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eggtoasties · 3 years

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Chapter One: I. Allegro

Pairing: Kuroo Tetsuro x Reader

Rating: G

Word Count: 3.2k

Summary: Kuroo used to think the best sound in the world was a volleyball hitting the court on the other side of the net. Now, he has other things on his repertoire.

Counter point: Good counterpoint requires two qualities: (1) a meaningful or harmonious relationship between the lines (a “vertical” consideration—i.e., dealing with harmony) and (2) some degree of independence or individuality within the lines themselves (a “horizontal” consideration, dealing with melody).

It was illogical really, Kuroo thought to himself, having to take a mandatory arts class. He was an athlete. He would probably major in STEM or business the next year if he didn’t go pro. But here he was, staring at the course catalogue, deciding between different bands, choirs, art classes, and orchestra. Irritatingly, Kenma had finished his arts requirement last year, taking a video editing class which Kuroo thought was definitely cheating since he figured Kenma already knew the basics. Plus, he not-so-secretly believed that Kenma would benefit from another non-electronic hobby.

Sighing, he assessed each class. He knew he was tone deaf and did not want others listening to him sing. Plus, he’s seen the red cummerbunds and bow ties the choir had to wear for concerts and refused to give his teammates the blackmail fodder even if Yaku thought it looked “refined.”

To be honest, Kuroo didn’t know much about the arts. He only had the vaguest understanding of the differences between Watercolor 101, Figure drawing 101, and Oil Painting 101. While he thought of himself in the studio, palette in hand with an apron tied around him, working intently at the easel on the next generational masterpiece, he remembered when Kenma threw his pencil-drawn mockups of promotional posters in the trash and told him not to show the rest of the team.

While maybe he could try digital media, he couldn’t help but imagine himself against the romanticized backdrop of more traditional arts.

He had to choose between the several band electives and orchestra. He couldn’t do marching band—he wouldn’t be caught dead in those uniforms, wind ensemble had auditions he surely wouldn’t pass, jazz band had mandatory solos, but symphonic band was for rookies. ‘Beginners welcome,’ was typed out with an asterisk under the listing. But, so did orchestra. Doing a quick search to figure out the difference between band and orchestra, Kuroo weighed his options.

He took piano lessons from ages four through ten before finally convincing his parents to let him quit—wearing them down by crying every week and throwing a mini tantrum at daily practice—not that he intentionally did it as an elementary school student. But, even from an early age, he knew volleyball was it for him.

While he wasn’t well acquainted with classical music, he had grown up with it from his parents. Well, when they were irritated with the bickering matches between him and his older sister, their parents would crank up the car radio, drowning their yelling. His mom would tell him she used to play Mozart for him when he was a baby which is why he grew so tall—which he would always say makes no sense—and occasionally, a film score would make the hairs on his arms rise even when he was trying to focus on the scene.

So he decided. He’d enroll in orchestra for the year, make himself unnoticeable in the back, and fulfill his arts requirement so he could graduate high school and maybe apply to university. Plus, he figured, as he ticked the box next to orchestra, he’d finally be able to wear his suit his parents bought him, saying that he’d need it eventually.

Folding the course registration paper and sliding it into an envelope to be sent to Nekoma High, he stood up from his seat at the low dining room table and decided to go to Kenma’s, figuring they could squeeze some volleyball practice before summer vacation ended.

The first day of his third year was unextraordinary. He woke up tired, coaxed his bed head into something manageable, and started his commute to school, picking Kenma up on the way. Double and triple checking his course schedule on his phone and reminding his teammates that they all had to help out in advertising the volleyball club—well, maybe except Yaku—he tapped his toes with a mix of nervousness and anticipation.

His classes were nothing special, most of them a continuation of the year before or courses he carefully picked with the advice of his seniors. But, walking towards the orchestra room at the far side of the building where all the music classes were, he felt a familiar rush of nervous adrenaline spike—not unlike the nerves before a big match. But this time, he couldn’t be confident in his own skills or rely on a team to back him up. Counting the room numbers until it matched the one on his registration, he found the room with its double doors propped open.

Striding in, the large open space was in various states of organized chaos. Other students were already moving chairs in uniform columns, two to a row, and were pulling instruments out of cases. Unsure of what to do, he immediately found the teacher.

“Hi Jouda-sensei, I’m Kuroo Tetsuro,” he introduced. “I’m new—where should I sit?”

“Hi Tetsuro-kun, it’s nice to meet you,” she said warmly. “Ah, yes I see you enrolled as a beginner.” Flipping through the pages on her clipboard she hummed, “Is there a particular instrument you’d like to play?” sweeping a hand across the room. “We could always use more violas, we have enough cellos, weirdly too many basses, but we could also stick you with the second violins?”

Kuroo didn’t quite know the difference between violas and violins but figured ‘second’ violins implied that there was also a ‘first’ violins group and that he’d be more likely to be able to hide in the back in a bigger group.

“Yeah,” he drawled out confidently, “I actually wanted to learn violin.”

“Okay, perfect. Here—” she motioned another student over. “Tetsuro-kun, meet Daisuke-kun.” Daisuke greeted Kuroo with a shallow bow and Kuroo responded with a head nod, mentally rolling his eyes at Daisuke’s subtle disapproval.

“He’s first chair of the second violins,” Jouda-sensei continued, “he’ll get you set up. Daisuke-kun, have him take one of the rentals and teach him the ropes. Today’s mostly getting people set up if they don’t have their own instruments and playing through potential setlists,” she explained while twirling her pen in her right hand. “Testsuro-kun, you’re our only new violin which means everyone can help you learn—take today to be comfortable with an instrument in your hands and observe your classmates!” she finished, walking away.

“I’m Sato Daisuke, a second year,” Daisuke reintroduced, emphasizing his year.

“Kuroo Tetsuro, third year,” he said smugly.

“Ah—okay,” Daisuke said standing straighter, “Kuroo-san, follow me,” turning towards the back of the room.

Chuckling Kuroo said, “Just Kuroo’s fine—you’re technically my senior here since I’ve never played violin before.”

Stuttering a bit and covering it with a cough, Daisuke nodded once. He stood in front of a wall of neatly labelled cubbies and pulling a black rectangular case out, he handed it to Kuroo. Explaining the rules of the rental and making him sign a form, Daisuke taught Kuroo how to properly tighten the bow, use rosin, clean the instrument, and taught him simple exercises to practice posture.

Fiddling a bit with the shoulder rest as Daisuke excused himself for a second, Kuroo ran through the exercises to get himself acquainted with the feel of the violin under his chin and a bow in his right hand. It was uncomfortable, he noted. His left shoulder wanted to scrunch up towards his face, his left wrist wanted to press towards the neck of the violin, and he couldn’t comfortably hold his bow. For the first time in a while, Kuroo felt out of his element—he felt as though his body couldn’t do what he wanted it to do. He felt awkward and unsure and the back of his neck prickled as he caught other students look his way.

Finally, Daisuke came back. Holding a thin blue book in his hand he explained, “This’ll teach you the basics of reading music. The thickest string on the left is G, followed by D, A, and E. Notes go in order of A through G and it just repeats.” Making sure Kuroo was following along, he continued. “So, If we start on the G string and put a finger down,” he moved over to place Kuroo’s index finger on the first tape, “what note is this?”

“A?”

“Yup, great. Follow the tapes for where you should put your fingers, I taught you how to tune and you need to study and practice every night so you’ll be able to partially follow along in class.”

Head a little dizzy with the new information but also proud to have understood some of the basics, Kuroo nodded. Daisuke took Kuroo to the back of the group, explained to a student who Kuroo was, then took his place towards the front.

Kuroo’s stand partner was a first year—Hayato. He’d been doing orchestra since middle school, didn’t take private lessons like many of the other students, but enjoyed orchestra enough to continue in high school as a hobby. Although a little awkward, Hayato was patient when giving Kuroo a more detailed explanation of reading music, since six years of piano lessons had completely left him, and set him up with basic exercises.

