Summer...the death of practicing?

As a musician, I know how hard it can be to keep that musical momentum going through summer. Many people don't take lessons during the summer, as it can be hard to schedule with vacations, camps, and other activities. You don't have classes, the weather is beautiful, and fall and music lessons are months away. But when fall comes, you might find you have fallen behind were you were in May.

So how to you keep your musical skills up without locking your self in a practice room?
There are many ways, and everyone is different, but I'll share a few strategies here.

1.) Set Weekly Goals

If you set small goals for yourself, like your teacher would, then you are more likely to practice. It helps if you write them down. You might even post them on sticky notes and hide there around your room.

2.) Go to a Music Camp

This is a way to combine camps and fun with music and lessons. Music camps come in many different sizes, levels, and types. There are band camps, classical camps, blue grass camps, rock camps, chamber music camps. With a little research, you are sure to find a camp that suites you.
Going to a camp gives you a goal to practice up for, and is a way to learn things you never would have otherwise. I highly recommend this strategy. (I'll post a blog in a few days about how to pick the right camp for you.)

                                                 3.) Play Music with Friends

Set up a weekly jam session where you are some friends play music. This will encourage you to practice to keep up with your pals.
Make sure that this is not the only time you see these people, so that you won't spend the whole time talking and hanging out.
 Set aside some time after the jam session to hang out and talk.







4.) Go to Concerts

Feeling tired of practicing? Then take in a Summer music concert. Lots of cities hold them for free, and you can just sit in a park and listen. You will also find discounts on classical concerts too. Going to concerts will encourage you to practice, introduce you to new pieces and new genres of music, and is just plain fun.

5.)  Start your Fall music lessons early
If you've been unable to practice all summer (it happens, don't stress!) or just feel your are not where you want to be when school starts, then begin you fall music lessons before school starts to give yourself a head start. It's a great way to cover lost ground, and make it seem like you've been living and breathing music all summer long! You can contact your private instructor, or even search out another one for a single lesson, just to boost your confidence.

These are some ways to help keep your interest and chops up during those warm sunny days. What strategies have you used?

Behind even great musicain is...a mother.

This Mother's Day, I have been thinking of how much my mother has supported me as a musician.
Moms have a HUGE impact on their children's musicaly aspirations and ability. Some musicians had great mothers, some not so great. But they all had an impact on the importance of music in their child's life.

Pyotr Tchaikovksy

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky loved his mother dearly, and when she died of cholera, he was devastated. The

only way he could cope with his grief was to write music. His love for his mother transferred itself to music.

Robert and Clara Schumann

Another important mother is Clara Schumann, who was the wife of composer Robert Schumann, and a famous pianist herself. She has eight children, and balanced her performance career and her time with her children. She was devoted to them, and spent her life playing piano.

Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel

Fanny Mendelssohn was the sister of Felix Mendelssohn, and was a gifted composer. She married and had a son, whom she named Sebastian after her favorite composer. She spent much of her life reviving the work the work of this composer, who you may have heard of, Johannes Sebastian Bach. 

The "Limelite" website has a great list of pieces written for and about Mothers, which I reccomnd you check out here. This website has a list of more famous and influential mothers in music.
Thank you all you mothers out there!

Has your mother had a profound effect on your love of music? Tell me about it here.

The MVYSO SPice of Life Concert was last Friday, and was a sucess. Jackie Hickman's performance of the Greig Piano Concerto in A minor was flawless, and the audiance agreed, springing to their feet for an entusiastic standing ovation.
All of the ensembles performed, from the young students who only picked up their instruments last fall, to the students who have been in the Youth Symphony for years.
It was a joyful occasion, yet bittersweet. As the last concert of the year, many good-byes were mixed in with the excitment. Haley Kovach is one of the students graduating this June. She plans to attend Whitworth college and study music. Please help her win a scholarship by following this link  http://www.hsnation.com/voting_ballot.php%20and voting for her!
Yet the season isn't completely over. There is still a chance to see friends as SummerStock rehearsals begin this coming Monday. A select group of students will be performing all around Maple Valley, at Farmer's Markets, ball games, and the Maple Valley Fourth of July Pinic.
I will be blogging about these events, so don't forget to check back in!
And don't forget about MVYSO Summer Camp...this years it's going to be OUT OF THIS WORLD!
*Literally. We are hiring a space shuttle to fly the kids to the moon. I am totally serious.*

The Spice of Life

There is a lot to life besides classical music. Even as a music nerd, I know this. There are movies, books, sports, parks, and just being around people in a million different ways. But classical music is persuasive, pervasive, and seeps its way into every other part of our lives, whether we notice it or not. The MVYSO concert on Friday is celebrating this, celebrating how classical music has become a part of every facet of our lives.There are more pieces being performed this Friday them I have room to talk about, so if you can, come and check out the concert!
As mentioned briefly in the Bugs Bunny blog, classical music is often used because it's free to use. That would explain why so many movies, commercials, and sporting events use classical music. The don't need to pay for it, and can use it without hassle. In this, I think that human greed has done us all a favor, because it has ensured that classical music is liberally sprinkled through our culture. I guess the flip-side is that the classic music that is used is often not taken as seriously BECAUSE it was used in a commercial or cartoon. But it my opinion, it's a price worth paying,  if it helps people to know great music.
I've grabbed a couple examples of music that will be performed at Friday's concert, and put them below.
Charo is a Latin singer and guitar player from the 1970's, well known for her outrageous costumes and antics. Here is Charo's take on Espana Cani, a Spanish song traditional played during bullfights, and also during baseball games. The theme to Espana Cani begins at the 1:20 mark.

