy as there are a lot of tourists out here still. my room is decent and i can't complain because i have my own bathroom.

tomorrow i have to go pick up my college card and my student union card. that is about it. i'm going to buy some food tomorrow as i have only bought cereal and milk. egham is a small town so i am going to take the train to a bigger city called "hounslow" where they have a wilkinson. at wilkinson i will purchase some pots and pans for 'dirt cheap'...apparently.

england is really lovely right now. i was telling my friend that i have to tell myself that i live here now. this is my home, for now. it's still hard to believe.

tuesday i have music department induction and i guess some department meet and greet stuff. the rest of the week is free time. there is a freshers fayre going on toward the end of the week with loads of fun stuff going on. next week classes begin. i can't imagine. i really can't. i must be dreaming!

as everyone out here says...cheers!

Aaron's got a knife!

2006-09-20T22:34:00.000-07:00

Aaron's got a knife!, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

this is what happens when your mother sends you to an uptight religious private school. I visited my family in Monrovia today as it will be the last time I see them in a long time. I can't believe that I am going to be a graduate student in Ethnomusicology.

My bedroom

2006-09-20T15:05:00.000-07:00

My bedroom, originally uploaded by vansgirl12.

just in case anyone was interested, this is a photo of my bedroom, taken with my new nikon d80. it's an amazing digital camera. it is going to take me a long time until i figure out everything it can do.

bob 'dillon' or bob 'dye-lin'?

2006-09-20T14:34:00.000-07:00

my dad couldn't believe that the person who sings "lay lady lay" was the same person who sings "rainy day women". he thought one was bob dylan "bob dillon" and the other was bob dylan "bob dye-lin".

i leave for england on friday. i am in the middle of packing and it's a real pain. packing is my least favorite thing to do---ever.

no hangover = good times

2006-09-15T09:46:00.000-07:00

last night's pbe show was fun. after having one vodka tonic i was quite on my way to a fantasmic night. normally i am very critical of pbe performances but last night they sounded awesome. it may have been the alcohol as they claim that it was a really really rock performance. however, i had a great time being with my friends. i'm flying out next friday to start my somewhat new life as a masters student in ethnomusicology at royal holloway in london so i'm glad i was able to have such a great time with my friends out here, it may be the last time i see them in a year!

why the emmy's ruled this year.

2006-09-13T10:39:00.000-07:00

i didn't actually see the emmy's but i saw this clip and i knew it was fantastic for at least 2 minutes of the entire show.

colbert and stewart

old posts new posts

2006-09-11T11:12:00.000-07:00

i came across my old blogger from 2001. i posted from my junior year of hs until half way thru my freshman year of university. it is so fascinating to see how we change over the years. i am proud of who i have become. i feel like i have so much ahead of me and a lot to offer.

yesterday nicole mentioned that one of her best classes was when someone asked "how do we define music?" and she threw out the lecture and just talked about that. it is true though...how do we define music? what is music? there are so many definitions and so many of them are subjective. someone might say about rap, "oh that is not music." however, they say that simply because they do not enjoy it. rap music is in fact music.

i guess this is something for me to ponder upon. i have to eat brunch so i can run my errands.

rhul drama for your mama

2006-09-11T10:00:00.000-07:00

so just about every student at royal holloway is having problems with enrolment. it's really out of hand. the university's online enrolment service has not been working for everyone and forms have been mailed out late to a majority of the students. at least it appears that way from the bbs at the rhul student union. it's nice to know i'm not the only one getting information later than i should be.

my loan has been processed and payments are already being made to the university. yay! so i'm in the clear and i won't be too broke when i'm out there. i still will need to get a part-time job though.

as for my money problems in the local area, i called my old job and reported my lost cheque (finally, i lost it in january but didn't know until may and then lost it again when i was moving) and they are going to mail me a new one. that will cover the amount of money bank of america took out for the check bouncing (i don't use bofa but the guy who deposited it does) and then i can pay him back for the original amount. i'm glad that is working out, at least.

thanks to everyone who came out last night! i had a great time.

according to the student union counter, 13 days until term starts. dun dun dun!

just when you thought it could only get better..

2006-09-09T21:26:00.000-07:00

it gets worse.

just came back from camping up north and having a great time with carl. i wrote a check a few weeks ago for my improv class and i must have been short about 10 dollars and so my check bounced when the guy cashed it (not his fault, i'm just an idiot who should keep track) and his bank charged him 90 dollars. that is crazy. i mean, i got charged for 'insufficient funds' but it was only 22 dollars. so now i owe the guy 175 dollars. currently i have 13 dollars in my entire bank account. hopefully i'll be getting some cash this week or i'm screwed.

update on this person

2006-09-02T21:57:00.000-07:00

don't judge. don't judge other people. you are not smarter than them. you are not!

i need to tell myself this before i judge this person i've never met.

oh my god. she is also a pisces! i don't want to meet a strange version of myself!!!!!!

creepy coincidence

2006-09-02T21:51:00.000-07:00

so...myspace is really freaky.

i put in my course numbers for royal holloway on myspace and it shows other people who are in the same course. one other person put their courses up as well and it turns out they are also american and studying historical musicology at rhul and we are going to have two of the same courses together. so i asked them to be my friend so we could keep in touch. i was just looking at her myspace and it turns out she plays oboe as well. come on...how many oboe players ARE THERE IN THE WORLD?!?! she is really into south indian music and it seems like she is really good at singing karnatek music. maybe she can help me get better at making oboe reeds...

small strange world.

the wickerman

2006-09-01T21:56:00.000-07:00

well, i watched the wickerman today with my relatives. it was pretty awful. the ending was the worst part. i felt like i was watching a really great improv scene. the only problem is that the film is supposed to be a serious kind of twisted horror suspense driven story.

my nephew is off to kansas tommarow morning. it's pretty sad. he doesn't really want to go but he doesn't have much choice. hes going out there to some private boarding school. it's a catholic school that goes from k-12 grade, apparently. they are really strict and apparently the boys and girls aren't allowed to talk to each other. it sounds miserable. my sister one day decided to become religious and she became a traditional catholic. it's almost like being a chabadnik but worse. i think i would rather be a chabadnik than crazy catholic. of course, that is just me being slightly partial.

i don't know if i mentioned this, but i have my schedule worked out for the fall and i don't start class until 4pm on most days. i go to class three days out of the week and no one has class on fridays. four day weekends rock. i think i am going to get a part-time job so i can buy groceries and be able to go to the movies. it's insane but for working a typical college job, you earn almost 10 dollars an hour. i didn't even earn 10 dollars at my law office job and that was a decent job. i was paid 9 dollars an hour. if i get an office job in england, i will be paid more no matter what, i think, because i have a years experience working as a receptionist.

most of my classes are in london with the exception of one being on campus. my 'music and musicology' course is in Bedford Square near the British Museum and my 'Music in the Americas' course is in London somewhere. I don't know where exactly. It just says 'London' on the Music departments class schedule. My other course is in Wettons Terrace, which is the main building for the Music department. I'm a bit disappointed that I will have to travel into London for my courses because it takes about a half-hour by train. Maybe I'll be able to get a ride into London. It's only 18 miles away but it takes ages for some reason to get there by train. i guess there are stops along the way.

the reason why some of my courses are in central london is because royal holloway is a part of the University of London which has several 'colleges' around the London area, Royal Holloway included. so i guess some of the courses are taught at the central base.

i got my diploma in the mail earlier this week. pretty awesome. carl says i have to frame it. i feel happy to have finished. nothing lasts forever. generally we hang on to bad memories more than good memories, but in regard to csuf, i seem to only have the good ones to think about. i'm glad because my best memories are of my friends at fullerton. i feel so lucky to have made such wonderful friends. i don't think i've ever had friends that i could really relate to. i am very fortunate.

i think n.baker is right. i think i should probably continue working on my jewish music research. hopefully they will let me switch. the only problem is i don't know what aspect to focus on in england. i was thinking that it would be nice to do field work in israel since there are so many different cultural backgrounds in israel (jews from all over the world make aliyah and bring their home's culture along with them) it would be interesting to see what goes on musicially. also, israel is so secular that jewish pop music would be interesting too (not klezmer! and yes, pop music is a popular area right now!). but who knows. i need to get through my courses first! if i don't do my doctorate right away, i really kind of what to be a writer for a while. i actually have experience and i've been published as a journalist so i might have a chance. who knows. those long vacations for teachers is so tempting...

lessons and uni

2006-08-17T17:35:00.000-07:00

well, csuf is bustling with students. i drove to fullerton to a lesson but i stopped by campus to find out when i would be receiving my diploma. faculty meetings, students lined up for parking passes, book purchases, etc. looks like summer is over.

not for me! i still have a month of summer. woop woop. yesterday my sister asked me if i would have to take math or science classes at royal holloway. i told her, "no! i did all of that already." i am very glad i don't have to take GE courses anymore. many of them were interesting, sure...but sometimes they were a pain and i wish i could have just picked any courses i wanted to take on the side instead of being forced to take certain ones. instead of making you take 51 GE units, you should be able to pick a minimum of lets say...21 units of whatever you want outside of your degree. it isn't a minor and it isn't a major, just any courses you find interesting and that might relieve a little stress from your really important classes. futhermore, you should only be allowed to take those courses for credit or no credit. that way you can enjoy them better without the stress of worrying that you might ruin your gpa. i am not saying you shouldn't try hard in those extracurricular courses, but that you should try hard but even if it is only C or B material, it won't mess you up and you'll still come out having learned something.

i had a counterpoint lesson today. it went pretty well. i love how lloyd can rip your work apart and then go back and complement what you did so you don't feel totally incompetent. basically, i left a lot of mechanical errors that i know not to make but i did anyway. anyhow, i won't do them ever ever again. however, on the upside of things, he said that i have a good handle on the melodic lines...so...at this point, he told me, i should really strive to be error free even if it weakens the melody a bit.

haven't received anything in the mail from rhul yet. i e-mailed the music department the otherday asking if i am supposed to be getting something from them soon. no response as of late but i am hopeful. my 'application status checker' tells me that something should be coming in the mail about the accommodation stuff. oy oy oy!

look forward to tonights show....just wish it was so late. yay for pbe.

rhul updates

2006-08-15T11:35:00.000-07:00

since this blog is really about my take on the musica academia, i thought i should give an update on my status with royal holloway in london.

i have my UK entry student visa stamped into my passport. i purchased my airplane ticket. i will be flying out on the 22nd of september at around 3pm from LAX. i'm flying virgin atlantic--premium economy (woop woop). they give you a complementary glass of champagne upon take off. i have also sent my financial aid information to royal holloway so that it can be processed. about a week or two ago i was notified that i have been offered a place in one of the on-campus accommodations. i will be living in highfield court, which is, i believe, mostly a postgraduate accommodation. i get my own bathroom, yay!

as for registration and courses, that is still up in the air. i have been checking the enrollment site everyday now for about a week and the status is still the same "we will be making enrolment available in mid-august"...i have no idea what i am supposed to register for but i am hoping that i should get something from the music department telling me what to do. if i don't get something by the end of the week, i am planning on e-mailing the head of the ethno department to find out.

so, from the looks of it, i'm about 80 percent on my way. on the less than academic and adminisration side, my mom bought me a new set of luggage (it's really nice) and new clothes. i've been wearing clothes that i've had since sophomore year of high school and she claimed that i didn't have anything to wear...am i going to say no? yeah right.

as for the issue with airport security, all i can say is that i hope they loosen up by the time i go through check-in and customs. i'm annoyed by the choices our government makes but i can do very little to sway anyone in power.

all of my friends are going back to school next week. i can't believe summer is already over for them. i don't know what i am going to do for a month. i have a feeling i'm going to be following carl around fullerton because i'll be so bored sitting at home.

impluse

2006-08-15T11:29:00.000-07:00

i forgot to mention that my sister finally came home early this morning (2am) from her nearly three week tour around the mid-west of america. she travelled with the drum and bugle corps known as 'impluse' and apparently they one first place in their division. it is 11:26am and my sister is still asleep, medal around her neck.

if you are wondering what she played in the group, she was the vibes player. one of the youngest members of the corps.

things that are going on in your neck of the woods

2006-08-15T10:24:00.000-07:00

couple of things going on this week. one, thursday night at MR. T'S BOWL, the paul bailey ensemble (pbe) will be performing a fun set of music. the bar/club is located in Highland Park. i believe they go on at 11pm and there will be two bands performing before them, so come by to listen to a wide variety of styles.

on sunday night at 8pm, i will be performing in an improv show. this is my second show and i'm hoping it will go well for me! our shows are pretty good. it costs 5 dollars to get in but the money goes toward the rental of the space and that is really about it. we are going to be performing at a place called "wordspace" in los feliz it's off of russell and you can get there by vermont. i think they have a website with better directions.

me versus bach

2006-08-12T20:48:00.000-07:00

so today i met with the guy who hired me to read through scores and tell him what's happening. it went quite well, i thought. he knows nothing about music so he thought i was amazing with all the information i was giving him. he mailed me a copy of bach's six partitas for harpsichord and a copy of the recordings (on harpsichord and piano).

the nicest part about working with him is that he is so excited about the music. i never get that excited about music but it was nice to work someone who has so much enthusiasim. this guy loves bach. i listen to bach and then i can't take it anymore. i think bach is so heavy-footed. he is such a german.

it is interesting to talk to someone who has no musical training. for them, you are opening up so many doors into the way the music works. i take that ability for granted.

oh yeah.

