Ok, finally, after a grueling set of edits and more edits, I am done with the dance film. On Wednesday, I am going to part of the tech run for the show where the film will be premiered(after I've gone back to London), so at least I will have a chance to see the film and music together.
I think that brings my total productivity for this break to 26%, or something like that.
Nevertheless, I still have just over a week before I am back to school, and I have every intention of completing that remaining 74%! Please, someone remind me of that when, in a week's time, I am making up excuses for not having met my quota.
As for my time in Winnipeg, I have something social to do every night from now until I leave. Fortunately, that gives me something of a schedule with which to work. I will work in the morning/afternoon and then socialize in the evening. I think it should be a matter of just not sleeping in too late. Sleeping the days away is really not so good.
Tonight is sushi. Maybe I should have something to eat first, there's only so much sushi I can handle, so I don't want to be hungry later on. Oooh, I have jellybellies!

Bright and early tomorrow morning, we head back to Winnipeg. It has been a spectacular Christmas. It was nice to spend a bit of time with sister and brother-in-law, dare I say we may have even overstayed our welcome by a day...
Nevertheless, it's been great.
Last night we all gathered into the hot tub with some drinks. Now for the fun part... the hot-tub was OUTSIDE! It was awesome! Gareth and I both dunked out heads completely under the water and within minutes we were sporting iced hair-dos! It was a little nippy on the wet shoulders, but I think we were in there for at least 45 minutes and no one had frostbite or pneumonia.
I'll see what we have planned for tonight, anyway, I won't mind staying up late to finish the Dance Film music, I can sleep for the first 4 hours of the drive tomorrow anyway! If I get it done tonight, GREAT! If I need more time to finish it tomorrow after we get home, that's fine too, I'll still have it done a few days early!
I was the only one to buy something today for boxing day, aside from my mother buying some chocolates from Giant Tiger. It was so different from our normal boxing day experiences. Firstly, we all slept in quite late and were in no rush. It's Thompson, so even though the stores might have been busy, they were nowhere near the madness of Winnipeg's boxing fiestas.
I bought some nice speakers that I can hook up to my laptop, or anything else for that matter. They are quite fancy, with a control interface ON the speaker. Rather than just changing the volume of the speaker, it communicates through USB to the computer or device and changes those settings - ie, it communicates and interacts with the controls in Sibelius!

Christmas in Thompson

Well, the weather actually isn't that bad here. I mean it's cold, but not as bad as I was expecting/fearing.
My sister and her brother have both been working opposite shifts since we got here, but now they're done working. It was nice today that we were finally all together for lunch.
Having the family all together for the holidays is very nice.
The schedule around here has been crazy, last night, my brotherinlaw went to work around 7pm, the rest of us stayed in and watched movies, sister went to bed around 11 cause she worked in the morning. I ended up staying awake until about 5am working on the Christmas music as well as trying to get a fire started. I was awoken by my sister on her way out the door for work. I must have slept through my brotherinlaw coming home, but was awoken again by sister calling the house. Anyway, by the early afternoon, everyone was awake and home from work.
Since people were working, I managed to steal some time away for my own work (ish). I was making the family a Christmas soundscape to make use of the 5.1 surround sound system my sister has up here. I finished that and played it for them today so now that's out of the way.
I had a meeting the other day with my filmmaker and we discussed timings and changes to the score for that. I am now working on those, and unless I run into some huge problem, I will have that done before we drive back to Winnipeg.
I should also try to knock back on of the autumn song cycle poems while I'm up here, that or do some work on the orchestration.
I'm finding that time up here in Thompson has been very relaxing, but at the same time, I can get a fair deal of work done. Good times all around!
It's Christmas Eve Day!!!
I think I actually got all of my shopping done. I tried to be subtle, but it's hard when you are shopping with the people you're shopping for. Anyway, I really hope my sister is surprised. I asked my mom what she wanted, she replied with the thing that I was holding in my hand so I replied "that would be a silly thing to buy for Christmas, you can get that for yourself when you get back to Winnipeg", I felt bad because she looked kinda sad, but I couldn't ruin the surprise! That's what surprises are all about, making people sad so they'll be even happier later on! haha

Uh Oh,
I sense that opportunities for productivity are dwindling; 2 of my friends arrived back in town in the last day or two, and I would like to see them both before I go to Thompson. Plus, one of my friends got a new puppy, so I have to go play with it this afternoon!
I also have to do my remaining Christmas shopping. I did a good chunk of it online, but I still need to get something for my dad and a few smaller things. My sister also called and asked me to pick something up for her husband's present - basically that's what's kicking my butt to go out and get stuff; my own shopping isn't enough motivation.
Anyway, I hate stores at this time of year, but I'm not organized enough to do the shopping before it gets crazy, so I'll live in my own hell-that's ok. Also, maybe going shopping and managing my time today will force me into productive mode, here's hoping!

Well, after my last post I DID try to be productive. I went to the university Saturday evening to get some work done. I got a tiny bit written. I just don't understand, it's like I have no creative juice lately. Anyway, I kept taking little breaks here and there wandering around the music building, reminiscing and reading lots of the postings people had outside their doors and whatnot. Long story short, I ended up accidentally setting off a security alarm during one of these wanderings, so I got kicked out of the building. It was late at night and I was done being productive, so it didn't bother me much, but it seemed so silly.
Regardless, I am continuing to try to force the creativity out of myself, little by little. Here's an account of my productivity so far during this break:
Orchestration- Nothing, haven't even opened the file.
Dance Commission - Nothing, waiting on instructions from the director
Voice Commission - I've set the first 2 lines of one of the poems, amounts to 1%
Piano Trio - Nothing
In conclusion, 1 % of one of my projects amounts to 0.25% completion of my December work. And I believe that 55% of the month has passed... Something doesn't quite add up, haha!

Damnit, socializing has been SUCH a bad influence on me over this break!
It hurts me on the inside to think that this month is already half over and I've done nothing towards my goals and what I need to get done during this break!
Even just Christmas shopping has been going slowly... I've only done a bit online. Anyway, I'm going to waste no more time [Famous last words] and I'm going to do some serious composition work for these Autumn Songs before I go to bed.
Autumn song cycle this weekend. I'll work on my new piano trio during next week because I'll have access to the piano. Also the Autumn cycle. While I'm in Thompson, I can do some of the sound editing as well as orchestration stuff. I'll set aside two hours a day to work on that and boom, there will be 10 hours! ish
Quick note, tonight and last night I hung out with the XIE ensemble people - I miss those people and that group. We had so much fun last year, I really want to get something like that started and going at Western, who knows...
Here I go, to see how much work I can do before passing out for the night.. it is already 2am...

I'm back in Winnipeg and it's surprising how much stuff there is to do which has tracked me down.
I know it's mostly the fact that it's the holiday season so there's lots going on anyway, but it makes me feel like this homecoming has been filled with love and friends and lots of good food and good company!
My sugars have not been in .... good control lately, which causes me to be irritable and I regret that that's been aimed at my parents because they're around at just those moments. The control is a mix of not having really done any walking since getting here and then the eating of holiday goodies- as much as I don't like bitching... you people with working pancreases don't know how good you have it. Most of the time, I eat foods of which I know how many carbs they contain, or generally, so I can get my dosing somewhat in the ballpark, but the holidays just kills that. And you know me, you know my belly... I lack the willpower to not jump into the deliciousness!
Surprise surprise I'm meeting with some friends for lunch today, but I'm going to walk there, so at least I'll have 20 minutes of walking.
Generally, I need to get my ass in gear. I've slipped into vacation mode, but I can't afford to do that. I've done no composing, and I have so much I need to do; I haven't started my shopping; I've generally been lazy. Bad Michael, haha. Oh well, I'll get on that starting today!

Ok, so the tone of yesterday's post was a wee little bit negative. Today, it's a completely different story.
I was up very late last night finishing my electro piece and getting it relatively well notated. We had our class at noon, so I still got a solid 6 hours of sleep! The hardcore work I did on the piece paid off, it was fairly well received by my prof and the other student. I got a few suggestions of how to improve the piece - unfortunately I don't have time to do those before I leave, so I'll basically just have to revisit the piece when I get back.
After our performances, we went to the grad club for some drinks and pretzels. It was nice to drink and socialize with the prof. I really like the grad student relationship with profs, governed by a strong sense of respect, but sprinkled with comradery; more of a mentorship through which they are welcoming us into the world of professionalism/academia.
Later tonight, I went for Thai food with some other music grad students. It was the most delicious thing I've eaten in quite a long time. Also, socialization is something I've been missing lately; more of that will come this next month.
I leave London tomorrow evening, I'm not excited about the fact that it is currently 26 degrees colder in Winnipeg than it is in London, but oh well. I grew up there, I should be used to it...

Just a bit stressed...

