Moving along..

My last blog was posted almost half-a-year ago. Guess I’ve been a bit pre-occupied. I almost thought that my blog was lost forever when I couldn’t figure out wordpress’s new format.

Much has changed…

I’m no longer at FSU, but rather at FIU. I am able to live at home and help my parents. This summer was a rocky transition period. I spent many days doubting my decision to finish my senior year down here. God has confirmed through so many ways that I am going in the right direction. FSU was an incredible experience and it was right for the time I was there. I am blessed to have met so many neat people and develop genuine, life-long friendships. I know I was there for exactly as long as I needed to be. I was wary of transferring to a new music school where I knew only a few people as I entered my senior year of college. I’ve realized that my life isn’t ever going to follow a grid of normalcy. I never perceived leaving FSU, but I have admit, it’s worked out for the better. Being home has opened some great opportunities for spiritual growth as well as musical growth. Even though Miami isn’t necessarly a classical music hub, there are more performance opportunities than in a small town. I’m excited to see how God challenges and grows me in the next few months. He’s already stretched me far beyond my comfort zone…and surprisingly I wouldn’t want it any other way. [Yeah, God's faithfullness and love has never failed me...I trust in Him alone.]

TGIF

LONG week.

So I didn’t waste time on facebook chat this week. In fact, God did something really cool, to show me that he could use the stupid things of this world in a mighty way. On Monday night I was chatting with a few people, and randomly a friend who moved on from FSU im-ed me. Every once and a while we’ve had small-talk surface convos, but from the beginning of the convo – it was different. He mentioned wanting to get back to church, and that triggered a long conversation about just knowing Jesus vs. church-ing/religion-ing. He was really receptive to the gospel, and said he wanted some time to make his decision to follow Christ. I am so excited!!!! I’ve been praying all week that he would make his decision soon, and that God would bring a godly guy into his life. So lesson learned: Facebook chat isn’t horrible. If God can use it, I guess I can use it…. Which I’ve been doing, so I guess I won’t stop  – BUT, no need for it to stop me from doing legit things, like say, homework or practicing.

Allright, off to USO (orchestra) concert! Shostikovich, and some other ridiculous composer’s names on the program. I have no idea what I’m about to hear – hopefully it’s a delightful surprise.

Ela, how are you? Are you over the flu yet? I miss talking to you! But get better!

Whew.

Long day. Fun day. My-feet-are-ready-to-fall-off day. Even though I stayed mostly indoors and in two buildings today, I must have walked a marathon today. FSU had its last round of auditions for next year today. 450 applicants signed up, thankfully they didn’t all come. Had they, I would’ve ran a marathon in the opposite direction.

It has been such a fantastic week! The weather is beautiful, I didn’t have class on Tuesday or Thursday. I actually got ahead with some of my homework, a miracle. Spent a lot of time outside. Went to Starbucks and DIDN’T drink coffee. Started singing again. Went to chilis with some amazing friends who I used to hang with all the time during freshman year. We had a “reunion”, even though most of us see eachother every day. Rarely do we get to have fun/meaningful conversations, so one guy had the great idea to spontaneously get together. 10 of us sat at a table that was meant for 6. I had so much fun, and then was overwhelmed by the fact that I haven’t been keeping up with Ugly Betty episodes…so roomie and I had TV time ( or ABC.com time).

What a cool week. I think the biggest reason for it being so spectacular was because I was conscious of God being in the midst of everything. I caught my thoughts and words cutting Him off, and started listening more. He has really beautiful, profound things to say, but for some reason I like to listen to my own voice. Heard some new things this week. I think we miss out some really amazing blessings sometimes, because we’re so busy trying create our own blessings (I say we,  first meaning me).  I also remembered that facebook is a life-sucker. I can’t believe how much time I waste on it! I’ve been better the last few days…but for real, it’s a problem. It’s nice to stay connected and catch up with long distance fam and friends, but I find myself mostly talking to friends up here, and then avoiding homework (yikes).

Alright. It’s early. But every muscle/bone in my body is yawning.

Happy Saturday Night! 