Charo doesn't like Bullfights, and encourages us to dance with them instead. :)

Here is an example of the "Beef, it's what's for dinner," commercial which uses the Rodeo by Aaron Copeland, just one of many classical peices to be used in commercials.

Can you imagine a different piece of music beinging used for this commercial? Or even (shudder) a jingle?!?  

Life is better because of the additions of classical music. Commercials are more memerable, movies more dramatic, ball games more traditional, and videos funnier, all because of classical music.

So even though there is more to life than classical music, classical music also adds more to life! So shake it up, add a little classical spice, simmer, and enjoy!

April Musician of the Month: Jackie Hickman

On the last day of April, I want to honor the piano soloist in this Friday's concert, Jackie Hickman. Each Month I will honor a standout musician, and this month it is Jackie, for her work on the Grieg Piano Concerto with the MVYSO.  Jackie is a Junior at Tahoma High School, and has been been playing piano for 11 years. Her piano teacher is Sydney Lee.

Jackie practicing.

The Grieg Piano concerto in A minor is a famous and recognizable concerto, and is being performed this Friday as part of the Spice of Life concert.

Jackie, right, and Haley Kovach, left.

Jackie is usually the principle cellist for the Maple Valley Youth Symphony, but this Friday we get the opportunity to hear her talents on piano as well.

Jackie accompanying her younger sister, Marcy Hickman.

The piano concerto was composed by Edvard Grieg in 1868, when he was only 24. It is the only concerto that Grieg completed, as well as one of his best known works.

It begins with a timpani roll, and a huge piano flourish that is instantly recognizable.
Even animals can't help but sing along with the opening!

If you're in town, be sure to check out the concert at 7pm at the Maple Valley Presbyterian Church. If not, then let me know what your favorite piano concerto is. I'm pretty partial to the Tchaikovsky - Piano Concerto No.1 Op.23 in B Flat Minor myself.
 Tomorrow I'll upload my own interpretation of the concert title, The Spice of Life! Happy May!

Rossini and Gossip

Today, I’m going to examine another piece MVYSO is playing in the May concert: The Overture to “L’Italiana in Algeri.” I’m also going to tell you all the gossip I know about the composer.

This composition was written for the Opera “L’Italiana in Algeri” by Giocchino Rossini when he was 21. Writing the entire opera, according to him, only took 18 days!

Rossini was famous for writing good music, fast! One of my favorite stories tells of Rossini sitting in bed writing a composition, when it fell beneath the bed. Instead of rising of picking it up, he wrote an entire new page! Laziness, or genius?

Rossini is famous for writing exciting and melodic operas that combine both dramatic and comedic elements. He started writing music as a young man, and but famously quit while in his thirties, to move on to another of his loves, fine cooking! He was such a fine amateur chef and lover of food, that several dishes now bear the name “a la Rossini” meaning they were developed for him, or even by him.  

(He also ate a lot of this good food, and by age 36 looked like this. Compare to his earlier picture!) 

One of the most famous is “Tournedos Rossini,” a French main dish composed of: bread croutons, filet mignon, foie gras and black truffle slices with Madeira wine sauce.   

It looks pretty good, but one question: what exactly is “foie gras?”

Rossini was famous while he was alive, but also knew that such fame was a double edged sword. His audience could turn against him at any time. They would either love his opera, and throw roses and chant “Brava! Encore!” or throw rotten fruit (an important accessory for any serious opera goer of the day) and even burn down the theater! Rossini was known to actually sneak out of the theater after the premier, and wait in his house to see whether the shouts of the crowds outside were of praise or an angry mob!

Certainly someone who lived with such a sense of drama would translate that to his music. Rossini’s compositions are famous for having not only beautiful melodies, but dramatic and often surprising dynamic changes and crescendos. In other words, the music would change from a subtle whisper to an exuberant shout, and crescendos would take up an entire page, building to an impressively deafening triple fortissimo.

Below I have included a video of the overture to “L’italiana in Alegri.”  Check out the 7:08 mark for the “Rossini crescendo." It begins very delicate and quiet, and takes the rest of the piece to build, slowly, but very noticeably. 

Rossini always make me want spaghetti, so while I go make some, I'll leave you with this question. 

 If you were as skilled a composer as Rossini, would you have left it in the middle of your life? Or would you have continued? Do you agree with his decision? Please leave you comments below, I'd really like to know!

Next time, the Grieg Piano Concerto!

Bugs Bunny: Classical Music Ambassador

Remember watching Looney Tunes and huming along with the music? Laughing as you watched Bugs Bunny trick Elmer Fudd once again? As a child, you knew theses tunes by the cartoon they were in, until one day, listening to a radio, playing in a band, or watching a movie, you would hear that music again.
 Wait, I know that tune!
Looney Tunes made music that was famous, but old, new again, by introducing it to millions of children through cartoons.
Sure, maybe the Warner Brothers used it because, aside from being awesome, it was free domain as the copyright had expired, and they didn't have to pay anyone.
But seriously, who really cares why they used it. The important part is they did, and now we all know "Ride of the Valkyries," where Bugs Bunny famously (and once again) dresses like a woman.
There are so many great compositions that Looney Tunes used in its cartoons, and next Friday, May 4th,  the Maple Valley Philharmonia is playing a piece that celebrates them. Check out the website http://www.mvyso.org/ for details.
The piece celebrating Looney Tunes is called "What's Up at the Symphony," and includes the famous Looney Tunes theme, as well as snippets from "The Barber of Seville," "Ride of the Valkyries," and "William Tell." In honor of their playing this fun piece, I now give you some clips of the Looney Tunes episodes that made these pieces known in every household in America.

"The Rabbit of Seville"












"Ride of the Valkyries"

What's you favorite Looney Tunes classical music episode?

And "Th-th--that's all folks!"

For now.