Connection

I know. It's been forever.  Again.  For those of you who continue to check for updates, thank you.  I apologize for not posting life stories, deep and meaningful comparisons of life in CO and life in ND, or media of recent performances.

It's possible (although not likely) that all of the above will come again sometime, if I ever find the time, energy, and inspiration to keep writing.  It's also possible that writing this entry will encourage me to write more. 

Until one of the above happens, this will have to suffice:

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I had one of those experiences this weekend that reminded me why I'm doing this whole music thing. 

One of the most important reasons that I'm following this path to what I hope will become a lifetime of performance is for the opportunity to make music that moves people to feel.  There are songs that have brought a huge smile to my face (see this), evoked tears (Adele makes me want to die), incited laughter (how could you *not* laugh at this the first time you hear it?), or made me want to shake my booty (although I can't do it as well as JLo).

But the beauty of music is that what those songs do for me could be entirely different from what they do for you.  We all connect to different things at different times, based on our past and present experiences.  It's powerful for me to hear a song that formerly meant nothing to me suddenly mean something and I enjoy exploring how that connection was created.  That connection is what makes music powerful.

Even more special to me than exploring that connection, though, is playing a part in the connecting.  

For those of you who don't know, I'm fortunate in that one of my sources of income is doing what I love: singing.  A local church pays me to attend weekly choir rehearsals and services to support the choir and sing a solo here and there.  It's very common in cities, although I'd never heard of such a thing when I was living in good ol' ND.  (I could write a whole blog on this topic, so I'm skipping over the details.)  

Due to a number of unforeseen circumstances, the song that we sang this past Sunday featured me as a soloist for 2 of 5 verses.  I sang, the choir sang, church went on, life was normal.  

Until after the service.  A man who I've seen in church every week approached our music director. I was near her and overheard him thank her for such beautiful music (she wrote the setting of the text).  He then pointed me out and said, "I don't know where you found her, but she's incredible."  He then turned to me for the first time and I saw tears in his eyes.  He then asked me, "Can I give you a hug?"  I smiled and replied, "Absolutely."  While we hugged the awkward hug of people who don't know each other, he thanked me and then walked away.

I should mention that seeing people cry almost always makes me cry, too.  But the tears in my eyes at that moment were out of gratitude and a tiny bit of shame.  Gratitude is obvious.  I'm grateful to be here, studying what I love, sharing beautiful music, working with my talent, connecting with people, etc.

But why shame?  I have to be honest with you: even to this moment, I have no idea what the text of that song was about.  I didn't give one thought to the text or its meaning.  I'm pretty sure that the only things that I was thinking about while singing were the notes, blending my voice to the section, and making sure that I was using good technique to create a smooth, even phrase with no major bumps or misaligned vowels. I never once looked at the congregation in an attempt to connect with them.

In light of the horrible performance practices outlined above, I never ever could have imagined that what we were singing about as a choir would have an effect on the people listening.  But it did.  A large effect.  It's humbling. 

This is a problem that we performers have.  We have to pay attention to the details to make technically beautiful and sound music.  We need to use good technique to preserve our bodies and minds.  We can't get so emotionally attached to the music that we get emotional in performance.  We MUST do all of those things.  But we do occasionally lose perspective.  We forget to look at the bigger picture, to think about the music as music itself, which is just as important as the details.  We sometimes forget that we aren't performing for ourselves, but for our audience.  (Every "we" in this paragraph should maybe be changed to "I."  I should speak for other performers.) 

Thankfully, our audience can be affected even if we aren't doing everything exactly right.  And we can't know if, how, or when we'll affect them.  We can just do our best and hope that someone is making some sort of connection to the music.  And when we do make that connection, we can be thankful for the opportunity and ability to have made it.  Connection, after all, is one of the best benefits of performing music.