1st String Music

Brandon Heath is tied with Sanctus Real and Casting Crowns as my favorite Christian bands at the moment. For those of you who haven’t heard of Brandon Heath (The Major), this video is must. The song is “Give Me Your Eyes”.

More good music to check out….

This piece, I just can’t stop grooving to. At first listening I thought this piece was so-so and typical of Vivaldi. Well, typical it may be, but after studying if for Music History last semester I started getting into it, and found myself dancing around my room while it played on iTunes. So beware, this Violin Concerto in A minor by Antonio Vivaldi will eventually make you get up and move. This recording is okay. I prefer the one I own, which is slower, but this one is good. If you don’t enjoy the music, at least you’ll appreciate the EXTREMELY entertaining video.

Cheese and Crackers

I ate cheese and crackers the past 2 nights for dinner.  I ate PB & J twice this week. Oh, and yesterday I bought sushi. Tomorrow is the day. The day I suck it up and get to work in the kitchen. …Stay tuned for “Kitchen Nightmares”.

Ela and Ritz, you will be happy to know that I DID go to the Winter Jam concert tonight! The concert which featured Brandon Heath, Toby Mac, Hawk Nelson was only a few blocks away from my apartment, but due to the FREEZING temperatures, we drove.  I went with 3 of my friends from the music school, and the 4 of us realized that it had been at least a year or so since we’d gone to a “pop” or non-classical/jazz/musical theatre concert. Totally different environment than we’re used to. It was a ton of fun, I danced the entire time. The show definitely catered towards middle-high schoolers, which was odd since it was exactly a block away from FSU’s campus. It was cool to see the younger youth being ministered to, because I’m sure in Tally they can be overlooked with all the college ministries. My friend Emily and I felt like we were in middle school again. There were two, awkward boys in front of us throwing up the “I love you”/”rock on” sign every 30 seconds…  Cell phones being waved… Confetti. ’Twas entertaining.

Changed the blog scheme… Not sure if I like it or not. But I needed a change from my litho theme.

3 in one week. Definitely a record. 2 papers to write before next Wednesday. Doubt I’ll blog again until next Wednesday. How’s the weather in MIA?

Post-Salsa

Yay, I survived rehearsal. We only rehearsed an hour and a half tonight, due to a jazz concert which involved all the horn players. So we sang more tonight, and we ran through the Marc Anthony “It’s Okay” song a few times. It took me a time or 2 to get used to the groove, but I started to get the hang of what kind of voice timbre they’re looking for. I’m excited!

Now back to real life…

My first class of the day – Italian diction – is cancelled tomorrow!

Winter Jam concert featuring Brandon Heath, Toby Mac, and some other people who I’m sure are pretty cool, is tomorrow as well! I’m supposed to go, and I want to…but I’m kinda feeling like a bum, and just kinda want to go to a coffee house and rest. We’ll see.

Long weekend, thanks to MLK holiday!

I have gone to the gym TWICE this week. RECORD for this school year so far.

Latin Music for Dummies

After an unplanned vacation from blogging, I have returned to find wordpress sporting a new layout. Usually I would say New AND Improved, however, I’m not sure if I feel wordpress has improved… it’s making me feel quite wordpress-illiterate right about now.  [What in the wordpress is a "trackback" anyway?]

Anywho. A week and a half into second semester of my 3rd year up here in Tallahassee. Today the temps were in the mid-30s. A nice wintry (word?) day, and a wonderful opportunity to take advantage of fun scarves, hats, and jackets. If I could wear one “genre” of clothing all year long, it would have to be winter clothes. There’s nothing like being able to layer green over navy, bittersweet orange under dark brown, little touches of color with a beret or a knit scarf. It makes up for the skies being grey and the trees bare.

Enough about clothes. Miami people, I have odd, funny news.

