The LaValley’s Blog

Well, I’m a bit late on the afore mentioned update.  But better late than never… in the majority of cases.

So, if you were to come and join me here on my lovely campus, you would find me busily attending my classes (yes, I am still in that horrible habit of showing up early my classes… except I’m super early, since classes start a full ten minutes after the scheduled time.  Apparently I need to work on my learning curve.  On the upside, I meet people whilst I am waiting to be able to get into my classroom.  Which is fun.); doing homework (high school definitely lead me to believe there would be more of it… not that I am complaining); and being social.  Seriously social…. we’re talking a full-on social butterfly metamorphosis here.  Ok, well maybe not that extreme… I’m basically just chatty with good listening skills and some memory recall.  But I’m meeting tons of new people, eating meals with groups of friends, and coaxing a couple to go see Star Trek on the parade ground with me (or a lecture… or whatever else sounds fun).  I got described as a “cool kid” today – which is an impressive turn of events.

And starting tomorrow, you’d find me – at work.  I have a job with the School of Music’s publicity office, which is pretty awesome sounding to me.  I get to learn how to use professional publishing software (and “send stuff to the printers”!  I don’t really know why that’s exciting to me, but it’s just fun to say), potentially help manage the a facebook page for my college, and keep on the up-and-up with all the performance going-ons around campus.

Let’s see…. what else?

Oh! – I promised an update on the bassoon auditions.  Alright, well, I’m gonna cut right to the chase:  they did not end well.  I didn’t make the orchestra for this semester, and despite my swan song performance in my final audition – I am currently the fourth chair in the lowest group.  And for a few days, I was really down on myself for that.  But a few serious pep talks, a playable reed, a little application of logic, and some rudimentary soul searching later, I am making the best of it.

The Pros of my situation:   1. No pressure on the performance level.  This gives me a lot of free time (to be social and studious at the same time).  2.  The free time allows me to pursue other interests.  Point in case?  I joined a double-reed chamber ensemble.  It gives me that challenge I’m craving and gives me a little more diversity in playing to add to my repertoire.   3.  The ensemble I’m in gives me a chance to focus on studying the conductor-ensemble relationship, and take note of what works for this environment and what doesn’t.  4.  Plus, the multitude of audition failure I just got through only pushes me harder to blow them out of the water next time.  Which will help make me a better player anyways.

So, yeah.  That’s the gist of things for now.  College is definitely a new experience, and I’m enjoying it completely.  And the more I see of this little patch Louisiana, the more I am growing to love it, and the more I want to see the rest of the state.  Really – it’s simply beautiful down here.  I’m going to spend part of my holiday weekend just walking around campus with my camera, trying to capture the scenes I like best.  So keep your eye out for them early next week!

I love you all!

Well, I’m beginning to check some seriously big items off the college portion of my to-do list.  The most recent items to meet the mystical red pen in my minds eye? Moving in and drumline auditions at LSU.

So, moving in:

Newton had a law that kinda sums up the entire moving to college experience for me -  For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.   Apparently this applies outside the vague and unfathomable realm of the physics classroom and automobile crashes.  This stuff happens in my life a well.  Packing up seemed to drag on.  It was weeks of “Huh, will I need this and where should I store that” and quite a bit of “Seriously, how do I have this much STUFF to sort through?!?” thrown in the more quiet moments, just to keep things interesting.  But unpacking… that’s a whole other kettle of fish.  It’s wham, bam, thank you ma’m, and suddenly I’m chatting with my RA (who’s really sweet, btw), have a PO box for the year,  and am looking at my 95% unpacked room realizing that I hadn’t thought of curtains before now.  Actually, I probably wouldn’t have noticed for about three days unless my family had been there – acting, as always when I get a little tunnel visioned  (which is unfortunately just how I have to pack if I ever want to finish), as the other half of my brain.  Thank you guys for all your help!  Not to be cliche, but – It all happened so fast!  But yeah, I’m done for now – moved in and everything.  I like my room, which is (of course) small, but I think it’ll be comfortable for the year.

Once that was done, it was on to thinking about my drumline audition…

And, here’s a couple stats to paint a basic picture: 4 instruments to audition – 4 judges – 50ish auditionees in total.  Objective?  Fill a drumline with spots for 9 snares, 6(?) tenors, 6 basses, and 9 cymbals.  Auditions begin at 1 pm.

7 and a half hours later, I get called in for my cymbals audition, which lasts approximately 2 minutes.  Tops.  Followed by another half an hourish of waiting to hear the cymbal line get announced.  The time leading up to my audition kind of plays out like a day at the DMV.  A lot of waiting, a lot of practicing, a lot of making small talk – all to this underlying fear that your request is going to be rejected.  So yeah, I didn’t make the cymbal line.  Considering that I am a bassoonist, who hasn’t marched a show before, and there were 10 new people (the rest – percussionists) auditioning for 3 spots if you assume all the cymbal line veterans made it – I wasn’t exactly expecting to make it.  I had hoped to, but I’m just too excited to be disappointed.  I met a big group of really amazing musicians, got to help teach some cymbal technique (which I really wasn’t expecting, but was glad to help), and still have a ton of great opportunities ahead of me.

After that, I opted to take a few more days vacation and have already had the chance to discover something new that I love doing: kayaking.  Not super suprising since I love canoeing, but it’s something else I can look into pursuing on campus.  And now I’m moving on to preping for my bassoon auditions – which I will definitely update you all on once they happen.  Wish me luck!

Hi everyone!

So, Jean invited me to join the virtual melee via his blog – at least whilst I am away at college.  And here I am… First time blogger, long time reader…*looks around* …  It’s a lot quieter than I’d imagined.  lol

Anyways, I’m hoping to be able to keep everybody at least mildly entertained and updated with my adventures into being a college student, musician, writer-type…  all that jazz.  I’m definitely excited.

So, yeah.  Enjoy!

(Grammar quality not guaranteed … I like ellipses.  A lot.  You’ve been warned.  But spelling should be good – I’ve got a spell check. ).