The Conference on World Affairs

Before I really get into my topic today, I need to 1. apologize, and 2. thank you all.  I haven't blogged in well over two weeks, and believe me, it's as much to my dismay as it is to yours, if not more so, and I apologize.  I thought about doing it every day, but I have simply not had the time.  I realized it was time to blog when my mom called and said, "Are you alive?  You haven't even written a blog."  So now that I have a few minutes I'll get into it.  Even though I haven't written, people have still been visiting, waiting and hoping (at least that's how I interpret it) for an update of my life here in CO.  For that I thank you.

So here it is: the number one reason why I didn't blog for at least one week during my dry spell.

Please, if you're a CWA member, forgive me.  I've put this disclaimer in other blogs, but if you haven't read them, you won't know.  This blog is solely for my opinion, and whether or not I offend you is not my deal.  If you don't like it, don't read it.  But if you have any insights, feel free to share them.  I'll listen.

Although it was news to me (as so many things about Boulder are (more to come on that later)), it's no news to Boulder locals.  For the past 62 years, the University of Colorado has been host to what is known as CWA: The Conference on World Affairs.  One of the first things that I learned from Stephanie Rudy (my scholarship sponsor) was that the CWA is an amazing program and that it runs partly with the assistance of student volunteers. 

As she told me, the conference is a very special event.  Over 100 panelists are invited to Boulder to talk about subjects that are important to the world right now, as we speak.  Obviously, the university can't afford to pay to fly these people in, give them money to talk, and house them all.  Instead, each panelist pays for their own flight in and families in Boulder volunteer to house them for the duration of their stay.  Rather than the committees telling each person what they will talk about, each panelist sends in a list of things they would like to speak about, whether they are experts in the field or just interested in the topic.  Once the lists are compiled, the CWA takes an entire weekend to put people (usually 4) together on a panel.  The tricky part comes in naming the panel something fun and catchy that will encourage people to attend while still telling the real idea of the panel.  And the panels are completely unscripted, so one never knows in which direction the topic will go. 

From the get-go, Stephanie encouraged me to get involved, and it really seemed like a good volunteer activity.  It was clearly something that she was passionate about, so I agreed to help out.  My name was put on a mailing list and suddenly I was part of the CWA Student Committee.  The initial meeting was good.  I learned that most students opt to drive panelists to and from the airport, as well as around Boulder, and that sounded just fine to me.  In order to drive university-owned vehicles, student drivers were required to take a defensive driving course that was pretty painless.  And I actually learned stuff!  After I passed the class and went to a few more meetings, it was time for the Conference to actually begin.  At the last meeting, the week before panelists arrived, we received our schedules for the week.  Let me begin by saying this: we presented our availability to the heads of the Committee, and they encouraged us to write down all of our availability and they said that they would schedules us for a few hours here and there, from morning to evening for 9 days.  

What I didn't expect was to be scheduled for 6 of those 9 days.  Still, when I received my schedule, I found it to be manageable.  And at the beginning of the week, I was still dog-sitting, and it was therefore easy for me to get to headquarters to get the car I'd be driving.  My schedule looked something like this:

Saturday: 11:00 am - Airport Arrival - 2 panelists

Sunday: 8:30 am - Airport Arrival - 1 panelist

Monday: Dinner Driver

Tuesday: off

Wednesday: off

Thursday: Dinner Driver

Friday: 7:45 am - Radio Run, Dinner Captain

Saturday: off

Sunday: 6:45 am - Airport Departure - 2 panelists

What I actually ended up doing looked more like this:
Saturday: 10:30 am - Airport Arrival
Sunday: 8:15 am - Airport Arrival, 10:30 pm airport arrival
Monday: 3:45 pm - Airport Arrival, Dinner Driver (until 9:00 pm)

Tuesday: off

Wednesday: off

Thursday: Dinner Driver (until 12:30 am)

Friday: 7:45 am Radio Run, Dinner Captain (until 12:00 am)

Saturday: off

Sunday: 6:30 Airport Departure

Now, please don't misunderstand me, because yes, I am complaining.  However, let me explain the nature of my complaints.  I don't mind jumping in at a moment's notice when I have time, and I don't mind having to be flexible.  However, no one warned  me that I would need to be so flexible.  Also, no one warned me that being involved in dinner meant carting people around until all hours of the morning.  Finally, no one warned me that things would be very disorganized much of the time.  Had I known these things up front, I don't think that I would have been so upset and frustrated.  Had I known that being involved in dinner would mean that I would be going from 3:45 pm to 9:00 pm, or from 5:00 pm to 12:30 am, I would not have given my availability for those time slots.  After finishing on those nights, I still had to drive home and do my homework.  