2006-08-06T22:38:00.000-07:00

i forgot to mention what kind of ipod i got.

my mom bought me the ipod 60gig with video, black shell.

technology!

2006-08-06T22:29:00.000-07:00

well, i got an ipod.

my sister was converting our dvd's into ipod compatible format so that she could watch them on her ipod on her three week trip cross country with implus drum and bugle corp. i thought, "hm.. that could be good for my plane ride to england." i mentioned it to my mom and she said she was going to surprise me with an ipod for my trip.

it's fun. i've been putting songs on it. i guess i could get used to it.

i got a bunch of scores in the mail for my job. i have to analyze the bach partitas. i think i am just going to do a reduction of them and just go from there. real simple. it's like form and analysis all over again. i'm meeting with the guy i'm working for on saturday of next week in pasadena. we'll have a nice chat. i'm really excited. i love talking about music. this guy does not know a lot of the 'technical' aspect but he has read up on some of the scholarly material out there so i know we'll have plenty to talk about.

i've been a bit bummed, i'll have to admit. while i am excited about my trip to england to begin my career as a postgraduate student in ethnomusicology, i am also saddened by the fact that i will be saying goodbye to my good friends. i've made some wonderful friends and some of them have only been over the last few months. i've really grown up with these people and it's sad to let go of them for so long. it is hard to have to make new friends, especially when the ones you have right now are really great.

it's an interesting experience to realize that you are changing and growing as a person. life is something!

a dream job

2006-07-30T09:58:00.000-07:00

well, i missed a lesson this week. i've been running around a lot so i didn't have time to finish my counterpoint stuff. oh well. it's not that i said, "lets me tommarow" and then i didnt show up...i just didn't call lloyd and say let's meet this week. but i did call him and left him a voice message so we could mee this coming week.

how is counterpoint? slow. ha ha. i think i am starting to understanding CONTROL. although, it's difficult. last lesson i was scrambling to finish and carl came over, which is distracting, and i wrote some pretty horrible stuff. the stuff i'm working on right now is better. more controlled. but not so stuffy. i started second species which is a blast. not really. it's counterpoint. how much of a blast could it really be? at least it keeps my brain thinking like a musician.

i was recently hired as a score reader for an upcoming web art magazine. they pay me 35 dollars an hour to tell the main music writer what is happening in the music of some dead composer. my first assignment? bach six partitas. i'm looking forward to working with this guy. i mean, it really is a dream job for someone who has just graduated from college with a degree in music history and theory. apparently, my responses to his questions were what got me the job over some "stiff competition". i suppose i have lloyd to thank for that! or maybe just the collective thought of the bad news bears. or maybe i should give myself some credit? yeah. i'm a genius. yeah yeah.

carl is jealous. he wishes he had the job and not me. can you blame him? i told him i'll give him the job when i leave to england. i mean, i'm leaving the 23rd of september! i found the job, if you are wondering, on craigs list. opportunities are everywhere.

i need to remember to turn in my student visa application to the british consulate! i paid the fee for it. i just need to print it out and take it in. i must do this monday. must must must.

i hear there is a pbe concert coming up in august...see you guys there. i'll be in the crowd.

what do i care about more...?

2006-07-13T21:01:00.000-07:00

i am taking counterpoint lessons with lloyd rodgers. i had my second lesson today. so far, lloyd says my counterpoint is good, my voice-leading is fine, but that my melodic lines are stuffy. i smiled when he said that because i was being so conservative when i wrote them, of course they were stuffy. but that is fine. i did not want to do what my old roommate used to do with her counterpoints. i guess i was a bit traumatized.

i have to say that i really am enjoying the work. lloyd asked me if i was getting out of the lessons what i had expected. i told him that i am and that i was having fun doing it. i don't know if most people have fun doing five exercises above and below each cantus firmus, but i do. i'm learning a lot and it's really changing the way i listen to intervals. i'll probably get more out of this in terms of musicianship than i did out of the three semesters of musicianship at csuf. woop woop. at last, i can't stop being mediocre!

i'm currently working out of 2/3 books. the jeppeson, the swindale (an out of print british book that is really quite good and has all of lloyd's highlights of important stuff in it), and the fux. i write '2/3' because we really aren't using fux so much. swindale and jeppeson both agree that fux's scholarly approach was a bit off base. i brought that up with lloyd in my lesson today and he said it was true and that fux is good basis for learning 18th century counterpoint.

why am i studying 16th century counterpoint? well, i wanted to take the class but it was not offered the semester i was planning on taking a counterpoint class. so i took 18th century counterpoint. that was a mistake because lloyd teaches it almost as a continuation of 16th century counterpoint (which it is but...the class i mean). so since i hadn't take the class, i was clueless. "species? what? 5th species? grid??? you mean this isn't like my theory class where you realize the bass line?!!!!" apparently not since i tried to do the same things i was doing in my theory class in the 18th century counterpoint and getting D's! ha. don't worry, i got a B in the class in the end. the only B lloyd has ever given me!!! it was literally a sink or swim situation for me and for a moment, i was drinking water. but somehow i learned that if i kick my legs and i use my hands to keep me afloat, i would survive.

when carl took 16th century the following year, i was jealous because he seemed so into the class that he was ignoring me! i didn't see what was so fab-u-lous about 16th century counterpoint. come on, give me a break. i'm way better looking than any of those dead guys, in the first place. anyhow, i soon came to realize that carl was actually learning what the hell first species was, second species, third, fourth , fifth, tenth, one-hundreth...(ok so there really aren't that many) and i was pissed off. if i had taken 16th before 18th i would have received an A in the class, not a B!!! hmm, perhaps that last statement reveals something about me that isn't neccessarily a positive quality in some circles...

furthermore, i began to realize that carl seemed to suddenly have this insight into music that i was lacking and what's more his musicianship was suddenly genius. what happened?!!!!!! then, of course, everyone i know who has studied with lloyd has taken 16th century counterpoint with him. i wanted to be a part of the in-crowd, too.

so there you have it. i like writing music. i would have studied composition if it weren't for the fact that i wouldn't graduate in four years. screw that. i can learn outside of the institution more than inside.

other than that, i've been working on trying to make oboe reeds. it's hard and boring. i gave a couple of weeks ago but i'm gonna start again. i really shoud learn how to make a decent reed. i suck. :)

carl and i are done house-sitting for another one of our professors (comp prof., as well...go figure). today was also my last day at the law office. somewhat of a depressing day.

oh well. i'll get over it!

pbe concert

2006-06-27T13:56:00.001-07:00

well, the concert went pretty well in some respects. the performance was really shakey on the fearless leader piece but everyone seems to agree that we came together on the last piece, 11/25/05. that piece is a really simple modular piece that has three sections with the middle being the most contrasting of the two surrounding sections. the greatest moment was when i ended up finishing the piece. something i have never done before. it was the unwritten oboe solo that was finally realized. hilarious really. but everyone seemed to like it. i have never ended a modular piece before because it always sounded kind of weak in rehearsal when we'd done it in d.i.e. in the past. i guess i've grown as a player so it showed in the performance. i hope that paul will have a recording of the concert up so you (and really so that i) can hear the piece.

i stole this pic from paul's blog because i like it and it's the most recent one i have of me and my friends.

at last!

2006-06-23T13:37:00.000-07:00

i checked my unofficial transcript online and my degree has finally been posted!

i am a college grad. i am exstatic. i also received word from royal holloway that they received my final transcripts and have changed my status of acceptance from conditional to unconditional, which means i am definately accepted as a graduate student in their ehtnomusicology program. next step for me? i need to mail out my accomodation application. i already paid for the deposit via the internet. so that is practically taken care of. after that, i wait for a letter in the post from rhul regarding my FAFSA loan amount and registration. i imagine this will all come together by mid-July. exciting.

i am going to try to take some 16th century counterpoint lessons this summer with lloyd rodgers. i need to remind carl to get me his copy of the y...man book (can't remember the authors name). i recently checked out the fux. fun read. go socratic method! i might pdf my paper and post it. i'll have to remember to bring it up to the office with me next week and do that. it's very easy to do and does not waste paper.

shameless.

2006-06-22T12:47:00.000-07:00

this weekend is the paul bailey ensemble concert at Whittier College. They will be performing as part of the REAL NEW MUSIC FESTIVAL. I think the web site is: www.realnewmusic.com. I will be performing with the group for this one time only event! Tickets are fairly inexpensive I hear so it's worth checking out. The music should definately be something worth listening to.

Also...if you like TWIX bars, then you should click on the banner on the right hand side. You can enter to win some fun stuff, apparently. That's all.

die live

2006-05-18T09:18:00.000-07:00

last night was the d.i.e. concert. it went quite well, in my opinion. no performance is perfect but at least i felt that i played well. i wanted to make the performance special, since it was my last d.i.e. concert on campus. i thought it was very special, indeed.

not very many people showed up to the concert, which was unusual. normally students are trying to get in last minute extra credit points and so we normally have a decent crowd. tonight was one of our smaller crowds, i guess. they were a bit subdued, as well, it seemed. what was funny to me was that throughout the performance it was difficult to see the audience and so you couldn't really tell how big the audience was until they brought up the lights. so for me, in a way, i almost forgot the audience was there. i'm not sure if that is good or bad or if it just means i was really focused on creating good music.

--------------------------------

tonight is the wind ensemble concert and i hope no one shows up to that. we'll be playing in meng concert hall and if you are interested in what we are playing, here is an example....Show tunes from Porgy and Bess. if you like that kind of thing, then come on down!

---------------------------------

in a world with so few good teachers, we are lucky to find one that inspires us, and well, to steal a line from a great teacher who does just that, one that sets us free. i don't know if i've found that yet in my musicological studies. i don't think i'm set free yet but i do think i am going down a good path. i think the real test will be when i go off to london and study out there. we'll see!

-----------------------------------

as the semester comes to a close, what i have left on my plate in terms of music are a music history paper, a jury, and then outside of that are finals. i am almost done with cal state fullerton. can't believe it.

disturbing realizations

2006-05-17T10:52:00.000-07:00

Recently I was walking through the music building when I realized that I was a music student. Not only that, but that I was about to graduate with a degree in MUSIC. I don't understand how this happened. I am not saying that I have made a serious mistake. But it seemed that I was walking around with an oboe case swung across my body and I did not feel at all like a musician. I felt like a fraud, just then.

What is a musician and if I am truly a musician, then why do I feel like I don't fit in as a musician? Well, I do fit in. But not in the large pool of musicians that play in the orchestras or wind ensembles across the country. I fit in with a group of musicians that I think of as reject musicians. We are not bad musicians, but we are not model musicians.

Right now I am feeling really disconnected as a musician. I think the only time I don't feel this way is when I am playing in scratch (aka diverse instrument ensemble). I don't know what I will do after tonight when I'll play my last concert with the group. It is really depressing. I found a home and a reason to continue playing when I joined the group.

I am going to miss making music with my friends in scratch. The people I spent the past four years with, making fun of other musicians, complaining about the institution, plotting the overthrow of the institution, being disruptive in class with, terrorizing the department, and spending late nights at the bar having discussions about music, anarchy, and just sharing great laughs. I don't know if I'll find people like that when I am in London. Do we exist anywhere else outside of scratch's influence and ultimately, lloyd's influence? I guess we do if we continue to believe what we believe.

I think if there is one thing I have learned from Lloyd and scratch, it is that it is ok to be a romantic. We are all romantics in that group. We believe in a world that does not exist and could never exist under the current structure of the academic institution. We are revolutionary sypathizers and whether we will ever be listened to and understood by the masses is obvious. We won't be. However, we keep playing in our ensemble and we keep talking about what makes us angry and we keep doing little things that we hope will tell others to kiss off and we hope that we'll make them angry. I hope I make people angry in the future. I hope I write papers that make people angry and I hope I write music that makes people angry. I don't know if they'll be angry at what I am angry at, but at least they'll be angry at me.

