Oh, sigh.

Once again, I have fallen into the habit of neglecting my little blogs...so much so that my "Baroque Corner" still has only one entry. I keep meaning to write about some Vivaldi concerti, but I need to give them another listen and they are currently on loan to one of my co-workers to use as "thinking" music in our classroom. Therefore, I don't know when I will be able to share my thoughts on them. My first chamber concert, however, will have some Vivaldi and some Bach, so I do intend on writing about that.

As far as this blog goes...school + work = very little blogging. Very little writing in general, in fact, which can put me in a rather irritable mood. Well, maybe not really irritable...anxious, perhaps? I don't know. I need my writing, but I also need this degree and my current job. At least I've managed to work my school schedule around rehearsals for the semester, and hope to be able to do the same in future semesters. Speaking of rehearsal...

...our first symphony concert is October 18th, and our first chamber concert is November 15. I am very excited for both. The symphony concert is all French composers, and promises to be extremely fun to play. My available practicing time has diminished lately, but I think because of that, when I do practice, I concentrate better because I know I have less time to prepare my music. Anyway...I'm super excited for the first concert, and for the first chamber rehearsal this coming Friday.

I do have a few "artsy" things to write about (in order to stay with at least part of the theme described by my blog's title). Last Sunday, one of my orchestra friends performed Mendolssohn's Octet at Danny's in Bucktown with some people from her other orchestra. Danny's is a bar, so I wasn't sure what to expect. It was fabulous. The bar is in an old house, and has three separate rooms. The octet performed in the middle room, which made for a very intimate space. It would be like sitting in the front row of a concert hall, exactly level with the stage. That's how close we all were to the musicians. I love the Octet, and it was played extremely well. It was a unique setting, and the sound was actually much better than I thought it would be in that small space. Quite impressive, really. And a great way to end the weekend.

I've also been reading The Power of One by Bryce Courtenay, which is proving to be a bit dense, but captivating. I saw the movie in my world history class my freshman year of high school, and since then (so, since some time in late 1998...) I've meant to read it. It was rather difficult to find, but eventually my search was successful, only for it to sit on a bookshelf another few years before I finally picked it up to read. Not only is it very well-written, but gives such a detailed view of South Africa in the 1930s/40s, a topic that I really don't know very much about. It's therefore sparking an interest in that region/time period for me that I will later pursue. (Maybe I should have done that first, in order to have more of a schema for the story...) More will be written about it when I finish it.

Well. Seeing as I still have a mountain of homework to complete before Wednesday and Thursday, I should probably go off to bed...buonanotte, tutti. : )