Wherein I digress

It's high time I burdened you all with details of my personal life, rather than post actual content- not that I've ever made that a priority in the past, so if you don't remember any, don't go on a wild-goose chase through the archives thinking you missed it. So without further ado, allow me to present to you my life a la Livejournal.

It's that time of year again, for more things than one. Finals are beginning to loom (see previous post), and next year's room draw and class preregistration are just around the corner. Concert season is about to get underway, with Chamber Choir this afternoon, Elizabethans in two weeks, and Concert Choir the week after that. Lots of good music all around, particularly the Renaissance pieces in the Chamber Choir repertoire and the Martin Messe fur zwei vierstimmige Chore being split between the Concert and Chamber choirs. Chamber is also doing two of Poulenc's Quatre Motets pour un temps de Penitence, including- you guessed it- "Vinea Mea" which I also happen to be conducting in 'Bethans this semester. Concert Choir, in addition to the Credo and Sanctus of the Martin Mass, is singing Barber's Agnus Dei (Adagio for Strings, transcribed for voices), Psalm 90 by Charles Ives and an Eric Whitacre setting of "i thank you God for most this amazing day" by e.e. cummings.

Perhaps I'm merely becoming jaded in my old age, but I'm beginning to lose patience with this last. I enjoy the poetry of e.e. cummings in small doses; it's sweet and fluffy, but like marshmallows, too much leaves you - or leaves me, I'll leave you out of this (you're welcome)- feeling slightly sick and hungering for a substance that just isn't there. Whitacre, of course, delivers an excellent setting but this only compounds the problem- not to disparage him, as I really like some of the stuff he does (Leonardo Dreams last year was fantastic, and not just insofar as it facilitated some of the greatest bass pranks of all time) but he's not above a bit of saccharine fluffiness either. On the other hand, I'd probably not like the Ives as much were it not so refreshingly stark in comparison, so I suppose it evens out.

To be honest, I can't say I haven't been guilty of sentimentality in my own writing, though I find I can't keep up a musical straight face on it for very long- for instance my piece A Medicine for Melancholy, performed two years ago by Student Symphony, in which a rather schmaltzy and melancholic first half turns out to be a parody of the jig tune which follows it- somewhat paradoxically, of course, since you hear them in the opposite order from how they were written. At any rate, I'll save further discussion of my own music for the 15-page paper on the subject that I'll have to write next year in addition to my composition thesis- not something I'm looking forward to (the paper, that is.) The thesis should be fun, and in fact I'm optimistic about my classes next year in general, since it looks like everything will fit together nicely- always a relief for a double major like me. Two more classes each for Music and Classics, plus the thesis, and I'll still have space for something fun and non-major.

I had been thinking of taking an intro modern language like German or Italian, but the prospect of early morning classes five days a week is less than appealing (not to mention that it would make it difficult to get to daily Mass). So you can imagine my delight when, browsing the course catalogue online, I stumbled purely by chance upon "Reading German for Beginners", which looks like it could actually be one of the more useful classes I take here at Williams, especially if I end up doing further work in music or classics. Beyond that, I hear it's a great class from a friend who, as it turns out, has been taking it all year and never saw fit to mention it to me before. (Just kidding, Emily!) In all seriousness, I've been so fortunate with class scheduling in the past that I was bracing myself for the inevitable conflicts next year- I must be due for them- but it looks like things will actually work out quite nicely, which is a pleasant surprise. That just leaves the question of where I will live, which will be resolved between 8:30 and 9:00pm next Tuesday evening- hopefully in favor of a nice cozy room in the Odd Quad with south-facing windows.

I'm off now to practice the organ for tomorrow morning's Family Weekend service (one of those "interfaith" shindigs), tomorrow afternoon's Newman Mass, and Tuesday afternoon's studio recital.

Current mood: Sabbatarian
Current music: Respighi- The Pines of Rome