Long live musical truth.

2006

2006-01-18T16:37:00.000-08:00

well, i haven't posted since november. i've been around, naturally. i think i've been spending my off-time obsessing about Arrested Development. so you'll have to forgive me. there is a 2 hour season finale on FOX on Feb. 10 @ 8pm. so watch it.

i've been getting these random comments on my blog and i think it's due to my inactivity. what has been going on in my neck of the woods...in the world of music? well, i lead the life of a university student. i'm not a professional musician. so i tend to be awfully isolated. but, university has it's drama.

i got word from UC Berkeley that they have finished reviewing my application and i will know in mid-Feb. the results. i hope they let me down easy...

still haven't heard from Royal Holloway. i hope that is not a bad sign.

haven't heard from UCLA.

haven't finished my Cambridge app. i guess i'm really not feeling Cambridge anymore. but i went thru a lot of trouble. i just haven't typed up my disseration proposal. oh well.

last friday was the opening of the new hall at CSUF. i believe our performance that morning really proves that music at the university is a shame. we premiered a work by William Craft called "Vintage Renaisannce and Beyond". this was a real crowd pleaser (sarcascm). we also played a couple of movements from a suite by susato (arranged some some other guy) and we played a work called "J'ai ete au bal". the last piece uses french cool jazz tunes and incorporates it into this modernist type work. we performed for what seemed like a venue that allowed only people over the age of 60 to listen.

rich old people music. it was disappointing, actually. i'll never understand why we perform such horrible music. the Craft work was, essentially, a re-hashed work originally written for orchestra. it's funny because CSUF commissioned the work. so, generally speaking, one would expect that a new and original work would be composed especially for the wind ensemble. however, that was not the case. it was a previously written work that seemed to be re-worked so it could be played in a wind ensemble. however, it still required a small string section. as someone in the audience said, "you know, i just didn't get that one."

the state of music really gets me down. i should have studied physics. i really think i want to get away from the orchestras and the wind ensembles. i can't handle them. whenever i am a part of the audience or the performers, i feel as though i am a part of a facade. as though my participation in these performances only help push an illusion of sophistication and culture that really does not exist. i don't know what i am going to do with myself. i hate that i've grown to despise music so much. i don't know what to do!

ho hum. tommarow night the paul bailey ensemble will be playing at mr. t's in highland park so check them out. at least i can enjoy that environment still. (no, it isn't jazz)

lucky winner!

2005-11-22T22:40:00.000-08:00

The National Lottery
P O Box 1010
Liverpool, L70 1NL
UNITED KINGDOM
(Customer Services)
Ref: UK/9420X2/68
Batch: 074/05/ZY369
Fax: 44 (0)871 661 8831

FINAL WINNING NOTIFICATION:
Dear Lucky Winner,
RE: BONUS LOTTERY PROMOTION PRIZE AWARDS WINNING NOTIFICATION

We are pleased to notify you the draw (111) of the UK NATIONAL
LOTTERY,Online Sweepstakes International Lottery Program held on 30Th
October, 2005.

Participants were selected through a computer ballot system drawn from
a pool of over 25,000 names of distinguished professionals drawn from
Europe, America, Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Middle-East, parts of
Africa, and North & South America as part of our international
promotions programme conducted annually to encourage prospective overseas entries.
We hope with part of your prize awards, you will take part in our
subsequent lottery jackpots.

The result of our computer draw (111) selected your name and email
address attached to e-ticket number: 56475600545 188 with Serial number
5368/02 drew the lucky numbers: 15 . 18 . 21 . 31 . 36 . 47 (bonus
no.46), which subsequently won you the lottery in the 2nd category i.e.
match 5 plus bonus. You have therefore been approved to claim a total
sum of £5,856,652(Five Million Eight Hundred AND Fifty Six Thousand, Six
Hundred and Fifty Two Pounds Sterling) in cash credited to file
KTU/9023118308/03.This is from a total cash prize of £16,533,022 shared
amongst the first Six (6) lucky winners in this category i.e. Match 5
plus bonus.

Your prize award has been insured in your name and is ready for claims.
To begin your claims therefore, you are advised to expeditiously
contact our licensed and accredited claim agent for Overseas Lottery
Winners within a period of 21 days (date of this email inclusive) for the
processing of your winning and remittance to your designated bank
account after all statutory obligations have been satisfactorily dispensed
with.

This promotion takes place weekly. Please note that your lucky winning
number falls within our European booklet representative office in
Europe as indicated in your play coupon. In view of this, your
£5,856,652(FiveMillion Eight Hundred AND Fifty Six Thousand, Six
Hundred and Fifty Two Pounds Sterling) would be released to you by any of our
payment offices in Europe.

Please be informed that claims not processed within the stipulated
period may be forfeited to the pool without further notice.

Our European agent will immediately commence the process to facilitate
the release of your funds as soon as you contact him. You may wish to
establish contact via e-mail with the particulars presented below
citing the batch and reference numbers to this letter between the hours of
8.00am - 7.30pm on Monday through Friday

Overseas Claims Unit
United Kingdom Lottery Fiduciary
Contact Person: Robert Kings
Email: thomasking@teenmail.co.za
Tel: +44-703-186-1163
Fax: +44-709-286-4814

Our winners are assured of the utmost standards of confidentiality, and
press anonymity until the end of proceedings, and beyond where they so
desire. Be further advised to maintain the strictest level of
confidentiality until the end of proceedings to circumvent problems
associated with fraudulent claims. This is part of our precautionary
measure to avoid double claiming and unwarranted abuse of this program.

CONGRATULATIONS!!!

At your disposal, we remain.
Very Truly Yours,

John Smith

The National Lottery
P O Box 1010
Liverpool, L70 1NL
UNITED KINGDOM
Te: +44-703-192-1413
Fax: +44-709-286-4814

i'm in heaven

2005-11-10T20:10:00.000-08:00

Dear Veronica

You will find lots of sympathy with your sentiments among
ethnomusicologists here at Royal Holloway. Ethnomusicology has been embraced here in
the Music Department and musicologist colleagues are taking a much more
reflexive angle than was the case 5 years ago. Indeed, in this respect
we have a very lively department and have, in effect, four
ethnomusicologists out of a staff of 16 - as well as several others with distinctly
ethnomusicological/anthropological leanings (such a Nick Cook, Jim
Samson and Rachel).

Also, if you are interested in how society relates to music (and music
shapes society), issues of power, representation etc you would find
plenty to get your teeth into on the MMus. I enjoyed hearing about the
Crumb controversy - although gauging when and when not to use the
McClary-style shock tactics is often hard. It can backfire.

As to your dissertation, there are plenty of interesting diasporic
communities based here in London. But you could also find yourself making a
critique of so called 'Western Art Music' practices/institutions - one
recent MMus student wrote an ethnography concerning notions of success
among contemporary art music composers in London...

All the best

Henry

I just had to post that.

the world the world is all around is all a round

2005-11-04T19:36:00.000-08:00

my last fall term is coming to a close and it's getting ever more stressful. i took the GRE last weekend and it went worse than i expected. i forgot my drivers license (why is it that when a person who is responsible acts slightly irresponsible in order to be a normal college student, they have to pay for it later on??!!!) in the pocket of my jeans and had to rush back home and back to the test center. i felt that i was going crazy during the exam. it showed on the results. 530 on both the verbal and quantitative. i would say, "fine, you aren't that great in math, at least...you work very slow.. (i am capable of outscoring people on a math test). however, for me to score exactly the same in the verbal was really frightening. and so low at that! i'm going to retake the exam, hopefully i'll be a bit more rested and in a better state of mind so i'll improve my chances of performing well.

as the only musicologist-to-be at CSUF, it is funny to sit in on a music history lecture and still be the only one who knows the answers. i attended N_icole B_aker's History B class with my roommate. I think she wants everyone to hate me because she kept telling everyone that I was jumping out of my skin to give the answer. I kept saying, "Oh, I should shut up." So she said, "No way girl! You can join in!" So I thought, "Ok..." So I answered a question and she said, "Right...ok...how about someone who is actually in the class give the answer?" So then I thought, "What? She told me to answer!" I was confused. Anyhow, I was taking notes for my roommate at one point because she was doing a bad job at getting the good stuff.

so i suppose that proves i have a passion for history. or at least some weird ability to retain it. i wish i could take an exam that showed that ability. not some useless exam like the GRE.

i'm applying to UC Berkeley, UCLA and Cambridge (yes that is in the UK). However, Carl mentioned that Lloyd that I should apply to some other schools in the UK but he didn't say which. I want to apply to a few others in the UK, because Cambridge is competitive. I really want to be a part of a good program but I want to get in, too! I think I have a good chance with the UC's. I want to apply to some schools on the east coast but I don't know which programs are worth the effort. Does anyone know? Anyone? Anyone? Voodoo....voodoo....? Voodoo economics?

Here's my biggest problem. What am I going to do? I understand the biggest thing when you're there, in the program, is your relationship with your advisor. How do I know if the school has the right person for me? I look at the small bio's for the professors at some of the schools and I think, "I don't fit in with these people..." I'm too much of a radical musicologist! (haha, i don't even have the degree and i'm already calling myself that, what a joke) I feel like I want to tear musicology apart. Even though, it's where I want to be. I love doing research and learning about things I didn't know about.

sometimes i think i've become too anti-music. i feel like sometimes i just hate music. or, maybe i don't hate it but it seems that it doesn't satisfy. i want more from the music. is that the qualm of the studied musician? i feel so overly critical. i see other music students and they seem so pleased with themselves. i see them and i think they are oblivious. they annoy me. to be quite honest, the only musicians i can seem to get along with (this is just from the pool of music students at CSUF and does not include any which i have not met nor does it include those who are not students) are carl, ryan and marissa. carl is my boyfriend, so i really should get on with him, right? of course. ryan, carl and myself used to hang out our freshman year with a group of freshman and from that group we're the only ones that still hang out regularly. but besides that, we've grown together as people and as musicians and we're the only ones we can stand. marissa is basically my best friend whom ive known since freshman year MUS-109, our first music class (that includes carl and ryan). i can't explain her as a musician. maybe that's why i like her.

when i'm in class, particuarly when i'm bunched with carl and ryan, i feel like we're the outsiders. i also feel like the professors and everyone else knows it, too. that is, we aren't music educators-to-be, we don't want to make love to our horns, and we aren't drooling and foaming at the mouth whenever F_ennell walks by. we don't go with the flow at all. we argue with professors and walk around in masks of dead composers (and it's not even halloween). we don't care about decorum or about representing our program in a respectful manner. hell, we'd like to show the world what a sham it really is. and the irony is that we are probably the best students, at least when it comes to music theory and history. we are not poor musicians either. we've played in the top bands (and survived that hell hole). we're just like the antichrist in someways, i guess.

what am i trying to say? i think what i'm saying is that it's amazing that i want to continue on in music when i show such animosity towards it. maybe it's the school of thought that i show animosity toward. maybe that is why i worked so hard to make sure i get out in four years or less. i'm just afraid that i won't find the right program for me.

one of the reasons why i'm applying to cambridge is because one of the professors there wrote that they are interested in 'the history of music as it relates to the history of society.' i tend to think that that is really what i'm all about when it comes to music. personally, i want to focus on how hatred is revealed through music. hatred, oppression, etc. that professor seems to be the only one who seems to be closest to what i am interested in. i think there was one other professor there that was like him. UCLA has the "new musicology" people, those who i am not sure i want to get mixed up with. i'm not about trying to rationalise that which may not actually exist. however, i do agree with some of the stuff that's come out of that school. Berkeley, I'm not too sure of. Berkeley confuses me. I've scanned a bit of the stuff that the professors put out, and to me they all seem to be too focused on just the music. The only professor that seemed interesting was one of the ethnomusicologists there. Which leads me to ponder another question...

