Eileen gets on a plane and flies away to New York today. I don’t get to go. I couldn’t take a weekend off so early in the new choir season. Eileen will have good time and get to see daughter Elizabeth and her partner Jeremy before they move to Beijing. Elizabeth didn’t seem too upset that I was unable to visit. If she had I probably would have finagled it some how.
As it is, I am putting huge amounts of time and energy into upcoming music at work. It looks like my fall work week will peak from Sunday through Wednesday. So yesterday, a Thursday, will probably become a day for recuperating. Despite trying to take this into account I spent several hours practicing yesterday.
Of course I have one ballet class a day to play for on Mondays through Fridays. This leaves only Saturday open as a possible day of rest. And I find that I need to prepare for Sundays on Saturdays.
So reinstating the Wednesday evening rehearsal is changing my work schedule and inevitably increasing it as well.
At least I go in with my eyes open realizing this.
Speaking of being reinstated, I checked and I still am not authorized to use the library and resources at college yet. Sheesh. I will stop by the Dance department office and check with the secretary again today. On Monday she said this could probably be fixed with a few emails and that she would get back to me.
I have been reading in The Robert Shaw Reading. I admire the many letters reproduced there that he wrote to his choirs. They range from humorous to analytic to inspiring.
Yesterday they were in my mind as I emailed my choir recordings of two upcoming big pieces.
This setting of “Christus Factus Est” is an ambitious one for a small choir. I do think we can pull it off. I found a recording by John Rutter’s small choir (I don’t think this Youtube version is it). Of course my church choir is not the quality of his, but still it shows that a small ensemble sound can make it work.
I do think it’s a pretty cool piece.
I hit the accompaniment to the Bach cantata 139 movement we began rehearsing this week pretty hard yesterday. It is a mountain for me to climb because of the intricate (and necessary) voice leading in the transcription of the two oboes and violin obligatos. It began to fall together a bit better yesterday. I have been practicing it slow so I was encouraged at how slow this recording was. Here is a screwed up Youtube version of the recording (It doesn’t begin well as you will see… the choir doesn’t come in for a page anyway).
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AP’s Mostly Factless Factcheck | FAIR Blog
Democrats Stretch the Truth in Talk and Text – Check Point – NYTimes.com
After all the hoopla about misstatements at the Republican convention I guess scrutinizing the Democrats was inevitable. At any rate, I am completely for accuracy.
And of course there is the critique from the left which reminds us what Clinton’s governing philosophy really was. I’m afraid it’s the way I see his presidency as well. I couldn’t vote for him the second term. Although I did admire the adroitness of his speech on Wednesday evening especially the part about not hating the opposition.
What Clinton Left Out Last Night
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Naomi Wolf’s new book is making a splash. Haven’t read this review yet.
Here’s the link to the excerpt of it on the Guardian website:
Vagina: A New Biography by Naomi Wolf | Society | The Guardian
I quite like the picture the New Yorker used in its review:
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TobyMac Tops the Charts – NYTimes.com
Christian music at the top of the charts. I can remember when Christian pop music was pretty terrible. Now I usually find it a bit cloying but much better written, performed and produced. I plan to check out some of the music mentioned in this article.
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John Dewey’s Vision of Learning as Freedom – NYTimes.com
I’m a long time admirer of Dewey.
“… [S]chools first and foremost should teach us habits of learning.
For Dewey, these habits included awareness of our interdependence; nobody is an expert on everything. He emphasized “plasticity,” an openness to being shaped by experience: “The inclination to learn from life itself and to make the conditions of life such that all will learn in the process of living is the finest product of schooling.”From the link above
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A Never-Ending Story – NYTimes.com
I’m so glad that Linda Greenhouse continues to write and publish in her retirement. Here she gives us a bit of history her insights on the ugly pre-Roe V. Wade aspects of abortion.
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