Week from Hades. I finally have a minute at a hip coffee shop Genuine Joe's to update the blog entry I started last night before passing out from mere exhaustion from this week. Here goes:
In my quest to expose my students to high quality musical experiences and interactions with professional musicians, I persuaded the Aeolus String Quartet to visit my school to play an informational performance of a Haydn Quartet, Op. 20 No. 4. The 4th marking period brings us to in depth study of the Classical Period. Having just finished listening to Haydn symphonies and quartets, it was perfect timing!
They were wonderful guest artists who related really well to my students. They played and talked about their lives as professional musicians who rehearse 4 hours a day as a quartet and worry about things like bow bugs.
It was the perfect balance of informality and go-with-the-flowedness as we had not really planned any details, but rather let it all naturally fall into place. Going back to my days as the Crane Student Association Public Relations Officer (two years of service), I did do some good PR and made them out to be celebrities.
P.S. They are giving a recital on Monday February 15th at Bates Recital Hall at UT. You should all attend!
Two students get Nick's autograph.
It all went so smoothly that there had to be something to bring it back to reality. After one of the performances during Aeolus Q & A, two of my sixth grade girls come up to me in the back of the room. From their expression, they looked fresh and ready to test the waters with their snarkiness. They begin their smack talk, "Did you see their posture?! Their feet were all over the place and the violinist in the middle..." Unfortunately, this is all right beside the Aeolus' high definition digital camera which is recording this educational outreach for Fischoff.
I swiftly yelled at them the moment I knew what they were doing, but I'm sure I was too late. To my Aeolus friends, I am sorry that I am creating audiences who scrutinize the way you sit and play your instruments. Unfortunately, the world is not ergonomic. Thanks for coming and giving my students an experience they will not soon forget.
Seriously, Somebody root for the Viola!
Being the reality-tv version of a school teacher, I naturally started my presentation for the Fine Arts Festival at thirty minutes to midnight. It was rock star.
My presentation was a 12-minute feature of solos from each instrument. For example, basses played Mummers, cellos played the Habanera from Carmen, the harpist was demonstrating glissando...it was just wonderful. Knowing that my violists do not attend sectional, I formulated a last-minute plan-B where they would not play a feature, but play with the violins. For the overabundant violinists, I decided that they would play 'boring but beautiful' Chorus. Besides, who needs more violins anyways? I figured that if you were a 5th grader truly interested in the violin, you might as well deal with listening to something that is not appealing to your demographic.
Keeping this in mind, I decided to create bubbles from viola players in my orchestra talking about how awesome the viola was. That should do it.
Infinitely? Come on. Now you're just trying to play God.
So, in the middle of my presentation, I had all the 5th graders cheer for their favorite instruments. It was obvious that I had done my job with the cellos and bassists. It shouldn't have, but for some reason it surprised me that when I asked, "Who likes the viola?!" no one answered. Crickets. That's not true, actually, there was one 5th grader in one of four presentations. That was it. I was dying inside. Well, it's a good thing I have 12 violas (8 of them new) at school that will still sit untouched next year.
More to come...running to Blackerby's to teach some lessons.
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