Senior Recital and Open House

Saturday was the big day: my senior recital! It went really well and I'm happy to be done with practicing the same songs!

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The program:

Sonata in e minor Hob XVI:34 - Franz Joseph Haydn

O Praise the Lord - Maurice Greene

Nocturne Op. 32 No. 1 - Frederic Chopin

Intorno All'idol Mio - Antonio Cesti

Three movements from Partita III in a minor - Johann Sebastian Bach

American Lullaby - Gladys Rich

Panis Angelicus - Cesar Franck

Two movements from Dolly Suite for Four Hands - Gabriel Faure

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After that was over, we headed home for a fun and relaxed open house. It was great to catch up with old friends! 

Two Recitals

     This weekend was a busy one: special Mass for the 100th anniversary of the Fatima apparitions on Saturday morning, then a voice recital Saturday afternoon. Mother's Day Mass and brunch on Sunday morning, then my last studio piano recital on Sunday afternoon. A little tiring, but good practice for my senior recital, which is in less than two weeks!

I sang "Intorno All'idol Mio" by Antonio Cesti and Tessie and I did a duet of Franck's Panis Angelicus.

Seven kids at Mothers Day brunch!

For the studio recital I played the fantasia from Bach's Partita III in A minor.

I got a special trophy and pin for being a senior.

STM Youth Choir

     The school year is coming to a close, and that means the end of the religious ed program at St. Thomas More. The youth choir meets every week before religious ed, so they'll be done for the summer, too. I played piano for their rehearsals all year, and now that it's ending I'm realizing how great of an experience it was.
     First of all, the kids are wonderful. Being in a choir is kind of self-selective, and these kids' behavior is an indication of that. The choir includes first- through eighth-graders, and I've never met a bunch more enthusiastic about praising God in song. They sing their hearts out at every rehearsal. They beg to sing certain hymns over and over. They learn new songs faster than most adult choirs.
     It's interesting for me to watch them interact, since I never went to school and don't know what it's like being a kid in public school. There are sets of best friends, close cousins, and siblings who love each other. Someone always has a story to tell or a question to ask. They talk about what they're doing at school, what they're learning in RE, where they're going on vacation. They are a lively bunch of kids, and they have so much joy.
     Musically, too, this experience has helped me. My sight-reading skills have improved quite a bit over the past year, due to sitting down and having to play hymns and part-songs on the spot. The kids don't care how much I mess up, but sometimes they tell me I should practice. (They're always right.) It's nice to work on something, even something little, that isn't part of my actual piano repertoire. And it's nice knowing I'm accompanying a forgiving crowd. Sometimes they ask me to play a solo I'm working on while they aren't singing. When they sing in a circle, they like to watch the hammers strike the keys inside the piano. Spending time with people who are so fascinated by the instrument definitely breaks up the monotony of the practice-lesson-practice cycle.

At their Christmas Program in December--I'm behind the piano.

     I'll miss playing for youth choir. I'll miss the way the kids remember my name and talk to me, even if I don't remember which one they are. I'll miss their exuberance and their willingness to try new things. I hope that, in some small way, I've made a difference in their lives.

Solo & Ensemble Contest

Yesterday we were at Augustana most of the day for vocal and strings solo and ensemble contest. I sang sang a solo in the morning, then after lunch sang in a small group and accompanied Tessie for her solo.
My solo was "Weep No More" by George Frederic Handel, and I scored 29 out of 30.
Our small group sang "For the Beauty of the Earth" by John Rutter, and we got a perfect 35/35.
Tessie sang "Sento Nel Core" by Alessandro Scarlatti and scored 28 out of 30.
My favorite part was probably accompanying...I enjoyed being a part of a performance and helping the singer do well, but not being the center of attention.
Overall it was a good but exhausting day!

All in black...musician life!

Piano Festival

Last Saturday was my last piano festival! It's always fun to play on the really nice piano in the recital hall, where I will be doing my senior recital in May! The judge was really nice, and his pencil barely stopped moving while I played, so I'm curious to see what his notes were at my next lesson.
This year I played "Shadow Dance" op. 39 no. 8 by Edward MacDowell, and Nocturne op. 32 no. 1 by Chopin.