So FSU requires all students to take 3 credits (usually 1 class) to fulfill a “multi-cultural” requirement. A class called “World Music Cultures” is a mandatory course for all music majors, but apparently that class isn’t “cultural” enough, so we are also required to be apart of a “world music ensemble (Irish fiddling, Caribbean Salsa, Viola da Gamba, Andean, Mexican, Chinese, and Steel Pan). Apparently music majors just aren’t cultured enough. So, guess which one I signed up for. … Salsa! It sounded the coolest, and also was the only ensemble that did not display an “audition only” warning. Well. Unbeknowest to me, it is actually an audition only band. haha. So I found this out when I met “Papo”, our Salsa instructor, at the first day of class. When I told him the “experience with salsa” aka NONE, he told me to prepare a salsa song to audition with for the next class. haha. I searched the library, couldn’t find any authentic salsa. I almost resigned ask if I could just shake an egg, but then a friend from the band encouraged and lent me some salsa music. I learned “‘La Vida es un Carnaval” by Celia Cruz, only to find out that it’s not “real salsa”. So the instructor had me sing “Summertime” from Porgy and Bess in a very low uncomfortable key. I sang horribly, and then he was like, “yeah, you sing BGVs now, and then we’ll see about doing “summertime” salsa- style.”  So far it has been a blast just being in an ensemble that’s so chill. Just listening to the instrumentalists jam with the different beat patterns and improvisations has opened my eyes to the possibilities. Totally different life-style than I’m used to, and it’s a nice change from my other rehearsals. Tomorrow we go over a song called “That’s Okay” by Marc Anthony. Since I haven’t known any of the music they’ve rehearsed so far, Papo assigned this song to me and dude to sing tomorrow as a duet. I’m no Marc Anthony, so I’ll let you know if he kicks me out of the band after rehearsal.

Alright! Time for me to hit the sack. Have a fun day ahead… gym, class, lunch date, voice lesson, meet with friend, and salsa rehearsal. Let’s see how long the gym routine lasts….

Enjoy the week!

Snippets…after so long!

Not as in Goodbye…but “man, it’s been sooooo long!” -so long.

3 days until Christmas! yippee! It’s good to be home. There are a lot of things in Miami that I did not miss, but two that I did miss are my family and friends! It’s been so good to friends at LPC!! I haven’t gotten together with any friends so far, just because I’ve been hogging my family. My Dad works a lot, so whenever he’s home I try to make the most of our time. It’s just such a short break. But I am definitely enjoying every minute of it.

Surprisingly, Mom has had more energy than I since I’ve been home. We’ve been on more shopping adventures this past week than I have this entire semester. And she’s given more backseat driving advice than I ever want to hear. Oh, and when my tire was flat this week (Ahh!), she drove me to Kendall in my Dad’s manual truck (My mom hasn’t driven in a while). At least now we know that the the truck has great brakes…Hopefully they still work.

Recently I discovered a fun, non-stressful activity… decoupage. For a long time now I’ve cut out letters, words, designs, emblems, etc. from magazines, cards, and fliers, but never could decide what to do with them. After seeing a friend tape pictures and similar clippings to a box and give it to a friend as a gift, I went scouting for another alternative to scotch-tape. I found out that there’s a decoupage glue, that adheres the paper to its surface, and also serves as a lacquer coating which gives a laminated affect. I think diluted Elmer’s glue does the same thing, however, it may get tacky if wet. I decoupaged 2 boxes and 2 notebooks so far, and had a hard time stopping. I guess it was just nice not to think about music and other things for a while, and just focus on the task at hand. Ah, thank God for the little things.

Life-changing Holidays

If you don’t read another word from my blog, at least read/watch this, and pray.

Snippets

It’s been a while! I miss my Miami friends! How are you warm people? [It's getting a bit chilly up here] An update for the avid college football followers, FSU beat Clemson this Saturday…don’t ask me the score, I was preoccupied with devouring a yummy, pretty pizza with my roomy at a restaurant a block away from the stadium. I think my roomate, the violinist, and I have become food connoisseurs. In fact, the heck with music, we should take up food criticism. I think we practice eating, more than our instruments (vocal chords are instruments too).

We’re also into food combination discovery. Whatever that means. She’s a bit more creative than I. But my most recent exotic meal was a sauteyed mixture of spinach, ground beef, black-eyed peas, and cheese in tortilla wrap. I have to admit that it looked disgusting, and it kinda tasted like it too. So lesson number 3,456: spinach, ground beef, and black-eyed peas, need not to be mixed and ate. I’d have to say, thus far, my prettiest meals would have to be the following: