Why I Love the Midwest

I love the Midwest (Wisconsin, in particular) for many reasons. Our cultural association with food (beer, brats, and cheese to be exact), the sense of community in Midwestern small towns, the hard working citizens and most of all: FESTIVALS. The Midwest has festivals for everything: Wiener and Kraut Days, Corn Fest, and Brat Fest are just a few of the favorites I've been to.

This weekend, as I was leaving for opera rehearsal, I opened my door and saw that the world had been covered by a blanket of snow. Still falling from the sky, the snow was the picturesque fluffy stuff that makes you feel like you live in a snow globe as you watch it descend. As soon as I stepped outdoors, I gathered that some hot soup and coffee was in order. Luckily, I live in the same building as a wonderful mom-and-pop coffee shop and cafe in an historic building (the Sweet Spot Coffee Shop, you should check it out if you are ever in Whitewater). When I stepped in, I noticed that the shop was uncharacteristically busy. I also noticed that the sign that usually indicates the soup of the day instead only had chalk residue where an artsy depiction of a cup of soup and an indication of the soup du jour normally is.

When I approached the counter, I asked the barista if there was any soup, her reply was "No, sorry. Lacey (the owner of the shop) has the container at the festival. She has entered her chili into the chili contest" as she pointed her finger towards the park and lake across the street. A giant tent was set up in the middle of the park and there were hundreds of people walking around, despite the cold weather and foot of snow that had accumulated in the course of a few hours, like it was the most beautiful day of the year. Maybe it was...

The festival being held in the middle of the winter on a frigid day featured two of my favorite festival events of the Midwest: a food contest (the chili bake-off) and the polar plunge. For those who don't know, the polar plunge features people jumping in their bathing suits into a freezing cold ice covered lake for charity. Beautiful. While I am sad I didn't get any soup, I am happy to call the Midwest my home and hope that Lacey won the chili contest.

Aboriginal Music

This semester, I am taking a course on World Music. I was supposed to pick a topic weeks ago about which I have to write a lengthy paper. The instructor spent some time in class last week asking me and my fellow students what our topics where. I had not thought at all about this paper and had done absolutely no research. Put on the spot in class, I was unwilling to seem like I hadn't pondered what to write about. Consequently, I blurted out "Australia!" (the first country I could think of on the spot). My professor's only reply was a disappointed "Australia's a big country, better do some research...next." I spent much energy researching this evening, as the library's computer server was down, which made me wish there were still good old card catalogs...not that anybody much younger than me would even know how to use the things... and determined that I would write about the clan songs of the aboriginal cultures of Northern Australia. Wish me luck!

Any body remember these things? I do, which dates me a little :)

women in music

Until recent history, women's roles as professional musicians were limited. The classical music world is known for being a male-dominated industry. It wasn't too long ago that women with any association with music were considered to have a "loose character." I am happy that my involvement with the classical music world has more-or-less been positive on the gender front, but think that our musical education doesn't teach future musicians enough about women composers and performers. Throughout history, several female musicians held their own in an extremely sexist world and continued to practice their art despite the risk of harming their reputation. So, I dedicate this blog to the women of classical music and hope to enlighten my readers to some the composers and performers I admire.

Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677)

Primarily a composer of vocal genres such as the madrigal and motet, Strozzi relied on her skills as both a composer and a singer to make a living and is well known for her collections of secular works. Because many of her songs make a play on words based on Strozzi's name, and consistently are written for a soprano with similar vocal strengths, it is hypothesized that Strozzi wrote most of her works for her own virtuosic voice.

Strozzi evidently experience a "wardrobe malfunction" as this portrait was painted.



Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre (1665-1729)
Badass french composer from a family of freemasons. Could it get any cooler? First woman in France to compose and opera and a virtuoso harpsichordist, it helps that de La Guerre married a fellow musician (organist Marin de Le Guerre) so she was not only allowed, but encouraged to practice her art. I'd recommend giving her "Pieces de clavessin" a listen because of their virtuosity and frequently improvisatory nature.

Painting of de La Guerre, perhaps with a newly composed work in her hand?

Maria Theresia von Paradis (1759-1824)

Blinded between the age of two and five, von Paradis was a professional pianist who was admired by good old W.A. Mozart. Her performing career and professional contacts (memorized over 60 concertos by ear, studied with Salieri and is rumored to have had Mozarts's Piano Concerto No. 18 written for her) are remarkable. Von Paradis is also known for devising a music notation system for the blind and establishing a school of music for young girls.

Von Paradis

Maria Anna (Nannerl) Mozart (1751-1829)

Both W.A. and his big sis, Nannerl, were child prodigies. Unfortunately, Nannerl was prohibited from performing once she was old enough to be married. Many correspondences between W.A. and Nannerl reveal that Nannerl composed several works and that W.A. was Nannerl's biggest fan. Unfortunately, none of her manuscripts survive. We can thank Nannerl for aiding her contemporaries in finding some of W.A.'s lost works.

Nannerl Mozart next to some 18th century "big-note" music.

