new favorite

"JUNO."

an evening at the lanz's with the usual crew-nathan scott lynn me alexis lorraine shakoo-and of course madame. fondue and alsatian white wine, something involving cranberry and walnuts for dessert.

rushdie's satanic verses, dumas' black tulip.

rediscovered: golijov's ayre, dawn upshaw, the oh-so-versatile-soprano recently victorious from a battle with breast cancer.

to do: pack pack pack in those festive trader joe's bags. start doing yoga again. brave the hills of westchester. don't think about 20˚ weather. collage. get up earlier. smile.

almost new

christmas was chez nous: grandma, aunt ruthie, uncle lenny, ben, james, aunt eva, uncle chris, and lukas. for hors d'oevres we had crudités (radishes, celery, scallions, baby carrots, cucumber) with hummus, olives with cloves of garlic, cheese (camembert, comté [my favorite!], etc) and crackers. mom cooked a ham infused with cloves, a turkey breast with accompanying cranberry sauce from trader joe's, and red peppers with sugar snap peas. eva brought a wild rice salad, and i made a huge green salad (mixed greens and escarole) with toasted pine nuts, dried cranberries and sherry/balsamic vinaigrette. we also had date bread and pumpkin bread. for dessert, chocolate ganache from tj's and pecan pie (my mom's secret recipe). oioi. yum.

saw the golden compass on the big screen with my dad this afternoon, after a leisurely morning practicing and avoiding the pouring rain. afterwards, a peppermint decaf mocha from starbucks with banana nut coffee cake. delightful. i was quite impressed by the special effects of the movie - seamless, as is everything in cinema these days. can't wait for the big ice bear fight at the end of the third movie in the trilogy. good character acting, nicole kidman makes a particularly delicious villaine.

gossip girl is my new indulgence. life on nbc as well. on the plate for literature: christopher hitchen's take on contemporary organized religion, god is not Great. i am tiring of sappy tales of romance.

happy birthday, nathan vogel!

almost 2008, how strange.

the case of the salsa nazis.

i spent the past few days in south beach, miami, florida. i didn't send anyone any postcards.

i went to dance salsa at a place on lincoln road called yuca, which cost me $40 for 2 rigorous hours of lessons and some dancing at the end. there were 6 levels of classes happening at the same time, and i somehow ended up in the highest level with oscar, a slim venezuelan guy with the collar of his uniform shirt popped. he proceeded to teach us a series of moves that involved spanish names that i didn't understand, and i was pretty confused most of the time, having not really had that much experience with uber-complicated twists and turns.

everyone has a different idea of who i am as a dancer, and what i figured out that night is that i don't like cuban (casino) style. it's too smooth, too contrived, too thought about somehow. the circles are weird too. this guy steve who goes to law school in michigan was also mistakenly placed in the highest class and as we watched these people twirl around he said they looked like "salsa nazis." and that would be about right. they stick to their own, everyone learns these formulas. it does provide a certain reassuring base for dancing, but somehow i'm more drawn to the puerto rican (or is it new york?) style, simple, no-frills style. nothing fancy, just hot.

the sun did us good, i think. i read eat pray love, which was hilarious and sad and beautiful, and then jed rubenfeld's interpretation of murder mostly between yesterday and the plane. i went caroling at lynn's house, a yearly event, minus alexis (new york string orchestra seminar, lucky ducky) and nathan (working lights at a rep stage show) and lorraine's viola. apparently she's doing well in the astrophysics doctoral program at harvard. i think she studies stars. i'm just a musician - what do i know?

christmas is fast approaching and i don't have an apartment to move into yet. doris and i didn't work out. tara offered up her studio for me to crash in for a few weeks in january (but o, where would i shower?), and the percussionists mentioned that i could crash on their couch. they would be sick of me after like two days. kind of them to offer though.

also, lee braun pointed out (though as till now i haven't seen it) that on the brandenburg poster in the elevator of the music building someone had circled my name and penciled in "i have dibs." who are you and what makes you think you have dibs? ah, well. if it's cesare, maybe it's ok.

cleva

upcoming:

• "art of the fugue" recording session for deutsche grammophon, windscape + orion string quartet, chamber society of lincoln center tomorrow evening.
• presentation of jolivet's cinq incantations, jeune france+rough ritual, friday in class.
• sunday, tatyana tenenbaum with the raw and the cooked, multimedia things, at the tank in the village, perhaps bach hors d'oeuvres at a lutheran church (is it jp's gig after all?) with the ever effervescent steve menotti.
• concerto competition at school, for which i am playing reinecke. i'm at an unfortunate "meh" point. it's beautiful, romantic music...but i don't even have even a glimmer of a fizzle with anyone.
  
• two movements of piazzolla's exuberant histoire du tango for flute and guitar ("café 1930" and "nightclub 1960"), wed dec 12, 6(ish?)pm.
  
• brandenburg 4 in a midnight blue almost indigo floor-length gown, exceedingly elegant and only $65 at saks, with alice jones (flute) and cal (violin) at the PAC, fri dec 14, 8pm.

and so, it goes. my thoughts dwindle. is milkman gonna die so soon in song of solomon? i feel cheated. i started to read it once. i'm not existential enough for eco. i desperately need a haircut...norman from the aveda non-credit card-accepting salon in tarrytown to the rescue! he requires absolute stillness and some photos of celebrity possibilities. i'm counting on the hudson news at grand central for inspiration. who in hollywood other than natalie portman has short hair anymore?

oh, fie.

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Now playing: Norah Jones - Wake Me Up
via FoxyTunes

is it?

all a self-indulgent waste of time? because if it is, someone needs to tell me so i don't keep posting.

berio flies in T-minus 20 hours. i will probably wear pinstripe pants. you can't go wrong with pinstripes.

game?

"lucky # slevin."

"no country for old men" like tommy lee jones. does that shadow of death guy really date penelope cruz? how does she sleep at night?

i know this much is true makes me ache for a twin that doesn't exist. toni morrison's song of solomon sits untouched; i did bozza in three takes at joe's this evening before dinner. i need fingerless gloves. my body won't stop shaking. heat dries me out, and yet a shower leaves me cold.

thanksgiving was not relaxing. my family may be small, but it's hardly functional. i did not buy anything of consequence on black friday. i'm starting to lose faith in presents, perhaps something to do with my rapidly dwindling savings. i need a real paycheck to open a checking account here in new york.

the letters drift across the screen almost of their own volition.

i love ben kingsley, even if he is knighted.

formatting is everything. i convinced myself of this long ago. even if your content is shit, if it's formatted well, at least the thing looks good. does this masters degree i'm supposedly pursuing have any real consequence? did josh hartnett really love lucy liu? he killed those people so quickly. she was so brightly quirky, a match for his flyaway hair.

and with that, i bid you 'goodnight'.

latest

i feel like i've been playing catch-up.

i guess i have to join the nfa.

this weekend:

Friday_________________

• first klibonoff rehearsal for reinecke. not perfect, not shabby.
  
• after the orchestra dress rehearsal, a bunch of us (david, crystal, da, derek, alice), shivering in the brisk november night air, headed in two cars (mine low on gasoline) to the westchester wine warehouse. we tasted (i tried an oak-y zinfandel, aussie shiraz and californian pinot noir), ate bits of bread with tart tapenade, and bought a few bottles. i'm bringing my italian estate dry red and reisling home for thanksgiving.
• next we went to seasons for sushi (alice's wise suggestion), i had a delicious roll, eel and cucumber wrapped in avocado. yummmmm.
  
• the concert was pretty good, surprisingly. the program was egmont overture, a little mozart symphony, and mahler 1. the horns (9 strong!) were stellar, the trumpets pretty good mostly. i had heard so many disaster stories, but because dunkel laid back in the performance, it was more of an organic performance.
• after the concert, after much deliberating, we headed to stopn'shop to buy cheap booze (because in new york, they sell the petty stuff). then we drove to alice's in david's huge red boat of a car and ordered pizza...nothing like beer and greasy pizza in a warm apartment on a friday night.

Saturday____________________________

• train to harlem-125th st, m60 to the end to andrew's house to drop off my flute with clio.
• somehow by transfer to the q to canal st to meet nora. dinner in chinatown involving soup dumplings. delicious and cheap.
• electronic music concert at roulette (20 greene st), music of anna clyne. we should've brought ear plugs. the live graphics were really amazing, something called superdraw. i saw some timara guys from oberlin teching the show. the world gets smaller every day.
• then uptown to spanish harlem to the f b lounge for what crystal thought would be salsa dancing, turned out to be $10 cover jazz, not bad actually, just not the free dancing i thought it would be. i left after the first set, and didn't have money for a cab to get me to 96th and broadway, but the bouncer lent me some. thank god for kind people who worry about young women. i took the 1 train to the bronx (181st) to clio's house. crash...

Sunday_____________________

• 9h wake-up, groggy shower, hit the streets at 9h30 for the train to 96th. lenny's bagels, i thought maybe steve menotti would show, but he didn't. blueberry bagel, plain cream cheese, and an hour of score study (reinecke, berio, bach e major).
• noon lesson at tara's house at 98th and west end. gorgeous apartment: hardwood floors; high ceilings; art and books everywhere; cabinets full of scores; copper pans in the kitchen, clean and well-used; freshly ground coffee...mm.
• walk up broadway to 105 to the silver moon bakery, what tara described as the closest thing new york has to paris. their pain au chocolat wasn't too shabby. i hardly had any money left, so i bought a crispy grilled cheese from a little short-order place on the way from the bus stop to the train.

blah blah blah, this is my life, take it or leave it. maybe drinking coffee in new york means that i can bear to let go of a small part of paris, the café + crèpes part. meredith and i had a place in the marais, i think it was 5 or 6 euro. the waiters would stare at her, her blonde, dancer self, mostly unconscious to their attention. so much inherent grace. sometimes i wish someone would look at me like that.

enough of this self pity. sorry the picture of the penguins disappeared. that's happened a couple of times. i guess that's what i get for lifting images off shifty websites.

aces

brahms piano trio in b major, op. 8 no. 108
calvin wiersma, violin
julia lichten, 'cello
paul ostrovsky, piano

purchase college conservatory of music - 11/13/07 - 8pm

brilliant, stunning. something in julia's playing is so alluring...playing brahms chamber music must be like skinny dipping in the daylight, vulnerable and chased.

i had a bit of a conversation with kevin lubrano tonight. he said it sounds like i'm exploring. lately i've been feeling pinned down, but maybe it's a trick of mirrors.

i need a haircut and a good glass of pinot noir. maybe not simultaneously.

saturday the plan is to go to the city, drop off my musicking things at clio's before salsa dancing, location tba. i have a lesson at tara's house uptown on sunday. it would be a waste of a round trip train ticket and a few hours' sleep to not stay.

sometimes my soul craves silence. maybe the suburbs are what i need right now. someone told me once that new york city would be too overwhelming for me, too soon. what i loved about paris was the possibility. i don't know what thriving feels like.

tara and cat cantin have both said that the flute comes easily to me for some reason, which means i have to give that much more to make the music happen. interesting that that has been said twice in the span of a year in two different countries and languages.

designs

gregory maguire's confessions of an ugly stepsister, set in haarlem, netherlands, hometown of our very own jp.

we talked about our interviews, and i was reminded of my plank research paper from last year, for which i spoke with l. dean nuernberger, the incredibly inventive original conductor of collegium musicum at oberlin. i sent it to a bunch of friends, old compadres from collegium, while i was in paris, trying to stir some interest. mary larew suggested i send it out to early music america. i'm planning to get a draft of it to jp next week to see how it can be reworked. i don't know if nuernberger would grant his permission to publish it, though. he's modest to a fault.

alice and i had our first rehearsal with cal (faculty violinist at purchase) for brandenburg 4 this afternoon. derek, crystal and i went to the cobblestone for a drink. hot toddy=tea+shot of jack. (too strong for me tonight) good when you're sick and need a drink (think finals week, meeting clio for a drink at the feve, december 2005, bleary eyed and sniffling).

one more mandelbaum gig to go (slight groan)..."paris is as paris was, my son..."

dave's jokes:

how do you get a musician to complain?
give him a gig.
how do you get a musician to complain more?
pay him.
...and more?
feed him.

what's the difference between jazz and blues chords?
blues is 3 chords for 1,000 people; jazz is 1,000 chords for 3 people.

my days are scattered, frayed. i'm not sure what to do with the time i have. hopefully rebecca's errands will fill up a few hours a week, maybe playing a few more gigs...the weather here is drippy, moorish. i want to hibernate, away from the damp, dark cold.

next week, denisov. marc wolf and i bravely take the stage (well, the floor) of the pcom recital hall (nov 15, 8pm) to play some weird amorphous quarter-tone music. stay at least for the 2nd movement nocturne.

stay tuned.
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Now playing: Marcos Valle & Joyce - Valeu
via FoxyTunes

renaissance revolution

i was supposed to work a dinner shift at the restaurant last night, but apparently there was a scheduling mishap, so handwashing my apron and drying it at the laundromat was in vain. i hate that, disruptions in what i expect of my day. i went home, watched crappy tv, ate eggs and leftover squash, and rented a dvd for $1 called renaissance. it is an animated film noir, with paris cloaked in a murky, smog-ish darkness, something about scientists perfecting an elixir for immortality. i chose to hear the dialogue in french with english subtitles. my french is sore, strange and heavy. i catch snippets of paris in my dreams, slices of what seems now a faraway life.

current books: i was lucky enough to snag purchase's copy of the memory keeper's daughter, so i'm into that, also a book of short stories by raymond carver (i read somewhere over the summer that he was pretty good). the time traveler's wife isn't doing it for me.

the rehearsals for tito's gig are tiring, the music is beautiful at times, but is also often abstruse. i don't know if all the rep will come together in time for the competitions.

what do i want, actually? it changes by the hour.

chagall's memoir is cute, stream-of-consciousness-like. he knew he wanted to create art. i am not as confident in that.

below, chagall's stained glass window at the UN. i saw it when i played the gig there and thought it was tiffany.

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Now playing: Bonnie Raitt - Walking Blues
via FoxyTunes

geek chic

according to the ever-wise (and hilarious) jordan, i am "geek chic." maybe i should start designing clothes. i draw the line at cigarettes, real ones or jean material, unwashed hair, and angry cause-blazing haters. my idea of politics is fairly simple: support with conviction, and don't criticize those who don't give you the time of day. people find their own way into communities. it's a passive principle, but that's what i believe. so today, o embittered students for "save darfur," you came up short. no signature for you.

for 2 days i have felt like i have a swollen golf ball settled in my collarbone. ginger tea? sleep? tara suggested a gargle with salt, but hopefully some strong ginger infusion will do the trick. "heroes" + dinner involving squash, garlic, mulled apple cider, and milano cookies. not necessarily in that order.

upcoming:
nov 5: interview with patti monson for research&writing class;
nov 6, 11: music of joel mandelbaum at queens college and hunter college under tito muñoz;
nov 8: handdrumming performance (suny-purchase);
nov 15: denisov sonata for flute and guitar (mvmts 1+2) with marc wolf at suny-purchase;
nov 28: berio's sequenza (orig.) for paula robison masterclass at diller-quaile in the city.

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Now playing: Fred Hersch - At The Close Of The Day (live)
via FoxyTunes

spacey

fall still doesn't feel right.

last night a group of us went to see charlie neidich play the brahms clarinet quintet with the juilliard string quartet near lincoln center. the concert was briefly interrupted for a false fire alarm (they restarted the shapey quintet, which was a little abstract and abstruse, even posthumously). also on the program was elliott carter's second string quartet. a great piece, but as nick gallas wisely interpreted, is too dense to really understand at first hearing. it takes a good study to approach it. i read him for fischer's class at the sorbonne, i'm quite enthusiastic about the way he conceptualizes music, but then somehow his music makes me come up empty.

the most impressive part of the performance was the instrument neidich played on. he had it modeled after mühfield's, the clarinetist brahms heard play in meiningen. he even had it cut from the same vintage wood. the idea was to best recreate the quintet sound brahms must have heard at the end of his life. amazing, actually. the juilliard quartet is a great vintage ensemble. i especially liked the second violinist.

we had our first brookshire midterm (blech), long and moderately painful. bridget, susan and i are going to see STOMP on broadway tonight, taking the train and transferring to union square. derek recommended a great indian restaurant nearby called raj mahal (the east village is his 'hood).