Mostly, I haven't been unreasonably stressed as the term has been winding up.
Today, I was.
I need to have my electro piece finished for tomorrow. The only available time was today from 12-5. I made myself a schedule of what to do in that time. After 2 hours, I had only done what I needed to do in the first. Anyway, things were coming along, I changed the piece altogether so that one of those hours just disappeared.
Skipping the boring parts - Just before 5, I had reached a point where I could be done in the lab, I needed to make it into an audio file so I could take it home and finish notation. At some point in the afternoon, I had renamed the file... apparently this cause the save function to not be usable, only 'save as'. When I went to save the audio file onto my flash drive, the program froze; I waited - nothing happened. Finally I force-quitted the program. When I re-opened the file, I was expecting to lose maybe 10 minutes of work which I could redo without too much guff. As it happens, everytime I hit apple-S or whatever, it did nothing and I had lost over an hours worth of work.
I was expecting the other guy booked in the room to show up any minute, but I was devastated, I literally threw myself off of the chair and onto the ground. Anticlimactic - I didn't burst into tears, I just thought, "Wow, that was overdramatic". Anyway, the next guy didn't show up til 6pm, so I managed to rectify things, but it was horrible. I couldn't recall what exactly I had done, in what order, or how exactly I did everything, so there are a few minor changes. I listened to it a few times, each time noticing another thing that I had forgotten.

Tonight - I have to fill in the gaps that not having given myself enough time has caused in my piece. I also need to notate it - I haven't decided whether or not I should do it in Sibelius. Maybe I'll start with the outer sections in there and see how easily that comes.
I'm not excited about how much work I need to do tonight, but I will do it and I will be a better person for it. And tomorrow, it will all be over, yay!!!

Damnit, I need an ice-tray.
Tonight was a long evening of class with a lot to digest, therefore I would love to drink something on the rocks. I have Rye, but no rocks. I wonder if it would work with frozen veggies.

I got in over an hour of walking today, I walked home in the late morning from my first part of the day. Then I walked about 20 minutes before I hopped on the bus that takes me very close to home.

I really have nothing new for my composition lesson tomorrow. My prof gave me one very specific task to do on the piece and I wasn't able to do it. I spent most of the week on orchestration. I sat down at a piano to do that task three times during the week and it just didn't come. I'm not sure if this is writer's block or what, but I feel guilty about it. I will try again tonight and tomorrow morning, otherwise I'm certain there will be something we can discuss in terms of composition in general, what I should focus on over the break, or some such thing.

As of right now, teaching and orchestration are done for the term. Tomorrow afternoon, I will have finished with comp lessons for the term, then all that remains to finish up is my electro piece.
Of course, I say all of this like the work will magically end once classes end... NOT!
this is going to be probably the busiest 'breaks' I've ever had. Let me list:
1)Orchestration - making yet more decisions and making the score and parts all pretty
B)Composition - ever developing, I'll have to force myself to do that task once I'm in a house with a piano.
iii)Commission 1- I need to edit the dance film soundtrack to better fit the timings of the film. I have a feeling this might be more work than I had anticipated on doing, but I think my work in the electro course has given me better ideas and tools to make things go more smoothly.
d)Commission 2- The Autumn song cycle; I've done a lot of the prep work and now I just need to write the music. Like B) I have a feeling that when I'm in a house with a piano, things should start to flow. Not having a piano in my apartment is a bad thing. I think I thrive on comfort - that of my own piano or the pianos at U of M. UWO doesn't have that for me. I think I need to invest in a good digital piano next year (eek money) which I can use both as an instrument as well as midi input for notation.

As well as that work element, I need to do lots of knitting and socializing while I'm in Winnipeg. As daunting as it may seem, I'm excited for the change of pace that December will bring. The pace will be changing in both directions, interesting...

Post number 601!

Wow, I don't regularly pay attention to how many posts I have made, but my eye caught the number this time... SIX HUNDRED posts!
How much time have I wasted on blogging?!? It's really unfathomable. I'm going to see if I can download all my blogging posts so that I can somehow do a word-count and see just how many novels I could have written.
Someday, I'll be able to save a biographer the trouble of even asking questions about this portion of my life, pretty much everything has been detailed online... or has it?!?
This blog has been with me through a lot of development over the past few years. I've learned the responsibilities of publicly posting information and it's resulted in a veil which separates the blog version of Michael from the real version.
Anyway, I shouldn't get so philosophical about this, this is a happy occasion!

Cue balloons and champagne!

Other happy news - I just finished my Orchestration assignment. 'Finished' is a very subjective term here; there will be much editing, but I have somehow translated all(ish) of the piano version into my orchestrated version. I have my class tomorrow during which I hope to learn what I've done wrong, what I've done well and what things I need to reconsider and fix.

I spent a LOT of time on this orchestration assignment this weekend and over the last week especially. Unfortunately, I feel that I have spent less time on my other work as a result of it. Composition especially - my piece seems to have reached a plateau, my prof had really amazing suggestions last lesson and I was excited about them and ... I just never did those things and I'm not sure how much I can do before my lesson on Tuesday. Regardless, I will spend my free time tomorrow working on that piece of my electro.

Calculations - Let's say that above is an average length for a Michael Post - I will now plug that into MS Word and get a word count:

315 words
times 600 posts
=
189,000 words.

According to random internet statistics, the average novel is from 60-100,000 words in length... that means, I've written between 2 and 3 novels through this blog!
Maybe over the break, I'll find a real word count.

I'm getting a little worried...

Smart Michael wouldn't worry about this until he finishes his school work, but that's not the Michael we know and love... [That one is a little more narcissistic]
At the end of the summer I had sent out my permissions requests - there were two. I heard back promptly from one and I'm still waiting on the other. I had sent a request for confirmation that my request was being processed and I received that over 10 weeks ago. The whole process is supposed to take 6-10 weeks total. I'm fairly certain that it had been in processing for 5-6 weeks when I sent that request. Moral is: it's been about 15 weeks and I just want to know already.
While I really want a yes, I would actually prefer an email on Monday saying, no, rather than having to wait any longer. Basically, I need to get the bulk of this composition done over my Christmas break. I knew my time line and I made sure to send out requests with extra time. As in - I sent a confirmation request with enough time that even if it magically disappeared, I would have time to file a new one.
Right now, I'm at the point where if I don't hear within the week, I need to cut and run and pick a new poem altogether. Of course, I send the most recent email tonight, Friday night - so that I get to wait all of Saturday and Sunday and then maybe have a response on Monday, if I'm lucky!
With all the copyrights issues in general, it's a wonder that ANYONE would be willing to use any previously written words!

Anyway, I've bitched enough for the night, back to work.
By the way, things are going well with my work so far. I've spent all afternoon/evening/night... working on orchestration and I'm making good progress. Tomorrow I'll continue, but work more on my own compositions, be they electroacoustic or for piano trio. Therefore, I will be going to the school tomorrow, and actually leaving my apartment!

Who was I kidding - of course I'll find time to blog: that's what keeps me sane!

Electro class - went surprisingly good. For the protools section, it seems like I've spent endless hours and still only gotten a lukewarm response to it. I had only spent a few hours preparing the keyboard sections for class today, and yet, the feedback was super. While this is not good for motivating to continue the hard work, I will pull through. The basic consensus was that I should take some of the ideas of the keyboard stuff and relate the protools more to that. In the end, I have about 1 week to pull it all together and then it will be spectacular!

Tomorrow I'm giving the final test to 2 of my 3 sight-singing classes. This term has wrapped up so quickly. I'm glad that once this test is over, I'm done for the term, I just have to hand in the marks.

Things coming in the mail - Since no-one has sent me anything in the mail, even though I published my address on facebook and email... I had to start ordering things online to make use of my mailbox...
Today I got a USB keypad for my laptop. Sibelius uses those keys for some functions, so now I can use the program more efficiently.
Yesterday I got a book that I ordered used off of Amazon. It was a library book - complete with markings, stamps, and catalogue number and label. I've bought books from libraries before and they are always clearly stamped 'discharged' or 'discard'; this was not. This got me thinking - Who would steal a library book and then sell it for profit?!? I saw the opportunity to make use of my US/Canada long distance freeness and I looked up and called the library in Baton Rouge, Louisiana (I love their accents).
In the end, they are a small library and not-computerized so they don't have a record of having or discarding the book. The lady seemed to be in disbelief that someone would call about that, and thanked me for informing them, but told me not to worry about it - that they most likely wouldn't have use for a book like that anyway.
It was a bible thumper Evangelist bible college library. They put me on hold and it was the namesake evangelist talking about the devil and stuff like that; between that and the accents, the phone call was totally worth my while!

A week and a day until I fly back to Winnipeg, I'm excited! Mostly to see friends and family, but also mostly because then I'll have finished with school work for a while ish (I know it's a lie, but let me believe it just for a while).

Wow!
This term is ending so quickly. So much to do, so I'm not sure how much I'll be posting in the next little while. Orch and Comp will be hardcore until monday and tuesday, respectively.
I have my last electro Class-class tomorrow, we are presenting our pieces the following week, so it's not as much of a class. If there are major things to change from that presentation, I'll try and get them done in the few days before I leave for Winnipeg because after a month of not touching it, I'm not sure how familiar I will be with what I wrote... at the same time, I will need to play it at the end of the year, so it needs to be detailed. I basically want it to be finished before I leave. I am going to the lab tonight. While most of my work has been focused on the ProTools playback element, I'm going to focus tonight on the performance element - using the keyboard - this makes up the outer two sections of the piece. I also need to do a fair bit of work on the ProTools, but argh, time management...
Long story short, I have a heck of a lot of work to do this week!

The Saga Never Ends

I know there's a few of you out there who will enjoy the punchline of this story.