To ethno or not to ethno? I thought I wanted to become an ethnomusicologist last semester because I thought people like George Crumb should have no excuse to be so ignorant. However, I don't know what to do really. I really love music that is pre-18th century. It seems so raw and so new. Even for today. it's really wild. however, if you don't know. my undergraduate thesis falls more under ethnomusicology than general musicology. My paper was blessed with the name "Foundations for Jewish Music in American Society" (or something like that...ask N.B. she gave it the title). Of course, I'm working on the era that has the most music available. However, I'm really getting into those Russian Jews who came over to the US in the late 19th century and early 20th. I don't know about them music wise, though. The interesting part about my paper is that from a socio-economic-historical perspective, there is so much recourse. But from a musical perspective, there isn't much. So my research is to find out what was going on musically. That's good, because that's my area of expertise! anyhow, i think it is safe to say that it falls more under the ethnomusicology category than musicology.

well, now you know what's going through my mind these days in regard to music. am i suffering from dellusions?

music history woop woop

2005-10-17T22:15:00.000-07:00

it's very interesting how i've become the definitive expert on all music history in my apartment. what suprises me the most is that i actually remember it all. i think i go in and take any of the exams and get a passing grade, without any review. i guess that is important since it's what i'm going to be doing for a long while. but i enjoy it and i find myself enjoying tutoring my roommates for their exam. the only that i don't enjoy is the fact that they don't know the information! i'm not even in the class and i still remember it...but they don't even have a clue what's going on. however, i don't think it is entirely their fault. well, at least for one of them. it sounds like she has a poor excuse for a teacher. oh well.

i have a cold. it's pretty miserable. i can't hear anything and my head feels like it is going to explode. i have a lot of pressure around my ears, sinus, and temples. no fun when you have to reherse. of course, rehersing is no fun when it's in wind ensemble. i think i've given up on tryin in wind ensemble. i don't really care anymore if i can play the peice of music or not. for one thing, i don't practise the music. i go in and try to learn it in rehersal. at first, this was not by choice. i have such a busy schedule that i have no time for practising. it's pretty miserable, actually. i enjoy playing my horn and practising for my lessons. luckily, dr. timm is very understanding and we mostly play duets these days. which is really great because there are no other oboeists in the school so all i have is my own sound to go off of, but when you play with another oboe, it is really amazing. i love playing duets because they always sound so good.

anyhow, wind ensemble is a load of crap. i wish that i would get kicked out of the ensemble. however, i don't want to have to play in the symphonic band, either. i want nothing to do with these ensembles. i can't stand the repretoire nor the way the ensembles are conducted. i suppose i have a poor attitude. i'm going to graduate this year in the spring, so i suppose i can feel fed up. except, i've been fed up with these ensembles for a while now.

number 9 number 9

2005-10-13T22:28:00.000-07:00

i used to think the universe was important. but i'm not sure anymore. i saw a headline and it read, "blackholes provide breeding ground for stars." why does that even matter? the universe is unimportant, i think. i don't think we should ignore the fact that we live in a universe but we keep looking for answers but we can't find the answers out there. it's like love. we can't keep looking for love and expect to find it. you can never find it. it just happens when it happens.

maybe we aren't supposed to know this, and this has nothing to do with the universe, but our department is somewhere around 10 grand short on the comission for the craft piece the wind ensemble is supposed to premiere. i guess that is the difference between schools like ucla and cal state fullerton. some people get it done. others don't care. i think most people don't care.

i think there is real music and i think there is fake music. when i was a kid my dad would put on the classical music station in the car and i would sit in the back sit and i would close my eyes and i would imagine little stories to go along with the music. most of the time i would imagine people in peasant attire dancing around in some woodsy area. i have no idea what i was listening to. i mean, i couldn't tell who composed the piece. when i was a kid i thought that classical music was really the greatest form of music. i thought it was intellectual. i thought it made me a more intellectual person. i thought i was unique because i was a kid who had an interest in classical music when most kids my age couldn't stand to sit through a few minutes of it. it was like poison.

when i was a kid i thought a degree in music was a joke. i thought that people didn't need to go to school to learn how to play their instrument, they could do that on their own. i thought, "what could they learn at school? that's a joke degree. that's stupid." i wanted to be a computer programmer, a computer engineer/scientist. i wanted to go to mit. when i was in the sixth grade i was already checking out their schools website and requesting prospectuses.

when i was a kid i played in the middle school band with my friends and we played the same music every year. we never attended district festivals. we tested on scales and i wanted to play percussion but my teacher would never pick me. i did not get the award for best musician.

when i was a kid, i used to wander around the different sections of the music area and look at the different composer's recordings. my parents did not have a real inclination toward music and my mom always said the violins gave her a headache. but my father tried to teach me how to play the blues on the piano when i was 9 and our piano was out of tune. it's an old upright piano that was built in 1889. it belonged to my grandmother and her sisters.

i didn't go to mit and i am not studying to become an engineer (but i suppose if i wanted to fall into debt and give it a go, i guess i could). i became a musician and i play the oboe in the wind ensemble. i'm only in the wind ensemble because they don't have anyone else. i used to be a good clarinet player. but i think anyone can be a good clarinet player. i've been playing oboe for almost three years. and i spent a year in symphonic band before i was moved up to wind ensemble. so this is my third semester in the wind ensemble. i hate the wind ensemble. i never feel comfortable. i feel so insignificant. i feel inadequate. i play in the diverse instrument ensemble and we play music that is far more musicially challenging and in an enivronment that is very intimate and revealing and yet i feel confidence and i don't feel alone in the ensemble.

i get a lot of grief as an oboeist because i lack in a lot of areas because of the little experience i have. i get hassled because i don't know how to make my own reeds. i get hassled because i don't know how to fix a problem on my instrument or fix a problem on my reed. i get hassled because i don't play soft enough. i get hassled because i don't play loud enough. i get hassled because i don't have enough ego. i don't think it's fair that i get all that grief. i never say anything about it because i know it makes no difference and people just figure you're just making up excuses. i'm not a bad player. i play in the wind ensemble and i manage to stay afloat. i play in d.i.e. and lloyd hasn't kicked me out yet. i'm not a bad player.

i think one day i might be an oboe player that people don't hassle. i'll get some respect for a change. i have no idea what this has to do with real music or fake music or the universe. i think i'm trying to deal with my friends death but i don't want to deal with it here.

i saw the terry riley concert at ucla a few weeks back. i was disappointed. i only went because carl thought it would be good that we saw him live. it was overpriced.

a topic, i may have.

2005-08-22T21:54:00.000-07:00

well, i think i have a topic. i'll explain it some other time. but basically i'm going to focus on samolone rossi and mantua. i'll explain more. if you know anything about rossi, you might see why.

university has commenced once again. it's a different feeling knowing this is probably, undoubtly, your last year. what is even stranger is knowing that all of your friends are probably not graduating this year and still have at least another year to go. university, in many ways, is like an extension of high school--for the undergads. but in so many other ways, it is nothing like high school. for one thing, i like being a student at university. i hated high school. another is that exceptations are far different and peoples goals are really varied. i'm going on to graduate school, but i don't know anyone else who is. i don't know what i would do if i didn't do more schooling. i couldn't do much, really.

today was an easy day, but it was also a stressful day. i've had very busy days all summer and today was considerably an easy day with not much to do. it was hard to handle. i walked around the music building a lot trying to think of something i needed to do. when i couldn't, i think i got a bit down. i think it's the sudden let down from doing so much and living day-to-day with a lot of stressful activity to going back to a steady routine that is relatively relaxing. so right now i'm feeling a bit down, i just need to adjust to the change of pace. it's hard to do. its like, being on a sugar high and just crashing from it. usually a good night sleep seems to make me feel better.

sorry this post was not really about music but just about myself. this journal used to be about myself as writing has been my main means of letting out my feelings but since it's mostly focused on writing about music related topics. so i apologise if you are dissapointed, somehow.

help help help

2005-08-18T21:42:00.000-07:00

i'm having a hard time trying to find something to write about for my research paper. i need to write a paper as part of my graduation requirements, but i also need to write it so that i may submit it to the universities i am applying to for evaluation. it's frustrating because i want to write something that has meaning and relevance to my own ideas but also stays true to credible musical research. i guess i really just don't know what to talk about. i want to put everything i've said in prior posts and apply it to something legitimate. but what exactly, i can't say. what should i focus on? where do i start? i did a presentation on lully and how his operas were influenced by the ruling idealogy of king louis xiv. i think i could do something along that line.

i was just thinking about something that is a bit funny. i was talking to dr. baker recently and she was just mentioning what she thought i wanted to write about or what i did not want to write about. so she said, "well george crumb is out because you don't like him...." but i was just thinking that just because we write or do reasearch on someone does not me we have to like the composer or his music. certainly we can do research on him/her to dispprove his music or place him in the correct social context?

i want to focus on music, and how it is used by powerful figures in society to sway society. i want to write about how music is manipulated. music, like religion, like anything else, can be manipulated to promote certain ideologies. i want to show how music has been used throughout history in this manner. i can't write about every instance, but i need to find a period to focus on. a few years in a countries history. we probably do not notice it, but music right now is being swayed by those in powerful positions. take for example what i have written about in regards to my experiences at the university i attend. is it not obvious?

maybe, what i want to do is something that requires far more research than i can handle. well, it is not that i cannot handle the research. it is that my resources are limited and so is my time. i don't know what to do. ahhhhhh!

someone give me some ideas!

it's true!

2005-07-29T11:09:00.000-07:00

lloyd rodger's web site is up. it's a miracle.

http://www.lloydrodgers.com/

all that is up right now is audio, i can't wait until the scores are up.

yes, there is a doe here, she is playing with my cats!

2005-07-26T08:41:00.000-07:00

i had some interestng dreams early this morning. the best one was that i dreamt that my father knew robin williams and brought him to our house to meet. i was so excited to see him in my dream. i said to him, "hi robin williams! i'm so happy to meet you! you are so funny!" then there was a baby deer in the front yard with my cats and the cats kept trying to kiss the deer with their noses. i asked robin if he liked animals and he seemed to like. i went outside to get the deer and i was holding it for the rest of the dream until robin decided he had to go eat somewhere but for some reason we weren't invited...

the dream right after that was about me at work at the law firm. however, we were on a balcony it seemed and i was typing some stuff, it seemed mostly random. however, i got up, perhaps because it was time to go and then there was a strange girl sitting in my chair. she was training for my job! i turned to maggie and told her there was a girl sitting in my chair training and she said, "oh we got more help?" and i said, "Yes...we did."

i'm going for an early morning bike ride--i think. hopefully something musicial will come to me.

THREE is the number, the question.

2005-07-24T11:13:00.000-07:00

question number three: what does positivist musicology mean to me, and how would i like to change it?

well, before i begin, i thought i had another experience to share but i cannot recall it anymore. i'm sure i will remember it later on, when i do, i'll post it. i wonder who reads this. does anyone? i think the only person who does is my boyfriend, which is fine by me. he's been quite supportive of my writing. his support gives me strength to believe that what i am saying is not entirely without ground. anyhow, back the question of the post.

i think i mostly answered the first part when i answered the first question. i didn't have a good definition for positivist musicology because i had never seen one before. in a way, i took the term and made it my own. but on a different level, what it means to me is that musicology had lots of problems. the approach, its basis, it is wrong. i hear some people say that musicologists just do not seem to be able to analyse music properly. i do not know whether or not musicologists should be analysers of music. i mean, what a musicologist does is look at music and look for traits that fit its time period. i do know that some focus too much on the pettier details like, "ah yes, here is a napolean augmented sixth chord." which, is fine. but is it worth mentioning? i suppose, i know where that person is coming from. seeing as we have been taught by the same professor. i do not know that i would be any better than the next person at analysing music. i can say that i have recieved A's in all of my courses when analysis counts. but what does that mean, really? i don't know. i guess it depends on what you think is important in an analysis of a piece of music.

as i said, there are great problems in the field of musicology. it makes me angry to know that we are taught to be so prejudice. What would I do to change it? I guess what I am doing right now. Writing about it. Expressing my qualms on the topic. Most importantly, I think, is that I am trying to sort it all out. Make sense of the problems. All I can do is prove to everyone that what I believe is correct. I suppose, there are detailed things that I would change. I mean, broadly, I suppose I would make music history relate music to it's environment. sometimes i feel like when musicians sit in a history of music course, they are only there so that they can be familar with all the titles and important works of some important composer that the music society considers important. they aren't in that course to really understand the music, or the composer. just to remember his name and his most important works. it is almost like a sense of prestige, or status. knowing that you know all the works that other composers refer to in conversation. something like, "ha, yes of course i know that. yes, i'm just a good as you. oh? what? you don't know that famous Bach work? well you are truly an idiot, aren't you? get out of my face you scum." It's like prized possessions. How many famous composers can you keep in your head? that isn't history, though, now is it?

i cannot expect that everyone will agree with me. i cannot expect that they will change. at least at my current university, i do not see how anyone would agree with me. but i do not think i am alone. someone told me that he taught that perhaps there was a change occuring. that it was the older ones that still cling to the old ideas. well, maybe. i don't know. it hasn't trickled down to me yet, here at the unversity as an undergraduate student. you might ask, "well then, how come you are talking about what you are talking about? obviously you got it somewhere!" well, i did. but it wasn't from a musicologist. and it wasn't from a young person. perhaps my opinions will change when i go off to graduate school. not my opinions in regards to the problems with musicology, but my my pessimistic opinions in regards to making a difference and changing musicology for, what i believe is, the better.

well that about sums it up for me on that topic. it may be a while before i think of something else to talk about.

question two, part 2.