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Now playing: Missy Higgins - The River
via FoxyTunes

approaching...

friday: classes, second shift at rebecca's.

saturday: parents. my birthday. dinner. lucia di lammermoor at the met (not dessay). possibly the pepsico sculpture garden, or the bronx botanical gardens for some japanese chrysanthemums.

things seem joyless, grey around the edges. the change of weather, flipflopping crisp and warm, makes my bones creak. maybe fleeing the scene of this life is the solution. for now, i'll read more allende and the time-traveler's wife to steal me away from the earth.

i tried love in a time of cholera, but it didn't stick; of love and shadows on the other hand, was almost epic. i almost think what irene and francisco have doesn't exist in the real world. it's that much more beautiful on the page.

below: kiku, queen of Japanese flowers.

as of late

the concert went pretty well - good turnout, confused applause for the messiaen, coughs at the wrong times in the debussy. i think maestro dunkel was pleased.

recent reads: vanishing acts by jodi picoult, a tree grows in brooklyn by betty smith, the sea and the bells (poems) by pablo neruda.

from "ode to salt":

Dust of the sea, in you
the tongue receives a kiss
from ocean night:
taste imparts to every seasoned
dish your ocean essence;
the smallest,
miniature
wave from the saltcellar
reveals to us
more than domestic whiteness;
in it, we taste infinitude.

i'm pumped to find, on iván's recommendation, chagall's autobiography, entitled (in english), my life. there's a copy at the purchase library!


i love the smell of old books. i caved and bought copies of the master and margarita by mikhail bulgakov (knowing my parents, they probably bought me a copy for my birthday), as well as naked lunch, william s. burrough's chef d'oeuvre, at the campus bookstore. i don't have the money to spare, but...somehow, it seemed right.

this week marks my first of rehearsal freedom - more time to learn daphnis and practice my quartertones for denisov.

first taste

and so it was, saturday dinner, my training day at rebecca's in greenwich, ct : boot camp for those virgin to the restaurant business. following ricardo from 5pm-2am. she sold out and sat eager diners at the counter. my favorite table thus far is the café table, tucked away in an intimate nook, out of sight of the rest of the guests.

i don't know if i'm cut out for this business. in fact, i have no idea. it will be a good training ground. well-oiled machine, that's for sure...i just hope that it doesn't take over my life. i can't work more than 3 nights/2 nights+lunch/week. it would wear me down.

alice very graciously went shopping with me in white plains to find white oxford shirts and khaki pants. i bought some cute black shoes (mistake). i didn't sit down once (or go to the bathroom) during my entire shift. i was on my feet the entire time. i have massive blisters from those new shoes and my legs are sore.

i sang a gig at a church in the city this morning as a favor to jp (research and writing teacher at purchase), which was a mistake. i should have just slept. my brain was too fried to rehearse with marc in the afternoon, so i took a day. played a little, burned myself with the iron trying to smooth out my new gap khakis, finished reading teacher man by frank mccourt (angela's ashes), still am in the middle of a tree grows in brooklyn, which, derek balcom was right, is a chick book. we have yet to think of an equivalent phrase to "chick flick" that applies to literature.

i saw ladysmith black mambazo perform at the PAC on friday, $5 student rush (nice). they have an exquisite sound that never really varies, velvety polyphony...they sang "homeless" and spoke a lot about peace and love as means of conflict resolution. the original guy who started the group 46 years ago still sings with them. i was so tired, i just closed my eyes and sank into the velvet.


purchase symphony orchestra's first concert is this weekend! friday night, 8pm, PAC. program: martin ballade (crystal zagarello, flute), le tombeau de couperin, debussy nocturnes and messaien oiseaux exotiques. should be sweet.

early morning blues

underslept and not yet paid, the heavy morning fog is setting a gloomy stage for a day of 3 job interviews, a haircut, and an evening in the city.

1. part-time waitstaff at rebecca's in greenwich, ct.
2. salesperson at chef central, hartsdale.
3. stockkeeping at triboro quilts, white plains.

haircut at eclipse A salon for hair, tarrytown.

evening with lisa & ed cohen at the joyce theater for funky fusion dance.

somewhere amongst all this i have to eat lunch at home and practice my new altès and jeanjean études, and patch boulez memoriale.

busy, à la paris or oberlin. hopefully my zippy little car and gps will serve me well today.

it's not you, it's me.

i'm at one of those junctures where i realize that i'm the problem. my roommate is sensitive to strong smells, i have a penchant for cooking with garlic and olive oil, but we keep similar sleep schedules and basically coinhabit the space. i am going to have to learn to actually be clean and keep clean. for some reason this was left out of my childhood, this tendency to keep things clean. maybe i resisted it. my parents are pack rats. i am cleaner than sam sharp or colin marsh, but that isn't saying much.

148 n. main was a memorable house, but not for good reasons. charmaine was a good part. so was my invite-only wine&cheese birthday party. with eben lichtman, jazz piano and supporting musicians. steve menotti showed up sheepishly to crash the party. candlelight, good people, laughter, friends. cary cody, kat cohn, there from the beginning. alice teyssier, alex conway, darcy gervasio, my girls. kevin lubrano stopped by. john shaw showed his amazing face.

here at purchase, i feel like someone stole the snow from my snowglobe. suddenly, magically, rug from under my feet, no people. not something that is cured by a late-night stiff drink.

with that, i am going to walk to the dam in these last hours of sunlight and read a little fux.
that's right, the oh-so-seductive chapter on second-species counterpoint.

found, in part.

saturday. crystal took me to a place called gonzalez y gonzalez, located in soho around the 6 bleecker st stop.

interior, gonzalez y gonzalez
625 broadway

clio and i met at grand central at 10, and took the 6 downtown. the place itself is a restaurant and bar, but they have live music starting at 11:30pm on saturdays.

salient feature: NO COVER. that's right, boys and girls, one of the salsa spots in new york city without entrance fee. the men were a little grabby (but i'm fresh, and don't have a crew), and i had to duck out at around 1 to get on the subway to get the last local train out of grand central.

cheers to david and the fearless john boland of the meeting point bookstore at tai sophia for keeping up with my musings! i miss you guys too, particularly the hip abstract art and fun philosopher finger puppets. i forgot to buy buddh-its before i left (they're probably all sold).

sooo o o o...more letter writing is in order, particularly since i think it makes me smarter. i don't know if that's actually possible, but i feel it.

my hands have been very stiff, and i'm not sure where the tension is coming from. maybe it's karmic. i'm working on boulez memoriale and the denisov, trying to play the quartertones correctly. singing along with a recording helps. sometimes also made-up fingerings for glissandi work better than fingering manuals. especially in the mid-low register. those are easier to fake, i think.

this week, doris is in california, and i can breathe. alice and i cooked tacos and fresh guacamole last night. i'm going to attempt ratatouille tonight. i'm getting nostalgic for france again. my hand hovered over a vat of nutella at the stop n' shop today. i decided that my baguette will have to be happy with raspberry jam and honey. damn, and honey from apiaries from the south of france...and amazing côte du rhône wine...

maybe i should just give it all up and be a writer. move to france, become a food critic. thoughts?

professional, ish

as i have recently made the error of placing my blog address on my shipment of business cards, i will take this opportunity to pull in the reins a bit, as it were.

projects that will soon be implemented at purchase:

• flute+guitar with marc wolf, one of the geniuses behind the record label furious artisans;
• a renaissance vocal group, unnamed and unpersonelled as of this moment;
• hand drumming class, wednesday mornings, externalizing beats that will better me as a dancer and a human being.

i am a grad student at suny-purchase and dream of scandalizing the masses with cutting edge new music and rarely heard (in these parts) old music. education, for me, is a means by which one may open doors - cliché, but absolutely and utterly true. at some point early on i decided that, whatever the consequence, i would endeavor with a mind thirsting for knowledge. those who regret going back to school should have never been there in the first place. auditing classes is a genius idea: it enables one to learn, stress-free, with none of the stigmas or bad karma associations that come with assignments, grades, expectations, all those tethering things. maybe it is a little haze of mania talking, but i think that heading out to new york alone, knowing no one at the school, moving in with a stranger, was a way of creating newness - even now it seems a little raw - and breaking the invisible cords of what expectations oberlin had for me. premed, biochem, cum bioethics major - these labels, these things, so utterly irrelevant to the shaping of one's soul.

recent flute-related events:

• first lesson with the very clever and effervescent tara helen o'connor;
• first (not half-bad) rehearsal of messiaen's "oiseaux exotiques" - which, though cluttered, makes for very entertaining listening, if you can pick out the birdcalls and distinguish the groups of instruments through the contrapuntal muck;
• ordering of new music - new études (altès and damase, on the recommendation of tara) and a few romantesque french grande solos, which i hope won't break my bank, from carolyn nussbaum.

an aside: it is very rainy in new york at the moment, and the fog shows no signs of lifting. very "secret garden", england, moor-esque. i am reading a very nice book called blue shoe by anne lamott, taken from the popular collection at the purchase library.

the reason that i inject my reading here (for those of you that read the occasional blather) is that i find that literature - poetry, prose, plays, however you take it - is incredibly important for anyone's character. when i was in high school and was required to read a certain amount of heavy-handed stuff - to the lighthouse, black boy, 1984, lord of the flies - i lost sight of that. not that i went straight to faulkner (whom my mother worships, or did, at one stage), proust (whom darcy recently bravely tackled), or joyce (someone i know owns ulysses in several languages), but rather i have taken the opportunity to step back and consider style and form. i didn't love on beauty, for example, but i absolutely adored the center of everything. j.d. salinger turned a little sour, while f. scott fitzgerald climbed my rankings.

conclusion? i am a passionate person with a lust for music that extends to literature and dancing and traveling. the list will probably lengthen with time. i hope this has been an improvement. stay tuned.

in a small tribute to a place i called home for an hour on early friday mornings a year ago...

after

conclusions after a full day of graduate life:

• JP, or Professor Knijff (prounounced "Knife" with a hard "K"), the Research and Writing teacher, is a slight, tall, hilarious keyboard player (mostly organ and harpsichord). He hails from Holland (Titus van den Heuvel's native land?) and has many ideas for the class. Our first assignment is to brush up our bios - I feel mine is too stiff and bland. I am neither stiff nor bland.
• Brookshire terrifies me slightly. His class is ultimately going to be an exercise in my patience. I thought species counterpoint would never haunt me again in this life, but it seems that it will be a big part of what we learn in Harmony and Counterpoint class. For some reason, I don't see how emphasizing that aspect of the 16th century has any resonance with us as musicians. Da and Derek were saying yesterday when I drove them to the White Plains Metro North station that understanding species counterpoint affects the way we conceive of musical line...I'm a singer, I think that's basically bullshit. My ear has always saved me.
• Paul Dunkel rocks. He conducts the Westchester Phil and plays flute at Lincoln Center. He's working with us for the joy of it, not the money or the glory (both minimal). His tempi in Tombeau are a little sketchy at times - I hope he takes the last movement at the brisk marked 120, or at least 112 - but I think he will whip the orchestra into a fine form. I honestly think that the string players, though intonation in the violins was a little "eh" occasionally during the first rehearsal, are more committed than the Oberlin players. Maybe not in the cello section.