Last week I was on the bus and my glasses fogged up, I took them off and out popped my lens. No big deal, I put them in my pocket and since then I've been wearing my other pair, the RayBans; you know, the one's I've had for about 2 years now.
Long story short :
Punchline - Sitting with a friend at a recital on Friday, she looks at me and asks, "Are those new glasses?"

In conclusion - the world is still not ready for a person who owns and switches between wearing more than ONE pair of eyeglasses.

I just thought I'd let you all know that it's nearing 4pm on a Saturday afternoon and I still haven't showered or even changed out of my pyjamas. I might get dressed if I decide to go to the school to work on electro tonight. That all depends on how much of my orchestration project I get done today.
For those of you who know how indecisive I am, you can still only imagine how difficult orchestration is for me, not in the academic sense, but in terms of being forced to make decisions. Orchestration is making endless decisions and every one effects the other decisions you will have to make around it. The key is finding the important areas where the decisions are the most important and then working around that.
Nevertheless, I find it fascinating and very interesting to see how one little change can really open up so many doors to new possibilities that weren't previously there.

Weekend = busy with worky!

This week just flew by.
In electro class today, my prof commented that my piece had really come a long way since he last saw it. That made me feel good. Then he went on to make comments on how I can make it better. After having spent a lot more time on it this week a)it damn well better have improved and b) I was feeling anxious to hear his comments - what if it still sucked?!? Luckily it didn't completely suck, he had some good things to say - he just wants me to change the focus from events to developing textures.

The internet seems to think that I am now foreign... Google is giving me search results in Spanish, and craigslist seems to think I always want to go to Berlin... which I do, but it used to always go to the last city I had been to. Maybe this is its way of telling me to stop looking at apartment rates in other cities... Berlin is the place to go.

I just realized right now what a good influence my roommate is on me. He is always working/studying around the apartment, it makes me feel like I should do the same, so I do. He is gone for the whole weekend, so - alone in the apartment- I am lacking that drive to be as productive. Nevertheless, that drive has to be there, so I will force it into high gear. This is my second last weekend to do work.

AHHHHHH! I just looked at the calendar... not only is next weekend my last weekend to finish up these term projects, but in 2 weeks and a day, I will be flying back to Winnipeg!
I am almost one quarter finished my Master's!!

It's an odd sensation to be working with such momentum right now at the end of the term. It is momentum for the sake of momentum.... with no real end goal.
None of my term projects actually have to be completely finished by the end of this term. Orchestration needs to be finished by Jan 15th, meaning that I will basically be using the break to do the parts and score, so I do need to have a good sense of what I will be doing before I leave for the break. My composition doesn't need to be finished until the first week of February. For electro, on the last day of class, we are having a close-to-finished performance, but the piece won't actually be performed until the end of the year. At the same time, I will need to write another piece next term, so I won't want to be spending my time editing the first one, so I'll treat the end of this term as an actual due date.
After having just typed that out, I don't believe what I said before about no real end goal... these things TOTALLY have to be done in 2 weeks, yay for buckling down as of now!

Good Night!

Starting to feel real progress!

For the first time today, I felt like I was really in control of what was going on in the electroacoustic studio. 2 minutes of my piece is pretty much completely done and it was the finniky part - the middle section where I took the sound samples and sculpted them into a little 2 minute piece which serves as the middle section of the piece. I will probably have to revise this a little to allow for the performance aspect to be involved, but generally now I just have to make the outer sections which should mirror each other.
I did a lot of the prep work today using the keyboard and the digital effects editor that I will be using as the live performance element of the piece. For the longest time, I was not able to find a digital effect that had what I was looking for; today I did! On second thought, there's probably a lot of different effects I could use, there was a problem with the mixing board that was making me think none of the effects were working properly. Nevertheless, this one is good and has a lot of reverb. There are a few parameters of the effect which I can change in small intervals to make it seamlessly change from a highly processed to an unprocessed sound.

I listened to a lot of Scriabin today, and over the weekend. While reading scores, I have listened to and studied(somewhat) all 10 of his piano sonatas and the his first two symphonies totaling nearly 4 hundred pages of music. I also listened to his piano concerto, his fourth symphony and his symphonic poem "Prometheus". I think I am now much more aware of his style in general. I realized that the sound which I had long associated with Scriabin is that of his early works, of the Romantic period. However, the sound of his 'chord of mystery' which characterizes the Scriabin that most musicians think of and refer to, doesn't appear until later in his output.
The development through his musical output is astonishing. His influences of Chopin and Debussy are obviously there, but one also hears his own influence on all of modern pianism. I can now trace the line of Debussy to modernism in piano writing that I never really understood before.

In terms of my own composition. After the reading session, I applied the notation changes and added in tempo markings and now I have quite a detailed score. I think I have a good balance of enough detail, but not stiflingly so. I also started to re-evaluate the piece itself. My prof's major comment was that the piece lacked counterpoint - looking at it, I agree. I had tried to emulate the rhythms of speech/conversation, but I guess I forgot that dialog is never limited to back and forth - my musical depiction where the two voices never cross really doesn't represent that with any realism. My initial thought is that I will be able to fix this with some additions, then I will have to reevaluate that and see if it needs some structural alterations as well.
Aside from the dialog element, I had earlier left a more 'pure music' section with a blank area so that a secondary melodic line could interweave there, but I was at a loss for words when it came to filling in that blank. I feel a little refreshed about the piece after this weekend, so that should sort itself out when I get to a piano next.
I still have to do some work for my orchestration meeting tomorrow, while the listening I did will surely benefit what I learn in the course, I still have to have the work to show for what I've learned!

Yesterday was a long day. Rather than an electro class, I had a meeting with the prof. Basically I have been feeling really negative about the class because it seems to take me an inordinate amount of time to do anything. He as reassuring, as well as two other people I talked to during the day; letting me know that everyone takes excessive time at first. It's amazing how having your feelings validated can change your outlook on a situation. Now that I know it is pretty much a matter of spending more time, even though I knew that all along, I will spend more time more often in the lab. I will go today.
The big event of yesterday was the piano trio reading. They played from the version I had sent a few weeks ago so a lot of the finely detailed things had been fixed since then. However, they gave me some helpful feedback. The common thread between most composers yesterday was a lack of tempo markings and details. The trio questioned my use of 'free' notation - they found it hindering. This was something that I wasn't completely convinced with myself - it is difficult to find the balance of enough detail to give the performer what they need, while not nailing them down to the fine details. While I didn't get a cut in stone answer of how I need to notate it, I now have some good insight into how to approach it.
I wanted to go to the masterclass they were doing today with my piano trio, but I think I slept in too late. I had a very active dream night - it's interesting that my subconscious is so thinly veiled when I do have dreams.
I always dream about daily events. The main dream late this morning/afternoon was me going to the masterclass of my trio and talking to the Fibonacci players afterwards - the dream did not actually involved my trio's players. In my dream, as I talked to the violinist, she commented on how unfortunate it is that our school has such strong performers, but composers who don't even write tempo indications. Can you say Self-Confidence Issues?!? Nevertheless, notice that subconscious Michael wasn't willing to label Western's composers as bad, only pointing out that they don't write tempo indications.
Perhaps this is subconscious Michael trying to cope with the fact that no judgement was shown by the trio yesterday, only constructive criticism. I was probably expecting some subjective judgement, and now I'm trying to read some into it.... But there isn't any, so I will stop.
The moral of the experience with the trio is that I need to be more detailed in my indications. This has been something I've been battling since my very first composition lessons. I need to come to terms with the fact that while I want freedom in music, not everyone has the same definition of freedom, or means of attaining it.
I have spent too much time writing this already. Now I am going to write in some edits for my trio score and then head off to the school and spend the evening making electronic music!

Can you say snow?!?

Holy Moly!
Yesterday, it was the first time it was actually snowing, I had snowflakes all over my sweater - made it look all sparkly, however, I never expected it to stay. Muchless did I expect it to look like it does this morning.
I am terrible with estimates of how much snow in terms of centimetres and whatnot, but there is a thick layer of snow covering the ground, the trees, and the cars outside - it is now, visually the middle of winter. This is shocking and exciting.
I've been warned about the buses here when it snows, so I'm going to leave extra early today, enough time to make sure that I'm not late for class.
Today, the Fibonacci trio is playing my piano trio at the workshop. I am also going to an opera concert tonight - not an opera, but random selections from the repertoire.
Anyway, the snow has me filled with happy energy, so off I go!
I had time to snap a quick photo:

Today was just not my day for timing.
I intended to work on my electro piece for hours this afternoon. I got there at 3:35ish. The other guy in my class had the exact same intention, except at 3:30, therefore, I went home and did some reading and listening before I went back to the school in the evening.
I helped a friend with separating some tracks and burning a cd for an audition. I could have gotten it all done in about 15-20 minutes on my laptop, but I was forcing myself to do it on the school computer so I could get better at using protools. This was a mistake - it took well over an hour. and seemed needlessly complicated.
Anyway, after I finished that, I started working on my own project. Slow progress. I started to play around with some of the sounds, creating sounds that do not sound like the original. This was kinda the moral of my last class. The prof's comments were that some sounds were useful, but when they sound too similar to something concrete, it will be difficult for the listener to divorce those connotations from that sound.
I think I've changed directions with the piece. I'm going to have the interface/performance element be interactive via the listener. It will take advantage of that connotation element. Nevertheless, I need to spend more time in the lab and with the sounds - so I will go again to the school tomorrow.

