caffeine will see me through

The nature of life at Brevard creates a strange atmosphere sometimes. Good strange, I mean. For example, I was eating alone at lunch today (I was a little earlier than usual and it the cafeteria was pretty empty) when I noticed none other than Andres Diaz sitting at the opposite end of the table. These things happen a lot -- famous and ridiculously talented people like Diaz mixing right in with the students in the midst of their day-to-day. For those of you wondering who this dude is, check this out. The trio mentioned in that link, the Diaz Trio, gave a concert on Monday night that was by far and above the best concert I have heard since I got here. They played some Dohnanyi and some Kodaly (early 20th century Hungarian composer... very folksy and awwwwesome). But they opened with Andres Diaz doing a solo Bach cello suite which just... blew me away. And that isn't easy to do with solo anything, especially something as antiquated as Bach, but it was so full of personality and beauty! I couldn't even see him as he performed because I had walked in last minute, too late to find a seat, and had to hide around a corner just to hear him. His performance made me so excited about playing Bach that I decided to play my partita for Donna Lee at my last lesson with her the next morning, and it was well worth it; we had the best time together, both of us throwing our hands around like wild women and exclaiming about Bach's genius.

Speaking of Donna Lee, I have decided that I really like her, as a person, a performer, and an educator. All of my complaints about inefficiency put aside, I think she is very talented and kind, and I would love to work with her again in the future. My next teacher, Elizabeth Pridonoff, gets here on Saturday, though, and since she's the reason I came here I am naturally very excited to meet her and play for her.

This week has been very, very busy, and the next few days are the culmination of it all, so I'm feeling the pressure! Tomorrow I am premiering a new song in an afternoon recital, and then that evening I am playing the synthesizer part in a piece for the Transylvania Symphonic Orchestra (one of the high school orchestras here). On Saturday I play for three competitors in the concerto competition, which will be terrifying -- orchestral reductions are so hard. And on Sunday, if any of my instrumentalists make it I will be accompanying them in the finals, which are a public performance. Wish me luck, because I will need it.