The picc part for "Oiseaux Exotiques" looms in my immediate future. Shopping goals: hangers, for all my jackets and sweaters and somber black clothing, ear plugs so i don't go deaf in my right ear from high fast piccolo playing, and perhaps an Indian buffet at Bengal Tiger in White Plains.

tales

lately: ghostwritten by david mitchell. i believe it was matt, who lives with kat in brooklyn, who mentioned mitchell after kat almost spilled vending machine coffee on his worn ivory leather loafers in the subway. she snuck up on him from behind.

the flute crew at purchase is small, and i hope will become tight. peter lee is a married, grounded soul who commutes from long island, and crystal reminds me a bit of anita in her friendly disposition. i expect they're all strong players, particularly alice. she seems mysterious, as if she has something up her sleeve. jaime is quiet, and adam is very worldly. i'm crossing my fingers for the picc part for messaien's "oiseaux exotiques" - which, tara and i agreed, totally kicks ass - as well as maybe 2nd on debussy's nocturnes.

class-wise, i would love to sit in on an intro creative writing class as well as a hand drumming class...

for the few of you that rose early friday mornings to catch my radio show last fall on wobc (http://www.wobc.org/guide-show.php?edition_id=1795), i had a djembe show one week and featured a track from a live album by adama dramé (above). if i can't get into any classes at djoniba in the city, i might just have to settle for soaking it up at purchase.

so...marc wolf and i are likely doing some cool flute and guitar things, denisov and bozza, perhaps a piece by francaix. we'll see if we've bitten off more than we can chew rep-wise.

i hear the train at all hours, and sleep fitfully, waking usually at dawn...

oioi

i am here, north white plains, ny, and don't know anyone yet. i spent a good share of the weekend with kat cohn, lovely old friend of mine and freshman year roommate, in brooklyn. she has an internship at christie's auction house, where she works in the contemporary art division. she hopes for a paying gig after december.

moto
so. williamsburg, brooklyn

kickass resto, its dark interior reminiscent of "triplettes de belleville" (old timey, and the subway is visible through the window in the picture, which is actually the table at which kat and i sat). good shiraz, fantastic pesto panini, even better company.

we then stashed my stuff on the roof of her building (she forgot her deadbolt key) and ventured to soho to find a bar with some really good beer. i slowly but surely got through half of a very good citrus-y wheat beer. during that hour and a half, kat had several wheat beers/light lagers.

i'm a slow drinker. sue me.

we crashed at kat's place, which is gorgeous and high-ceilinged and not quite finished, and then arose 8-ish to meet clio back in soho for some much-needed breakfast. pancakes were delicious, though i am unsure the fresh oj was worth $3.95. kat hailed a cab and we hotfooted it to grand central so i could catch the last non-peak train back to north white plains. 40 min later, i was in my car making my way back to the house.

placement test tomorrow, icky memories of sonata form and fugue subjects...luckily, i held on to mr darcy's handouts from theory 3 and 4, so i should be set for that.

clio has the GREs. i am oh-so-very-glad that the path that i chose for the moment doesn't require that.

"buddha garden" + yoga = love.

briefly

coming up on my last day of work at tai sophia.

You're going to make someone very happy.
And fat.

Ron, front desk, after tasting one of my apple cinnamon granola and blueberry muffins.

i miss my spot on rue de lappe, dancing aggressive ballroom-style salsa with ray keller, ballet dancer extraordinaire and student at harvard, and eating late-night crêpes on the walk home.

my departure is approaching, and i'm not packed.

surprise.

two-faced

words from what seems a faraway past:

at times, hopeless romantic with a bitter aftertaste...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
early morning, 9 march 2005

i want to fall asleep by the light in his eyes
submerged forever skips of accordion slow
halting misguided and quaint shimmer of
silliness secret laughter impenetrable gazes
layered teeming with implications undiscovered
subtleties amidst the obvious melancholy despair
solidarity grandiose terms for something so small
escape to better warmer without glare on bleached
snow city streets rife with culture close crowds
misshapen from distortion by pop mania
subsisting surviving on cups of joe and the
occasionally frequent cigarette darkened by
fatigue general societal restlessness thinking
in metaphors dreaming in dirges split open
by half-truths sick lies bitter martyrdom
selling out for a better more miserable life
amongst the fakes fools fanatics forlorn
another acronym for another demise damn it all
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

...at others, glumly sarcastic and frustrated.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
27 mai 2005 , just

pretend plastic wasn't it lovely
whizzing choreography dazzling technique
stolen dreams silent muted blues
offended hardly miffed and alone
those paid to invade other lives do they
find solace pleasure in their dirty work
or does it have a rancid aftertaste
every time distinctly the same
was it out of need boredom these few
scrawled words etched in steady ink
blabitiblah yada yada yada boom boom
oh how i wish all the cards would
fall down 52 card pickup of my life

every

"I know the answer! The answer lies within the heart of all mankind! The answer is twelve? I think I'm in the wrong building."

--Charles M. Schulz, afterthought to Dana Adam Shapiro's the every boy

i almost cried a tear when i finished this book. brilliant and brief, the sweet adolescence of shapiro's narrative hit me hard. i never had a henry every growing up. i always wondered about jonathan and wiley, if there was ever any truth in adolescent obsession. note-writing and furtive hand-holding in darkened hallways was as far as i ever got. danny stole an unmarked bottle of perfume from his mother, and nick made me a bookmark with a few school portraits and permanent marker hearts. when i hit age 11, i got braces and cut my hair, and the dreamy days of boys pining for my quick wit and loud mouth were over. they had wised up, grown out of me, and so i retreated into books i almost couldn't understand (portrait of an artist, too intellectual, secret garden, a former true favorite of mine, a bit mundane) and wrote blindly on lined pages.

henry wrote and color-coded his ledger - my entries are never as precise, nor as complex. i crave the expression of a written word, and so i write, not knowing what comes next.

"ratatouille," though it lagged at points, was simply delightful. the scene where he is chased along the seine reminds me of the night i tripped on a rat coming down some stairs with a certain someone. except the rat in the movie charmed the heck out of a gloomy, stubborn food critic. the one i saw just made me shudder.

teaching flute to caitlin this weekend, but this time i have a sweet ride, a silver honda fit. it still smells new, but it's half-mine. i keep it locked with a purple club that i hope will keep it from getting nicked in new york.

here's to discovering the smallest, darkest salsa clubs (that don't persist in playing crappy bachata and too much merengue) in new york city, and maybe an african dance studio specializing in congolese dance.

well,

the trip was stressful, but worth it. the place in rye is too beach-y for me, not to mention pricey, and sue is a career smoker. the apartment in tarrytown costs twice as much as i thought. 2 closets, king-size bed, private bathroom...i loved the place in north white plains, though, but doris hasn't called me back. i'm taking that as a not-good sign.

it looks like things are falling into place for transferring my credits from paris. perhaps i will receive my diplomas from oberlin come christmas...the most important thing, though, is that my transcript be sent to suny-purchase so i actually have proof that i completed my undergrad education.

for the audition for chamber placement, i'm thinking the first schumann romance and the 3rd movement of cpe bach's unaccompanied a minor sonata.


the covered-up blackboard wall at tai sophia resembles rothko's untitled (orange & yellow) (1956). david thinks another paint job will do the trick, but i think it looks rather...intellectual.

recently: water for elephants by sara gruen. she is brilliant, brilliant, brilliant at telling a story. i read it last night almost in one go.

so, so...

i leave for new york saturday morning. i have 3 apartments visits saturday and one on sunday morning. i'm pulling for the place in white plains - $400/month with 4-5 hours of french tutoring to an already bilingual (spanish/english) 4-year-old. perfect. even if i have to use a laundromat.

lunch with carol reggia today kicked *ass* : fresh guacamole (aguacate, cebolla rojo, tomate, ajo, zumo de lima), chorizo, black beans and rice (lesson = soak beans overnight) with a salsa soundtrack. dessert, brought by carol, mango with fresh lime juice and dark chocolate.