Clara Schumann (1819-1896)

The romance between Clara and Robert Schumann is something out of a soap opera. The early stages of romance deal with themes such as scandal, deceit, the law, and disowning parents. Crazy stuff. Even crazier is Clara's virtuosity and her AMAZING compositions. Schumann's musical education was unparalleled by any of her contemporaries (male or female) and included lessons in counterpoint, orchestration, theory, fugue-writing and even managed her own tours. She continued teaching and performing despite her husbands death and having *gasp* eight children. Everybody can be inspired by the tenacity and intellect of this woman.

Clara hanging out with her hubby.

Amy Beach (1867-1944)

Amy Beach was the first American composer of large-scale art music and was also a virtuoso pianist. Her popularity with Americans of all ages resulted in "Amy Beach Clubs" that celebrated her music. Beach had perfect pitch at a young age and "at the age of one she could sing 40 tunes accurately and always in the same key; before the age of two she improvised alto lines against her mother's soprano melodies; at three she taught herself to read; and at four she mentally composed her first piano pieces and later played them, and could play by ear whatever music she heard, including hymns in four-part harmony (Oxford Music Online)" Even though her formal musical education was limited she still composed large works such as a mass. Listeners should check out her Piano Trio (good stuff).

A young Amy Beach.

Rebecca Clarke (1886-1979)

I had to include Ms. Clarke because she was a violist and wrote amazing viola repertoire. Her life as both a performer and a composer is surrounded by mystery. She was one of the first female musicians admitted into England's Queen Hall Orchestra and broke many barriers in the performance world on her instrument of choice: the viola. It is known that her relationship with her parents was rather turbulent, but information about the life of this composer is scarce because her family is reluctant to release her documents and papers. Check out her viola sonata!



Clarke rockin her viola.

Well, I hope this post has inspired some fellow female musicians. Look for future posts on women composers and female performers, because lord knows that I forgot some of the greats in this post (Fanny Mendelssohn, Boulanger, Crawford, Hildegard of Bingen to name a few). Thanks for reading!

premonition of a quarter-life crisis?

This May, many of my friends will be graduating from college. Soon, I will follow in their footsteps. I used to live in an idealistic world where getting a degree in something I was passionate in was a romantic ideal a la "la Boheme" (hopefully minus the TB). I firmly held my resolve as I worked my way through four years of a music degree with a minor in non-profit arts administration, despite the lack of job prospects in my field. Four years ago, this seemed like a good idea. Now with one year to graduation, I am scared shitless.

Lately, conversations have abounded with those friends who will graduate in a few short months. Many of them have similar degrees as mine. Each graduating senior I ask about career goals in the near future stares at me dejectedly and answers sadly "I will do anything and take any job just to pay my student loans." This was not what I had anticipated when I decided on my path of academia. In my mind's eye, I would get a degree and open a small, hippie-like private lessons studio in a fashionable neighborhood. Or, I would get a job playing with a local professional symphony. Or, I would work at an awesome grassroots non-profit whose mission aligns with my ethics. That was when unemployment in Wisconsin was less than 4 % and gas was less than $2.00 a gallon. Now, thoughts of working at the same crappy movie theatre job I have had since I was 15 just to have job security and pay my student loans terrorize my imagination and make me tremble with fear.

But why?

I must have a positive attitude and assure myself that I have been successful my entire life, and that accomplishments don't cease as soon as you receive a diploma. Working hard to ensure I am a well-rounded individual, I have held management positions in both for-profit and non-profit arts venues, teach both violin and viola lessons in a studio very similar to the one I hope to some day own, and participate in every music ensemble possible in order to establish myself as a desirable musician in a world desperately in need of violists. Hopefully, this means I will have many employment doors open to me as I step out into the career world. This goes for my fellow students in the fine arts as well. Why would we spend thousands of dollars on a degree that we honestly think won't assist us in finding a job? It is merely because our confidence is waning due to our imminent change in scenery and the current economic and (thankfully changing!) political climate. Upon writing this blog and really analyzing the situation, I am now more confident than ever that me and my fellow 2010 graduates in the arts field will be successful.

What if I don't get a job in one of the fields I most enjoy? How will I maintain my artistic life in the midst of a job that doesn't allow for much expression? If any readers have advice for a confused soon to be college grad, or have had similar bouts of anxiety themselves, please drop me a line!

My Voice

Today was the first day of classes for the 2009 spring semester at UW-W. One of my professors asked her pupils to answer a few questions on our own time. These questions included "How would you describe your own voice?" and "How would you describe your voice as it reflects your personal psychological and metaphorical character?"

The first query was easy enough. My voice is rather low pitched, frequently raspy and LOUD. I come from a family of loud people. We talk loudly, joke loudly, quarrel loudly, and most of all, we laugh loudly. My family's identical chortle gets me in trouble at the least opportune moments. Laughing at a malapropos moment is embarrassing on its own. Not being able to control the ill-timed cacophony I call laughter is an unforgivable offense. My father's early career was as an opera singer. The joke is that all his progeny should have been opera singers as well, because our voices carry enough to fill Carnegie Hall.

I find that analyzing my inner "voice" reveals that even though I spend 24 hours a day with myself, it is easier to study the actions of others than the actions of, well...me! I also feel that neglecting to be aware of your inner self is an element of the human condition and do not think that it is unusual to have difficulty analyzing the inner voice. I wish it wasn't this way. I hope to use this blog as a way to find my inner voice and to aid others in their search for the same.