Recent Happenings

I decided to post some pictures of various life things.

Mom has been making delicious roasted tomato sauce. 

On Sunday after church we walked to Cottonwood Coffee...

...and obviously took pictures.

Sunday afternoon was an art afternoon.

Tessie finished her four-season fox project.

Later Sunday evening we went to Cherry Berry and were our usual awkward selves...

Claudia and Othman the day he left.

A random picture I took while practicing piano.

I've been making dinner once a week: this was yesterday's effort. source

Rehearsals for All-State Chorus began this week. It'll be a blast! source

Starting School

The end of August means the beginning of the school year, which is my senior year of high school! I'm so glad to be getting done with high school and moving on to bigger and more interesting things. Here's my (mostly-elective) lineup for senior year:
Statistics
American History (part 2)
Ethics (theology)
German (still teaching myself for fun)
History of the Church
Poetry (with Dad)
ACT math test prep
Concert Choir
...and the obvious piano and voice lessons.
With so little school to do, I'll have plenty of time for my favorite hobbies: writing, reading, baking, and music!

Piano Recital

Next week we begin planning my senior recital!!

Intermezzo Op. 117 No. 1 by Johannes Brahms. I really enjoyed this piece, despite its slight sappiness. It was a good exercise in voicing because the melody is almost always in the middle voice.

Sonatine (1st movement) by Maurice Ravel. This is one of the hardest pieces I've ever played...which is evidenced by the fact that I started learning it in June and it's still not perfect! It was fun to learn, though--one that I'll keep up so I can play it in the future, I think.

Here's to one final year of piano lessons!

Piano Festival

Piano festival was yesterday, and I guess it went pretty well, because I got superior in both my categories (songs and hymns).
I played "Cantico Iberico" by Eugenie Rocherolle and the first movement of "Sonatine" by Maurice Ravel.

Various Life-y Stuff

Wow, all my recent posts have been about writing or books. What else is happening in my life?
Thinking about it, I almost said "not much." But then I remembered...
-I'm working on several essays for contests, in addition to editing my book and freewriting.
-I received the "official" (mail) report of my PSAT scores today, and overall I'm in the 94th percentile, so that's cool.
-Thomas Aquinas College notified me that they are reviewing my application for the Summer Program so I should receive something about that soon.
-In piano, I'm working on memorizing pieces for Festival in early March.
-In voice, I'm working on my solo for contest, which will double as my solo for the Senior Honor Choir audition. Plus learning music for Regional Honor choir, which is next week!
-Preparing for Lent, which is weirdly early this year! I like it early, though, because that means my birthday isn't in Lent.
-Still slowly teaching myself German for fun, and trying to catch up in American history. In Church History I began the chapter on the Protestant Reformation today.
-Online classes (algebra 2 and chemistry) are plugging along at a good pace. We get a nice break for Presidents' Day, during which I'll probably work ahead in chemistry.
-I've been baking a lot recently, but expecting that to slow down with the beginning of Lent. Every year Mom and I do no desserts. Plus, I'm excited for lots of vegetarian dishes! For some reason I really like vegetarian food.
-Patrick is coming for a visit the day after Mom's birthday!
-I did a cool braid thing in Tessie's hair today.
Well, I think that about catches you up for the non-book-related things I've been doing. But really, it's mostly writing. And missing summer.

Various October Things

Played piano at the nursing home for the third time on Friday morning. 

Obviously mom took a picture.

Last weekend Gus came for a "sleepover" visit. It's so nice that there's at least one sibling close enough to do that! 

He came on Saturday afternoon and left on Sunday morning.

Things have been pretty slow around here...well, for me. Tessie has been insanely busy (got back from a band competition at 2am so she and dad are at late Mass). Speaking of which, I sang for Mass last night without Tessie due to said band competition, then got home and Dad was here, back from Kyrgyzstan and Turkey! I had a writers' group Skype session which lasted over two hours, which was fun. I was the first one up this morning, and I didn't go downstairs until 8:45!

A fun (and warm) Saturday

On Saturday Nicole and Mrs. Gerdes came up for the event downtown known as the "Arts Crawl," or something like that. It was pretty laid-back and fun. There was a piano you could paint...

