Brrrrr! Time to Get a Jacket.

So I went to a St. Louis Symphony Concert on Friday...the first in quite a while. It was a really interesting program...Dad, you would have hated every minute of it. :) There were a couple of pieces by this French guy named Messian. The first one was pretty sweet, but the second one was this one for woodwinds, percussion, and piano called "Exotic Birds." Now, usually I can find something I like in every piece of music, so I don't say this lightly: this particular piece gave me a headache. It was quite the cacophony...it sounded more like "Attack of the Large, Man-Eating Birds" than anything else! :) There was a rad gong clash in it, though, that I thoroughly enjoyed. Anyway, there was another piece by Stravinsky and another piece that was arranged by Shostakovich...I don't remember what they were. My favorite piece, though, and the reason I came to the concert, was "Pictures at an Exhibition" by Modest Mussorgsky, arranged by Ravel. It's a piece that Mussorgsky wrote about pieces that his late artist friend painted. After he died, there was an exhibition of all his paintings, and each part of the piece depicts a different painting. I love that piece. I've decided that I'm going to play it someday. :)

Rebekah and I are getting to be great friends! We run up and down to each other's dorm rooms a lot and work on theory together, have random jam sessions, talk about life, and just chill. We're in the works of planning a trip with our friend Matt to the St. Louis Science Center, which sounds like OMSI, so I'm pretty stoked about that. Her mom is the one who leads our knitting group and who taught me how to knit, and she's way cool, too. They even said that I could come back to Wisconsin with them for Thanksgiving if I don't have anywhere else to go. :)

I have a concerto competition coming up the week after next, which is really scary. What's even scarier is that they still haven't set a date for it, which means I still don't have an accompanist. Even scarier: I have to have the thing memorized, which isn't going so hot right now. Well....I guess there's not a lot I can do except practice hard, go in, learn a lot, and hope for the best, right?

I turned in another paper on Thursday for Jr. Comp. This one was a proposal for reform on a local issue. Not being from St. Louis, I pretty much write all of my papers for this class about UMSL or some aspect of it. :) I've often wished for a grocery store within walking distance of the campus, so I wrote my proposal about how UMSL and the communities around it should have a university city. I now have to turn it into a speech that I have to give the week after next. It shouldn't be too bad. Even though I may not be the most amazing speaker in the world, I'm very thankful for the small experiences I have had with my one term on the CCC speech team and in the speech class I took!

I've started research for my Music History paper. I think I'm going to do it on the viol/viola da gamba, which is an instrument from the middle ages. Sadly, the instrument is more like a bass or cello than a viola, but I think it will suffice and will still be interesting. :)

I visited a thrift store on Saturday to find a "real" winter jacket. I figured I should go this week before it got any colder and I couldn't even walk to the thrift store to find a jacket because it was too cold. :) It's become SOOOOOO cold here! The windchill yesterday made it feel like 10 degrees colder than it was. Ugh. Feels like 31 degrees in OCTOBER. How sick is that? I'm not so sure how I feel about midwest winters. I'm a little afraid of the rest of the winter...if it's this way now, my mind is imagining something comparable to Dante's Hell for the rest of it! When I got the the thrift store, I wasn't quite sure what constituted a good winter jacket, so I asked a random lady at the thrift store, and she helped guide me a little. So now I have an intense, long wool coat that I feel a little ridiculous in, but at least I'm nice and cozy now! Hopefully I'll stay that way! :)

One of the highlights of my week: the UMSL band concert. They brought in a random village band from Germany to play with them and the conductor was complete with lederhosen (I seriously think Dr. Richards needs some lederhosen!). It was sweet! But that's not even the best part. They played Czardas.........with solo TROMBONE. It was AMAZING! Hahahaha, I laughed the whole time because it was so awesome! This German trombonist guy kicked some serious butt. At the end of the concert, however, they played "Stars and Stripes Forever" with a combined 150-piece band. You know the piccolo solo in the middle? They played it with TWO unison piccolos. (I think an instrument of that........caliber.........should travel alone, if it must travel at all! ;) )Stephen leaned over to me during the solo: "How do you get two piccolos to play in unison?" I reply: "Shoot one!" :)

Anyway, the days are long here, but the weeks are flying by. Please keep me in your prayers! Take care, and I'll see you all soon. :)

Love always,

Maren