I had completely forgotten.
This is not just another day that was randomly named by some facebook group, or on the internet. The recognition of a day around the world for diabetes was a joint venture of the International Diabetes Foundation and the United Nations.
World forces are recognizing that diabetes is an epidemic.
They are trying to raise awareness amongst the general population.

The question I pose to everyone today is -

What do you know about diabetes?


The answer, whether you are diabetic yourself or not at all affected is -

Not enough.


I ask everyone to do something today to become a little more aware of diabetes. Maybe you will type in 'World Diabetes Day' in google and read up on events and the day itself. Read about the Unite for Diabetes Campaign or go to the World Diabetes Day website.

But don't limit yourself to the internet - your ability to effect positive change today is two-fold. Talk to other people - you can both inform yourself AND get other people involved just by asking them a)what they know about diabetes and b)to learn a little more.
Please don't treat this like a facebook request to send out an email or other intangible. Use your voice and words to talk to people.

Have a great day everyone!

Wow, long time without posting... I feel a little guilty.
The weekend was a blast - it was awesome to have Fi out here to visit, even though she killed my gnome. RIP Gnorman.

[Insert hour long pause here]

Wow, I just ended up doing a last minute extensive edit to my piano trio which will be played on friday - suddenly I don't feel like typing a blog entry... I'm going to go watch some TV and maybe I'll feel inclined in a little while.

Damn it - today was pretty much a total waste. It was icky out, so I didn't leave the apartment except to check the mail... and I did laundry, but that's just down a flight of stairs.
Not to be completely negative, I did do some good things today : I cleaned a bit, room looks bigger without clothes all over the floor. I did laundry. I got a little bit more of the piano trio notated into the computer - no new material written, but more has been specified in terms of notation.
Regardless of the weather, tomorrow I need to get to the school to a)compose at the piano b) do more electro homework and c) buy groceries.
I am achy right now, while I'm tired, I know that I won't be able to sleep. Legs hurt from the humidity. It's been raining all day, might have even snowed... it was supposed to be a mix of rain and wet snow.
My electro class is for sure not happening on Friday = good. I'm waiting for confirmation, but it will most likely be on thursday so I will have that completely out of the way for the weekend.

Despite a massive chunk of doing nothing in the middle of the day, today was a fairly successful day. In the morning I finished giving the SightSinging tests and then I went to the electro lab to do some work. I got the necessary samples into the synthesizer for my project. From there I need to play around and figure out how the samples need to be transposed and used so that they relate mumbly. I know what needs to be done, it's just a lot of listening and playing around in order to get things to the point of being usable.

I came home and internetted/napped/ate lunch from 1 - 4pm. Then I went back to the school. Originally I was going to go to school, work and then take a break for dinner. While I left my house at 4:30 for the bus, I didn't get to my bus transfer point until after 5pm... I literally could have walked in 15 minutes, BUT I waited for the bus out of spite. It should have been there right when I got there... Bastard Bus! Pissy, I went to Wendy's for supper and had a frosty, Yum!
Eventually I got to the school. I did got some composing done and then I went to the electro lab again, this time to do the listening assignment for this week. They were long pieces, but I enjoyed them. By that point, I was ready to go home, but then I stopped in the big class/room with piano in Talbot College and I ended up composing for another hour or so. I forced myself to fill in certain gaps before leaving. Basically, the opening dialogue of my piece is well, certainly not finished, but in formation.
The 'dialogue' sections are based on the rhythm and shaping of speech / language. I had marked the rhythm of these sections, but not notes. I had a few of the gestures notated with notes, but today I forced myself to choose notes and gestures. For the first time in the process, I allowed myself to just compose, like my prof had suggested, rather than planning everything and fitting the notes in as result of the plans. Especially for the piano part, it was great to be writing this at the piano.
Speaking of piano - I started relearning a piece that I played for my ARCT examination / undergrad auditions. Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody No. 5 in E minor. It is a great piece and I want to be able to play it again, not just random snippets that I recall vaguely how to play.
I am feeling some of the contrast between how I used to play it and how I am trying to relearn it. I can feel it, it's blatant which areas I never really learned reliably the first time around. Applying some of the practice methods and technical skills I learned over the last few years will make the relearning process efficient and I will be able to play the piece super well with less than major effort. It was the first really big piece I ever played. Huge and Romantic and I played it with a certain passion back then, but I think now I'm a little more mature and wiser, and I think I will be able to do more with the piece this time around.
I'll be honest, I've been toying with the idea of entering a performance competition here. I need to find out some details about it. It wouldn't be much, I would just have to submit a recording of myself for the first round. I could use this piece as the second and third round piece if I even made it that far. Anyway, I'll see what my options are...

Gitch!

Since people have stopped commenting and assumedly reading, I'll write one of those "why the heck would be blog about That?!?" posts.

After I blogged this morning, I realized I should do laundry as I was running out of clean underwear. Then I realized that it's always the underwear I run out of first. I was suddenly hit by the universal truth - why wash if you can buy!?
I kid you not, if I won the lottery, high up on my list of to-do's would be buying new socks and underwear everyday. A brand new pair everyday?!? wow!
Off I went to my favorite underwear store - Giant Tiger!
Needless to say, I now won't have to do laundry for another week!
Although I don't think Laundry Day would be Fiona's idea of fun while she's here for the weekend.

I did a fair bit of planning today for my electro piece... After I teach tomorrow, I will be going to the lab to fiddle around with some of the plans I have. I'm actually really interested to see how my piece will start unfolding. Lately I've been working the wrong way in the lab - using random sound samples merely to do a function that I know the lab can do. What I need to do now is use the tools of the lab to explore what it CAN do that I don't already know about = explore!
I talked on the phone tonight, too much so I wasn't very productive. Focus Mikey, Focus!
Before I go to bed, I will try and input some more of my piano trio score into the computer

Good Night.

I just realized as I was lying in bed before getting up just how busy this end of term is going to be. At first I thought it wouldn't be bad because I only have the electroacoustic piece which is to be performed in class on the last day of term. but then, I realized that both my Piano Trio as well as my Orchestration assignment need to be handed over as soon as I get back from break. This means that the break will be spent making sure all the parts look nice and generally editing the pieces. I'm not even sure if I will have a class/lesson on them before having to hand them in, so basically, I need to have them finished before I leave London for Christmas.
At the same time, maybe I just need to accept the fact that this IS independent work and I shouldn't be latching on to what a prof might say.
The moral of this story is that I am going to get as much work done as possible on my own for everything so that I am prepared for whatever might change along the way.
For electro, we are supposed to have a relatively detailed plan for our pieces by next class - from there it will just be a process of doing the work and processing the sounds and setting things up for the performance. I want to get that done this weekend so that it's out of the way, then during the week, I can actually start to implement some of those plans!

I am very excited for next weekend. My friend Fiona is coming to London to visit. I really haven't been social lately, so her visit will be timely, she is a genuine FunMaster!
I will let the weekend serve as inspiration for me to get as much done this week as possible. My lesson is on the Tuesday right after the weekend, but Fiona is here until Monday evening. I don't want to be a bad/boring host, so I need to make sure that school work won't interfere too much with her visit. There's already going to be a big chunk of lame on Friday because I have class pretty much all day - nevertheless, that means that Electro will be out of the way and I can ignore it until the following tuesday/wednesday.
At the same time, the studio is really cool and I think Fiona would enjoy seeing some of the things you can do with it so maybe I can incorporate some work into that...
Anyway, I don't really have anything planned for her visit because, well, it's me AND its Fi. We're random and planning things would be LAME!

Ok, I've wasted enough of my Sunday morning blogging. It's time to go and do something productive, YAY!

musings at the end of a rather long day

Being at the university for 7am was rather early, but not the worst thing. The sun wasn't even up when I got to the university. It was cool, dark and unpopulated - just how I like it!

I got to play a bit for my choreographer and some of the dancers. It wasn't as inspiring as my initial experiences with the YoungLungs, but they are a very receptive group and things look promising. We're all going to start thinking about possible topics/subjects for the thesis project(long term), but there are going to be some opportunities to work on some smaller project during this year - a good way to get to know each other.

Two of my sight singing classes had their second test today. They did SO much better. Almost too much better. I was a little more lenient this time, but their skills were much better. It's not just a matter of seeing that the numbers are better for their marks, but I could hear the improvement. The students have actually been working and the classes have been going smoother. I'm a happy teacher!

Electroacoustic class was not so hot today. The piece I brought in for my listening example ... the prof labeled it 'compositionally weak'. It's not like I chose it specifically and loved it, I chose it because it was one of the few tracks of a suitable length off of a compilation album. One would assume that a work done by someone who teaches electro composition at a US University would be sound, but I guess not. The piece gave us some stuff to talk about, but I still felt a little down that I didn't make a good selection.
There are only two of us in the class, and it's pretty clear that I am the weaker of the two students. I need to spend much more time in the studio so that I might be able to come close to catching up, but the other guys has more electro experience. It should be encouraging me to do better, but I'm finding it a little frustrating that he always seems to be going that sizable step beyond what I am doing.

I took a nap this evening, but I'm still tired, so I'll go to bed somewhat soon.

I read for pleasure tonight, only 37 pages, but it's a start. I need to increase my reading speed because next term I will have to do a lot of reading for my academic course. Also, I should generally be reading a lot more than I currently am. I should also be listening a lot more and looking at a lot more scores. I should also be composing more. I should do more.

I should also increase the quality of what I am currently doing, rather than simply adding more quantity.

Michael, it's time to step it up.

Fickidy Fuch!
It's 10pm and I'm still not finished filling in the blanks for this composition excerpt. Once I finish that, I need to make sure the parts look alright and then save them as a PDF and send that off to the prof in charge.
I wouldn't mind and I'd just stay up really late doing it, BUT:
Tomorrow morning at 7am, that's right SEVEN in the MORNING, I am meeting my choreographer and dancers to get to know each other in terms of music/movement styles.
I wouldn't mind and I'd just come home and sleep after, BUT:
Tomorrow is a pretty busy day anyway - I am giving 2 sight singing tests. I have a listening assignment for my electroacoustic class (also tomorrow), which obviously I won't be getting to tonight. I have a few hours between classes tomorrow, so I can use the library to do that!

Anyway, enough wasting time on here - I have work to do!
While this is quite stressful, this is what I've been waiting for and excited for with grad school! May the craziness begin!

Time has been flying - I've been rather busy.
Monday and Tuesday kind of whizzed by with the classes and lesson and preparation for both being rather extensive, well more just for the lesson.
My teacher's reaction was neither really here nor there, some good suggestions, but the piece is still not quite at the point where it can really be critiqued. I hadn't gotten it to the put together shape that it should be.
The energetic section that I wrote which I was excited about, and I thought it fit both piano and violin quite well, didn't quite win over my teacher. He even raised some concern about whether it was good writing for violin. I went to a violinist today and they reconfirmed that it fits the instrument, phew!
I talked to the prof organizing the workshop - I have until Friday to get my shit together, and I will need the time. I had originally thought I would get my piece ready for the lesson, get some corrections and then plug it into the notation software - things don't work that way. Not that this is a bad thing,- I feel that the piece has continued to grow. It's not like I got shot down at my lesson and had to rebuild; my lesson served me as a bump on the road to where I'm going.
The tricky thing is going to be working it up to a point at which I'll submit it and have to be ok with it at that point until the workshop. In the meantime, I will continue working on the piece - it will continue to develop and most likely will be a very different piece by the time I actually hear them play it. At the same time, what I'm presenting to them is going to be the second half so if I focus next on the first half, then maybe things won't be so out of sync.

Overall, the weekend was pretty damn productive in terms of composition. I still have quite a bit of time tomorrow during which I can finish up my composition and then I have time on Tuesday morning. At that point, I will need to make any changes/improvements as well as input it into my notation program. I hope I'm not going to run into any major setbacks with the notation, as that could have negative impact on my one-day timeline.. maybe that's not realistic, I have to make sure it's not just notated, but the parts have to be prepared as well.
I guess this is what grad school is all about. I will have to find a way to get it all together.
At the moment, there are some things which will be tricky to input, but that's just because I haven't made actual decisions about them yet; how do I want things to line up, if at all?

Oops, I should really sleep. Late night = Mikey not happy at his 9:30 sight singing class...

Somewhat of an end to witer's block

I figured out why I wasn't able to come up with any music - I was trying to compose away from the piano. Somewhere along the line, I got the idea that I didn't need a keyboard in order to write music; I barely used the piano for some of the pieces I wrote last year. I guess the moral of this story is that what works for the goose doesn't necessarily work for the duck. Wait, it's supposed to be the female version.. what is a female duck.... oh well,
What works for the drake doesn't necessarily work for the gander.
The additional moral is that I am neither a duck nor a goose, so while they don't use a piano to compose, I should.
Also, the fact that I am writing for a piano ensemble means that I need to be conscious that this is going to be played on piano. Between yesterday and today, I've spent over 10 hours at the piano trying to come up with stuff. It is surprising how slow things are to make it from my head onto the keys and then into my head again to get it on the paper. I'm certain there must be something mentally wrong with me that is preventing the process from going as smooth as it seems that it should.
Anyway, I have the first half of the piece pretty much mapped out, unfortunately it is the second half that I have to have close to finished by tuesday/wednesday. Nevertheless, inspired by how I've been working lately, I am confident that I will be able to get everything together for my deadlines. The good thing is that this piece doesn't need to be finished completely until December, so this will really raise the bar for what the finished product will be.

Another observation, last time I wrote for strings, I had issues remembering and making tangible the concept of how the pitches lie on the strings, but for whatever reason, I seem to have developed that sense and even my fingers on the keyboard were tuning into what is and isn't possible. It must be subconscious as well; I wrote down a theme for the piano part and then looking at it on the page, I realized that it made really good use of the open strings on the violin - saving me much time in trying to find a way to rewrite it for the violin.

Now, school has officially gotten busy. Writing is underway and it's amazing how much of my time I can dedicate to that. Electroacoustic course is suddenly getting heavier in the workload. Besides just doing more, I need to also kick things up a notch in terms of using the tools better. We had a mini assignment and well, when there's only 2 students, it's obvious which student is the better or in my case, lesser. In terms of using the technology, it's a matter of going more often to the studio and spending more time. Once again, in order to benefit, I need to do a couple of significant, like 3+ hour sessions. I find myself getting frustrated/antsy after about 2, so I need to force myself through it.

Oooh, I sent a piece to a chamber ensemble for their call for works today. They are looking for an emerging composer, so basically a bunch of people send them a piece and they pick one or a few that they will tour around the country. I sent in Auskultu Bonvolu, but I read that last year they had over 140 applicants, so it's already looking not so promising. That currently puts me at 2 competitions that I'm waiting to hear back from. Nevertheless, I feel that I wrote a really strong cover letter, so I hope that wins it for me! haha

Wow, I originally planned on listening to one Sibelius Symphony today, maybe two if I had time and the inclination. Somehow I ended up listening to them all(most).
I had listened to the first one another day. I actually listened to Symphonies 2-4 this afternoon and then 5-7 tonight.
This afternoon, I actually wrote down listening notes and read about them on the Grove's Online Encyclopedia. Tonight, I just listened and tried to understand / get inspired by the music.
I made sure that I was completely open and I even tried to fall in love with this music, but it didn't really happen. I really enjoyed Symphony number 5 and 7.
My prof and the other first year Master's student recommended that I listen to them all - probably not in one day, but that's just how I did it. Now I have a real sense of what Sibelius's music is all about and I will even be able to enter into discussions of these works.

I'm worried that I've lost or temporarily misplaced the ability to be really moved by music. The symphonies today were great and there was a lot that should have caused me to weep or scream or something, but nothing. Anyway, to test it all out, I'm going to listen to Liszt's Sonata in B minor. It is one of my favorite pieces of all time, and it once caused me to get a nasty speeding ticket on the evening before my birthday a few years ago. Hopefully it will inspire some tears as I settle down for the night.
I will let you know how things work out tomorrow.

Oooh, tomorrow I am performing the Double Bass and Piano piece - I'm excited and our rehearsal went very well today, things are really starting to come together. I will also provide commentary on that tomrorow.

I am becoming an ethical person!

I have decided that I need to become a professional in what I am doing. Therefore, I need to actually own the software that I use to make a living (or as close as I can get to making a living as a composer). However, being a professional doesn't necessarily mean that I am going to jump on paying full price on the software, especially when they have great offers that are just begging to be taken advantage of.
To just buy the full Sibelius 5 program, I would be paying 599$US. While the Canadian dollar is currently stronger than the US one, that is still a huge sum of money. At the same time, they have an offer that tries to convince users of the competition, Finale, to switch over for only 199$, or 99$ for the month of October. To save $500, all I would need to do would be to send the table of contents from the user manual of one of the accepted programs. Unfortunately, I couldn't get a hold of a user manual, damn! Nothing on ebay, and no-one I know uses those programs. But upon closer inspection, one of the programs that they accept for the upgrade is their own Sibelius Student program - only 99$. I ordered both the upgrade and the student version so that I can register the upgrade. A total savings of nearly 400$ and I get the ethical validation I've wanted for just over $200 Canadian.
I think Apple/Mac should offer a competitive upgrade thingy for Windows users.. haha, not likely, but that would be nice.
Anyway, with this detail out of the way, there isn't anything pressing that I need to upgrade. The step up to ProTools and getting a Macbook aren't necessary; they will have to wait pending the funding situation next year. If I know for sure that I will be getting decent money next year, then I will switch to Mac. Getting ProTools is not a rush at all. For this year and next, I have the use of a great recording/audio editing studio at school. I don't need to have the hard/software for my own computer, but that is something I need to address eventually.
Mumbly mumbly, no more talking about finances, I know it's not the most interesting topic, but that was all I really had to say for tonight, so I'll sign off for another day.