“You need to make sure your left wrist is down and relaxed,” Hayato said, tapping a pencil to Kuroo’s inner wrist. “Also, your bow grip is atrocious, but that’s one of the hardest things for a beginner.” He showed Kuroo how the bow was supposed to be held, stressing how it should look relaxed and curved.

Making small adjustments while Kuroo shakily moved the bow across the strings, Hayato said, “Sensei will probably have you come during study hall to practice, but you need to practice at home too or Sato-san and the concertmaster will probably chew you out.”

Bow stuttering crookedly across the strings, making Sato tut at him, Kuroo paused. “The concertmaster,” he asked disbelievingly. “What is that?” imagining some despotic conductor in long tuxedo trails and a clipboard.

Laughing at his confusion, Hayato explained. “The concertmaster is the first chair violinist. In orchestra they’re like the leader of the group. They tune the group, come out second to last before the conductor during concerts, make decisions on bowings, and everyone kinda follows their lead.”

Nodding to himself Kuroo said, “Okay, so he’s like,” he trailed off, “the captain of the team?”

“Exactly. Except she’s a third year like you and pretty well known in the music scene in our area, y’know.”

Frowning at his assumption he admitted, “Ah, okay so,” he trailed off, “concertmistress? I play volleyball, I don’t really know music.”

Hayato laughed and Kuroo raised a brow. “I mean obviously—you don’t really look like a violinist.”

Affronted Kuroo said, “Oi, what does that mean?”

“Kuroo-san, you’re like, huge,” Hayato squeaked out.

Trying not to preen, Kuroo waved his hand and turned his head towards the front of the class.

Jouda-sensei stood on her podium and tapped her baton on the raised stand in front of her. “Hi everyone, good to see all of you again. We have a few new faces so make sure to welcome them and help them out. I’m super excited for our potential set list this year, but before I pass out the folders, let’s a hear a few words from our concertmistress!”

With scattered applause and stomping, a girl rose to the podium as Jouda-sensei stepped off. Holding her violin and bow in her left hand she beamed at the class. Briefly introducing herself and sharing her excitement for the year to make music with everyone, Jouda-sensei interrupted her return to her seat.

“For the first rehearsal, how about you formally tune us?” Jouda-sensei offered.

“Aw, no it’s okay—some people are beginners and all the section leaders already took care of it right?”

Next to her, her stand partner threw an eraser at the podium making her scowl. “Just do it, her stand partner complained,” drawing laughter from the class.

Giving her partner the finger, hidden from their sensei’s view, she laughed good naturedly and straightened her shoulders.

All of a sudden, Kuroo noted, the atmosphere in the room changed. Students were no longer whispering to each other, playing random tunes, or shuffling in their seats. Everyone’s eyes were on her at the podium. She offered an open palm and nodded towards the back of the room. A single note penetrated the silence.

She swept her hand towards the back and Kuroo was suddenly flooded with the sound of the deep and rich brass section. After a few seconds, she repeated the process and the woodwind instruments close to Kuroo in the back began to tune.

Hayato leaned towards Kuroo. “Before concerts and rehearsals everyone should’ve tuned beforehand. This more for last minute checks and also a show for the audience. The order and how many sections tune at once is usually decided between the concertmaster and the conductor—Kuroo-san, we’ll tune last.”

Nodding in appreciation, Kuroo turned his attention back to the podium. The woodwinds trailed off and after a beat of silence, she nodded once again for the tuning note to be played and she waved her hand towards the cellos and basses at her right. The gravelly resonance of the strings filled Kuroo with a strange sense of full contentment and marveled at the size of the basses, whose strings seemed to be quadruple the thickness of his own.

Finally, the concertmaster gave one last nod and tucked her violin under her chin. Hearing the drone of the pitch, everyone around Kuroo began to tune. Unsure of what to do, he stumbled to mimic Hayato who was adjusting his tuners. Since Sato Daisuke already tuned his instrument, Kuroo just played open strings and waited for the rest of his section to stop. Glancing to his left at Kuroo’s right hand, Hayato whispered sharply, “Keep your pinky curved!”

After tuning, folders were passed out to each student, filed with sheet music. Hayato organized the sheets on their stand.

“Since you’re on the inside—the left hand side of the stand—your job is to turn my pages,” he explained. “It’ll be good practice to see if you can follow along even if you can’t read, but no worries if you want to spend today just watching and listening.”

Thanking Hayato and teasing when he fumbled in embarrassment, Kuroo spent the rest of class in awe. Although the group was seeing the pieces for the first time, he couldn’t help the goosebumps on his arms as the orchestra came together. Even when he heard Hayato miss a note, noticed when the conductor would glare at a section, or when they had to stop and regroup, listening to individual instruments try come together as one left Kuroo wanting to be a part of it. From the inside, he watched as bows moved in unison and fingers slid up and down the necks of stringed instruments. He was hyper aware of the instruments behind him providing support to the main melody, and leaned towards them to catch their individual parts.

He set his gaze towards the front of the room and watched the concertmaster. Powerful yet graceful, her bow made sure movements across the strings, fingers moving quickly and accurately. Her body swayed with the music and her face, unlike Hayato’s, was not one of extreme concentration. She seemed focused as she watched the conductor and indicated entrances to her section through her body, but despite the multi-tasking, it was clear to Kuroo that she was having fun.

She trusted her section to follow along, for her stand partner to flip the pages at the right times, and for the rest of the orchestra to do their parts. When Jouda-sensei made the class begin again, she would lean towards her stand partner and share whispered giggles and Kuroo caught the glint of shiny pink polish and traced the way her hair fell across her shoulders.

He knew what being a captain was like—he had been captain since he was voted in at the end of his second year and he wondered how long she’d been playing for, how much she practices, and how she encourages her section. He wondered what the differences and similarities were between leading a team and an orchestra were—the differences and similarities between them, even.

At the end of class Kuroo promised to himself to practice a little every day to be able to play with the group and hold his own. For the rest of the school day, he idly hummed the melodies they had played in class and replayed images of bows and hands moving in unison.

In the club room before practice, Kuroo came in with his violin case. Greeting his teammates, he started to change.

Loosening his tie and pulling his sweater over his head, Kuroo heard Lev ask about his case. Swapping his school top for his practice one, Kenma responded.

“Kuroo’s taking orchestra for his arts credit.”

“Why would you take a band credit, you should’ve taken sculpture like I did,” Yamamoto exclaimed proudly.

“Your sculptures were ugly,” Kenma said evenly, over the sounds of his video game.

Before Yamamoto could respond, Fukunaga menacingly shook his water bottle at the two of them causing Kenma to turn his back and hunch defensively over his game.

Narrowing his eyes at Kenma, Yamamoto turned his attention back to Kuroo who was idly flipping through the practice book Daisuke had given him.

“Yeah Kuroo, band classes are so much work when you’ve gotta learn the instrument, why’d you enroll?”

Before Kuroo could respond Yaku jumped to Yamamoto’s side and jabbed him. “Band and orchestra are two different things you uncultured swine!”

Doubled over and grasping his stomach, Yamamoto glared tearfully at his senior, then directed his glare towards Lev who was slapping his knee in laughter.

“Kuroo-san,” Lev shouted, “can you play us something?” he asked excitedly.

Gaining the interest of the rest of the team, everyone crowded around Kuroo, nodding in unison. He rubbed the back of his head in uncertainty.

“I’ve literally just learned how to play. I don’t know if you’d really want me to.”

“We really want you to!” Lev said, encouraging him to open his case.

Begrudgingly, Kuroo went to his violin and briefly explained how to setup and tune, to the amazement of some of his teammates. Even Kenma peered curiously over his video game in the corner. He tucked the instrument under his chin, carefully held his bow and placed the hair on the A string and played. Kuroo focused intently on ensuring that his bow grip was loose, but secure, that his pinky and thumb were curved and that his bow was making straight lines across the string.

As Kuroo looked over to his teammates, he noticed Yaku’s shoulders starting to shake while he pointed a finger at him.

“I-Is that the best you can do?” Yaku nearly screamed, howling in laughter. “You’re not even moving your f-fingers!”

To Kuroo’s embarrassment, the rest of the team tried desperately to hold in their laughter and Lev deadpanned, “That kinda sucked, senpai.”

Stuttering out an indignant scoff, Kuroo’s brow furrowed, “I told you I just learned this today! A-and posture is important you heathens!” shaking his bow at Lev and Yaku.

#kuroo tetsuro #kuroo tetsuro drabble #kuroo tetsuro oneshot #kuroo tetsuro x you #kuroo tetsuro x reader #kuroo tetsurou #kuroo tetsuro scenarios #kuroo x reader #kuroo x you #haikyu x reader #haikyuu x reader #haikyu x you #haikyu x y/n #haikyuu x you #haikyuu x y/n #nekoma high #nekoma haikyuu #kuroo tetsuro fanfiction #kuroo x y/n

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missdelphinilestrange · 4 years

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1ST RULE — tag some muses you would like to know better.

@crucioslut @tmvoldemort @lokilaufeysonslytherin @thestrongestmagic

2ND RULE — BOLD the statements that are true for your muse.

current muse. Bellatrix Black - Bellatrix Lestrange

fc. For this blog there is no face claim

occupation. Student at Hogwarts, War Lieutenant / Dark Witch, Lieutenant to the Ruler of the Wizardry world, Delphi’s mother

age. 47 years old - Born. 1951 - 1998

Sexuality. Bisexual

APPEARANCE:

i am 5’7 or taller

i wear glasses

i have at least one tattoo - Azkaban tattoo on my neck, and a small rose tattoo on my left shoulder with this saying “i’m as pretty as a rose as long as you can look past the thorns that are my flaws” (not many know about the last tattoo)

i have at least one piercing - both my ears are pierced, along with the top of my left ear

i have blonde hair

i have short hair

my abs are at least somewhat defined - only because I workout a lot

i have or have had braces

PERSONALITY:

i love meeting new people

people tell me that i’m funny - humor is the only way I can really cope with my childhood trauma, so I’m often told I’m funny

helping others with their problems is a big priority for me - usually only with my sisters, or very close family. when Sirius broke out of Azkaban, I gave him a bit of my food that way he would have a bit of energy before going on the run, but I told him to tell no one I helped him

i enjoy physical challenges - it’s something that’s always been enjoyable for me, because going to the gym used to be the only way for me to escape my strict and controlling parents

i enjoy mental challenges - I’ve always been very intelligent above my years, and I set records in Hogwarts for perfect scores in all classes for my OWLs and NEWTs, so even as an adult, it’s fun to get a challenge

i’m playfully rude with people i know well - I’ve always been playfully rude or sarcastic to people I know well, because I can’t do that around my strict parents since they always said “sarcasm isn’t ladylike” or “acting like that won’t get you a husband” and my close friends and family know that I’m unruly and they accept me for that, which is why I act different in public than I do around my close friends and family

i started saying something ironically & now i can’t stop saying it - I always say “just because I kill people doesn’t mean that you can” to my youngest sister whenever she gets mad at someone. Ever since I watched Toy Story 2, whenever someone asks if I’m calling them a liar, I always say “well, if the boot fits” and then they usually punch me

there is something i would change about my personality - I wish I had the ability to stop rolling my eyes at every person I don’t like

ABILITIES:

i can sing well - singing as a child always helped me deal with whatever I was going through, so I started taking singing lessons

i can play an instrument - piano, guitar, flute, and violin

i can do over 30 push–ups without stopping - I often did push-up competitions with my friends and cousins as a child, and from that, I’ve gotten quite strong

i’m a fast runner - I used to run away from my problems as a child: quite literally, because when my parents would scream at me I’d start running away, so I learned to have a lot of stamina from a young age and run really fast

i can draw well - I always liked to draw pictures of my little sisters, and I ended up getting really good at it

i have good memory - I have really good memory, but a terrible attention span

i’m good at doing math in my head

i can hold my breath underwater for over a minute - This is because I used to go underwater while swimming and pull people down by their ankles just to scare the shit out of them because it’s funny. I stopped doing that though when I got kicked in the face

i have beaten at least 2 people in arm wrestling - this is because they’re either weak, or I cheated by kicking their shins which distracted them

i know how to cook at least 3 meals from scratch

i know how to throw a proper punch - I’ve always been very strong, and I learned how to punch by doing boxing with one of my older cousins. many people talked bad about Andromeda after she was removed from the family in the summer before my seventh year at Hogwarts, and since I knew how to punch really well, I ended up sending a lot of kids to the hospital wing that year (probably a few hundred). After Sirius was removed from the family, I got in a lot of fights with my fellow death eaters because they were talking shit about him and it made me mad. Needless to say, people don’t DARE talk bad about anyone in my family anymore.

HOBBIES:

i enjoy playing sports - Quidditch

i’m on a sports team at my school or somewhere else - During Hogwarts, Slytherin Chaser for Quidditch

i’m in an orchestra or choir at my school or somewhere else

i’ve learned a new song in the past week

i work out at least once a week - I started working out as a kid (about 8 years old) because I wanted an excuse to get away from my parents. Then, when I was 10, the reason I worked out was because I was skinny but I didn’t have much muscle. When I was 12, the reason for me working out was because I was insecure about how short and skinny I was, and I wanted to be stronger that way I could beat the shit out of anyone that made fun of me for it.

i go on runs at least once a week - running was the way I got away from my problems as a kid, and I guess it just stuck with me

i have drawn something in the past month - I drew a picture of my little girl, Delphi, playing with the flowers in the garden

i enjoy writing - writing helps me to get rid of all the stress and anxiety that I always try to hide

i do or have done martial arts

EXPERIENCES:

i have had my first kiss - first year, I kissed Rabastan to see if Rodolphus would get jealous. It backfired and Rabastan ended up in the hospital wing. I guess Rodolphus was jealous.

i have had alcohol - when I was in my first year, a seventh year I was friends with sneaked a bottle of whiskey into the dormitory during one of the house parties. I’m just amazed we didn’t get caught

i have scored the winning goal in a sports game - in my second year during quidditch, right before the other team caught the snitch, I scored ten points, and because of that my team still won even thought the other team had the snitch

i have watched an entire season of a tv show in one sitting

i have been to an overnight event - Slumberparty at a friends house

i have been in a taxi

i have been in the hospital or er in the past year - I had to visit someone I beat up that way he wouldn’t press charges. In my defense, before I even hit the guy, he tauntingly said “what are you gonna do, hit me?” so it’s his own fault for being dumb enough to say that

i have beaten a video game in one day

i have been to another country - Germany, France, Italy

i have been to one of my favorite band’s concerts

RELATIONSHIPS:

i am in a relationship - Voldemort and Rodolphus

i have a crush on a celebrity

i have a crush on someone I know

i have been in at least 3 relationships - 100s throughout Hogwarts years

i have never been in a relationship

i have asked someone out or admitted my feelings to them - Admitted feelings for Voldemort

i get crushes easily - especially throughout Hogwarts years

i have had a crush on someone for over a year - Voldemort

i have been in a relationship for over a year - Rodolphus and Voldemort simultaneously

i have had feelings for a friend - many times, especially during Hogwarts years

MY LIFE:

i have at least one person i consider a best friend - Narcissa

i live close to my school - only during Hogwarts years

my parents are still together - for some unknown reason, but yes

i have / had at least one sibling - two: Andromeda and Narcissa

i live in the United States

there is snow right now where I live

i have hung out with a friend in the past month - Narcissa

i have a smartphone

i have at least 15 CDs - Mostly classical music, but a few are American muggle music (but no one knows about the muggle songs, and they never will)

i share my room with someone - only during thunderstorms: sometimes thunderstorms are scary due to childhood trauma, so those nights are usually spent cuddled next to Narcissa for comfort and safety

