Surrounded by Music

Last night I went to choir practice and it was awesome. I had such a great time and I really feel like I am becoming a full member. Our choir director Monica just got back from the States where she studied Jazz studies. She has all sorts of awesome information about singing technique. It is obvious that she is super happy and excited to be back as well. She has lots of plans for the choir and I am so pumped to be a part of it. She told me when I auditioned that she has plans to get us involved in some competitions. That would be fantastic and it could mean that we could be traveling in the future. I am also super excited because Claudia said that some of the girls would be able to sing at our wedding! I am excited that my family will be able to hear the choir I am a part of. We also celebrated the choir's 17th birthday with a cake and a very harmonic rendition of Happy Birthday. This choir reminds me so much of my a cappella group in college and the energy of the girls is fantastic.

I am feeling motivated and excited these days. I feel like my days are more packed with things to do but I am surrounding myself with music. I went to the Gil Shaham concert on Tuesday night. He played the Bach Sonata No. 1 in G Minor and Bach's Partita No. 1 in B minor. They are both completely unaccompanied violin pieces that were great for demonstrating his beautiful technique. He was accompanied by the youth orchestra of Peru in the second part. They played Tchaikovsky's Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D Major. Even though the acoustics were not that great in the Teatro Nacional, the energy was felt and they did a really good job. It helped that I had binoculars from my 4th floor back row seat so I could see all of the players. The first chair violist is a colleague of mine who teaches violin where I teach music. We actually met playing a gig together in Lurin in March. I am very happy that Lima is becoming a city in which more and more international artists want to come and perform. There are big bands and popular artists as well orchestras and classical musicians. Andrea Boccelli is going to be performing at the end of this month.

I went to an orchestra practice for a youth orchestra last Sunday. It is mostly comprised of conservatory students and since it is not a paid orchestra (like the one that played on Tuesday night with Gil Shaham) the members don't come to practice consistently. That makes things difficult for cohesion and musicality. There is also only one practice a week on Sundays. That is great for me but it means more personal practice to get things sounding great. I feel like this orchestra is a good opportunity for me but it means I need to be on my game and practice a decent amount. I am not the best sight reader and I need some time to develop and practice my part. The other issue is that it takes up 5 hours on Sunday afternoon/evening including transportation. We will see how it goes. There is a concert on Sept 17th. There are 5 more rehearsals before then. I also like that Ximena is my stand partner. I really like spending time with her!

Off to practice!