I do place a bit of blame on the transportation coordinators, although I realize that all of it is definitely not their fault.  In all fairness, there is no way one can predict the promptness of flights.  Also, no one can predict the attitudes of those panelists who think that they need a ride RIGHT NOW, whether or not there is a car ready (those people made me really, really mad).  It is a very big job to coordinate all that they coordinate, though, with flight arrivals and departures, driving people to and from their housers in the mornings and evenings, driving people to and from dinners and to and from the radio station.  There is a lot of unpredictability.  What I will say is that despite my frustration with the system, I'm not sure that there are many better ways to improve on the system.  And I will definitely not say that I could do a better job, because I'm not sure that I could with all of the variables involved.

Even if I had a lot of better ideas, I could never be transportation coordinator.  I recently learned that in my next spring of school, I'll be giving a junior recital.  Now let me tell you: I don't know how many student volunteers actually went to classes during CWA week.  In fact, I heard more than one telling others that they went to one or none of their classes.  That does not work well in music classes, where one is allowed, on the average, 3 unexcused absences without a full letter grade penalty.  Besides, I'm not really a class-skipper.  Never have been (that might be a fib).  And skipping classes the semester of one's junior recital is definitely frowned upon around here.  

Because I'm mostly complaining here, there are more to come.  Next topic: the panelists themselves.  Many, many, many of the panelists have been coming to the Conference for years.  And by years, I mean 25.  Yes, 25.  To me, that seems kind of counter to the idea of the conference, which is about current events.  I mean, yes, the topics change every year, but isn't it boring to hear the same people speak every year, even if they're really good?  Many of those panelists, at least the ones I met, were really nice.  However, there were some who had this attitude: "Well, I've been coming to the conference for 97 years, and therefore know everything, and you are my minion.  After all, I'm the important one here, not you."  Which I guess is kind of true, except that the conference is really focused on sharing information with the students (who generally don't even go to the panels).  I ran into a few of those panelists, the ones who were so self-important that they didn't even talk to me as I drove them to and from their destination, and it wasn't for lack of trying to converse.  If there is one talent that I got from my parents, it's the art of conversation.  I've also learned from many sources how to get people to talk, and that is to ask them about themselves.  Even when I asked them questions about themselves, many gave one-word answers.  I wanted to say, "Yes, you're tired.  I'm tired, too, but am still doing my best.  Yes, you're here because you were invited, but your job here isn't over until you're at home and in bed." 

And here's a complaint, one against myself: the conference is for students, really.  One of the major complaints of organizers and panelists alike is the lack of student attendance.  I personally didn't make it to a single panel, what with my volunteer and school schedule.  But why do students not attend?  I don't know the answer for sure, but from what I heard from some, it's for the reason outlined above.

I'll be honest: there were a few good points to the conference, but for me, they were far outweighed by the negative impression I got from the very first meeting.  Even then, I thought it strange that the organizers didn't even bother to learn the names of their student volunteers.  On Monday, I overheard one of the head organizers say, "We've been doing things the same way for 62 years.  Why change now?"  Again, strange considering this conference is all about today.  Tradition is good, but tradition for tradition's sake is not.  That comment gave me a really bad taste in my mouth (this coming from a conservative Lutheran from ND).  Although I met quite a few people, I haven't seen or heard from any of them since the conference ended.  And I felt that the only reason many students were involved was to rub elbows with important people, which is the exact wrong reason to volunteer. 