"stardust" premieres friday. the meeting point bookstore has gone under an extreme makeover, involving gondolas, which i assumed only referred to boats on the canals of venice, new paint jobs, and tearing down lots and lots of boxes of new textbooks. my workout of the day. ha ha. it wouldn't be so sad if it weren't true...

road trip! hopefully richard will burn me some regina spektor cds (her older ones), yo yo ma bach cello suites, perhaps some brahms violin sonatas, and india.arie's confessional, bien sur...

really?

so strange for a girl my age to like to cook? if i cook, sue said she'd do my laundry. $1000 is a little steep on rent, even if her ranch house in rye is near 2 beaches...so still no definitive news on apartments.

examples:

• today's lunch = half/half whole wheat/regular penne, sautéed bell pepper (red, yellow), onion, canadian bacon, garlic, parmesan cheese, made before i went to work in the morning;

• the salad i proposed to john = raw spinach, blueberries, toasted almonds + balsamic vinaigrette (olive oil, strong balsamic vinegar, mustard, salt, freshly ground black pepper)

i'm not bitter. i'm just deprived of close contact.

when i talk about living in paris, it seems like a few months of my life were on someone else's dime. maybe i didn't value the experience enough while i was living it, i don't know. i was too busy soaking up all that i could from all the different sources - sorbonne musicologie, michel fischer, michelet monde islamique, cat cantin, m-a letellier, pascal odille, cheminals, solano - that maybe i forgot to just be. to just exist, you know?

erin wang said recently that i paint with words. i avoid it sometimes because it hurts, but maybe that means i'm deconstructing something real.

vonnegut's welcome to the monkeyhouse is superb, and it gets me through the long days of work. that, and i put on trio medieval's stella maris album when there's barely anyone in the store. keeps me sufficiently entranced.

an absolute nobody.

I'm just sick of ego, ego, ego. My own and everybody else's. I'm sick of everybody that wants to get somewhere, do something distinguished and all, be somebody interesting. It's disgusting.

JD Salinger, Franny and Zooey

maybe it's salinger's (franny's?) cynicism that helps me along this literature binge. next in line is vonnegut and possibly steinbeck, if i can get my hands on east of eden.

the renaissance group has yet to be named, but repertoire ideas are flying around - monteverdi (brookshire), ingegneri (gideon), lasso (thatcher), machaut (me) - now we just need bodies and a rehearsal space.

yum yum yum, indian food. good company and tasty leftovers.

new piccolo! burkart world (manufactured in china) with a wave headjoint - responsive with a percussive low register.

i'm starting to develop short story ideas...bought myself a little book for writing catchphrases, maybe a direct result of this wild, tumultuous summer spent between plot points and thin pages.
what defines an installation? a vibrant explosion of mixed media? something is happening in budapest, and they won't even know what hit them.

at last...

"Because, Martha, life's too short!" (Covent Garden, London, 12.07.2007).

i have realized that i have been duping myself. existence is as good as you make it, and you have to do what you love (anya, front desk at tai sophia). i've been trapped in my own delusion, which had til now made me wonder what went wrong. perhaps harry potter and the deathly hollows, 750 pages finished in just over 5 hours of reading (but who's counting?), broke the spell. not quite sure. whatever the case, it's time to blink my sleepy eyes and snap out of this bog in which i've been slowly treading water.

claro (def.)

new york will be a continuation of something i start here, now, this moment. african dance liberates my body; playing flute, my mind; writing and collaging, everything leftover. the spark is back - now i just have to run with it.

not so out of luck

i have a job now, at tai sophia institute, an acupuncture school about 20 seconds walking distance from the applied physics lab, where lynn has been working this summer. i make coffee, clean various surfaces, and sell people books and herbal supplements. my boss david is cool, very experienced in the book selling business. i try to bring positive karma to the store. so far it's working.

today my parents and i saw "the witches of eastwick," an awesome new musical that is in its pre-broadway stages. it closed tonight at signature theater. anyone remember the movie with cher, susan sarandon and jack nicholson? same plot, and the actors in this version are particularly delicious in their roles. hopefully a good portion of them will carry it to tinseltown (is that new york's nickname? i always get it confused for the nickname for paris, which i now know thanks to aunt eva is "the city of lights").

i have a certain amount of trepidation about carting myself away to new york. it's an inevitable change, i know. working in the box office at the arts center, interning and/or dj-ing at the radio station, forming and directing an 8- or 10-member renaissance group sponsored by the harpsichord professor, playing flute consistently and demanding more of myself - will it be all that i hope for? will i be able to get down to the city on weekends with any regularity? frequent art galleries and new music concerts? fall in love with the woods and remoteness that is purchase? drum up enough money for airfare to france to see important people?

hm.
as usual, too much worrying.
just read kite runner and have been listening to india.arie's "confessional" sans cesse.

fireworks and placing blame

working a 15-hour day is hard.

what do bottle rockets actually do, anyway? i know you're not supposed to hold them in your hand when you light them, at least...

my parents are at the beach for the week. i have the house to myself, and i jump at the sound of my own voice. my thoughts are louder. i'm thinking takoma park tomorrow. maybe looking at vintage clothes and drinking a good strong latté will kick start my weekend.

i am in a rut, and am solely responsible. today, micromanaging myself while smothering myself in colorful nonlocal raw vegetables and non-bottled water, i realized that. i also read janet frame's scented gardens for the blind during my brief stint at the fireworks stand off richie highway in glen burnie (we were there for the big storm - no tornado, but it thundered and hailed). she totally threw me for a loop in the last 4 pages. wicked, that one!

j'ai modifié la langue de blogger

and i'm changing my own personal font. touché. the scientologist dental practice people claimed i "wasn't a good fit" for the job, which is probably true. i don't know. perhaps i intimidate people? i've seen certain sides of the world that i am proud of, but that doesn't necessitate showing it off. so i'm back on it, trying to find a job, i dropped off my resumé to a few salons and local coffee shops and restaurants. it's discouraging, mostly because i thought i had something.

saturday richard and i are heading out to blues alley to see tim reynolds (blues guitar). tickets were a bit pricey, and the overhead for food and drink is a little steep, but we've never been, and it's supposed to be quite a place.

i might head out to an african dance class at the howard county arts center saturday morning. they have live drummers.

if i get a job, am i still allowed to be kooky? i guess i should close myself a little more.

mr. sleepy

sound of the squeaky shower head
yellow shag carpet on naked feet
faint pervasive smell of cocoa butter and garlic
errant blueberries the taste of white gold on my chin
hum of the turning refrigerator smooth cracked leather
sleeping barely waking grown restful from disuse
the telling crunch of a cherry tomato guessing wrong
things familiar churning mulling it all over was it fixed
given a tell smudges on the mirror of my childhood
nightly hoping for spiderbites sign of nightmare
marks of bitter reality an excuse to sweep away
remnants of the past on my windowsill frozen fixed
flushed dripping sweltering dans l'air climatisé
biking paved suburban circles alone mid-morning

some drinks

mardi soir: café de paris, under the auspices of eric, richard and i rolled out at 9pm, i think i psychologically ignored eric's suggestion that i arrive from 5:30-8:30 to see the jazz...needless to say, when we arrived the musicians had packed up their instruments and gathered up their tips. we each had a glass of dry cote de rhone wine and talked things over.

plans for next week--dinner at iron bridge winery (which reminded me from the pictures on the website of that winery i stopped by but didn't drink anything at in the 16th arrondissement, was it? with manou?), maybe also a movie at the charles ("waitress"?).

in the farther future, we're planning a dinner party at richard's place (more space and no interference of my parents, a definite plus), perhaps indian-themed? although we wanted to have wine, with richard handling the wine pairings of the dishes...we'll see.

last night: happy hour with some obie alums in the d.c. area at café citron, down by dupont circle. oliver mains! cristina jardine! becky davidson! fabulousness. it was lovely to see oliver, it had been a while, and cristina met him for the first time and they became fast friends. we're plotting some cool things, maybe movies on e street or dinners in bethesda/silver spring.

cristina had a mojito (they're known for them there), i a corona with lime, and after schmoozing a little we left in the pouring rain (i had my little plaid umbrella with me, thank god) in search of a restaurant. we ended up at a good mediterranean restaurant, i had something involving beef and eggplant, although i was disappointed with the result, and cristina had a spinach and cheese pizza-type entree. blue moon for her and a glass of red wine for me.

we left late, my fault because i talk to much (obvi). it took me a while on the metro (like paris, at night the trains run less frequently), and i changed at chinatown (as did cristina, but she to the yellow line in the opposite direction) to the green line and took it nearly to the end. there was a bit of a mess on 95S past the 32 exit where i got off, i'm not sure whether it was an accident or what, but i was tired and the flashing lights woke me up a little. i was home by 11h30 and in bed by 1.