2005-07-20T23:08:00.000-07:00

my intent was to sit here in the living room of my apartment, listen to the beatles and play runescape (an online game). two of my roomates are here, one is watching an old movie and the other is online chatting. however, as i began to listen to "Martha My Dear" I realised that some music makes me really happy. That song, in particular, is a song that makes me feel really good. i think a lot of time, particuarly when i am in class at the university, i feel a lot of anger when i hear music. a lot of the music is violent, aggressive, hateful. i do not agree with it. sometimes i get so angry because i really do not think certain composers should be acknowledged. but then, am i being oppressive? i had just finished reading cornelius cardew's monumental work, "stockhausen serves imperialism" when we began discussing milton babbit and in particular, carlheinz stockhausen. i was filled with the idea that music that was so oppressive should not be heard at all. as a matter of fact, i even argued with my professor that we should not even be discussing stockhausen because he was a fraud.

carlhienz stockhausen, to many people, is a genius. but what is a genius? as far as a professor of mine believes, a genius is someone who can write rather engimatically so that it is very difficult to decipher the meaning in everything. this does not just go for his analytical writing, but for his compositional writing as well. i do not agree with this idea. as a matter of fact, i detest it. not because i hate stockhausen but the idea that he has come to represent is what bothers me greatly. i think maybe its fascist, in a way. if you cannot understand someone they must be very intellegent! we must blindly follow!--that sort of thing.

stockhausen's music is a joke, in my opinion. i took a course that covered 'compositional techniques since 1945' and one of the pieces we looked at was klavierstuke no. 3. it was apparently an example of intergral serialism. however, there was only one problem. no one could analyse the work. as a matter of fact, theorists have spent hours staring at the short piece and have been unable to come up with a good analysis. when comparing stockhausen's writing on his rules for his particuar compositional style to the actual work, there are many discrepencies. essentially, his work does not fit his outline. his work is not concrete except for the mere fact that it is clearly printed on a piece of paper. my question is this: why do we bother to study a piece of music that is, when put to the test, nothing but a bunch of nonsense? some would answer my question by saying that his work is not entirely nonesense. there is meaning! i would respond with a follow up question: where is the meaning?

as far as i can tell, it is no where. there is no organization, no method to the madness. what compositional technique did i learn the day we discussed stockhausen? well, i learned that if i appear a bit eccentric, speak in large words, look down on others, and make myself sound very intellegent by being convoluted, then i can make everyone think i'm a genius. furthermore, everyone will eat up anything i produce.

so i came to the conclusion that stockhausen should not be taught at the universities since he appeared to be nothing more than a mediocre composer, propped up by some people with an agenda to propagate oppression through his music. what do i mean by oppression? well, please read what is posted at this webpage: http://www.artnotart.com/fluxus/hflynt-fightmusicaldecor.html
Please do not be discouraged by some of the spelling errors. I think it was copied onto the webpage from a flyer. Anyhow, I have lots of spelling errors in this post, no one is perfect.

The point is, Stockhausen's music represents fascism. That is obvious.

There is someone else that I want to make a point of discussing. As you recall, question two asks what I have experienced as a student in regards to the application of positivist musicology in the universities. the second half of this post focuses on a man named george crumb.

perhaps you can imagine how i have been feeling. during the spring semester i seemed to begin seeing things a little differently. it was that little difference that made me angry and seem quite extremist. i sat in my history course (music from the 19th cent to the present) rather frustrated. it was not the fact that i was often discouraged from classroom discussion that made me so angry and frustrated. but the details of the course that made me feel this way. furthermore, it was that i began to realise it was not just a unique case, such attitudes were everywhere and the promoted norm.

so, george crumb came to orange county and was to give a lecture at our university. how thrilling. that was, actually, not a bad thing. what was bad was how mr. crumb and his music was used for purposes that, perhaps he was unaware, less than honest. i'll have to admit that i found some of crumb's music, on the onset, somewhat interesting. however, as crumb was forced fed to us and i began to learn more about his music and what he had come to represent over the years, i grew to despise his music and what it represented. my anger toward the system spilled over into a concert critique for the crumb concert. hm, perhaps i should explain how we were force fed crumb.

crumb was coming to our school at the end of april, we knew it from the start of the semester. i remember when it was announced that i turned to carl and we both thought it was very cool and we were wholeheartedly excited about the affair. an composer, a living composer, was coming to see us! what joy, rapture! we better make the most of it, you know, he won't be alive much longer. well, as the semester went on and we got closer to the concert and the lecture, crumb was brought quite often. we were required to study a set of program notes that was distributed to the students that included interviews with crumb and john adams. the adams interview was very enlightening and i only wish that adams would have spoken at our university. however, he did not. the main focus was on the man known as crumb. his music, we had to know. we had to be familiar with the interview that took place between joseph horowitz, journalist-moderator-whatever, and george crumb. this interview and the background informaion given by horowitz and my history professor was alarming. i just could not understand how crumb could be a composer on the cutting edge of his generation, taking the 'exotic' and making it household. that is far from the truth. i know it is. his music incorporates theatrics that, while they may be entertaining, are just as degradng to the cultures they mock as a minstrel show. i do not deny the fact that crumb comes from a different generation, but he should be subject just like the rest of us to the requirements that those of us born after his generation are expected to follow. that is a respect for other cultures, equality, etc. when i listened to crumb's music, and watched video clips of performances, i began to feel that crumb was promoting many foul ideas that do nothing more than to harm our society. i felt that joseph horowitz was promoting crumb as something he was not and his music as representing something it did not. i recall a question that horowitz asked crumb. he asked him about his travels. he asked him if his travels to many foreign countries had an affect on his music. afterall, crumb is proclaimed as incorporatng non-western music into his rather western compositions. however, crumb answered that he had visited countries like australia, parts of south east asia, he had heard the digeroo, but that was it. it had no effect on his music whatsoever.

did i hear correctly? the non-western music he heard did not influence his music? that is impossible! i was just told that he brought non-western styles to western audiences in a highly palatable form! anyhow, in my critique i attacked crumb and called him ignorant, a fraud, and a bigot. perhaps it is not that he is a bigot. but certainly he must be ignorant and somewhat of a fraud in that people claim that his music is something that it is not. some might argue that he does not believe his music is what people make it out to be, so therefore he cannot be a fraud. but i claim that crumb is a fraud because if he believes the above statement then he is guilty of not making a point of clearing up the position his music has in society. however, we cannot discuss that. that is not allowed. that is why i cannot compare crumb's theatrical presentations of some sort of eastern seance (fancy that, in the east they have seances!) to that of a minstrel show. how can i do such a thing? how can i even think of tarnishing the great name of crumb by placing him society?

i don't know. sometimes i do not think my writing is clear. at least, i feel as though what i write is a bit confusing. my paper on crumb is on my main computer. i will transfer it to this one and post it for you. you can read what i said.

i think, that i should make my stance clear. in a way, it was unfair to attack crumb as harshly as i did. crumb is just a victim, a pawn. but i think that crumb is not without responsibility and that he is not completely incompetent. therefore, he deserves some criticism. you know, it is not enough to say that some of his music lacks an overall structure or abuses the instruments. that is too superficial. we must do more than that. george crumb was not directed by god to write his music. and neither was bach, stockhausen, wagner, beethoven, mozart, webern, or schoenberg (mind you that i do infact like at least half the composers i listed). everyone must be held accountable. i have to be accountable for what i say, what i write, what i do that is in the public sphere. our government must be helf accountable for it does in the name of its citizens. what goes on in the sphere music is not isolated from the world. music is very public and what we put out there as musicians, composers, etc, should be put to a test. not just compositionally, but on a social level. what does this piece of music represent? is it oppressive? does it represent fascism? does it represent violent uprising? music does have the ability to represent all those ideas. we just have to make ourselves more keen to notice. we have been told over and over that music is so pretty and nice. "listen to classical music if you want to be calmed." "classical music is not angry or violent." that is what we are told. we have been told this over and over again that we truly believe there is no meaning in music unless it is programatic.

i get angry now when i hear someone listening to a classical music station. not because i hate the music they listen to but because of what it represents in our society. to me, such "classical" music is used as a tool by those who wish to oppress us, to divide us. i really do not know how to explain what i feel. but when i pass by the mainstream classical music station i just feel disgusted. maybe i will figure out exactly why i feel it is such an oppressive tool. when i do, i'll post it.

goodnight.

fighting cancer, how can you help.

2005-07-09T15:33:00.000-07:00

I have decided to try to make a difference by fundraising for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society by joining their Team In Training program. What we do is we participate in an edurance event and fundraise to help cancer patients pay for doctor visits and medication as well as research for finding a cure for blood-related cancers. I'm going to be participating in the El Tour De Tucson Century Cycle event. That is, I'll be riding a bike for 109 miles around the perimeter of Tucson, Arizona on November 19, 2005. Sounds scary...I know! I am trying to fundraise 2,400 dollars for the cause so if you would like to donate please visit my personal fundraising website: www.active.com/donate/tntgla/vpaez You can make any amount of donation you like. 75% of the donations go to support the cancer patients and 25% goes to keeping this program alive. Thank you!

just an aside

2005-07-08T11:57:00.000-07:00

don't think i haven't forgotten you my ol faithful web journal. this week was the last week of classes for the first session of summer school so i've been wrapped up in revising and exams. i have an exam that i need to take online today before the midnight deadline. i still have 2 and a half chapters to read! ha! that's alright. it's open book. my strategy is this: 1) read all of the required chapters. 2) answer all of the questions i know. 3) go back and look up the answers i don't know in the book. 4) review the rest of the answers against the book. i takes me about 30 minutes to get through 100 questions and another 30 minutes to go through my answers. it seems to help, i got a 95 on the last exam.

i'm on my break here at work so i get to type a bit. i have nothing else to do but sip a 7up. personally, i didn't want a break. i was forced to take it. oh well.

i had some very positive comments relayed to me on my answer to question to and wagner. i'm not entirely done answering that question so look for a new post. i'm probably be focusing more on the 20th century in that post.

also, i wanted to take a moment to talk about yesterday's bombing. it's very sad what happened and hopefully everyone who has friends and family in the area (like i do) are ok. so far everyone i know is ok, i still have one more person to get a hold of. it was inevitable, if you know anything about the underground and if you have been in england post 9/11. most people saw it coming because it was such an easy target. but nonetheless, this is very sad. it makes think, "please just leave us alone." but how can they when our government won't leave them alone? instead of our government taking a hint, they just take it as more reason for fighting their illegal wars. it's ridiculous.

well, back to work.

some links for thought

2005-07-02T10:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.faqs.org/faqs/music/wagner/general-faq/section-18.html

this site gives a nice look at Wagner and anti-semitism. It also contains several links and references to books and articles that are worth reading if you are interested in finding out the truth about Wagner and his antisemitic ties. I may look them up myself.

* 'Wagner: Race and Revolution' by Paul Lawrence Rose, who presented a
view in which racial and anti-Semitic ideas were the driving force behind
Wagner's creativity, even in 'Der fliegende Holländer'. Many Wagner
scholars vehemently oppose this view, in particular harshly criticising
Rose's scholarship; see for example Stewart Spencer's review ('Wagner',
January 1995, pages 46-48).

the above is taken from the webpage that i have linked. i like that the author of the page explains how the scholarly community has reacted to the publications. remember, anything that goes against the establishment is bound to be attacked. nonetheless, it is worth finding out what is being attacked and why. is there foundation for either argument? it is interesting that many scholars critisize Rose's scholarship. Rose, as I have just read, teaches at Penn State (located in Pennsylvania) and is a professor of European History, Mitrani Professor of Jewish Studies. on his page there is a listing of recent publications all having to do with Euoprean history and in particular, Anti-Semitism. Here is a list of his publications:

*

Revolutionary Antisemitism in Germany from Kant to Wagner (Princeton University Press, 1990; 2nd ed., German Question/Jewish Question, 1992).
*

Wagner: Race, Revolution and Redemption (Faber & Faber/Yale University Press, 1992; new ed. 1996).
*

Heisenberg and the Nazi Atomic Bomb Project 1939-1945 (University of California Press, 1997).
*

Editor, Antisemitism (Oxford University Press, 1997).