I walked home via a different route today. It would have been really nice, but the sun was in my eyes for more than half of it. I checked on google after I got home and the route I took was 5 kilometres and it took me about 52 minutes to walk. I totally thought that the walk would have taken a full hour, but unfortunately not.
In some ways the new route was nicer, for a long stretch of it you walk by a big open park and I get to cross the river, but on the other hand, it forces me to walk along a busy road for most of it. I know I will definitely not take this route in the late morning/early afternoon again, the sun was just too much directly in my eyes.
It was nice for variety and I will try it again at some point, but I like the original way better. I could walk along Richmond, a main street, but since I live a few big blocks east of it, I can also just walk through the residential areas. If anyone ever comes to visit (like my friend Fiona is coming in a few weeks) I will show this beautiful area. The houses are all amazing and the streets are all lined with trees and the colours are amazing right now.
Anyway, since I've been trying to find a way to extend my walk to an hour long, I think I will just walk a few blocks further east and then double back a bit.
Now I have settled into my schedule, which unfortunately does not involve a whole lot of at-school-time. I only actually need to go to school 2 or 3 days a week, sometimes 4 if I have a lesson. This is why I need to guaruntee that I walk at least an hour each time. I should also leave the house and get some exercise even on the days when I don't have anything. This weekend, I barely left the apartment and my legs ached when I walked to catch the bus on Sunday afternoon (I hadn't been out of the apartment since Friday evening).
Long story short (I lie) is that while I have been walking a lot more since moving here, I most likely haven't lost any weight and I'm not really in any better shape. I need to step things up in the exercise department.

New topic!
Now that I've finished my film soundtrack and got the tentative initial approval from the director, I have moved on to school composition work. The piano trio has developed slowly over the last 2 days, but it needs to go faster. A professional piano trio is coming to our school and they are doing a student composer masterclass type thing, so I need to have about 3 minutes of my piece suitable for them to read through so I can get some feedback. At the same time, my teacher wants me to have the whole piece generally sketched out in some detail for my next lesson. I think I'll give myself until friday to do that, then I'll spend the weekend filling in a3 minute section with more detail so that it might be ready for the end of the month (when I need to have it ready to send to the ensemble). It's all a matter of making sure I have as much done as I can so that I can make the best use of the resources; my teacher for this lesson as well as the ensemble. I think I'll have a day after my lesson in order to add some suggestions from my lesson in order to get it ready to send off.
It seems odd that I will be sending it to them to learn a section, but I will have worked on it quite a bit by the time they actually play it for me. I'll keep in mind that I will be wanting to listen for the concepts and style that they play rather than the specific notes, which will undoubtedly have changed.

I'll keep rambling-
A week or two ago, I had some bloodwork done through the student health services lab. Just the standard diabetes tests. This would have been the test of how my summer and first month of living here has been. My HbA1C wasn't bad; 7.2 when the targets are 7.0 or 6.5. I'm not even certain about what my previous result was, but somehow I have it in my head that this was a step backwards. While I try not to let numbers rule my life, I can't help but be disappointed. Not by the numbers, but by my perception... I really felt like I had made some monumental improvements over the summer, but I suppose not.
I'm posting about it now to admit that yes, it did get to me, but now I'm back on track.

I meant to blog about this yesterday, but I forgot.
I heard the Canadian Chamber Choir sing at a noon-hour concert on Friday. It was spectacular. It reminded me of how good choral singing can be.
Often, it seems that all singers have the sole intent of being soloists. I wonder why it isn't more like orchestral instrumentalists who have the intention of being in an orchestra. If more young people heard groups like the CCC, or if there were more choirs of that caliber, then maybe singers would aspire to be a voice within such a choir. The power of such a group is incredible.
Anyway, enough fawning.
It has inspired me to write differently for choir, whenever I next do that. It also brings to light the influence that the above mentioned bias against choral singing has had on my music. Not that it's bad, but let's look at the Baking with Momma piece I wrote.
I wrote it with a specific choir in mind, and with that came the premise that a choir would be made up of a bunch of budding soloists. That is how I wrote it - 8 separate voices, very independent. It was effective, but I don't think that the piece could be successfully performed by a non professional-ish level choir. I don't necessarily want all of my music to be elitist (more on that later).
I still think that the piece was quite successful, but I missed out on the power that the choral texture can achieve. I'm not saying that I'm not happy with the piece, in fact I will probably still write music in that style, but I want to also try the other side of things.

I was talking to my roommate earlier and he reminded me of how elitist classical music is. I need to keep this in mind as I attempt to not become overwhelmed by elitism.

Anyway, I'm rambling, perhaps I will stop.

I think I finished the soundtrack for the dance film I'm working on. I sent it to the film director/producer/editor and I'm just waiting on his feedback.
I've learned a fair bit about audio editing from the process, and I'm quite happy with how it has turned out. The first version I did involved the piano, accordion and some extended accordion technique, which ended up just sounding like heavy breathing. Through exploring some of digital effects available through audio editing, I ended up making a decision to use the piano as the only original sound source.
I won't go as far as to say that I've become a master electroacoustimusician, but I'm on my way. I was able to get everything to do what I wanted

In my electroacoustic class, we're using a program called ProTools. It has a steep learning curve so I have a fair bit to learn, but it will allow me even more tools than the program I'm currently using. All of this has gotten me thinking about some investments that I need to make within the next little while.
Basically, I need to switch to Mac. As much as I don't want to admit it, it almost comes down to a case of 'all the cool kids have it'. On top of that, and in terms of professional stuff, most of my colleagues use it, and most studios use it and my university uses it - therefore in terms of collaboration and being versatile, I need to be in that same situation. Not knowing much about keystrokes and using Macs is holding me back a little bit as I try and learn new ProTools at school. The reason why my colleagues and studios use them is because I've heard that the interface on most programs is better. Long story short, it all adds up to me switching.
When you add in the software that I'll need, this switchover will cost me approximately $3,000!
Ouch!
Anyway, this is part of me becoming a professional in my field. Nevertheless, I need to wait and make sure that I get funding for next year before I go and make such an investment, otherwise I wouldn't quite be able to afford to live...
Wow, this post has taken me hours because I've been flitting around on the internet doing absolutely nothing today. Here ends said post.

I went to the big mall in London for the first time today. I did pretty well at first.
I dislike malls, and shopping.
I needed to buy headphones. I've never really owned any - I have a pair of earbuds, but those are especially unsatisfactory now that I am doing sound editing for a score. Anyway, I looked online and it seemed that I could get something decent for between 50-70 bucks. I went to all the places that would have headphones in the mall and I was comparing prices.
I went to one actual music store. They had three choices, 2 that were around the same quality and prices as other stores I looked at. The guy was trying to convince me that I should but the other choice - professional quality studio headphones for a hundred dollars more. Long story short, they were trying to convince me by belittling me for even considering the other ones. Making big purchases makes me nervous and there were like 4 salespeople standing around be all assy and condescending. I had my mastercard out and once she told me the price with tax, I freaked out and decided I couldn't so I apologized and left. I hadn't even left the store and the other salesmen were asking her "what was going on there?".
They were certainly not going to get my business. I went elsewhere and bought a reasonable pair.

I've stepped back into being a pianist.
A small step, but a step nonetheless.

That's all I will do for now - take small steps.

A fellow composer has a piece that he wants to be performed at a concert coming up and I said I would play in it. It is for piano and double bass.
Now that I don't do piano as my mainstay, I think I'm taking the lesson that was thrown at me near the end of my undergrad - Regardless of whether you are professional or amateur, you want to sound like a professional. This is something that I never did while I was attempting to be a professional. I think that I wasn't able to give it my full attention while doing my undergrad perhaps because it was too much for me to handle. Now that I am more aware of my limitations, I think that if I take on only small amounts, I will be able to treat them with the respect and professionalism that they deserve.

While I haven't missed being the pianist I was last year and before, the other day, playing through a Beethoven Sonata, I was reminded of how I do enjoy playing piano.

My roommate and I had a celebratory shot of tequila tonight to celebrate finishing grad funding applications.
It's been weeks now that we've been constantly editing our 2-page write-ups. Trying to fit the plans for and research elements of this degree into one or two pages has not been a fun experience.
It's been a fair while since I actually had to write anything of worth. I did the SSHRC application last year, and I'm not surprised at all that I didn't get the scholarship. At U of M, they had no resources available to me to understand what the scholarship was about, so I didn't really treat it very seriously. This time around, there were presentations on how to write a successful proposal and all of my profs have been open and helpful. Other students, my roommate, profs and my choreographer all helped me to transform the original version into a much more detailed and refined version which I will be submitting tomorrow. Each time I got comments, I basically restructured it and the last few edits have been shifting back and forth based on the editors' views of what the panel will be looking for. Therefore, I am no longer getting commentary on things being unclear or not explained well enough, so I know that it is clear and concise. I took a compromise on the differing views of how I should structure the information and now I am actually happy with it. As I re-read it, I braced myself for finding that huge mistake that would set me back in front of the computer for hours, but I didn't find it.
Anyway, tomorrow it will be out of my hands and I will just have to wait until ca. February to find out the results. I am already nervous.
The value of the scholarships is about 15-17.5 grand - enough that I would be set for living expenses next year and be able to live comfortably. If I don't get either one, I still get the funding I'm receiving this year, but I would prefer more...
Anyway, I had still not really had any ideas for my Piano Trio work up until this weekend and it would be inexcusable to go into my lesson on tuesday with nothing to show for the last 2 weeks, but I had a wonderful creative outburst this weekend and I have something... not much, but something to go on. Now I have direction and it's just a matter of sitting down and working hard at it the next few days and I will have something valuable to show my teacher - well, I hope it will be of value...
I feel like I have more direction in this piece, so now it will just be a matter of actually getting around to writing it and putting it down on paper and then computer.
The Autumn cycle is bringing itself together, I'm getting impatient for the final copyright permission, then I will just unleash myself, but that is the least pressing project at the moment.
The Dance film, I did the newest recording session before the weekend and over the last few days, I started piecing together the session. I'm learning more and more about how to use the technology, so I have lots of new ideas that will make this new edit even better than the first draft. I feel like I will be in a lot better control for this edit. I need to get it done quickly though, that is high up on the list of priorities, and once Tuesday's lesson is done, it moves to priority number 1. It will definitely be done before next weekend and then I think it should be out of my hands, barring slight edits.
Starting next weekend, I'm pushing myself into super-composing mode. I've already been in grad school for over a whole month, I feel like I should have composed a hell of a lot more, so I'm going to make myself do it. Even though my only real focus/project is the piano trio, I will start working on much more. Of course these are words of bravado, but I hope to live up to them.