RANDOM STUFF:

i have break danced

i know a person named Jamie

i have had a teacher with a last name that’s hard to pronounce - as a child, the French piano teacher the Black family hired Jakob Fínêtyeá

i have dyed my hair - multiple times. once because Sirius and Lucius teamed up and put brown hair dye in my shampoo, and followed me around for weeks calling me Andromeda. the second time my hair was dyed was recently when Lucius put purple hair dye in my shampoo and followed me around calling me Nympadora Tonks

i’m listening to one song on repeat right now - “Teenagers” by My Chemical Romance because I’m emo as hell

i have punched someone in the past week - Lucius when he put purple hair dye in my shampoo and followed me around calling me Nympadora Tonks. Narcissa then yelled at me because I broke Lucius’s nose

i know someone that has gone to jail - me, and majority of my family / friends

i have broken a bone - (as an adult, running an errand that required to go to Hogwarts) the reason was because someone was talking behind Sirius’s back saying that he’s a disgrace to the Pureblood name, and I got in a fight with that kid. Sirius saw that both of us were bruised and bloody, but I didn’t tell him why, and I never will

i have eaten a waffle today - yes because I have a terrible sweet tooth

i know what I want to do with my life - as a student: teacher, artist, actress, ministry worker: unspeakable or working with magical objects. as an adult: writer, lieutenant death eater, artist, spell maker, singer, musician (not many people know about any of my jobs other than being a lieutenant death eater)

i know at least 2 languages (fluently) - English, German, French, Italian, Gaelic, Russian, Greek, Latin, Spanish (I come from a very culturally knowledgeable family, and intelligence is very important, henceforth why I know so many languages)

Idea From: @tmvoldemort

#bellatrix black #bellatrix lestrange #bellatrix #harry potter #hp #muse

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fangirling-throughlife · 4 years

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Music is in my DNA. I think there aren’t many Spaniards who don’t have music in their DNA. And if you go to Valencia, it’s almost impossible to find someone who hasn’t studied music at least for a year, who doesn’t know to play an instrument. It’s normal, considering that there are 1.686 musical groups (bands, orchestras, choirs, big bands...) in Valencia. 40.000 musicians, 64.000 music students. Our dearest memories are linked to music from the beginning: Fallas, the weeks of festivities, 9 d’octubre, Easter... I can sing you at least one piece that matches every major religious and civil festivity throughout the year.

I was raised around music. My grandparents gave money to the town’s band to build their rehearsal space and bar, my great-uncle is the oldest member of the band, my dad is a musician... My mum doesn’t know how to read music, or how to match a pitch, nor does she have any sense of rythm. But she loves music, and my childhood was filled with Beethoven, Mahler, Mozart, Eros Ramazotti, Andrea Bocelli, Pavarotti, amongst many more.

I started to study music at age 7. I was too young to start with an instrument, so I studied a first year of musical theory before they let me decide. Back then, the opera house of Valencia was just open, and there was a segment about it on TV every single day. The instrument I saw every day was the violin, so, of course, I wanted that. Because my dad was a member of a symphonic band, the violin was out of the question, but I was so stubborn that they let me pick the next best thing: the cello. I really struggled with it. I was a quick learner but my teacher didn’t let me go beyond what was recommended for my age. Then every other cellist in my music school left, and my grandmother told me the cello was the most useless instrument of all. Not having any famous role models (back then YouTube wasn’t very well known, and definitely censured in my house after they found out my best friend looked up dirty videos on it) or even role models in my everyday life, I wanted to quit. I started to play the saxophone (again, bribed by my family and a couple of friends) while I was deciding if I stopped with music altogether or just with the cello. As a last resort, my parents transferred me to a public music school in a city not too far away, where I had plenty of other cellists and other string musicians. I started orchestra lessons, then chamber music, then I got invited to play in other student orchestras during the holidays and suddenly I knew that was what I wanted to do in my life. I stopped making homework, but composed and played the piano instead. I played 2-3 hours a day, missed classes to go to concerts. I was set on being a professional musician.

After giving in to pressure from outside to have a back-up plan, I focused a bit more on high school, and, with top grades from the class in sciences, my grades dropped (a little bit) in music school. I graduated with very good marks, but I still decided to wait a year to focus on prepare auditions while I started something at university. That first year almost became the end of me. I got depressed, I had almost daily panic attacks, and after a little more than a month my mum figured out that stopping with music classes had caused such a big change on my life that I didn’t know how to go on. That year I started having serious bone and muscular problems that made me go to physiotherapy for 3 months. That was the moment when I had to give up my dream.

Since then, I’ve had panic attacks during rehearsals, I’ve played as a soloist, I’ve been first cello for 3 years in the orchestra where I spent my high school and university years, I’ve done small tours around the north of Spain and even premiered some pieces. By the beginning of lockdown I was involved in 3 different orchestral projects (two of them linked to a higher musical education institution) and my band, even though I was finishing Biochemistry.

Now I moved. Some of the best music professors in Europe are in Belgium, but I can’t find amateur orchestras or even symphonic bands to join. Like, not with a level to satisfy me after 12 years of musical education and 10 years of orchestral experience. I had my back-up cello (because MY cello stayed in Spain, waiting for me to come home and go to 1 or 2 rehearsals), which needed a lot of tending (basically, horrible strings). The first two weeks I didn’t play at all, because I cried every time I looked at it and remembered that my dearest instrument needs to go to the atelier before I can play on it again. Then I progressively started to play more and more, and now I was playing over 2 hours a day, studying technique and concerto’s by myself. Until I decided to change those horrible strings, and today, in the span of 15 minutes, two of my medium-good strings snapped (we suspect there’s a wood splinter somewhere). It sounds stupid, even more considering that I’m starting a Master’s degree in 15 days, but I kinda lost my purpose. The moment when I’d finished the dishes and the news was over, and I had the time to start and play was hard, and I always thought I didn’t have to do it. But the moment I started, I didn’t want to stop, and I always had to because my fingers were about to start bleeding, or because it was dinner time or something.

Now that’s gone (at least, until I find a decent atelier around here and they fix it). I can’t have that moment when I sit barefoot and with my eyes closed, playing El Cant dels Ocells and connecting with something bigger than myself, occasionally with some tears. Or the moment of triumph when that last scale was right or I got to 100% of an Allegro tempo.

I’ve spent half an hour listening to pasodobles, which are pieces usually written for wind bands to play on the street, and actually crying a bit. This is my past, my present, and I want to keep it in my future so badly. I never thought I’d miss something about my life back at home, not after the hellish last years I’ve had. But now I realise I miss having music everywhere, surrounding me. I miss being part of that. Of playing Shostakovich and feeling like we’re soldiers in the Russian Revolution, playing Tchaikovsky and trying to figure out what he wanted to explain, playing Elgar and actually mourning, playing Beethoven and feeling every feeling in the world, all at once.

There’s a saying about children and teenagers in my band. “He/She has musical notes in their veins”. I’ve heard it being said about so many people in my 22 years of life, including my brother and myself. I know this is stupid from a biological point of view, but I truly believe that music is a lifestyle, and, in my case, a lifesaver.

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evak-fic-rec-turtleanon · 4 years

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Evak Fics - Music

Music au:

** Band/Singer/Musician ** Instruments ** Karaoke ** Others

***** Band/Singer/Musician *****

Suavis et decorum sicut Jerusalem by champagneleftie (2.6k words) - Pulchra es, amica mea. He can never sing it without thinking of Even. Which is ridiculous, because he doesn’t actually know Even. Has barely spoken more than a handful of words to him. Can hardly even look at him. And still he just won’t leave Isak be. Choir au

Not A Fan by glbertblythes (2.7k words) - Eva drags Isak to a local gig at a bar but Isak isn't all that interested in going nor is he interested in the band - but the lead guitarist pulls some strings for Isak the whole night.

Love Of My Life by catathena (2.8k words) - Set in the late 1970s, "50 Kroner" are trying to make it big in the rock scene. Will the boys make it on their own? Or will a mysterious stranger named Even be their missing piece? Rock band

DKLA (Don't Keep Love Around) by dobrien (10k words) - Isak is an up and coming artist dating his highschool sweetheart, Chris. Even is a little jealous. Inspired by Troye Sivan songs.

written in the stars by ourlovelybones (17k words) - Isak is very tired, but it’s still not the right word to explain the heavy feeling in his bones and the empty weight in his heart. He should be over the moon right now. He should be dancing with Even to the venue’s after-show playlist and drinking beer to celebrate his best friend agreeing to finish out the rest of his U.S tour with him. It’s more than exhaustion he feels but Isak can’t quite describe exactly what it is - and certainly not to the person who took a whole two weeks off of work to come on this tour. The one where even follows isak around on tour but isak doesn't want to deal with his feelings. Musician Isak

you're gonna sing the words wrong by strangetowns (31k words) - He looks like someone stuck together a bunch of parts they thought looked good on their own and expected the result to look like a person, with no sense of what an actual person looks like. A marching band AU.

Come On, Set the Tone by boxesofflowers, Eeyoreneedsahug (57k words) - Isak is a recently out popstar who wants to prove that he is not just another pretty face in pop music. Even is a self contained, indie singer songwriter who takes shit from nobody. Shortly after a public feud between the two begins, they’re forced together for a nationwide tour.

Twice by intothewind (101k words) - “I told them we were dating, so they’d let me in their band.” Jonas states, shrugging his shoulders. Isak and Jonas fake date which then makes things complicated between them. And then there's Even, the lead singer, which complicates things even more. Threesome. Angsty.

(WIP) Wireless by ChrisJordyn (15k words) 5/6 chapters posted - Even leans into Isak’s side. He feels so nice. And warm. His hair against his neck. The sound of his breath. It’s heaven. He hasn’t felt this safe in ages. That’s when The Thought pops back into in his mind. "What if I’m gay?" The church band 5+1 au

(WIP) we are made up of love and hate by everythingislove (straykid), puddingandpie (42k words) - Last update July 2018. The one where Isak joins his best friends on their first North American tour and definitely does not fall for Even Bech Næsheim, their infuriating(ly handsome) opening act.

(WIP) Bassline by riyku (59k words) 12/16 chapters posted - Isak is a Norwegian ex-pat, fresh out of NYU with a journalism internship, who bags an assignment covering a band from his former hometown of Oslo on their first North American tour. It takes him about three seconds to realize he kinda has a thing for the bass player. riyku is brilliant!

***** Instruments *****

you can tell everybody (this is your song) by withoutwords (713 words) - Isak’s fumbling at the frets of Even’s guitar, the blunt lines of his fingernails scratching at the wood.

how i'm feeling by boxesofflowers, Eeyoreneedsahug, safficwriter (1.3k words) - A hungover boy squad watches Isak and Even flirt through a guitar lesson.

O Helga Natt by ichliebeskam (1.5k words) - Even gives Isak a guitar lesson but Isak is grumpy because he doesn’t get it. This and a little more

Heart and Soul by wordsarelifealways (1.5k words) - Jonas asks why Isak never plays piano any more. Naturally, it leads to him playing again.

If Not For You by minutebyminute2121 (1.7k words) - Isak walks the same way to work everyday as part of his habitual routine. That is until one day his usual route is obstructed by a closed road and he has to walk a different way and gets distracted by a certain boy playing guitar.

Just B♮ by Jules1398 (2.3k words) - Isak knows nothing about guitars and somehow he finds himself working in a store that sells them. Well, at least there's the hot guy that always comes in and plays while he's on shift.

Someday You Will Find Me Caught Beneath a Landslide by AlasBohn (4.4k words) - Isak's neighbor plays his guitar every night. Isak falls asleep to it every night until he doesn't.

And that's my song, unheard by Anonymous (8.4k words) - Isak is a second year at Nissen, and he's also a violinist at the local music school. The day a new pianist arrives is the day his world is rocked off its axis.

Just two boys and a piano by depressed_mermaid_53 (8.5k words) - Even just started a new art school and there's a beautiful boy that no one talks to. Even is completely enthralled by him the second he sees him. or Isak plays piano and Even suddenly has a love for listening to piano music

Evoke by TheGirlNoOneKnows5 (16k words) - Isak and Even are roommates attending the Norwegian Academy of Music. Isak is an enigma until their sleepless nights are no longer spent alone. Pianist Isak. Guitarist Even.

Play That Song by kapplebougher (41k words) - Every day, Even catches a boy in a snapback who sneaks in to play the piano at the summer camp Even works at. Even's never seen him before. But if the boy's good looks hadn't already captivated him, then his phenomenal piano-playing ability certainly has. Even doesn't know much about love at first sight, but he thinks that this is pretty close.

The boy next door by Zabn (110k words) - Isak looks at Jonas, hoping the blush has already disappeared from his cheeks, he nervously scratches his neck. Fuck, did Jonas notice that he was staring at his new neighbor? Even plays the guitar and sings.

(WIP) tell me what you see by whalefairyfandom12 (8.3k words) - Last update Feb 2019. Isak is a pianist. It's who he is, and sometimes it feels like that's all that's left. At first, Even is nothing more than the asshole who stole his practice room--a film major with a surprising passion for music. There's something undeniable about his charm, though, and the more time they spend together the harder it is to ignore.

***** Karaoke *****

Bright Eyes by boxesofflowers, Eeyoreneedsahug (857 words) - Isak is a great singer. Several people are surprised. Happy karaoke where nothing hurts and Isak sings to his boyfriend.

i'll be coming for your love by ihatefindingusernames (1k words) - Isak and Even meet in a karaoke bar

Ready to Jingle Your Bells by MacksDramaticShenanigans (3.5k words) - Even did sing him a song, and what kind of a boyfriend would he be if he didn’t serenade Even right back?

***** Others *****

(for when they are not musicians or music is not the focus...)

it boy by spoopydumpling (445 words) - Even serenades Isak with a special song

not the kind of fool who's gonna sit and sing to you by hippopotamus (1k words) - Isak doesn't sing, and Even doesn't get surprised by Isak anymore. Actually, neither of those statements is true.

I don't want to miss a thing. by glbertblythes (1.2k words) - Songfic based on i don't want to miss a thing by aerosmith. Very sappy.

Stjerner Lyser Skinnende by MacksDramaticShenanigans (2.4k words) - Their daughter plays the violin for an orchestra.

Who Wore What by wyoheartsmusic (2.9k words) - Even is a fashion blogger that has some things to say about a certain singer's outfit choices

Defying Gravity (Britain's Got Talent) by nessauepa (4.3k words) - Their daughter goes on Britain's Got Talent. It's super sweet.