I do not know in what way they critisize his scholarship other than I could guess at it. My guess is that they try to discredit his research and basically call him an ignorant bitter fool. But who knows, that just my guess.

oh, there is another interesting link: http://members.aol.com/wagnerbuch/intro.htm
it actually has the authors book online here is a quote from the webpage introduction:

My basic areas of interest are the violence of Wagner’s antisemitism - I assert that it was very much more violent than has been previously thought - and Wagner’s operas - where I have new research demonstrating violent antisemitic subtexts.

OK, then. How come, if the operas contain antisemitism, it’s proved so hard to nail down? How is that the violence of his antisemitism has been so seriously underrated? Why does the composer still have a clean bill of health? Here’s a quote that goes some way to explaining:

"Such a career as mine must ever cheat the onlooker: he sees in me acts and undertakings he deems to be my own, whereas at bottom they are quite alien to me: who marks the repugnance that often is filling my soul? All will be understood one day, but only when the sum is finished and the balance struck. Then folk must find that this Unusual was really but to be accomplished thus...Still: the day of clearing up will come - things are shaping up that way - and the world will clap its eyes on many a thing it had not allowed itself to dream of."/Letter of Richard Wagner to Mathilde Wesendonck p243 10/8/1860

Fascinating statement - Wagner's career cheats the onlooker - Said not by an enemy, but by the man himself in a letter to his then beloved. Not someone with whom one might expect him to lie - rather someone with whom he might unburden himself. This book is based around that perception.

sounds intesting...lets read another quote from the author's page:

And Hitler's famous comment:

"Whoever wants to understand National Socialist Germany must know Wagner."/Quote in The Rise and Fall of The Third Reich William Shirer

I do believe - and will attempt to prove - that, as far as the Jews are concerned, Wagner was Hitler’s prophet on the most profound level.

wow. i am definately reading this one, it's online and it's free.

Check out the links, I think it is worth the effort.

question numbah toow.

2005-07-02T10:37:00.000-07:00

question number 2: what have i experienced as a student in regards to positivist musicology?

good question. i've experienced a lot of things as study in a music history class. a lot of it has been good, but there are also lots of bad experiences. i suppose that i should share with you the bad ones since they seem to relate most to this topic.

of all the examples i've given, none of them have been too extremely controversial. however, as i go into my experiences, i am stepping in a realm that a lot of people do not like. i'll start with some mildly entertaining experiences and work up to the ones that get people angry.

well, one of the interesting things i experienced as a student taking music history at the university (4 semesters worth) is the relibility of the required textbook. the book that we used in our courses is often called "the grout". which happens to be one of the authors of the book. Grout and Palisca. however, either one of them tends to be out of touch every now and then with the history of music and one could even raise the question of anti-semitism. alright, i really have no grounds for that and i really shouldn't even try to push that as a truth but in my first semester of the 351 series (there are three semesters plus the survey course that is a pre-requisite) we were required to write a short paper on a madrigal. there was no title given but somehow i managed to find out who the composer was and i checked out books on the composer for additional historical background. the composer's named was Salamone Rossi. he was an Italian Jew that lived in the 1600's. the Italians liked him enough in Mantua that they allowed him to go around the city without the mark of the Jew. anyhow, in the second semseter course, which covers the baroque thrugh the end of the classic era, salmone rossi was brought up. perhaps by myself...i do not remember anymore why he was mentioned. but he was doing something a bit before anyone else. our professor did not believe that salmone rossi was not in the textbook. i told her he wasn't because i tried to find him last semester and had no luck. she still did not believe me. so she asked for my book and checked the index, and i was right.

thats the only proof i have. i hope you realise that i'm half joking with that one. i'm not trying to call anyone anti-semitic. however, i did not understand why she was so shocked and maybe even more i did not understand why rossi was not in the textbook when he was a pretty important figure in the history of music. oh yes, he was one of the earliest compoers to use the trio sonata texture. so yes, rather important figure. but not mentioned.

you know, something else i really found bothersome is how the 19th century is treated, in particular.

i ask you, when you think of the WESTERN WORLD, what do you think of? I myself think North America, Europe and Russia. That would include all of the Slavic countries, England, United States, Latin America, South America, Spain, Portugal, Poland, etc. You know, by the 19th century the idea of nationalism has come about. And all of these countries are fighting for their own peice of land to call their own. What I mean is that there are a lot of nations that are in existance than just Italy and Germany! And yet, we seem to only focus on those two countries. Why is that, especially considering these countries are destined to become the leading fascist nations along with Japan in a war we like to refer to as World War II? Surely Italy was doing more than just pushing out operas. And Surely Germany was doing more than just pushing out really bad operas (Wagner anyone?). Alright, it is true that we did cover more than just German opera. We covered some German instrumental music! Oh and music from the Austro-Hungarian empire, which includes a lot of German speaking citizens.

The only composer of this time that I even consider to have a good deal of depth is Liszt. Liszt, if you try to read up on him, wanted a united Hungary that was not under the oppression of another country. Hungary had never really been an autonomous country before so it is interesting to see this sense of nationalism effect the man and his compositions. However, that is not important in music history.

That was a bit of a tangent, back to what I was saying. Why is it that the 19th century seems to have only occured in Italy and Germany (and it's sister county Austro-Hungary)? What were the French doing? What about the composers in England? Or Portugal? Or in Poland? They are all Westerners. Maybe, as I understand it, it is because the development of the study of music history started in Germany. You know how the Germans are. Germans, particularly composers, seem to believe that they are the greatest thing to happen. Honest. Read what Wagner writes, read what Webern writes. Read what Stockhausen writes. Stockahusen believes that he is from a line of German composers that were put on this earth to make the greatest music and only they can do it. Wagner is an anti-semitic and here is a quote:

You ask me about the Judenthum [Judaism in Music]. You must know the article is by me. Why do you ask?...I felt a long-repressed hatred for this Jewry, and this hatred is as necessary to my nature as gall is to blood. An opportunity arose when their damnable scribbling annoyed me most, and so I broke forth at last.

This leads me back to question to general idealogy of musicology/music history. is it, in its popular stream, anti-semitic? i am not claiming that thousands of professors with a background in musicology are anti-semitic. but what i am saying is that as a whole, musicology has been moulded to ignore the Jews in music. does that seem likely? it is a very touchy subject, i know. and even writing about it makes me feel a little uneasy. but i put it out, because i think it is worth giving a thought about. Wagner admits that there are Jewish composers writing music in Germany and yet we have never even heard of them. There are a lot of reasons why I do not like Wagner, his anti-semitism is one and his music is another. i do not know if Wagner ever actually put his racist words to action through his music (i have not studied his music and no one has bothered to say so) except i do know that he advocated for violence toward Jews. but it is certain that he thought that the Jew or any other savage race had no place in Music.

i think maybe there is a built in ethnic/racist slant in musicology that probably stems from its origins. i do not have proof other than what i see as the main focus in the history books that are required reading for class.

it appears that this question requires a lot of writings, so i'll continue answering the question in my next post. i think i have written too much for one post already. if you are bothered by my inconsistent use of capital letters at the start of sentences, please forgive me. i am lazy.

working on those thought

2005-06-27T19:36:00.000-07:00

if you are interested in when i'm going to answer question 2, don't worry. i'm just really tired so i don't have a lot of energy to write a lot down at one time. but i've got a draft going, so it will be up someday!

so about liszt

2005-06-23T18:51:00.000-07:00

well, what i was thinking about in regards to Liszt was that what I know about Liszt from class is that he seemed to use Hungarian folk songs, styles, etc in his music. But no one seems to care why this is. the reason for this is that Hungary was under the rule of the Austro-Hungarian empire. Liszt lived during the 19th century and was influenced by the new idea of 'nationalism', no doubt. but the point is that Liszt was influenced by his environment to write more nationalistic music. He believed that Hungary should be its own nation.

The more I write this, the more I wonder if this is exactly what I mean at all. I am a bit tired of typing right now. I think I've posted too many entries in one day (I am also posting on a group web log that is called 'the 10 most harmful books of the 19th and 20th century' it's a book club and we're reading these harmful books.). i'll try to give some better examples of what i mean when i answer question 2 tommarow.

here is another example.

2005-06-23T08:46:00.000-07:00

i was just reading about imperialism and world war I (taking a world civ class, i think i mentioned it) and it mentioned something about the Austro-Hungarian empire. it gave me another example. that is Liszt. see what you know about Liszt and his music and I'll get back to you later.

lets get positive...positive.

2005-06-22T20:25:00.000-07:00

positive musicology. what does it mean to you? what does it mean to me? well, for a while i thought it was something that maybe carl and i had made up. however, it seems that it is not. it has been suggested that i cover three points in my discussion of the topic:

1. you should explain what it is.
2. what you have experienced as a student and
3. what it means to you, and how you would like to change it.

let's start with number 1: what is positivist musicology?

well, i do not know the true definition. maybe i'll look it up and post it at another time. but this is what it means to me (and i think it is more important this way since i may or may not have re-defined it):

positivist musicology is the analysis of music from a historical analytical perspective. actually, that is what musicology is. what makes musicology 'positivist' is the fact that musicologists refuse to take into consideration the society that the music developed in. when we study history, we should always look at the socio-political-economic impact. let us take for example, the developement of communist theory. there are several ways we could analysis this but we want to do so from a historical perspective. so, we would probably try to take into consideration what was happening in the world at the time that Engels and Marx were forming these ideas. we would probably be interested in where Marx and Engels fell in the society, were they members of the elite? or were they propety-less and members of the poor class of society? of course, we would probably try to understand exactly what communist theory means in and of itself. we might also ask how it effected society throughout history. this, in a nutshell, in a historical analysis. i think i could be leaving stuff out, but that's the basics.

in musicology, we tend to forget to to focus on the social atmosphere of the times. take for example Jean-Baptiste Lully. Lully is known as the father of French opera style. we are familar with his music. in a music history class we might learn about how he used dotted rhythms in his overtures because it reflected the fact that the king and nobles would usually walk in at this time. oh and by the way the king was Louis XIV, but thats not really important. or is it? in positivist musicology it really makes little difference where the music came from. it's just music. oh yes, there are some differences in choice of rhythm or structure or forms, maybe you might find a frotolla in italy but not in germany. however, that is all.

in my opinion, the study of music, if we are going to do it from a historical prespective should include the actual history. i go back to my example about Lully. if we knew anything about the french court during the 18th century we might understand why Lully uses the dotted rhythm in his overture. yes, the king would come in a sort of procession. but, Louis spent a lot of money on entertainment and indulged his court by putting on elaborate operas, performances, etc. however, he did not do this just because he liked all of the entertainment. it was because Louis knew that his nobles were concerned simply with status and reputation. by keeping them entertained with operas and ballets, they would not be concerned with what Louis XIV was doing politically. the question is whether or not that shows up in Lully's music. the answer is yes. often Lully and the librettist Moliere teamed up to promote ceratin views on the kingdom. for example, early on, Louis wanted to appear as though his monarchy was very strong militarily and so through the operas by Lully and Moliere, we find themes that might reflect military success. furthermore, the fact that Louis was a ballet dancer played a significant role in this opera-ballets. Louis was often cast as a Greek God or as a paternal figure.

does this make Lully a bad person? no, not really. I mean, Lully was probably just trying to make a decent living. however, he allowed himself and his music to become a political tool. this is important. in positivist musicology, such information is seen as irrelevant. i claim that it is not irrelevant. i claim that in order to fully under music and it's place in history, we must first discover what influenced the composer to write such music. in the case of Lully, he was influenced by the king of France to write in a specific way.

i think that there are musicologists/historians that do focus on the socio-political aspect of music history. however, i find that it is not widely accepted view. i do not think this problem is something common throughout history. i think it has its root in the 19th century, with so many other thing that i have problems with...

what i mean is that much of what we are seeing now, in the world, is a result of many actions the empowered nations of the world took place during the 19th century.

i know my views on the subject are fragmented and have some faulty reasoning. but it's a topic that i have a lot of difficultly with and i am still trying to suss it all out.

i'll read this over tommarow maybe and see if i can clear things up or try to tighten it up a bit. here are some final remarks:

i think that many people do not want to think of music as being influenced by the world that it lives in. i think that people want to believe that all music is beautiful and created for the sole purpose to be beautiful. i think that people think of music as an escape from reality. however, i think that music is not anything like that. i think that music is not always beautiful and i do not think music is created so that it makes people think, "oh that was pretty." i think that music, like other forms of entertainment, is a reflection of society. i think that when we can start focusing on how music reflects society, it is then that we can fullly understand it.

look for my next post as i answer question number 2: what have i experienced as a student in regards to positivist musicology?

by the way, the blisters from my sunburn are going down. still rather painful though. oh and yes, i really am enjoying those recordings! thanks again paul!

music in times of war

2005-06-21T14:23:00.000-07:00

well, i'm listening to lloyd rodger's score to the "little prince", check out paul bailey's blog for more information on that. carl, my boyfriend, got a copy of the score from paul and has it on his computer. it's really great music. i've mostly heard lloyd's modular stuff, which is alright but i tend to think modular music does not always work, only in limited circumstances. and even then, there might be a problem. if you've ever heard any of lloyd's work, or anything he has had influence on, such as paul bailey's compositions, sean fergusons, etc, you have a good idea as to what the feel of the music is. i'll have to add more to this post when i have a chance to delve into details. but it's nice music to listen to.

i went fishing on sunday, i may or may not have mentioned that. the point, however, is that i got badly sunburnt on my ears, particuarly my left ear. i'm a native californian and you would think i would be used to the sun. but my left ear is blistered all over the back. i can't see it, but carl has confirmed this. it's very painful. and very red. why does this matter? when i've got ear phones on my ears and it makes my ability to enjoy the music a bit painful. ooh yeah baby, i love pain. (not really)

so the music plays in the background and i sit here.