Zippydoodle, I need to go to bed - long day tomorrow.

People who send things through couriers are assholes. Sure, thanks for whatever you're trying to send me, but fucking send it through Canada Post! At least they can put it in my box or leave it at the post office rather than me having to take three busses to pick up a bloody package, and watch - it'll be a huge box! FiddleSticks!
And the courier people call me and leave these messages trying to belittle me for not having psychically sent her my buzz code and then again for not having a working buzzer!! Fuck you bitches!
If I'm bloody well going to buss out to the airport to pick up my package, it had better be flying on a jet pa-lane!
Couriers only work for people who sit around on their front porches all day waiting for the courier to come - I can't do that, I don't have a porch!

In other news, London is filled with delightful people. I'd say about 60% of the time, even when people exit the bus through the back door, they yell thank you to the driver. They also hold doors open for people.

I'm almost done with SSHRC. I'm going to aim to have it completely finished tomorrow (leaving the option for one more last minute edit). My choreographer today helped me to edit it and gave some super awesome suggestions. My poor Program of Study, it's been revised more times than.... well a lot. I've pretty much taken everyone's advice, so it looks much different every time I fix it up. Luckily everyone who has helped me has been very helpful! HelpityHelp!

Today we spent our class time for Electroacoustic music in the recording studio, I recorded leaves - scratching against each other, crunching, crumbling and having some kind of death match. Also the sounds of a kazoo, diet coke, and duct tape. These are the sounds that I will be using to make a piece of music later in this course.

But don't forget, I hate couriers!

This is a day in my life as a diabetic. This was actually a pretty good day. In an ideal world, my sugars would never have ventured out of the green space, but of course I didn't post the days where it did a lot more.
This technology allows me to see the trends of how my sugars move during the day. For example, you can see that I ate around 11:30am and I must have taken more insulin than I should because it shows my sugars dropping thereafter.
Anyway, I spent a fair bit of time this morning looking at the results from my 6 day stint wearing the Continuous Glucose Monitor and I've learned a fair bit from the experience.

Happy Belated Turkey Day!

This weekend was great. I went to my uncle's house just a few hours away and had a wonderful time. I went to a demolition derby - my first time to anything of the sort. It was amazing - I try to be all fancy and stuff, but the violence and reckless damage is just far to entertaining to ignore!
Thanksgiving dinner was very nice and filling. I got to meet my second cousins (ages 4 and 6) for the first time ever, their mother (my cousin) for the second time ever, and my other cousin for the third time. It's terrible, but living in different provinces seems to have been enough to keep the family from getting to know one another. I hope to be able to change that from here on in.
Today has been an amazingly productive day in terms of creativity. I had found the perfect poem to fit into the Fall Song Cycle and now it is all coming together, at least in the preparatory planning stage. I am still waiting for the copyright permissions on the third poem and then I'll be able to just jump into that one without reservations, but for now I am timidly avoiding it. Anyway, even if I have to find a different poem to replace that one, I know how the cycle will develop and generally how it will work itself out.
I'm now going to work a little bit on some rhythm study for my piano trio piece. That's what my teacher wants me to focus on so I will take his lead and put as much of my resources into it as I can. I realize that my use of rhythm up to now has been primarily mathematical - which can be fine, but I haven't had any reasons for doing so. In seminar/lectures, my prof has spoken a lot about the rhythm of speech and how it is very varied and always interesting. Tonight I shall explore precisely that.

Wow, I claim a new record for non-productivity today. Truly pathetic.
I'm going to give up at this point and just focus on doing the dishes, then at least I'll have accomplished one thing today.

It feels like I'm going to have 2 separate weekends this weekend. I am going to my uncle's house for thanksgiving dinner on Monday. I'm leaving on Sunday morning, but I still have basically a whole weekend before that time even comes.
Tomorrow, I'm going to spend the whole day working on composition. I didn't really have much for my composition lesson this week, so I need to have quite a bit for next lesson (in a week and a half) - it's a matter of getting started on this Piano Trio piece I need to write.
I also need to get a fair bit of conceptual thinking and planning underway for the Autumn piece I am going to write for my friend Andrea. Then there is the matter of finishing the piece for the dance film.
None of these things need to be done by the end of the weekend, but I can feel that I've been sitting on my haunches for long enough, it's time to move ahead.
Right now is definitely the time to be getting inspiration for the Autumn piece, so many leaves and trees changing colour. Actually I'm going to go outside and collect some leaves to record right now. My theory is that if I slow down a recording of a leave crunching, I will get a rhythm that I can use for the piece. I'm not sure if I will be using the actual recorded sound as part of the piece, but who knows.
I'll post about how that turns out!

Not that anyone has shown concern by commenting, but I just wanted to post that I am better today.
I need to do laundry, but that can wait until tomorrow.
I am going to force myself to finish my Program of Study write up tonight to give to my references. I'm doing some big scholarship applications due in 2 weeks and this write-up is a bitch. Basically, it wants me to have drafted up my thesis proposal already.
Anyway, I'm almost done. I did a very rough draft last night and I had a few people read it today. From that I'm reshaping it and then I will send that to my references tonight. I will still improve on it for the next few weeks, but I want to have something presentable for my references.
Anyway, I'm writing it as I write this, so I should focus on that - I'm nearly done.

Ok, I don't really have the time or patience to explain what I'm feeling.
This weekend was good and there's a lot of depth to what went on.

Superficial
The resort was gorgeous, breathtaking view of Lake Musoka from my patio. The food was pretty good and everyone was super grateful for me coming up to show some diabetic results. Meals were pretty good, good company and I got to golf yesterday. I'm a terrible golfer, but the course's beauty made up for my shortcomings.

Only Skin Deep
I got to wear a Continual Glucose Monitor for a few days before the weekend and for a few days yet. What started as a trivialty of knowing my sugars at any moment - simply at the press of a button - became more and more insightful. I started to make use of the information and, dare I say it, I've seen how it can improve my control.

Under My Skin
They brought two diabetics out there so that they could have 'real diabetic' results to look at. The other diabetic is a model patient; his control is impeccable and doctors made comments about 'where can I get patients like that?'. I'm completely supportive of the other guy, but at times it felt a bit like 'good diabetic, bad diabetic'. Mostly, it was bringing to light the fact that he is on the pump and it is allowing him to take such control over his health. Moreso, that I am struggling to do that things that the pump would allow me to do with much more ease.

Into the Depths of My Soul
It all comes down to money, and I know that. I've been convincing myself over the last few years that I can have just as good control without a pump. It is not true. Talking to the other diabetic as well as nurses and doctors, it is painfully obvious that I should be on a pump. Rumour has it that Ontario will soon be covering pumps, meaning that it might be a possibility very soon. Please, don't tease me - you might just as well hold a lollipop in front of a child and then lick it and stick it into their hair so that they would have to rip out their own hair in order to get the candy. I admit my weakness, and I can't convince myself again that a pump is just not worth it, because it is - but I can't afford it.
What's more is the fact that the pump is old technology by now and I still haven't gotten to it. This weekend I wore the CGM and I loved it. I've had a glimpse into how much easier, safer, comfortable life could be. In a day or two more, I have to leave that behind and return to the way I've known for years - only now I have the full picture of how incomplete it is.

I am weak.

I am vulnerable.

I should be excited for the developments and I should be grateful for my opportunity, and I am, but I can't be. But I am. I hurt from the chance of being disappointed.

I'm going to try to touch very briefly on all the things that have been going on:

Bionic - the CGM has been pretty nifty so far. I'm going to the conference tomorrow and I'll enjoy Lake Muskoka for the weekend. When I get back, I will have some specific comments on my experience.

Composition - I had Auskultu Bonvolu performed last night. It was quite different than the reading in Winnipeg. I was generally quite impressed with the players here at UWO. They had the piece for about 3-4 days and they pulled off a very respectable performance.

Scholarships, pleeeeeease! - I'm in the process of applying for SSHRC and OGS funding = kill me now. I hate paperwork and trying to sum up what I will be planning on doing for my thesis into a succinct little writeup. Two pages should NOT take this long.

Birthday - I am now 24 years old. It really doesn't feel any different. The phone was ringing off the hook all evening and my roommate didn't know why until a certain fun friend couldn't hold in her excitement and wished his a birthday as soon as he answered the phone. My parents had sent me a care package - a 20-some-odd pound, rather large box with no handles which I got to awkwardly carry through downtown. Nevertheless, it was filled with lots of good things, so I will forgive them.