on the reading list: the tent (m. atwood), some plath poetry, if on a winter's night a traveler (i. calvino)

cooking tonight: ratatouille (2e fois) avec de l'ail, aubergines, courgettes, tomates, poivrons (rouge, orange, jaune, vert), herbes de provence. yum.

no más! my first night at café de paris.

eric (owner of café de paris) m'a dit que je pourrais "observer" the staff d'une fête ce soir. quand je suis arrivée, j'ai rencontré nikki et jessica, deux soeurs qui travaillent ensemble au café. j'ai aidé nikki dans son boulot, qui était de servir une fête de 25 personnes pour l'anniversaire d'une femme. quand j'ai demandé le nom de la femme, elle m'a dit "paula micka" et j'ai commencé à rire! mon dieu, c'est mon ancienne prof de français au lycee, quoi!! alors c'était un gros plaisir de voir son mari, qui est malade depuis quelques mois, et sa fille, et tous les gens qui l'aiment beaucoup. je n'ai pas gagné beaucoup d'argent, mais vraiment c'était très sympa, avec tous le staff et les clients. j'ai aussi l'écrire une lettre quand j'étais à paris, mais elle ne m'a pas répondu, mais je comprends maintenant que c'était à cause de la maladie de son mari. je ne sais pas si eric va m'appeller toute de suite, mais j'espère que je peux travailler là-bas pour les petites fêtes comme ça, c'est quelque chose que j'aimerais bien faire.

it's also good practice for my french. still no wifi hub-thingy for my laptop, so i'm stuck using all the shortcut codes for french accents. i wish i had a blow-up team of guys that would help me unpack and reorganize everything. it's a huge job, and i'm intimidated by it.

quand-même, il faut que je trouve quelque chose comme "full-time job" parce que ce serait impossible pour moi de gagner assez d'argent comme ça. pour aller à new york, il faut jouer beaucoup de gigs (qui n'existent pas) ou travailler dans une boite que je déteste. je connais presque personne qui pourrait me donner un job, alors...idées? quelqu'un sage?

multiphonics across the atlantic

how is it that some women can contort their abdomens like that? i saw a thing on maryland public television (they were promoting a dvd) where they were combining yoga and bellydancing. it's beautiful and ugly at once. i'm starting in on ismail beah's memoirs of a boy soldier.

david's natural market is a no-go - they've hired for all positions for the summer. la madeleine and donna's are still possibles.

i got business cards printed and intend to draft a one-page resumé and run them around to local schools and maybe mail them to hotels that host events that might require music. solo flute might not be their style, but i think michael beharie (guitar) is coming back into town in july. will we get gigs? this isn't new york...

my dad sleeps chaotically when tired, snoring noisily, open-mouthed.

yoga, more unpacking, and a new paganini caprice tomorrow. 2nd movement of poulenc. i am enjoying the freedom of controlling the repertoire i work on. i'm brainstorming about the larrieu competition in nice - we'll see if i can lay down a few tracks good enough to send out for the preliminary tape by the end of july.

pondering the latent humidity (no metaphors)

my body is dissipating between the slats of my childhood bed. i miss the fast pace of the city because it forced me into motion. here, time slips away without a schedule, without a trajectory. swimming through dense jelly with leaden boots. it's been difficult to surface.

writing helps. playing will too once i settle into a pace. any tips from the wise? i've been looking for jobs, right now the crêperie at café de paris sounds the most promising. gas is up to $3.16/gallon, still cheaper i know than europe, where gas is sold by the liter, but quand même $50 for a tank of gas is obscene. french feels heavy on my tongue, like someone gummed it up and threw it back. tomorrow, a new day, a new week, perhaps i can figure out where to jam all these things i have into some sort of organization? it will take inspiration. i'm getting a haircut, maybe i'll come out with a clear head.

i missed indian buffets in france. scene of today's crime: house of india on snowden river parkway. chicken tikka masala, pea curried deliciousness, naan bread, sweet lassi, many other delights whose flavors bled into eachother and simmered into my mouth. i will sleep tonight without pause. the narrative of "inheritance of loss" bleeds into my dreams. sylvia plath's poetry sits darkly in the corner of my mind.

comment as you will, mes amis. pointers from slices of your life, outlooks from across the ocean, all much appreciated.

lately

1. friday: return from paris vers 17h to the states, one large valise m.i.a. with all of my clothes, sauf my beautiful graduation dress and button necklace that matches it perfectly. chinese takeout (string beans and kung pao chicken, 2 of my all-time favorites) and then dropping a few old things in my small suitcase (vide of all the books and music) before hitting the road for pennsylvania.

2. saturday: arrival by car vers midi to oberlin, oh, for the conservatory luncheon. i think many were surprised to see my cropped hair/open smiling face...i dashed down the chicken salad (still quite jetlagged and on a weird meal schedule) before going to meet up with my friends alex and darcy in tappan square.

we did nothing, sauf bavarder et relaxer, in wilder bowl on benches before heading out to clio's for a little reception at the old apartment (316 w. college). everyone was there, all the old dinner party crew - gwen, solon, elisa, stephanie, lilly - plus wendy, of course, and affiliated family members. lots of clio's clan. yummy warm pasta salad with cherry tomatoes and cheese; double gingerbread with crystallized ginger (a personal favorite of mine that clio makes so well); raw veggies and plenty of delicious fresh fruit and juices.

after, the commencement recital part I (meh); swing dance at wilder bowl (free, live band, fun to see and dance w/ brandon ramos and daniel who lives in nyc); dorm room with darcy, chatting about life, just like barcelona/fez!

3. sunday: leisurely morning, breakfast at oberlin market (soundtrack: stevie wonder!!) - chili/ cumin bagel with strawberry jam, chai with milk and honey; shuffling around with kitchen stuff that clio and i decided i would take for my place in new york...

wobc open house for a t-shirt and 2 stickers (one with an old design to replace the one i lost on my green nalgene before leaving for france); chem open house to see all the kids that i missed (zany mia casale and david smith, eben lichtman, rishana cohen, manasi bhate, all my old profs -- ackermann, whelan, elrod, craig)...

then i wandered around a bit before finding (trouver! god, my franglais) some friends to sing with at nuernberger's house. the crew ended up being steve lind (bass), noah horn (tenor), sarah allen (soprano), and zoe weiss (alto/tenor) and me (alto/soprano). we really needed another tenor, but i think he was truly thrilled to have us sing in his living room. it was intimate. i liked it.

caught a ride with noah and relaxed a little in front of gibsons before doing some shopping in town (earrings from the bead store, cards from ginko gallery, another green nalgene [how could i resist?] from dave's army/navy) and grabbing a feve burger (grilled onions and avocado), great lakes beer (local to cleveland), side salad with mango-lime dressing and a side of tots. i didn't finish everything, but it was delicious!!

i was somewhat courted while drinking my beer by these 2 musicians from new york city in town to see their bandmate graduate (they play klezmer music)? i got the business card of the mexican violinist, he sometimes plays gigs on broadway, i thought he might be a good contact? because really that's what it's all about, i think...

met up with the parents for the second part of the commencement recital, in which solon, clio and johanna played the lovely slow movement from the symphony concertante, alice/jon a great xenakis duet (flute/percussion) and stephanie washington sang a stunning rachmaninov set.

4. monday morning: graduation!! i was right behind the lovely sarah allen (who got high honors in neuroscience, p.s.) and received an envelope with nothing in it, sauf a little thing that said "your diplomas will be in the mail" once we receive the appropriate things, blah. but i got to walk anyway, and shake people's hands, and feel like college was actually over. which it is, and that's a little frightening.

back to france?

glittery aftereffects

joyous because i didn't have schenkerian analysis tonight. i left early, grabbed a crêpe sucre on my way down st michel (my flute on my back, after going to my last cat cantin lesson and my final islamic architecture class ), and waited around for 15 or 20 minutes expecting people...and then vaguely remembered my prof had assigned the rest of the class projects and wished me a bon retour aux états-unis last week...

but - some things restent sur mes épaules, unfortunately. the rest of this islam dissert, and something about domaine musicale and the total serialists of the 1950s, i like to wave my hands about it but it has to get written tonight. then pascal's final tomorrow afternoon, is it worth looking at? memorizing a few titles of salient oeuvres? meh, is what i say...things are coming to a rapid close, and like i told him earlier tonight, if i start packing it means i really have to leave. i'm stubborn.

inevitably, mes derniers jours il y a de bon temps en paris. sans doute god's way of saying "stay, martha, stay!"

jeudi vers 22h/salsa-ing/balajo/1o€ cover/anyone who can give up their dignity and shake their collective booty. it's my going away party i'm holding for myself! (encore)

wishing on a star

and so it was bench watching the sun glaze the seine
dizzy with nervous energy this man this voice
unassuming letting the mic pick up the little notes
funny glissandi scales chord progressions interwoven
all his household fights dissipating into beatboxing wars
passing down his incredible lineage cultivating what they had
two rows between bodies into it singing along bopping delighted
long braids clasped behind his head lights creating a dense jungle
light touch of the accordeon player musicians at play
improvisational banter so simple and yet complex incredible ears
pure joy the glee of musical conversation spinning audible threads
imagining bobby mcferrin in the metro on the bus divining up
webs of sound melodies mind constantly humming i do pretty
well til after sundown my heart is still with you
midnight knows it too near the village the peaceful village
where troubles melt like lemon drops thats where you'll find me...

crusty bread, the smack of balsamic vinegar, and honey from the south.

the latter in a thin layer over a carton of yaourt nature (activia, danon, the green one). these are staples of my existence chez cheminal. shoutouts to those who have written me letters, i think i wrote more to you than you did to me. i've been getting writer's cramp lately, filling out neverending paperwork for the abroad program whose credits don't really count for much at oberlin except to say that i did something in paris and taking frantic notes in the cm section sur "les dynasties en inde" so as not to make an ass of myself when i decide it's a good idea to open my mouth and answer one of her questions that she so intimidatingly leaves suspended in the air for 10 or 15 seconds.

warning: the following text is french, because i'm having writer's block in english. ça arrive de temps en temps.

cet après-midi j'ai vu meredith benjamin, finalement, une camarade de cupa (pour manger un crêpe chocolat et prendre un café crème dans un petit café que nous aimons bien sur rue de rivoli et pour discuter la vie d'une parisienne) qui est maintenant en train de finir un dissert de 12 page parce qu'elle part demain à londres! et c'est un jour ferrier demain, alors il n'y a pas beaucoup de bibliothèques ni magasins qui sont ouverts - tant mieux si elle peut le finir ce soir. moi, franchement j'ai complètement peur de commencer mon dissert pour "le monde islamique," parce qu'il y a un article que j'ai trouvé dans le journal muqarnas de 1996 qui était écrit en anglais sur l'architecture de la mosquée à al-azhar. c'est mon sujet, mais il faut dire l'information 1) en français et 2) dans une autre manière. il faut que je trouve un autre traitement de l'histoire de la construction et la renovation de la mosquée, mais il n'y reste pas beaucoup de temps pour le faire...alors, il faut que je sois prudente, et que je ne ressasse pas trop sur ce que je vais laisser ici...

frolicking and trying not to panic

oola...maéva was crying tonight, i think she was absorbing some of my stress...my body is collapsing inward, not so much from the stress but from the utter lack of planning and the fact that the time is just evaporating. how is it that it is 1.15 am on may 15? perry j o'halloran blew his happy british swaggering self through town this weekend, really helped to clear my head but at the same time screw my head on straight. i have this little gnat buzzing in the back of my brain saying "wouldn't you just love love to stay in france, work at cité de la musique and do your doctorate in musicology with michel fischer whose name is so very close to that of a southeast asian history professor i had for a winter term advisor freshman year at oberlin? who did his doctoral thesis on polymodality in the music of messaien?"

...but i digress...he is in strasbourg, i am in the city trying to sweep out my brain of all the extra stressors and distractions. bnf was a success this afternoon, and if the stars are aligned i will wake up, get the right score to xerox from michelet, print everything out, and make it to the sorbonne by 11 am.

see you at the finish line! prance, prance, prance.

bull castration

i added a sticker to my small grey nalgene: a spanish bull, apparently, bought by the roman amphitheatre in arles (provence). the weekend with my parents was fun, if stressful, and yes, i can read a map, quite well actually, even if i'm nul at determining distances.

i saw these pinchers that castrate the bulls, also - ouch, poor things.

suny-purchase next year for my masters with tara helen o'connor (anyone familiar with dawn upshaw's golijov disque "ayre"? she plays on it with the andalusian dogs). i will find people to sing with, and maybe even will get to play with gulia and clio (they'll both be in the city) and frolick the streets with katherine cohn, my longtime something of a soulmate.

jonathan from québec is coming to paris this weekend, as is my friend perry from london from french woods! hooray! i think some good chinese food grâce à ching-min is in order for a group of 5 on saturday...

more soon...plagued by work and thoughts of not leaving...

bites

information may be withheld from this post to protect the identities of those involved.

friday was the scene of something spectacular. bevin turned 21, and scared iván away with her girls' night party (we went to 2 bars and everyone got home safely [mostly] by noctilien).

i saw some dolce&gabbana pocahantas couture, and my oberlin pc-ass was offended. i immediately thought of the fact that they were profiting from the objectification of a culture, but then...so did disney.

i have a rather shadowy dark photo of the two phallic symbols of paris (concorde, eiffel).

donatoni was baaaddddd. not enough rhythmic integrity. i am constantly tempted to spell rhythm "rythme" because that's how the french do it.

after jolivet's "chant de linos" what was on the menu? boulez's sonatine for flute and piano. i haven't played it (yet) but i saw cantin do it at palais garnier with pierre-yves artaud. is that his name? the pianist, whatever his name is, the famous one that recorded with susan graham.

my mom lost her purse in the park by cité universitaire the day of iván's concert. i went to the concert, they went to the police and to the hotel to cancel credit cards and put a hold on their bank account...and then iván went back and recovered it from the security people at the park. my hero. 100,000 points. drink (café au lait for us, limonade for my mother, beer for my dad), dinner (pasta for the ladies, red meat for the men) with chilled (blech) red wine, ice cream at that gelato place in odéon (yummm, i had chocolate and mint that looked like a flower, but iván's was prettier and bigger), and then resting on a bench by l'institut de monde arabe.

pâtisserie and a huge gothic cathedral. plus a crazy québecer and a kiwi.

the bus granada-sevilla was...a bus, i bought a book of sudoku before leaving (which i quickly got bored of and dozed off). i sat next to this stylish blonde girl who was reading a spanish magazine with a small translating dictionary..."the client" was the movie of choice for the 3-hour ride, and it was subtitled in english (dubbed over in spanish), lucky for me...not a bad film, susan sarandon and that kid who probably didn't have a career after that movie, and that guy from ER who had cancer played the lawyer's assistant. oh yeah, and tommy lee jones in this hilarious role as a gospel-blabbing DA from louisiana. i was laughing, clearly an anglophone, and when i got out my printed out pdf to walk to oasis sevilla, the blonde girl asked me if i needed help getting there. or maybe she asked me if i was american, i can't remember the exact order of events...

needless to say, she took me on a long-ish walking tour of the city! she is german, from munich, a primary school teacher by trade, in sevilla for some months to learn spanish as well as assist in a primary school to teach kids german. it was about 25ºC when we arrived in sevilla, and she said that i had completely lucked out, that before she left for granada for a week's vacation it had been rainy and not-nice. she showed me some of the major sights and gave me scraps of history...the university, the cathedral, alcázares...it was sunny, warm, not many people on the streets, and i really got a feeling of the city. it looks big in the let's go guidebook, but it's not actually all that spread out.

she was incredibly kind, like lili said later, a kind of guardian angel. i found the hostel quite easily, she pointed me in the direction of the best pâtisserie in sevilla (yum, as i would find out later) and told me to turn the corner. an amazing start to a short venture in sevilla (and the last phase of my trip)!

i checked in to oasis, which i thought at first was closed for construction but they were just working on a building next door, and talked for a while with the swiss guy working there, he thought i was from québec (yes, jonathan, at first i was a bit miffed. i don't have a québecois accent, do i?). basta. i took my stuff up in the elevator to the 2nd floor (also room 6) and unlocked the door to find shirtless jonathan from montréal checking his email on his laptop! (not a girls' only room, i quickly concluded) we chatted for a while and we went down to meet a bunch of oasis-ers for a tapas and flamenco tour (one of the apparently regular nightly events that happen at these oasis hostels. heads up to anyone traveling in portugal - there's an oasis lisbon!).

on the walk i met a couple of australians and a lovely double bass player from milan named alessandra (goes by ale, who i hope has not dropped off the face of the earth). i ate some delicious beef stew and a chickpea dish at the first place and then had chicken curry and a big glass of sangria (mysteriously, my glass kept refilling) at the last place. we got to the flamenco place (la carbonería) a bit too late and were only able to catch their last set. it was a trio of performers: a female dancer, a guitarist, and a male singer. the dancer was tall, intimidating, and had an amazing dress that worked well with her passionate stomping and shadowed brow. the singer had a jaw/facial hair issue - he basically just looked crazy when he sang. he had a rough, gritty voice, that went well with the guitarist's articulations. (correct me here, o michael beharie and justin riberio, for i know not how to explain flamenco guitar)

after sticking around for ale to finish her beer, we tried not to get lost on the way back to the hostel (the streets were deserted at 1 am - strange for spain, as everyone seems to stay out til 6 or 7 am) and crashed. i rose early-ish to get some breakfast in the kitchen upstairs (waffles, toast, delicious chocolate spread, and milk) and also to get ale's contact info (although she rolled out an hour later than anticipated). we experienced a blackout from the waffle iron, although we thought at first it was the coffeemaker. i also met sydnah that morning, who is originally from queens, went to morgan state (pretty local to me), and is currently teaching english à la darcy in a suburb of paris. hopefully we'll prendre un verre demain.

i returned to my room to check out my map and guidebook to lay out a plan for my day and got into a conversation with a rather pasty irish guy who was still in bed in pjs. after having traveled for over a month, this guy was apparently so horny he even went so far as to proposition me right there, in a pretty decent hostel, while i am clearly not drunk enough to consider it nor forward enough to slap him in his half-wakeful state. puke. i bounced as soon as i had a vague sense of trajectory.

i walked around for a bit in town before seeing the massive queue for the cathedral, and i hoped (and was right) that most of the human traffic was due to tour groups. the line moved pretty quickly and despite my lack of student id card (i had locked my wallet in my safe back at oasis) the lady gave me the student priced-ticket. the cathedral was IMMENSE, people, just absurd. i read that it's the 3rd largest cathedral in the world, and the largest gothic cathedral. i have a certain disdain for christian iconography at this point, but this was just impressive. i didn't even bother to listen in on tour groups as i did in alhambra. they had beautiful orange trees in the garden outside.

i was dismayed that alcázares was closed on monday, but i got over it quickly because i had seen alhambra. i tried to find these beautiful gardens down my placa españa that sharonne had gushed about after eating a greasy sandwich and an ice cream from a random place near universitad...i found them eventually. parc de maría luisa. gorgeous. i wrote a postcard to clio there, which i ended up writing too much on and had to wait to get back to france to send it because i had no room to put 2 spanish stamps. i like traveling by myself a little bit because i can find my own chemin, sans souci pour les autres, and be totally in control of my situation. if i make a mistake, it's mine, and if i take time somewhere, it's mine to take. selfish, maybe, but i love it.

i walked down by the river (it must have been 28º or 30ºC) and ignored the one weird guy who tried to talk to me (i don't speak spanish anyway), eventually making my way back up to casa sierpes, a big shopping street not far from the hostel. i looked for shoes (on the prowl for sandals), but no dice. i bought breakfast food at a supermarket (pear yogurt, muesli bars, orange juice) as my flight was leaving at 7h45 the following morning for paris. i located the celebrated pâtisserie and bought 2 pastries, one that looked like a pain au chocolat (to save for the morning) and one that looked deadly and delicious that must have been filled with chocolate mousse. i took everything back to the hostel and ate a pear yogurt and the mousse pastry while recounting to one of the aussies i had met on the tapas tour the story of the horny irishman. blech. who does that?

i was sun-scorched and exhausted by that point, so i crashed for 30 or 40 minutes before meeting 3 washington&lee guys (all shirtless, wearing jeans, having just arrived in spain from the states that day). jonathan was on his computer and told us about the va tech shooting. too strange, especially for these guys who had just arrived from virginia for their study abroad...

monday was paella/sangria night, where everyone ate out on the roof (there is also a small pool) for 5€. ching-min (taiwanese flutist living in paris studying at the école normale) and i talked shop for a while, and i chatted with lili, this totally awesome kiwi teaching at a liberal primary school in zurich. it was a peaceful, humbling end to my amazingly awesome trip.

then it was back to paris early early and the rer back from orly to a less mediterranean parisian view of notre dame with machaut motet nº17 on my mind...

alhambra (for real).

(n.b. i am loosely translating from my let's go espagne book as well as commenting on my own experiences at alhambra in this post)

sharonne and i started with the palacios nazaríes (named for the nasrid dynasty, founded by al-ahmar in 1236 after he fled cordoba and took refuge at al-cazaba [Ar. fortress]), now known as alcázar (royal palace), built by 2 major moorish kings, yusuf I (1333-54) and son fils mohammed V (1354-91). i can't even articulate how amazing it was to be face-to-face with the kufic and cursive epigraphy that we had seen photos of in my islamic architecture class...sharonne has very little background in islam (or architecture), so i was able to point out some of the major elements, though some of the terminology escaped me. i took some photos, but sharonne took the bulk of them as my battery in my camera was running dangerously low, but not even the resolution of a digital camera can capture every dimension of the brilliant stucco work.

we also saw the palacio de carlos V (palace of charles quint), which was actually constructed by pedro machuca, a student of michelangelo. it is considered to be on of the most beautiful edifices of the spanish renaissance, with 2 floors of doric columns. sharonne saw it as a symbol of the blatant decadence of the époque (it is huge and circular, empty, and all in marble, and charles quint didn't even live there), but i think in many ways it fits with the idea that monarchs wanted to perpetuate their memory (and maybe create enormous empty spaces to demonstrate their wealth and power).

the views of granada and the sierra nevadas from the watchtower of alcazaba were incredible. it is said that al-quiada thought about bombing alhambra because it was the last muslim stronghold. the bells were rung (back in the 13th century) to announce imminent danger and also to signal different stages of the irrigation system set in place by the moors.

i know this is a big sin, but i didn't see generalife (the gardens at alhambra). i was tired, starving for some shawarma (the veiled lady at picadilly circus also gave me free falafel on my last afternoon! i think she liked my henna), and my bus left granada for sevilla at 4:30 that afternoon...

tripartite

i dozed in and out of the train ride through the sierra nevadas to granada...the sun helped motivate me to write...upon arriving in granada, i found the right bus with the help of two other hostelers from singapore (i think?) and got off at cathedral. the pdf i printed out from the oasis granada website was pretty simple to follow from there. i lugged my rickety (noisy) small rolling suitcase up the narrow alley lined with moroccan import stores (you could practically taste the incense from 3 feet away) and followed the signs to the oasis hostel! the check-in was easy enough, i spoke to the german woman who i later learned was the head honcho and she said that it was a good thing i made my free call (what am i, in jail?) because otherwise she would have canceled my 2-night reservation alltogether (they were booked solid that weekend).

room 6, bed 6. took the elevator upstairs and met a nice aussie girl named belinda who had been traveling around spain with a friend and had also spent a little time in morocco. she's just moved to london, and hasn't found a PR job yet (so is traveling to put off the unemployment). i was relieved to find that the travelers at oasis were talkative, open, and full of tales traveling adventures. i took the map they gave me and went out walking, caught an alhambra bus (1€) up to st nicolas and tried not to get lost in the windy little corners of albaicín. i regret that i didn't make it up to sacromonte to the caves. apparently they have great flamenco there.

i went back down to the hostel to relax a little bit and caught up with a group that was walking back up to albaicín. the weather was pretty, if a little chilly in the late afternoon, so i decided to go back out with them. i forget the name of our guide, but she loves the phrase "hella" and hadn't heard it our used it in a long time. i took a picture of a garage that had "hella" painted on it in her honor. maybe i'll send it on to the people at oasis granada.

but i digress. in that group i met rick (not greg), a long-haired blonde, tan guy from atlanta georgia (and at that i thought of my aunt and uncle living around there) who has been woofing for the last few months (working for food and accommodation on organic farms in italy and spain, most of which are run by german or english people); paula, an austrian painter and graphic artist from vienna who had left her painter boyfriend behind, in granada to learn spanish; sharonne, a zany non-spanish-speaking, wheat-allergic and lactose-intolerant australian dentist who worked for 7 years after university, saving every last penny to buy a round-the-world ticket and travel for at least 1 year (of which she has completed 9 months) - she spent the winter in canada (started west in vancouver and ended in québec...wouldn't be my choice for a winter!!), 2 weeks in cuba and guatemala each, and got laid up in sevilla for 2 weeks with a terribly sprained ankle; some guy from south africa who's living in london; sam also from australia who has been traveling for a while selling stuff at these big road shows all across europe (people drive really fast on windy roads? i don't really know)...basically, i was kicking it with people living in the moment, seizing life by the horns. i like that aspect. everyone has a different tale to tell.

sharonne and i decided to get out to alhambra early (6:30-ish) the following morning (as i only really had a bit over 24 hours in the granada) as tickets are very hard to come by (they let in around 2,000 people the day of, and people line up for hours to get in in the morning). slept a bit after eating a ton of food at this all=you-can-eat buffet not far from our hostel, i think sharonne consumed at least 4 plates of mixed salads (she eats meat, but finding a rice-based diet is hard to come by across the planet), and walked up the *slight* hill to alhambra and arrived in the queue at 7 am. there were about 50 people ahead of us, and the line continued to build...we were able to get into the 8:30-9 am time slot to enter the royal palace. i was freezing my bum off in my sepia h&m shorts because the sun hadn't risen by 7 am, but by the time we started walking to the palace, the sun had come out and the ground had started to unshiver...