No Rain, No Roses by Fxckxxp (23k words) - Isak and Even restore a house together and make it a home. Even plays the guitar every now and then (probably not enough as a focus to justify putting it on this list but this fic is so good).

tell him that his lonesome nights are over by fauu_stine (25k words) - After their mother's death, Isak and Lea have to leave Oslo to join their father, who's living with his new girlfriend, Aurora, and her own son, a young man named Even. Singer Even.

i would like to get to know you baby by ourlovelybones (39k words) - Isak wakes up to ten strange texts from Eskild and three missed calls from his manager. He's almost worried someone has died until the screenshot comes in. Even Bech Næsheim had tweeted about him. AU in which Even is an internationally famous singer and Isak is an up and coming model he finds on twitter, a.k.a based off of the iconic Zara Larsson

#evak fic rec #skam fic rec #music #music au

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goftor-blog · 4 years

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XE3F8753 – Mijaíl Glinka (Михаил Иванович Глинка), Tikhvin Cemetery (Saint Petersburg)

Mijaíl Ivánovich Glinka (en ruso: Михаил Иванович Глинка; Novospásskoie, provincia de Smolensk, 1 de junio de 1804-Berlín, 15 de febrero de 1857) fue un compositor ruso, considerado el padre del nacionalismo musical ruso. Durante sus viajes visitó España, donde conoció y admiró la música popular española, de la cual utilizó el estilo de la jota en su obra La jota aragonesa. Recuerdos de Castilla, basado en su prolífica estancia en Fresdelval, «Recuerdo de una noche de verano en Madrid», sobre la base de la obertura La noche en Madrid, son parte de su música orquestal. El método utilizado por Glinka para arreglar la forma y orquestación son influencia del folclore español. Las nuevas ideas de Glinka fueron plasmadas en “Las oberturas españolas”. Glinka fue el primer compositor ruso en ser reconocido fuera de su país y, generalmente, se lo considera el ‘padre’ de la música rusa. Su trabajo ejerció una gran influencia en las generaciones siguientes de compositores de su país. Sus obras más conocidas son las óperas Una vida por el Zar (1836), la primera ópera nacionalista rusa, y Ruslán y Liudmila (1842), cuyo libreto fue escrito por Aleksandr Pushkin y su obertura se suele interpretar en las salas de concierto. En Una vida por el Zar alternan arias de tipo italiano con melodías populares rusas. No obstante, la alta sociedad occidentalizada no admitió fácilmente esa intrusión de "lo vulgar" en un género tradicional como la ópera. Sus obras orquestales son menos conocidas. Inspiró a un grupo de compositores a reunirse (más tarde, serían conocidos como "los cinco": Modest Músorgski, Nikolái Rimski-Kórsakov, Aleksandr Borodín, Cesar Cui, Mili Balákirev) para crear música basada en la cultura rusa. Este grupo, más tarde, fundaría la Escuela Nacionalista Rusa. Es innegable la influencia de Glinka en otros compositores como Vasili Kalínnikov, Mijaíl Ippolítov-Ivánov, y aún en Piotr Chaikovski. es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mijaíl_Glinka es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Cinco_(compositores)

Mikhail Ivanovich Glinka (Russian: Михаил Иванович Глинка; 1 June [O.S. 20 May] 1804 – 15 February [O.S. 3 February] 1857) was the first Russian composer to gain wide recognition within his own country, and is often regarded as the fountainhead of Russian classical music. Glinka’s compositions were an important influence on future Russian composers, notably the members of The Five, who took Glinka’s lead and produced a distinctive Russian style of music. Glinka was born in the village of Novospasskoye, not far from the Desna River in the Smolensk Governorate of the Russian Empire (now in the Yelninsky District of the Smolensk Oblast). His wealthy father had retired as an army captain, and the family had a strong tradition of loyalty and service to the tsars, while several members of his extended family had also developed a lively interest in culture. His great-great-grandfather was a Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth nobleman, Wiktoryn Władysław Glinka of the Trzaska coat of arms. As a small child, Mikhail was raised by his over-protective and pampering paternal grandmother, who fed him sweets, wrapped him in furs, and confined him to her room, which was always to be kept at 25 °C (77 °F); accordingly, he developed a sickly disposition, later in his life retaining the services of numerous physicians, and often falling victim to a number of quacks. The only music he heard in his youthful confinement was the sounds of the village church bells and the folk songs of passing peasant choirs. The church bells were tuned to a dissonant chord and so his ears became used to strident harmony. While his nurse would sometimes sing folksongs, the peasant choirs who sang using the podgolosochnaya technique (an improvised style – literally under the voice – which uses improvised dissonant harmonies below the melody) influenced the way he later felt free to emancipate himself from the smooth progressions of Western harmony. After his grandmother’s death, Glinka moved to his maternal uncle’s estate some 10 kilometres (6 mi) away, and was able to hear his uncle’s orchestra, whose repertoire included pieces by Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. At the age of about ten he heard them play a clarinet quartet by the Finnish composer Bernhard Henrik Crusell. It had a profound effect upon him. "Music is my soul", he wrote many years later, recalling this experience. While his governess taught him Russian, German, French, and geography, he also received instruction on the piano and the violin. At the age of 13, Glinka went to the capital, Saint Petersburg, to study at a school for children of the nobility. Here he learned Latin, English, and Persian, studied mathematics and zoology, and considerably widened his musical experience. He had three piano lessons from John Field, the Irish composer of nocturnes, who spent some time in Saint Petersburg. He then continued his piano lessons with Charles Mayer and began composing. When he left school his father wanted him to join the Foreign Office, and he was appointed assistant secretary of the Department of Public Highways. The work was light, which allowed Glinka to settle into the life of a musical dilettante, frequenting the drawing rooms and social gatherings of the city. He was already composing a large amount of music, such as melancholy romances which amused the rich amateurs. His songs are among the most interesting part of his output from this period. In 1830, at the recommendation of a physician, Glinka decided to travel to Italy with the tenor Nikolai Kuzmich Ivanov. The journey took a leisurely pace, ambling uneventfully through Germany and Switzerland, before they settled in Milan. There, Glinka took lessons at the conservatory with Francesco Basili, although he struggled with counterpoint, which he found irksome. Although he spent his three years in Italy listening to singers of the day, romancing women with his music, and meeting many famous people including Mendelssohn and Berlioz, he became disenchanted with Italy. He realized that his mission in life was to return to Russia, write in a Russian manner, and do for Russian music what Donizetti and Bellini had done for Italian music. His return route took him through the Alps, and he stopped for a while in Vienna, where he heard the music of Franz Liszt. He stayed for another five months in Berlin, during which time he studied composition under the distinguished teacher Siegfried Dehn. A Capriccio on Russian themes for piano duet and an unfinished Symphony on two Russian themes were important products of this period. When word reached Glinka of his father’s death in 1834, he left Berlin and returned to Novospasskoye. While in Berlin, Glinka had become enamored with a beautiful and talented singer, for whom he composed Six Studies for Contralto. He contrived a plan to return to her, but when his sister’s German maid turned up without the necessary paperwork to cross to the border with him, he abandoned his plan as well as his love and turned north for Saint Petersburg. There he reunited with his mother, and made the acquaintance of Maria Petrovna Ivanova. After he courted her for a brief period, the two married. The marriage was short-lived, as Maria was tactless and uninterested in his music. Although his initial fondness for her was said to have inspired the trio in the first act of opera A Life for the Tsar (1836), his naturally sweet disposition coarsened under the constant nagging of his wife and her mother. After separating, she remarried. Glinka moved in with his mother, and later with his sister, Lyudmila Shestakova. A Life for the Tsar was the first of Glinka’s two great operas. It was originally entitled Ivan Susanin. Set in 1612, it tells the story of the Russian peasant and patriotic hero Ivan Susanin who sacrifices his life for the Tsar by leading astray a group of marauding Poles who were hunting him. The Tsar himself followed the work’s progress with interest and suggested the change in the title. It was a great success at its premiere on 9 December 1836, under the direction of Catterino Cavos, who had written an opera on the same subject in Italy. Although the music is still more Italianate than Russian, Glinka shows superb handling of the recitative which binds the whole work, and the orchestration is masterly, foreshadowing the orchestral writing of later Russian composers. The Tsar rewarded Glinka for his work with a ring valued at 4,000 rubles. (During the Soviet era, the opera was staged under its original title Ivan Susanin). In 1837, Glinka was installed as the instructor of the Imperial Chapel Choir, with a yearly salary of 25,000 rubles, and lodging at the court. In 1838, at the suggestion of the Tsar, he went off to Ukraine to gather new voices for the choir; the 19 new boys he found earned him another 1,500 rubles from the Tsar. He soon embarked on his second opera: Ruslan and Lyudmila. The plot, based on the tale by Alexander Pushkin, was concocted in 15 minutes by Konstantin Bakhturin, a poet who was drunk at the time. Consequently, the opera is a dramatic muddle, yet the quality of Glinka’s music is higher than in A Life for the Tsar. He uses a descending whole tone scale in the famous overture. This is associated with the villainous dwarf Chernomor who has abducted Lyudmila, daughter of the Prince of Kiev. There is much Italianate coloratura, and Act 3 contains several routine ballet numbers, but his great achievement in this opera lies in his use of folk melody which becomes thoroughly infused into the musical argument. Much of the borrowed folk material is oriental in origin. When it was first performed on 9 December 1842, it met with a cool reception, although it subsequently gained popularity. Glinka went through a dejected year after the poor reception of Ruslan and Lyudmila. His spirits rose when he travelled to Paris and Spain. In Spain, Glinka met Don Pedro Fernández, who remained his secretary and companion for the last nine years of his life. In Paris, Hector Berlioz conducted some excerpts from Glinka’s operas and wrote an appreciative article about him. Glinka in turn admired Berlioz’s music and resolved to compose some fantasies pittoresques for orchestra. Another visit to Paris followed in 1852 where he spent two years, living quietly and making frequent visits to the botanical and zoological gardens. From there he moved to Berlin where, after five months, he died suddenly on 15 February 1857, following a cold. He was buried in Berlin but a few months later his body was taken to Saint Petersburg and re-interred in the cemetery of the Alexander Nevsky Monastery. Glinka was the beginning of a new direction in the development of music in Russia Musical culture arrived in Russia from Europe, and for the first time specifically Russian music began to appear, based on the European music culture, in the operas of the composer Mikhail Glinka. Different historical events were often used in the music, but for the first time they were presented in a realistic manner. The first to note this new musical direction was Alexander Serov. He was then supported by his friend Vladimir Stasov, who became the theorist of this musical direction. This direction was developed later by composers of "The Five". The modern Russian music critic Viktor Korshikov thus summed up: "There is not the development of Russian musical culture without…three operas – Ivan Soussanine, Ruslan and Ludmila and the Stone Guest have created Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and Borodin. Soussanine is an opera where the main character is the people, Ruslan is the mythical, deeply Russian intrigue, and in Guest, the drama dominates over the softness of the beauty of sound." Two of these operas – Ivan Soussanine and Ruslan and Ludmila – were composed by Glinka. Since this time, the Russian culture began to occupy an increasingly prominent place in world culture. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Glinka en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Five_(composers)