2005-06-20T21:22:00.000-07:00

alright. i have been passed the baton. the baton for what, you ask? well, it is a complicated baton. a baton that has many facets. However, it turns out i am free to choose which facet i wish to spend the rest of my life in. well, perhaps not the rest of my life, but some good time.

what am i talking about? i think i am talking about music. i think that is exactly what i am talking about. i think i am talking about new music and the world it exists in and the who, what, where, when, and gosh darn it WHY!--of it all.

paul bailey is the ringleader of an emsemble known as the paul bailey ensemble. he is also someone with a lot of good things to say about music. somehow, he got the impression that i have good things to say about music. well, i have things to say about music that a lot of people do not want to hear. it's to the point that it's caused problems in a few of my classes. i do not regret the things that i said in these classes because whether i am right or wrong, i said it. i made people interested in the topic. i stirred up controversy. i think that was important.

there is a huge problem with the discussion of music from a historical analytical perspective. there is something called "positivist musicology" which means fairly much what you think it means. musicology that looks at all music as just fine. they refuse to take into consideration the social implications of the music that has been created. it is outrageous to think that music is without consequence and without influence from society. well, there you have it. the tip of the iceberg.

ok paul. ok paul. here i am. here i go. let's see what happens.

i think i found the baton...

2005-06-20T10:20:00.000-07:00

hm. someone has passed a baton to me? well, that makes me think. think that i need to rethink my blog. alright paul, i'll take it.

a jedi knight

2005-06-12T13:09:00.000-07:00

well, so continues our star wars marathon. my sister and i decided a few weeks ago that we would watch the star wars triology in order. however, we only managed to watch episode I just before june started since i was busy moving into my new apartment by campus. however, we finished episode II just now and so we are trying to catch up by watching episode III later on today. we really don't need to rush except that we asked our father to come see episode III with us in the cinema. for that reason, we do not wish to break our promise. we do not get to spend a lot of time with him anyhow, and it is hard to do things with him since his stroke. so we have to make the most of it.

last night i saw the dodgers play at dodger stadium with my sister and mother. it was a fun evening, i thought. the dodgers lost, sadly. they sell subway sandwiches at the stadium, now. i was excited because i thought perhaps i could find something edible at the stadium that was not beef (i follow the vegetarian diet nowadays). unfortunately, they only sold chicken and turkey sandwiches. very dissapointing. i suppose from now on, i will have to bring something to eat.

well, i am now a member of a book club. the set of books we are reading at the top 10 most harmful books of the 19th and 20th century, according to an online United States conservative magazine. Our first book on the list is Mein Kampf, which in English means "My Struggle", it was written by Adolf Hitler while he was in jail in the mid 1920's. http://harmfulbooks.blogspot.com/ check it out. Posting on the books begins June 20th. Check it out. If you want to join in, feel free to do so!

i think i am really angry

2005-06-09T09:46:00.000-07:00

maybe i shouldn't be so worked up over an A-. but unlike some people i've had to work extra hard this semester to make up for the fall semester. i did very poorly fall semester because i was really ill and had to drop a class, which didn't get dropped as a W but as WI because the stupid department chair wouldn't sign my slip. i had enough proof that i was ill but he wouldn't accept it (that's a story in itself, so just trust me).

so my gpa fell to a 3.29. so i worked really hard so i could get straight A's this semester. which i didn't because I got a B+ in piano and a B in my lessons because I totally blew my jury. but at least i would have a high enough gpa to bring my overall gpa closer to a 3.4 so that after i finished my summer classes (hopefully with all A's) and hopefully do very well in the fall, I would have a 3.5 overall gpa going into the spring '06. i'm graduating in the spring and my grades up to the fall '05 semester matter the most. so i'm running out of time.

my asshole professor in music history gave me an A- which brings my gpa down slightly for the semester which makes a different on my potential for getting closer to a 3.5 for graduation. i don't deserve an A-. i never ever dispute grades, for one thing. so obviously, this really hits a nerve. i'll take an F if i think i deserve it (which i have, once in high school). i generally feel that i deserve the grades i get. whether i like them or not. but i do not deserve an A-. i really think he did it on purpose. this professor and i have some conflicts of interest. and i'm deeply sorry that i cannot possibly see eye to eye with him. i refuse. i e-mailed this professor as soon as i saw my grades.

i might seem like i'm over reacting. but unlike some people, i'm graduating in the spring. so i don't have the extra time to waste to try to boost my gpa. i would really love to, but i don't have the luxury. my parents, specifically, my mother pays for my schooling. therefore i can't just sit around as an undergrad for 5 or 6 years, wasting her money.

i'm counting on my grades for the summer classes i'm enrolled in to boost my gpa so i can get closer to a 3.5. how can i get accepted to a decent grad school without a gpa at least in the 3.5's? what is even more annoying is the fact that your last semester hardly matters because applications are evaluated way before the second semester ends.

if only i had done better in the fall, i wouldn't be in this jam. i would probably have a 3.6 by now. i went into the fall semester with a 3.4. i should be getting close to a 3.6 right now. i would have graduated with a gpa probably very close to a 3.7, but now, all i can do is aim for a 3.5.

i wish i wasn't so obssessed with these stupid grades and numbers. i hate that i am. i hate that it makes me so angry. i can't help it. i just want to be the best and i'm not the best. i feel like i've been programmed to behave this way and even though i recognise this fact, i cannot change it.

school is an institution of evil. it is entirely wrong. education, as it is in the united states, is the result of a society overrun by capitalism. capitalism in the united states is a destroyer.

gone fishing

2005-05-26T17:20:00.000-07:00

just in case any one is curious as to my whereabouts..

my computer will be packed up until june 1st. i won't have internet access for a while after that i don't think. checking out of the dorms for the last time and then moving into my new apt on weds. sharing the place with some friends.

it's been a long year. glad it's over. time to move on. one more year to go!

i used to care but thing's have changed.

2005-05-13T23:24:00.000-07:00

well, that isn't totally accurate. i'm listening to a song by bob dylan with that title. its a great song.

today carl and i went to tower records to check out the latest stuff in the 'experimental section' we decided on an old recording from 1966 by AMM, an experimental ensemble that Cornelius Cardew was involved with. we were wholeheartdly disappointed. i knew it was coming but for some reason i didn't speak up when we were at the store. anyhow. it's fairly dreadful, the music. carl has gone from feeling very angry and cheated, to feeling very angry and violent to finding hope that he might be able to return it to coming to grips with the music itself by reading the notes on the inside sleeve. i think i like where he is now. i told him what cardew would say about the music. carl has the right to be angry. he should be angry. we should all be angry about this music. i think the next thing he would say is to make others aware of that fact.

i've been mulling over new subject matter for a magazine since i shutdown sexymonkey. i'm most interested in the art music world right now. simply because i am a musician. but most importantly, i am concerned with the new music scene. there is little coverage for it, there is not much of a community. the best there is are a scattering of web journals. i think that if i can put a magazine together that brings the music and the community together, on a very non-confrontational level, it could work. i am almost afraid to delve into details, as if i get many readers other than maybe catherine, since i think they are so good that someone would steal them.

well, i'm going to go through with it. it's not going to be an online magazine like sexymonkey. i'm ready to go to the next level. i'm ready to involve big bucks and an office space. i've got a lot of planning to do this summer.

save arrested development!

2005-04-22T18:36:00.000-07:00

i don't know whats going to happen, but i'm worried too. no one knows if arrested development is going to come back for a third season. i really hope it does. its the only show i really like. PLEASE DONT CANCEL IT FOX!!!

apparently, i'm most like Michael Bluth. Carl said the same thing not too long ago...

defying the odds

2005-04-09T19:39:00.000-07:00

so i've decided to remove meat from my diet. that is correct. i have decided to become a vegetarian. more so, i've decided that i would like to ultimately switch to a vegan diet. this means that i would refrain from eating eggs (which i already do since i don't really like eggs much), dairy products (i am lactose intolerant anyhow...but oh dear dear dear...i love cheese), and apparently honey. i guess stealing bee's honey isn't nice...

i don't really eat much meat other than fish. oh that too. there are many types of vegetarians. some eat only egg products in their veggie diet. some are dairy only in their veggie diet. and others are both. and some are fish in their veggie diets and some are all three.

i don't really eat fish outside of sushi. except i am allergic to it. so wait a minute. i'm allergic to raw fish, i'm allergic to lactose and i don't eat eggs...i hardly eat red meats....what do i eat? i don't know, to be quite honest. ok, i think i'm going on a rant here of nonesense..

i really like eating sushi. i don't eat it all the time, mostly because it's expensive and i only eat it with my mom. i love albacore tuna.

so right now, i think i'm going to start out vegetarian and eat fish and cheese, but phase out the cheese pretty quick. i understand there are cheese alternatives, i dont know how good they really are. cheese isn't very healthy for you. in fact, it is very bad. so. i think i have a good chance. eventually i'll phase out the fish. that might take a while. it's going to be my biggest weakness. and when i say fish, i really mean fish. you see, there are so many healthy fish. especially cold water fish like salmon. high in healthy oils. i won't eat shark or crestasians or shrimp, etc. they have poor removal of toxins and so the toxins build up in the muscles, which we eat. that is not healthy. that goes for pigs as well. OH. so thats why there are religions that ban pork.

well, let's see how well i do. i have some roast beef in the fridge. i guess i better feed it to my cat. thats another question. what about pets? i mean, people are against killing cows and stuff but what about cats and dogs who eat chicken and beef in their food? i buy my pets the best food available. it's called Wellness. It includes chicken or fish. I don't think they ever include beef, though. Cats and dogs are carnivores by nature. I guess the justification is that pets need to eat meat whilst humans are not biologically created to eat meat (here is my question, don't we have enzymes in our pancreas that are secreted to digest meat? i am confused...).

i decided to find out exactly how we digest meat...the first site i visit is called "TeenHealthFX":

Dear TeenHealthFX,

How long does it take for meat to digest in your body?

Signed: How Long Does It Take To Digest Meat?

Dear How Long Does It Take To Digest Meat?,

That’s an interesting question and TeenHealthFX is curious about why you would like to know.

The answer is, it depends. Everyone’s GI (gastrointestinal) track is different. So meat could take anywhere from a few hours to a day to digest.

Write back if you have any other questions.

Signed: TeenHealthFX

what the hell? that's funny stuff. no seriously, what goes on?