Okay, I guess I'm still searching to come up with good things about the conference.  Which is bad, because I know that there are some.  After all, it's really great for a group of forward thinking people to come together and share their ideas with a group of people.  It's also really great for students to get involved in a cause that they feel passion for.  

I think I'll end with a few thoughts.  I asked one of the transportation workers, who could hardly stand up and stay awake by the end of the week, if it was worth it, and she answered "Yes," without hesitation, which I think says something.  Which is, for some people, it is worth it.  Secondly, maybe I'm selfish and wanted to get something out of the whole experience that I didn't.  If I had to guess what that thing was, I would say it would be a new group of friends, who are my peers, who have similar interests.  I didn't really get that, though, apparently, because I haven't seen any of them since then.  Thirdly, I am really grateful for the opportunity to be involved, because I did meet some really nice people, both students and panelists.  And I think I will be involved next year, but in a different capacity.  

I do apologize for whining and complaining so much about this and for giving everyone a bad impression.  This whole experience has reminded me a lot about my summer job in Medora.  (If you're a Medora tourist, you will not want to read what follows.)  In Medora, we do a lot of behind-the-scenes work.  Work that would, if the tourists knew about it, freak them out.  For example: rattlesnake, mouse, and insect control.  After all, we're encouraged not to eat the ice from the ice bins because of the number of dead rodents found in them.  Another example: cleaning the "stars" dressing rooms.  (Yes, I put "stars" in quotes, because... well... yeah.)  They are, for lack of a better word, pigs, and we are the ones who get to clean up after them.  Joy.  Those are the not-fun things that we deal with that the public would never know about.  I liken this to that.  Had I not been involved in the behind-the-scenes aspect of CWA, and only attended panels, I may have found it to be a great experience.  And maybe it really is.  After all, even though we put up with all of that crap in Medora, we keep going back.  Over and over...  Does that make sense?

Famous?

Okay, really no time to write a real blog here, but I thought you all might enjoy this.  

If you watched American Idol tonight, you would have seen this guy.  He's famous around CU, not necessarily all for good.  I think he deserves a little more credit than he gets sometimes, but not all the time!

Please keep in mind that he isn't a true representative of music at CU, and this isn't what all of my friends are like.

Please ignore the fact that this is poorly formatted.

Lock 'er down!!! (or something...)

At North Sargent High School in Gwinner, North Dakota, the high school hallway is lined with bright red, floor-to-ceiling lockers.  Every student in grades 7-12 is assigned one.  An outsider can tell the age of a student based on where his/her locker is, because locker location is determined by class year.  It's kind of ironic that as kids get closer to graduation, their lockers are closer to the high school exit doors...  

Now, way back when I was in high school, the cool kids jammed their lockers so that they wouldn't have to put in their combination every time they wanted to open their lockers.  Although it was really to save time, it wasn't really necessary. With 4 minutes between classes and the farthest class being 10 feet away, time really wasn't an issue.  Even with lockers jammed, it was rare that something was stolen.  I kept mine locked, anyway.

At Jamestown College, there were no lockers.  I didn't even consider it as an option, actually.  Campus is really small, and something like 85% of students live on campus, so it's not a necessity.  I always carried all of my books around in my backpack, and never considered it strange.

Something that really surprised me when I came to CU was that The College of Music offers lockers to students.  It makes sense, really, because people don't want to lug around a huge double bass or guitars everywhere they go.  When I was given the option to get one, though, I never even considered it.  It seemed weird to me that students would keep their books in their lockers.  Or their coats, or what have you.  Plus, I lived on campus, so it was easy for me to go back and forth.

Now, I live in Broomfield, and the number of bags that I was carrying with me to and from school every day was ranging from 2-3.  My back was wanting to kill me.  However, due to some unforeseen circumstances, I have a locker now.  And it rocks.  No more carrying 50000 pounds on my back all day, every day!  And I have a place to store my coat.  And... it's just unbelievable convenient.