Nicole and I wondered what they do with the piano afterwards.

We played Heart & Soul, obviously.

And also my piano teacher just got a new studio, which was about four steps away, so we visited her and played some duets on her really nice new Boston piano. We strolled along, checked out the new cute kitchen store and sampled pies there, watched the street musicians, did chalk on the sidewalk, browsed for a while in the consignment shop, accidentally walked through a skit which was being enacted by the high school Improv Club, and saw this:

We enjoyed reading the different thing people had written, and added our own.

After a while we walked back home. Then after dinner Mrs. Gerdes got on the piano and Nicole and I sang some duets, apparently spending way more time than we realized, because I almost forgot to skype with the writing group. Thankfully I was only a half-hour late for the meeting and they hadn't done very much by the time I got there. So all in all, a very enjoyable day!

Various

September is humming along at quite a pace. Things have been picking up speed.

In choir, robe sizing was today. Our first concert is less than a month away!

First algebra II test was submitted. 

Russian Lit started on Thursday and is proving to be quite enjoyable so far. We'll see how we feel when it's time to write papers...

Speaking of which, I'm entering an essay contest: HSLDA 2015 Essay Contest

Chemistry is getting to the bad part...the part I call "math disguised as science." Scientific notation, significant figures, unit conversions, and I think the gas laws are looming on the horizon.
German is slow but fun! I like cringing at the outdated photos in my textbook.
Religion is awesome. I did the chapter on Revelation today...*sigh*
I'm preparing for the PSAT this year! I'm not worried...it doesn't seem as bad as the ACT.
Latin American History is as cool as I expected so far. Today we talked about Pre-Columbian peoples in Latin America.
After my daily writing today my word count is 87,717. It's getting hard to write the end!
Also about writing, I've been fleshing out some new characters who took up residence in my brain sometime during the winter...or was it November? Anyway, they are definitely out of my comfort zone, and it's been fun.
Tessie and I are preparing to audition for North Central Regional Honor Choir! Which is conveniently located in Sioux Falls this year. Recording is next week.
As of Friday I'm going to be playing piano at a nursing home once a week...should be a good experience.
I'm looking at the clock and realizing I should stop blogging and rejoin the humans who live in my house...then go to bed.
Over and out!

A Baby Grand Piano

...is now residing in our house! We bought it used from someone we know from church. It is the smallest baby grand you can have, but it makes an enormous difference when compared to an upright! The action is about 5000% better and the sound is nice and warm. It is taking a bit of getting used to, but after we tune it things will be considerably better. I'm so happy!

Thanks Mom and Dad!

Isn't it pretty? 

Piano Recital

Also on Sunday was my piano recital.

I played a suite of three duets called "The Northern Prairie" with another student.
For my solos, I did La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin by Debussy and Bagatelle No. 1 by Tcherepnin.

Mrs. Gerdes and Nicole came up, which was really nice. We stayed up very late at the house afterwards.

Piano Festival

This past Saturday was piano festival! I know you're probably thinking, "Why hasn't she mentioned it until now?" And really that's a good question. But in my defense it's been a busy week, and the weather has been glorious!
Anyway. I played Invention #9 in F minor by J.S. Bach, and Dance Scherzo by Denes Agay. They both went quite well, despite my apprehensions. I had been practicing on the grand piano at church all week, since the piano in our townhouse is dreadful. It paid off. Also, the piano I played on at Lincoln Music Hall is realllllllly nice, so that was a treat.
I got a superior! It was my first time doing Piano Festival, so I was happy about that. Also, we ran into my old organ teacher and talked to her for a while.
Afterwards we went out for coffee and brunch, which was de-lish!

My favorite Advent song

Forgive the messy intro and bad lighting.

 

Debussy

I have not, in my experience of piano and voice, done much by Debussy. The only song I played by him was Clair de Lune:

But now--behold! I have three new pieces by Debussy at once. The first is one I'm doing in voice: Beau Soir.

The other two are piano preludes. La Fille aux Cheveux de Lin...

...And Minstrels.

Maybe after all this I'll take a break from Debussy for a while...