From: NYCVeg (proxy2.nyu.edu)
Subject: Lose the enzyme to digest meat?
Date: May 23, 2004 at 7:34 pm PST

I have been a vegetarian for 13 years. On two occasions in the last few years, I accidentally ate a couple of bites of dishes containing meat (bacon, in both cases). Both times, I had a violent gastro-intestinal reaction (I'll spare you the details--but I know it wasn't psychosomatic, because the first time I didn't know the dish contained meat until long after I got ill). When I mentioned this to a friend, he told me that, after a certain amount of time, your body loses the enzymes that enable you to digest meat. Does anyone know if this is true? It's an interesting theory, but I can't find any evidence to back it up. Thanks!

hmm....weird. that still doesn't explain it. here is someones response:

From: Elise/FL (adsl-155-83-143.mia.bellsouth.net)
Subject: Re: Lose the enzyme to digest meat?
Date: June 9, 2004 at 2:30 pm PST

In Reply to: Lose the enzyme to digest meat? posted by NYCVeg on May 23, 2004 at 7:34 pm:

Hmmm. I don't know about the enzyme but I do know that weaning babies on to meat is something that has to be done very slowly. By contrast, giving a baby veggies or grains doesn't require any special program. So apparently, there is an adaptation at work.

My daughter, who was given a dish with meat in it (unbeknownst to both of us) when she was 3, was violently ill that night. I only recognized the source of the problem when I was able to see it floating in the toilet bowl after she'd thrown up.

That is insteresting. I had no idea you had wean babies to meat. i remember once i ate a roast beef sandwich in the 7th grade. i had bought a really cool drink called "Orbitz" that made me terribly ill and I threw up. When I threw up I had thrown up the whole chunks of roast beef. It had not been digested! It was very bizzare.

this guy is a bit more scientific:

From: Cornelius Garbanzo (ustlnx15-n2.ust.hk)
Subject: Not very likely
Date: May 23, 2004 at 9:49 pm PST

In Reply to: Lose the enzyme to digest meat? posted by NYCVeg on May 23, 2004 at 7:34 pm:

Digestion does not function at the level of abstract mental concepts such as "meat." It functions at the level of molecular chemistry. And at that level, there is nothing in meat that is not found in plant foods. If your body can digest the proteins in plant foods (if it couldn't, you would be dead), then it can digest the proteins in meat, since they're both made up of the same amino acids. There is no such thing as a "meat enzyme."

If you ate an entire meal consisting of nothing but bacon, then I can see how your stomach might be overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of fat, protein, and salt. But I can't see why a few bites of anything would trigger a violent reaction, unless it was either poison or something you're allergic to. If you've been accustomed to a low-fat diet, then maybe the fat in the bacon could trigger a gallbladder attack. Could that have been it? It's kind of hard to guess without further details.

very interesting as well. poison could be very close to it. the beef we consume these days is filled with antibiotics and other bad things for us that are supposed to help increase the amount of muscles produced, etc.

Another kid says that his parents are veggies and he's been raised as such and three times he has thrown up from eating food that wasn't spoilt and turned out that it had been because there were chunks of beef. he asked his doctor and the doctor said:

he was basically like "duh" meat is extremely dense, contains higher levels of heavy metals and fatty acids that are difficult to break down, as well as a number of antibiotics, hormones, chemicals, etc..

hmm! well, here is what i don't get. why can't i find a site that explains the process of meat digestion? all i find are vegetarian websites telling me why it is bad to eat meat! WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?!

everyone says too much red meat is bad for you. and it is true. i was looking at a table of how much protein a person should get and you need just 3oz's to get a high amount to meet FDA standards. furthermore, apparently, meat contains too much and we get too much of it that we store it as a toxin. eww. no wonder red wine is good for eating red meat.

whoa. i just found out that uric acid is contained in meat. cow meat. that means i'm eating cow PEE. that is disgusting. that is...enough for me to say no more. you know, the other day i was eating steak with my boyfriend (carl). by then i had already been pondering the idea of vegetarianism. maybe it was because i was thinking about dumping flesh for life or maybe i wasn't that hungry....but when i really had to force myself to eat the steak. it tasted strange. it didn't taste good. i felt wrong.

this seems to answer it best for me but i really don't feel totally satisified as to why we can digest meat. well, heres something else. we need ruffage which is indigestable celluose in plants and such. we can't digest it but we need it because it is fiber. strange.

http://www.juiceguy.com/meat1.html

thats the site that seemd to be most helpful.

wish me luck!

la de da

2005-03-28T07:49:00.000-08:00

well! it's monday and it's spring break and carl has left with john for santa cruz to see a band play. a mini-road trip. it should be a lot of fun. i can't go because i told my oboe teacher that i would babysit for him. i don't even know what time i'm supposeds to babysit because he didn't tell me and i called him last night and he didn't get back to me. so ho fum bo tum. i want to go on a road trip. i want to have fun. i want to get away for a little bit! really, what i wish i could do is drive across country in my car and see the different states. that would be fun.

well i don't know what i'll do today. the steve reich score for "four organs" came in so i think i'll go pick it up from the library in a bit. i don't think it's opened yet.

it's been while

2005-03-25T10:27:00.000-08:00

while i sit here in the universities underground (student union) browsing the internet, i find myself slowly coming to terms with the reality that my spring break has officially started.

life is a continous row of rolling hills. everything rises, reaches it's peak, and then comes back down. that is how our emotions work. at least for me. school is like this. we start school, and we begin our trek up the hill. we reach the peak when we find that we can no longer handle sitting in class any longer and then when it is time to rest, we come down the hill. the only difference, i think, is that rolling hills generally do not abruptly come down on one side. i find that at the end of a build up of events, or a certain event, that i often find myself falling off the side of a cliff trying to figure out what is happening and when i do it's because i've slammed face first into it. i don't know what to do next. i don't know how to enjoy the free time anymore because i've become conditioned to working until i've nearly killed myself each day. i find that i have to relearn what it means to live. how do i enjoy life? i don't know.

lately i've been spending hour in the library listening to music. it's become an escape from reality for me, i suppose. that and pracitising on my oboe. reading and listening/playing music has become a bit of an obessesion for me as i try to hold on to the little bit of sanity that i have left.

as i get more and more exhausted, everything around me seems very frustrating and difficult. and, as i become more exhausted mentally my mind begins to trick me. i've come to recognise that my mind's subconscious begins to surface and i find it telling me to do things that i know are wrong. i am not hearing voices except my own. my own voice in my head, if you can imagine, has split. there is mine, which is the one that the concious self, you could say, and then there is my voice that i don't have total control over. my inner voice seeks a way out from reality, i think. my conscious self on the other hand, tries to keep pushing working for the finish.

what does my inner voice tell me? well it does not tell me to become an assasin nor does it tell me that i'm the new queen of the antartic. what it does tell me is that i should find the best way out. in the opinion of my inner voice, it is to end my life. it is very shocking, i know. especially when i do not agree with my inner voice.

it is hard trying to battle with yourself all the time. it's hard enough trying to battle with the people around you. i just want to lead a normal life and be successful. and live. living is most important. but i can't live when a part of me is telling me that i should be dead and i keep saying that i don't want to be dead that i enjoy living and i do not think that i am tired with life. i like myself and i like what i do and the people who i consider to be most important in my life, i love them and i appreciate them.

i have a week off from classes. i hope that this week will help me find some understanding.

eureka!

2005-02-20T19:47:00.000-08:00

i brought mousey home with me. the cats are having an interesting time dealing with his presense. candy just hisses and sasha kisses him but hisses when he tries to play. poor guy.

i figured out what i am going to do. if carl decides to do composition then i'll just start my graduate work at cal state fullerton and then transfer to another university. that seems reasonable and i won't fall behind. that seems like a pretty good idea, i think. i hadn't thought about it until my mom mentioned it. that way i dont feel bad about waiting around for him since i'll be working toward my graduate degree. i want to finish the degree at a different university because i don't think our graduate program is very strong in the musicology field. at least it doesn't seem like it.

well...its raining!

all i'm saying pretty baby...

2005-02-18T10:48:00.000-08:00

well its been an interesting week. let me see, where should i start?

i've been feeling pretty tired lately. this is a worrying sign but we're keeping an eye on it. that is, i am keeping an eye on it and carl is too. i'm trying to get more rest. hopefully that doesn't make it worse.

i decided to stop seeing my psychologist on tuesday. i was getting tired of hearing him go on about meditation. i go in each week, and we don't talk about anything good. i haven't anything to discuss for one thing. so instead he tries to teach me these silly relaxation techniques that i honestly haven't any interest in. so i decided that i am wasting my ten dollars a week. i could spend that money on something else. like donating it to black veteran housing.

today i read an interesting article on the fowl treatment of iraq soliders who are suffering from post-tramatic syndrome (shell shock). You should read the article: http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/02/18/walter_reed/index.html

i ate dinner with my sister and mom yesterday. they came out to see me. it was pretty nice. i had a good time.

so maybe my week hasn't been all that interesting afterall. i do continue to do my best to be as random as possible. alright, i don't try to do my best at it. i just do it. without thinking. i am who i am. random.

my political science teacher thinks that i think like a political scientist or something to that degree. as a matter of fact, he now refers to me in class as "we". well, he was talking about something, about the "conservative republicans" and how "we, veronica and myself, would never agree to that." i thought it was very funny. but i try not to fall into a label. i don't want to viewed as a "liberal democrat" when i know so many people who call themselves that are fakes. i want to murder them. not really. that is just a figure of speech for those of you who take things such as that out of context.

i turned in my pre-liminary bibliography for my political science class and my professor said, "wow. look at that." i guess i had a lot of sources listed...more than i should have? more than expected? i don't know. I didn't bother to put it in the proper formating except for the first two. seeing his response, I doubt it matters. my issue is a local issue but there are a lot of articles on it in the Los Angeles Times and in the OC Register that i was able to find more than a hand full. yay for me.

in other news, i did well on my piano performance check today. super duper! so far, so good.

oh! on weds. i had to lead a class discussion on the failures of computer systems in my computer science class "the computer impact". it was not very much fun. i haven't had to lead a class discussion, really ever. i tend to fumble my words and start to fiddling with objects on the desk and forget to involve the class. i'm probably a very boring lecturer. the topic was mildly interesting. i would rather lead a discussion on what interests me--of course.

my birthday is 1st march. i will be 21. a legal adult in the united states of america. my perceptions of a 21 year old, as a child, are not what i have become. it is very strange. hard to explain really. i have to run off now. i am working as an assistant to a music professor who is putting on a women in music type event entitled "merging voices". she does it ever year and this year i get to be her assistant. wooop.

isnt internet archive great?

2005-02-06T20:26:00.000-08:00

here is a post from my old site pixillated.org:

1/15/2003
I am debating what I should do about clarinet and oboe. I almost feel annoyed about playing clarinet. Mostly thanks to my teacher. He tells me that you must love the instrument. And I do. Or did. But after what has happened with whether or not I can continue on oboe, I almost feel like, I don't care that he is a brilliant player. He is a tyrant and I can't handle someone who doesn't believe that I am telling the truth. That is a good person to work with. On the other hand, I have my oboe instructor. A brilliant player. One of the best oboe players around. He was the oboe player on the film "Titanic" soundtrack (the score by James Horner starring DiCapprio). He is kind and funny and he believes in my ability to be a brilliant oboe player. The only problem is that I can't get the scholarship on oboe this semester, only on clarinet. And my clarinet teacher put in as to say that I would not be a music major anymore if I went to oboe. I asked my oboe teacher and he said that was completely untrue and that my teacher was just "throwing his weight around." Which made me feel a little better. And so for a while I felt that I would just go with the state funded clarinet lessons and secretly take oboe lessons. But on Monday I woke up and I felt the urge to stop playing clarinet. To stop and only do oboe. And I still feel it slightly. It's almost an intuitive feelings, like I'm destined for something on the oboe. I don't know what to do about this at all.

i like reading the last part. "It's almost an intuitive feeling, like I'm destined for something on the oboe." For those of you who do not know me, I chose the oboe. I play in the wind ensemble now and I get state funded lessons. I am the only undergraduate oboe player at my university. I guess I was destined for something. It is funny to see this post. Journal entries are great in this sense. Especially when you've said something memorable.

I will be moving this journal very soon to leghairs.com. When I get a chance. I am currently working on a project for university. It is an organization called "Nose Round Productions" which I am the co-founder. http://www.noseround.org/ for more information. The site is not complete. Well, that's all. I have to read.

well hello

2005-01-21T13:50:00.000-08:00

well, i must say! it's been a wonderful time. my holiday in england is coming nearly to a close now. i return home on monday the 24th.

lately i've been having slight nightmares about school. i keep dreaming that i am not up to par on my instrument or something. i've also been worrying about my grades, you know. i am really going to try to work very hard this term and get all A's. i am behind now because of how stupid things went for me this past term. i'm trying to get over it but i don't think i'll be able to until i see it in writing. oh well!

i met up with richard which was quite nice. we went to st. alban's and saw the cathedral and a museum filled with interesting roman artifacts. very fun stuff. richard listens to some really great music so i'm hoping he'll send some my way.