Composition (version 2) - I found out that I will be writing for a piano trio this year. I get to write for piano AND strings, yay! I have to have the piece finished by the end of this term so the ensemble learns and performs it next term. This weekend, I get to work on sketching out the general framework of the piece and its textures and whatnot. I should probably get around to that. Maybe the beautiful lake this weekend will inspire me.

I'm bionic!
I currently have a Continuous Blood Glucose sensor poked into my right oblique.... who am I kidding, lovehandle. CGM technology has been something that I have followed rather closely for a while and it was on my list of things that I would love to try out for a while if I had the money. The problem is that all things in diabetes management technology are rather costly in the beginning stages. As a result, I had put thoughts of this and pumping out of my mind...
< End Tangent>>
...out of my mind since I was have been happy with my control via regular injections. A few days ago, a diabetic friend of mine called me up and mentioned that Medtronic (one of the leader's in insulin pumps and CGM technology) was looking for someone to be a guinea pig for their new Guardian CGM system. Long story short, I am now wearing a sensor and I'm hooked up to an insulin pump (not actually connected to it though) and they are going to present my results at a conference this weekend on Lake Muskoka.
The immediate benefits are that for the next 4 days, I get a peek into how exactly my sugars react to everything - food, exercise, stress, bitching - all I have to do is press a button and look at the screen. On a more surface level, I get to go to the conference meaning that they are putting me up in a resort for a night and feeding me some nice food. I was originally under the impression that I would actually be given the Guardian CGM system with some supplies, but I shan't be one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

I won't make any real comments tonight because the sensor isn't even transmitting information yet, that starts early tomorrow morning.

New information - A piece of mine is being performed tomorrow night. One of the other comp students was quite helpful in getting together players for my ensemble piece "Auskultu Bonvolu".

I'm done writing, I need to get laundry into the dryer before it gets any later... I'm already past laundry curfew...
I'll post about both of those topics tomorrow.

So, since this first month had a bunch of random costs which won't reoccur on a monthly basis, I haven't really been able to make or assess my budget. Nevertheless, I think that I can say that I haven't really had any problems cutting back on expenditures.
I haven't eaten at a restaurant since I moved here; well, I ate Wendy's for lunch one day when I was craving a frosty(but it wasn't a very good frosty), and we ordered Thai food delivery one night. Other than those two times, I've made all of my meals and my idea of a treat was to buy myself a samosa for 1.29$ at the local deli the other day.
Anyone who knows anything about my 'social' life in Winnipeg knows that it basically revolved around restaurants. I'm not at all surprised that I am having no problem with this new restaurant-free living. It is much cheaper when socializing involves bringing a bag of chips or a cheap bottle of wine over to a friend's place.

Anyway, I'm not writing any of this to brag, rather I just wanted to set up for the main point of this blog entry. So here we are, set up; I am comfortable with not spending much money.

Point of this blog entry: When I returned my cds to the library today and was informed that they were overdue... 3 days, 3 cds, 2$ a day = 18 bucks! I could have bought one of those cds for that amount; but in more tangible terms, I could go to 2 barbecue/potluck/wine and cheese evenings; I could have bought 14 samosas!
I realize that it's not a huge amount of money, and I don't really even think about it like that, but it just depicts the point I am at in terms of financial thinking and budgeting. Last year, I would never have been similarly affected by that amount of money.


New Topic!
I'm very close to finishing my piece. I'm just applying some editing to it while I'm not blogging. I have just over an hour before I leave here for my classes tonight, so it's about that close to being finished.
It's odd, yesterday at around this time, I was frustrated that this piece was going to turn out a total piece of crap. Later on, I left it for the evening - almost having lost hope- and went for what is becoming a weekly tradition, Sunday evening dinner/hanging out with Judy O. I had printed out a copy before I left and I ended up reviewing and editing it as I walked home; making use of those 7 steps where I could actually use the light between street lamps. Maybe it was the wine, maybe walking by my favorite 'castle' house (I'll post a picture eventually), or maybe it was having taken a few hours away from the piece, but I actually had some good ideas. When I got home, I poured another glass of wine and fixed/changed those areas of the piece with which I was particularly unhappy and then I actually had something to work with. Earlier this afternoon, I sat down and marked up the score with details I needed to fix up and now here I am - Happy with my piece.
I am also pretty sure that I don't need to present my piece today, more likely tomorrow sometime, so I will be able to apply even further improvements tonight if I still want.

I'm excited for this evening - my first Orchestration class as well as first Composition Lecture. A total of 5 hours of lecture.... but I'm sure it will be amazing!

I will post later about how it went!

I sometimes wonder whether or not I am a good communicator. I do listen and pay attention to people when they are talking, but I wonder to what degree I truly understand them. This comes up because I was delighted yesterday by a statement by Allen Forte yesterday when he was doing his lecture.
I paraphrase, 'Do you like octatonic scales? I usually like to play one first thing in the morning; to clear my head of tonality.'
The statement he made was absolutely delightful and I was immediately moved to get my notepad and write it down. The problem is that in those 10 seconds between his statement and my writing it down, all that remained certain was the idea of the statement.
I am not sure whether he actually said 'usually'; whether he referred to the scale as 'one' or 'them' or 'it'; whether it was 'first thing', or just 'in the morning'; and he may have even thrown a colour word into the last phrase.
For the longest time, I have used active listening. Therapists and counsellors use this in order to validate and verify the things that another person had said:

Jack- "so like, um, when she was there, I was like, ahh!"
Dr. Johnson - "I see, so her presence made you feel uneasy"

I'm not sure whether or not it is a problem, but I think I do this all the time. Most of the time, it works well; I remember things better if they fit logically into the way that I think, but therein lies the problem - when the topic is something that I don't understand easily like politics or philosophy, I don't hold on to the information effectively. Even more scary is the fact that I can easily misunderstand concepts when I am trying to translate them for myself.
I think I am going to hereby add this to my list of things I want to improve about myself. I am going to try to understand concepts in the context in which they are told to me before I try and apply them to my own life and thoughts.

Anyway, that's enough rambling for tonight. Back to work for me! [My piece is coming along, slowly but surely. I have plans tomorrow evening, so I will need to get it finished by tomorrow cause I sure don't want to leave it until late late Sunday night. Basically there are 2 more sections that I need to finish, and then I will probably tidy up how they connect together. I'm aiming to get at least one of those two sections done today.]

I've been bad. Starting my master's is my chance to take the boat by the oars and really get things moving, but I've caught myself procrastinating again. This composition - I haven't really touched it since the last time I blogged, and I should have been spending every spare moment on it. Now, I will have to spend pretty much the entirety of my weekend working on it. I shouldn't say that though, that gives me the excuse to waste a whole weekend on something that shouldn't take that long. I'll rephrase - I will have it done by tomorrow evening so that I can go out tomorrow and spend Sunday doing whatever I please. I also have to keep in mind that I have some reading and listening to do for my first Orchestration class and Composition lecture.

Another thing I noticed myself doing is walking on the left side of the sidewalk. I hate this; I have told people off in Winnipeg for walking on the left side of the sidewalk. Here, they may drive on the right side of the road, but I swear the pedestrians think they're in jolly old England, and it's starting to rub off on me. I will keep my eye on it and try to rectify this mistake.

Today we had a guest lecturer at school. Allen Forte is credited as being the man to have brought the Second Viennese School of music over to North America and revolutionized how we organize pitch content. Long story short, he is a hugely popular and respected music theorist and he came to our school. At lunch, we were treated to a lecture recital of the three Petrarch Sonnets by Liszt, played by his wife Madeleine Forte. In undergrad, I had played the vocal version of Sonnet 104, so having listened to quite a few recordings of the solo and vocal versions, I can easily say that hers was my favorite interpretation. How do I put this nicely... She is not a young woman, which made her incredible technique and pianism that much more impressive.
Later in the afternoon, I attended Allen Forte's presentation of a recent research paper on a short piece by Schoenberg. It was fascinating how he presented the many instances of referencing himself and his students through the use of the musical alphabet within a piece that was under a minute in length. There was so much more substance to his lecture, which I cannot even begin to try and explain here.

Ok, back to procrastination... I will do so by speaking more of procrastination - I've been avoiding dishes since yesterday afternoon. I certainly need to have those done before my roommate gets back from Toronto, but I'll set myself a goal - I should have them done before going out tomorrow. Maybe the dishes will help me to avoid working on my composition.

On a positive note, I finally got around to going to the percussion department today. I found some random percussionists in the hallway and they showed me some of the ins and outs of cymbals. In all of the textbooks I have and some online resources I consulted, nothing could answer the questions I had about them. They all told me about the fact that a cymbal can sound very different based on where you hit it, but they didn't really attempt to qualify that with descriptions. Basically all I wanted to know was if the harmonics increased as you move outwards on the cymbal or if it was the inverse; also what were the sonorous qualities of hitting the dome. Basically, those questions were answered simply enough by just hearing it played at different points of the cymbal. Harmonics are not the same in the cymbal as they are with other instruments. Rather than the number of audible overtones being different based on where you strike, it's the organization of the multiple sets of overtones. Hit at the outside rim, the overtones are quite spread out giving the sound a full body, whereas the inside renders a sound more compact at the high end of overtones. Hitting the dome gives a dead(ish) sound almost exclusively made up of the upper partials. Now I have the information about the cymbal that I needed in order to feel comfortable developing a piece based on the acoustic qualities of it as an instrument.

Now I will stop blogging and maybe even get some work done.