Posted by Enrique R G on 2019-09-12 09:20:20

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10000badframes · 5 years

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Why I Left Music

To understand why I left music, you've got to start with why and how I got into music.

When I was little, I was deaf, and when my hearing was restored, it came back in stages. I would listen, rapt, to a My First Symphony tape as the sections of the orchestra were introduced one by one, and as time went on, each became more intelligible. High pitches were easier to discern, so the flute stood out like a beam of light in the darkness. What's more, I was surrounded by music on a daily basis. My dad is a wildly creative and intuitive musician, proficient on a number of instruments, my mother and brother sang beautifully, and my sister had been singing and playing violin from an early age. We sang as a family at home and at church, and I was in choir and handbell choir from my earliest memories on. I don't remember not being able to read music. I started with piano, and moved to flute once my arms were long enough for the starter headjoint, in about fourth grade. My first teacher was the principle flute player with the Rochester Philharmonic, and when I moved to Iowa, I learned from the principal of the Des Moines Symphony. Both teachers made the smart move of throwing repertoire at me which was much more advanced than the usual stuff at my level, and because I didn't know it was supposed to be hard, I rocketed forward at a feverish pace. I continued with choir and handbell choir, and as my skill became more evident, I added youth orchestra, honor band, and pit orchestras, and that was just after school. During school I was in marching band, concert band, jazz band, and orchestra. I attended elite months-long summer camps for the nation's best young musicians. I competed regularly, and at one point was considered to be one of the top three musicians in my age bracket in the country. My first tattoo was of a treble clef. As a shy child in a talented family, I was pleased to have found my talent, the thing I didn't have to work very hard at in order to achieve great things. I rested my self-confidence on that talent, and when opportunities came up to show it off, I didn't turn them down. Nobody forced me to do any of the activities above; it came with a built-in social life and plentiful affirmation, so I almost never paused to think about whether or not this was something I actually wanted to do forever. It was simply assumed, as inherent a fact of life as the sunrise. I probably should have known it wasn't for me when practicing was boring; almost unbearable. I heard about people enjoying practicing, and assumed that they were lying in order to look good. I would avoid it however I could, and did pretty well regardless. I loved ensemble work because I loved music, but listening to myself for hours on end, however good the result was, was miserable. At the worst of times, I assumed that my hatred of practicing meant that I was lazy and undisciplined, inherently a bad artist, and probably a bad person. I heard talk about 'flow state,' and how it made the time fly. Having never achieved it, I assumed that it was a lie. Since I'd specialized to such a high degree, music was the only course to follow in college. The culture surrounding classical music then became much more evident, divorced as it was from my little Midwestern fishbowl. I learned about the way I was expected to present my gender, and was pressured by my teacher to grow out my pixie cut out of concern that I wasn't feminine enough to be a flute player. I learned about the ingrained gender divide, and how child-bearing was considered the knell of doom for female musicians. I learned that I was one of thousands of young musicians all competing for the same handful of jobs, which could wait for perfection to walk through the door as the market was so flooded. I learned that blind auditions don't mask your gender if the judges can hear you inhale. Most depressing of all, I learned that my chances of getting an orchestral job - the only thing which I enjoyed about being a musician - were so small as to be statistically impossible. I would have to join the military, become a teacher, or quit. At first, I quit. Two years into my bachelor's degree at a prestigious school, I quit, leaving my family and community reeling in shock. They had all invested faith, time, and money in my dream of being a musician, and I had thrown it away. To them, it appeared to be an impulsive, flaky, and selfish decision to make, flying in the face of every opportunity I'd been given. To me, I was trying to stand up for myself. I was lost, depressed, occasionally suicidal, and suffering from ulcers. I was still battling the notion that I was lazy and undisciplined, and now everyone I knew saw me in the worst possible light. I leaned into my new failure status, and piled bad choices on top of bad choices, embarrassing myself and my family. Years later, when I had leveled out somewhat and come to terms with the fact that I needed a bachelor's degree in order to be taken seriously on the job market, I wanted to do anything except for music. I enrolled in a community college and took math, science, and art courses, the latter having been a hobby of mine since I was young. I'd been drawing cartoons to put in my boyfriend's lunch for years, and in my drawing and painting classes, I honed the skill. When the time came to transfer my credits to the state college, the majority of my post-high school credits were in art and music. I applied at the state's art school, and was turned down. My financial reality became clear; in order to get a bachelor's degree in under three years, the majority of my transferrable credits were in music, so to music I had to return. I was accepted at the music school, and went back to rehearsals, practicing, and competing. It was much the same as the last time, in ways both good and bad, with the notable difference that this time I was resigned to the impossibility of it all. Whenever people said they'd had a satisfying practice session, I lied through my teeth and said I had, too. I incurred my debt, got my degree, and left with zero intention of pursuing a master's, surfing a new wave of disappointment from teachers and my community alike. The shambling zombie of my career ambitions followed me when I moved to New York City due to my husband's job, and I paid hundreds of dollars for lessons from eminent professionals at Juilliard and the New York Philharmonic. I took masterclasses, invested in new equipment, and auditioned. Nothing substantial ever came from it, as the statistics had foretold. I watched my classmates move into the military and teaching, with a lucky few going on to teach at the collegiate level, and even fewer achieving a performance career. I practiced, and hated every minute. Then, at my breaking point, I watched Monsters University. It's such a weird way to switch gears. People took a number of things away from their experience of MU; mine was the message that you can be amazing at something and still never hope to make a career of it. What you have to do when you've faced up to that truth is to find what you loved about the career you thought you were going to have and apply it somewhere else. Adapt. Something better might be waiting. I thought about how live music is being replaced with synthesized music and orchestras are dying across the nation. I looked at my dusty art portfolio. There were dozens of animators in that credits sequence after MU, I thought. There are two flutes in every orchestra. The next day, I sat down with my husband at lunch, and said, "let's move to California. I want to be a 3D animator." This was surprising coming from me; I'd only ever reluctantly taken to digital media, and barely knew how to use Photoshop. My reasoning was that if I wanted to be at the forefront of a growing industry, and if I re-trained in animation, I would have a better chance of getting work than I had now (there was nowhere to go but up in that respect.) There would be more opportunities for both of us out in California, where his company had a major office, and where several prominent studios were housed. He agreed immediately, and got me The Illusion of Life for my 29th birthday. Maya is a hell of a tough program at the best of times. It has a mind of its own, and even when everything is running smoothly, you have to contend with such gauntlets as the graph editor (a mathematical representation of motion over time.) You know what you want the characters to do, but you have to use this thorny, labyrinthine program to do it, and I've cried many tears of frustration over it. You are responsible for every single movement, every blink, every shrug, every breath. It is dizzyingly easy to mess up, and impossibly, sixteen-dimensionally complicated. And yet. Flow state, that thing I thought was a lie? I found it. It was about six months in, while I was still wrestling with the program. I was grappling with the reality that I'm not naturally good at this, that my talent lies elsewhere, and any progress I make in this quarter will come from elbow grease alone. I was making adjustments to a scene, and realized that four hours had passed unnoticed. I felt energized and satisfied. I craved more. At thirty, I found out that I wasn't lazy and undisciplined, that I didn't hate hard work, that I wasn't a terrible person - I was just very, very good at something I didn't truly want to do. Now, I struggle and weep and sink weeks and months into seconds worth of footage, and I love it. Wild horses couldn't keep me away.