Yay for reversion to high school!

Why I blog

A week off for Thanksgiving break while being employed only very-part-time means a lot of free time on my hands.  I could have gone home, and maybe should have, but it's a 14-hour drive one way, and all of that driving makes for an un-relaxing vacation.

All of this free time has translated to basically one thing for me: boredom.  I was so bored by 8:00 last night that I almost wrote a blog in the evening, after I'd already written one yesterday afternoon.  Basicaly, you all can expect at least a blog a day for the next week.  I hope that's okay with you, and if it isn't, too blad.

I've been considering writing this particular blog for quite some time, but always seemed to find events to write about instead.  Today, though, you get a blog about feelings, because there really is nothing exciting going on in my life right now.

When I started blogging, it was purely for you all, my audience.  I wanted a means of communicating my new life in Boulder without having to write personal emails to each of you.  I mean, seriously, people, I have tons of friends, and to write emails to each of you would be exhausting (that was a joke...mostly).  I wanted to be able to tell you about the interesting things that come from living in one of the most liberal cities in America (read this, this, and this), daily happenings (read this, this, and this), life as a music student (read this, this, this, and this), and anything else that struck me as interesting.

All in all, I'd say that I've done a pretty good job of it.  I post 3 or 4 times a week, with good content and length.  I'm more happy with some than others, and sometimes just don't have time to post as frequently or eloquently as I'd like, but I'm a busy student.  And I have quite a few regular readers and commenters (although I wouldn't mind a few more comments here and there... *hint hint*).  I've gotten into the habit of advertising my postings on facebook so that more people can be aware of a new posting and check out the blog.  On days when I do that, readership is way higher, especially if it's an interesting topic.

A lot of people start blogs and post a few times, then get sick of it or too busy and stop writing, but that wasn't the case for me.  Once I started, I couldn't stop.  For me, it's therapeutic to write, and it's easy to write this blog because it's my life; it's what I know about, there's no pressure to make it incredibly informative or entertaining or exciting: it's just the story of my life.  And if you don't like it, then you don't like my life.  It's fine.  (ha ha).  I make time to write, and I have a whole list of subjects to write about if for some reason I can't come up with a new one on the days I have time to write.  If I had time, I would write a blog every day.  It's awesome to get my thoughts down on paper and to have to organize them in a cohesive format so that others will understand them.

When I write, I don't just write and post.  I write, read, edit, post, edit, repost, edit, repost, etc.  I'm downright anal about the format of the posts.  I still make mistakes, but I really enjoy the process.  And I love it when people comment about the posts that I have made.

Shortly after starting the blog, I signed up for an account with sitemeter, a website that tracks visits to your website.  It's really basic stuff, and it's free, but it's addicting.  It tells me almost everything I could possibly want about each visitor's visit to my blog.  It tells me your IP address, location, duration of visit, referring website, page views, exiting webpage, etc., etc.  I call it my "stalker stalker."  I keep track of frequent visitors, locations, and especially page views.  On days when I advertise my postings on facebook, I get a ton more visitors to the page.  If I haven't advertised a posting in a while, I get way more page views, which I assume is people who visit whenever I advertise the posting notice that I've made other posts and they catch up on the ones they missed.  It's quite interesting.

Another aspect of my blog that's good for me is the ads that one can see throughout the page.  I have ads by google and through linkshare.  Google crawls my blog for topics and posts ads based on my blogs.  Every time someone clicks on one and buys stuff, I get paid commissions.  This, as of yet, has not been a significant source of income for me.  I don't get paid until I make $100.  Let's say I'm 14% of the way there.  (But if you all clicked and bought stuff, things would be different...)

Now, I blog as much for myself as I do for all of you.  I really enjoy the process and the topics and hearing feedback from you, and I hope that you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy reading it.  I hope that I continue to have time to keep it up.  For now, I'm doing fine.  And for this week, more than fine.  Any thoughts are more than welcome!!

Thanks, ya'll! :)