A Moment of Realization

It's late at night on May long weekend. Normally I would be attempting to do something fun with friends seeing as I'm 20 and it's, well, May long weekend. Alas, my friends are currently scattered throughout the province and country. Which led to me sitting in my house. Reading the websites for varying AMS* chapters. At midnight. On a long weekend. Cause I'm cool like that.

Right about the point when I opened up the New York State/St. Lawrence Chapter site, I realized that (I apologize for my lack of better phrasing), holy shit, I actually am moving to the other end of the country to pursue music scholarship. While I imagine Nova Scotia is actually covered by the mid-Atlantic Chapter and not the NY/St. Lawrence Chapter, both Chapters share the common feature of being on the other side of the country. Where I know absolutely no one. And where, in three and a half months, I will be arriving with a suitcase full of clothes and another full of books/scores, to make a fresh start.

Awesome? Absolutely.

Terrifying? Um. Yeah.

It's not like I hadn't thought about it before. My move is well-documented in the social networking grapevine, I spent most of the days after I got my acceptance letter in a state of ecstatic bliss, I've started thinking about non-Pacific Coast winter-wear, my parents are getting Air Miles cards. I thought about it when I persevered (only crying once!) through my last day at UVic (which, by the way, shall receive some over-due kudos in a later post).

And yet, I think tonight is the first time that it hit me. That's not to say I'm scared or having second thoughts. It's just that now, it's so undeniably real.

Moving on, in other news, in consideration of my friends who don't have blogger IDs, I have opened my comments section to all. Feel free to say hi and let me know that you're reading!

Tonight, for whatever reason, I am also feeling the need to express (a likely obvious statement) that this is not an academic blog. It's a blog about music, and academia, and music academia. But it's my blog on music/academia/the two combined. So it's also a blog about spirituality, philosophy, writing, books, life, events, people, places, community, issues, ideas, and other topics. Academic blogs undoubtedly discuss these things, but I want to feel free from time to time to write, unapologetically, without academic protocol (other than citing/attributing sources, of course), about some things that simply matter to me, and to the people and communities, musical and otherwise, around me.

Also, come on, I'm a second-year undergrad! Claiming to write an academic blog would be foolish. When push comes to shove, I'm not an academic.

Well, not yet, anyway...

*AMS stands for the American Musicological Society, which also covers most of (if not all) the Canadian provinces (possibly the territories as well; I'll admit to my own ignorance as far as that's concerned). It's an academic society devoted to promoting musicological scholarship through presentations of research at varying conferences, providing grants, et cetera.

This Made Me Happy

Being as I'm in an academic program that requires the ability to write really, really well, this made me giggle. I can't quite say "been there, done that," but the copious amount of type-speak I'm forced to endure as a member of the texting generation does make me somewhat sympathetic:

From Quick Study

A Study of Contradiction

Today I had an amazing conversation with Nancy, my piano teacher. We were talking about the balance of musicologist and performer, and how music itself is ultimately a series of contradictions.

Playing the piano is my life's joy and passion. My keyboard (whose name is Oscar, after O. Peterson) is my truest, oldest friend - and that's saying something, because I have really good friends, who mean the world to me. At my keyboard, however, select few other things exist. It's me, the notes, and peace/God/love/call it what you will.

I feel much the same way about singing, but my hands are more dependable than my voice, and so the piano has been my constant in moments when my voice is too weak or my asthma is too severe to make music that way.

That passion for music led me to study it. Yet one thing I've struggled with throughout my studies it is holding onto what brought me to music in the first place: I was a 17, and I knew nothing about Western Classical Music, other than the fact that I was crazily and passionately in love with it. Before I knew that augmented and diminished chords existed, before I knew of counterpoint or perfect pitch or Bach chorales or any of the other countless things my time as a music student has taught me...I already had music. Music is innately within me; innately within all of us.

And before I began music scholarship, I brought musicality to the piano. I brought an ability to play with passion, wild abandon; I had a performer's spirit. Yet somewhere, I misplaced that and traded it in for theoretical knowledge. I can analyze the pieces I play now - but at what cost? From sometime around October until present, the intention, the spirit, the magic I used to have behind and between the notes went away, and was replaced with fact, style; with good grammar, so to speak.

It's through the union, the marriage of my scholarly training and my innate performer that I create the greatest music. Great teaching, great research, and great performance are all born from the union of mind and heart, creativity and knowledge.

Music scholarship requires a concentrated, academic mind, but it also requires that you be a musician first, and forever. In becoming Rena the musicologist, I can't lose sight or understanding of Rena the pianist and vocalist.

And, indeed, combining the two will doubtlessly lead to better research, better playing/singing, and, eventually, more effective teaching.

Now I just have to do it, instead of writing about it. No challenge there, no sir, none at all... ;-)

The Last Academic Year in Natural Highs

Early morning sunrises.

Music History class.

Getting choir folders full of new music.

Arriving on campus at 7AM, leaving at 11:30PM.

Haydn.

London Fogs and Croissants with Chelsey.

Watching opera clips in Music History Class.

Overcoming my pathological fear of blank manuscript paper to realize that I love composing.

Breakfast, when I actually ate it.

The incredibly nerd conversations my roommate and I would have about politics.

Good cups of coffee.

Long chats with Tyler about Wagner.

Call me crazy, but, theory class.

Acing Musicianship tests!

Wrapping my brain around Don Giovanni and Mozart's Requiem.

Singing high notes.

Baking sugar cookies and cupcakes and chocolate chip banana bread.

The Madama Butterfly party!

Chats with Tori and Eryn.

The Rankins.

Halloween.

Concert after concert after concert. How I miss them.

Discovering new music.

Morning mass and brunch.

All my visits to old bookstores.

Late nights and early mornings at my piano.

What We Gain

A couple days ago, I was watching an episode of "Law & Order: SVU." It was a rather disturbing story about a piano teacher who had been horrifically abused as a child. Music had become a place of refuge for her; a place where she found, as the story called it, "affection".

I'm also currently reading Reich's biography of Clara Schumann (I imagine this will be the first and last time when Clara Schumann and Law and Order are mentioned in such close space), and one thing which Reich celebrates about Clara, often overlooked in celebrating Clara's strength and accomplishments, is how art and music were places where the pianist was "sustain[ed]" through considerable moments of hardship and tragedy.

Thus, as a result of thinking about these two women (albeit, one fictional), I've started thinking about the power music has over us mortals. It's easy to lose sight of the greater emotional meaning and implications of something you study. When you're constantly trying to improve tonal memory, increase theoretical/harmonic and historical knowledge and vocabulary, and get that damn English essay done for your English requirement, it's easy to forget that there was a reason we all chose this path.

Music has always meant a tremendous amount to me. While I always referred to it as a place of healing moreso than a place of affection or sustainment, I think that's ultimately what music has been in my life. Arguably, affection is part of what sustains the human race. Rare is the person who doesn't seek relationships based in mutual affection.

I know for me, and for most of my friends, music is one such relationship. It's probably fair to say that, for most of us, music lives and breathes. It gives more to us than we could ever give to it; hence the fact that we're able to spend hours in a practice room, go home, get some sleep (hopefully!), and then go at it again the next day.

Explaining what, exactly, it is that music gives back to us musicians is arguably the inexpressible part (too bad; so many more people would probably understand why we don't care that about the lack of money if they could comprehend the non-pecuniary rewards involved).

Music was - is - where I express emotions, come to terms with them. It's where I find, express, explain, and understand sadness, joy, anger, excitement. It's where my joys are reinforced, and where my sadness and anger can simply be. It's where I realize that everything is temporal; neither pain nor joy lasts forever, so each moment holds the potential for beauty. Knowledge which has sustained me through some pretty rough days...

Yet all of these things come back to sustaining affection. As I understand it, affection is one's sense of being cherished; dear to someone, or, in this case, something. Affection is grounded in acceptance of one as one is, perhaps with an eye for who one could be. Suzuki once suggested that to become a better musician, one must first become a better person. I think they go hand in hand - the affection we put into our music is returned to us, and we become better people, as we become better musicians - sustained, cherished by the music we're creating.

Yes, I'm aware that this all likely made me sound like a sentimental dolt. ;-)

Now, it's time to go read some more about Clara Schumann, who, I should add, is fascinating!

Mozart

Tonight's topic is Mozart.

As anyone who has ever had a substantive conversation with me about musicology/music will know, I'm kind of obsessed with Mozart. In hugely dorky ways. I'm reading Solomon's (substantially large) biography of Mozart for fun at the moment, along with Mozart-Da Ponte opera libretti. I wrote both of my musicology essays last semester on Mozart (and, when given the opportunity, will ramble about both of my theses at great, great length). I watch Amadeus (in spite of the historical errors that make me want to scream) whenever l feel sad. Mention Mozart, and my face lights up.

What is it about Mozart's music that holds me so captive; excites me so much?

Today was a really brutal day, both academically and personally speaking. So I came home, and naturally, fired up the substantive Mozart playlist on my iPod. Requiem is playing as I type. It's making me think of one of the many reasons I find Mozart so enthralling:

There is always something else to be found in Mozart's music. No matter how much one analyzes, there's more to be said, and no matter how much one listens for pleasure, there's more to experience as a listener.

I wrote a paper on the Requiem last semester, observing that "Mozart opens the mass by creating...a musical depiction of a unified, amicable relationship between God and humankind...[an] invocation to God does not begin until...interactions have reached a unified level; the petitioner is at one with God before the petition begins. The movement ["Requiem aeternam"]...approaches God with a sense of confidence...this confidence creates the spirit of the Requiem."

Tonight, I hear confidence. I hear the sense of peace I've always felt the piece (ha!) creates between God and humankind. But above that peaceful confidence, I hear hope.

Another reason why I love Mozart: in life's tougher moments, when I listen to his music, I can't stop myself from smiling, because no matter how awful things may seem, when I'm listening, I can't help but feel like they'll get better if I just give it time.

Schubert put it much, much more eloquently than I ever could:

"O Mozart, immortal Mozart, how many, oh how endlessly many such comforting perceptions of a brighter and better life thou hast brought to our souls!"

Balance

Lately, I've really been struggling with finding a sense of balance surrounding school, and life.

For the last month, pretty much every waking thought I've had has been devoted to school, assignments, how to get into grad school, how to navigate careers in musicology, developing music skills and knowledge, and the like. While I have taken moments to try to stop and rest, very few moments have occurred.

I started university as a political science student, and music was where I found moments of rest and reprise; comfort and security. It's fair to say that music has always been my joy, my greatest passion. It's what I wake up and go to bed thinking about, and what my mind usually wanders to when it has the chance to wander.

Now that passion is in the process of becoming my livelihood, and when something is becoming a livelihood, your relationship to it will change. That's not to say that music doesn't remain a place of reprise and rest for me; it is still how I connect to myself, others, and divinity; it is still my way of life.

But it's also what I study; it's my schoolwork, and I have my head in it all day, every day. Music school is a lifestyle, and it definitely consumes far more of my time than poli sci ever did. I'm used to relieving the stress of school with, well, music! So, all semester, I've been going home, and reading more about musicology, playing more, singing more, listening more...but they don't give me the same sense of relaxation, because there's a sense of guilt: I shouldn't be listening to Haydn when I ought to be listening to atonal music of the 20th century, I shouldn't be singing for the love of it when I ought to be practicing solfege, I shouldn't be thinking about composing when I ought to be studying theory. Even when all my assignments are complete, I often feel like I'm not doing enough.

None of this is to say that I don't love what I'm doing; I do. It's rare that a day goes by when I don't stop and think about how lucky I am to have these opportunities; to get to live my passion. But pursuing any dream is exhausting, and I suppose I'm just a little worn down.

So I need to find something new to give me a place of rest; a metaphorical "Sabbath" (or maybe I could just take the real one off) from school, and careers, and plans. Maybe I could take up baking again...baking cakes from scratch got me through many a Social Science essay (along with fruit snacks, Tostitos, and a whole lot of coffee). Maybe they can get me through theory assignments, too?