#career change #classical music #flow state #3d animation #personal

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blue3ski · 7 years

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Thanks for tagging me, @musical-mockingbird!

1st: tag 9 people you’d like to get know better: @vampyrekat @espresso--martini @colorblindly @ballerinamila @livinlavidaquokka @what-even-john-adams @little-mintings @defying-gravity229

You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to, please don’t feel obligated!

2nd: BOLD those statements that are true for you

APPEARANCE: I am 5'7" or taller I wear glasses (can’t do contacts or even have laser surgery cos I have misshapen eyeballs) I have at least one tattoo I have at least one piercing (I had? But the holes have closed up) I have blonde hair I have brown eyes I have short hair My abs are at least somewhat defined I have or have had braces

PERSONALITY: I love meeting new people People tell me that I’m funny (thank goodness) Helping others with their problems is a big priority for me I enjoy physical challenges I enjoy mental challenges (except math. Please no) I’m playfully rude with people I know well (I call my best friend a wench on the regular) I started saying something ironically and now I can’t stop saying it There is something I would change about my personality (I do have quite a mean streak)

ABILITY: I can sing well (I was in church choir for 15 years as a mezzo soprano) I can play an instrument (my beloved violin) I can do over 30 pushups/crunches without stopping I’m a fast runner I can draw well I have a good memory (for literature and music. The rest of the time, I have the memory of a sieve) I’m good at doing math in my head I can hold my breath underwater for over a minute (thank you choir training) I have beaten at least 2 people in arm wrestling I know how to cook at least 3 meals from scratch I know how to throw a proper punch (most valuable lesson my brother ever taught me)

HOBBIES: I enjoy playing sports (I do like badminton) I’m on a sports team at my school or somewhere else I’m in an orchestra or choir at my school or somewhere else (does worship band count) I have learned a new song in the past week I work out at least once a week (started again after a two-month hiatus where I was being hermit-y) I’ve gone for runs at least once a week in the warmer months I have drawn something in the past month I enjoy writing FANDOMS ARE MY #1 PASSION I do or have done martial arts (does one Muay Thai class count?)

EXPERIENCES: I have had my first kiss I have had alcohol (and never will again bec allergies) I have scored the winning goal in a sports game I have watched an entire season of a TV show in one sitting (JDramas since they’re only 10-11 eps long) I have been at an overnight event I have been in a taxi I have been in the hospital or ER in the past year (taking care of my grandma) I have beaten a video game in one day I have visited another country (and looking forward to more) I have been to one of my favourite band’s concerts (2015: Bastille and my ultimate love Muse)

RELATIONSHIPS: I’m in a relationship I have a crush on a celebrity I have a crush on someone I know I have been in at least 3 relationships I have never been in a relationship I have asked someone out or admitted my feelings to them I get crushes easily I have had a crush on someone for over a year I have had feelings for a friend

MY LIFE: I have at least one person I consider a “best friend” I live close to my school My parents are still together (uneasily so) I have at least one sibling I live in the United States There is snow right now where I live I have hung out with a friend in the past month I have a smartphone I have at least 15 CDs I share my room with someone

RANDOM SHIT: I have breakdanced I know a person named Jamie I have had a teacher with a last name that’s hard to pronounce I have dyed my hair (I ADORE red hair) I’m listening to one song on repeat right now (All This Time by OneRepublic) I have punched someone in the past week I know someone who has gone to jail I have broken a bone I have eaten a waffle today I know what I want to do with my life (Write forever) I speak at least 2 languages (English, Filipino, the Hokkien dialect, basic Mandarin. I understand Mandarin better than I can speak it) I have made a new friend in the past year (yaaay)

#tag meme #me

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wmucradio · 7 years

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Q & A with Gabrielle Smith of Ó (formerly Eskimeaux)

On April 12th, I attended a show at the Black Cat featuring the band formerly known as Eskimeaux* as the opening act, followed by Why? It was the first time I had been able to see Gabrielle Smith and her gang perform live, so I was very excited. The show was incredible, and the band was very tight. Every pause or idiosyncratic beat was facilitated expertly by Felix and Gabrielle, followed by head nods and curtsies between Oliver and Jack. The band is a joy to watch live, as you can see and feel their chemistry in every song. The set included many of my personal favorites, along with a few previews of new material. Following their set, I met with Gabrielle for a “brief” interview that ended up lasting over an hour. I can only speak for myself when I say this, but our correspondence felt more like catching up with an old friend than it did an interview. Gabrielle Smith is honestly one of the most pleasant human beings I have ever had the pleasure to meet. I have transcribed questions from the interview below.

*Since this interview, the band has changed their name to Ó. This came to fruition following a confrontation with Inuk throat singer, Tanya Tagaq, in which she made clear that the term “Eskimo” is considered derogatory by much of the Inuit population.

Q: What music did you grow up on?

A: When I was growing up my parents were really into Carol King, the Carpenters, and I grew up in choirs. So I was always performing, thinking about, and singing really weird hymns. A lot of Hallelujah and stuff like that. And my grandma is a pianist, so she would always play really good classical stuff.

Q: Was that when you started with music making? (Like when you were a kid, through choir, or did you do other things?)

A: Yeah, it was between that and I took violin lessons when I was growing up. But I didn’t really think of it as “making music.” I feel like when I was little I didn’t understand that choir, and orchestra, and Ace of Base were the same thing. There was this really big separation for me between musician, which I didn’t understand as being human, and the product. I sort of knew phonetically El-ton John and Ce-line Di-on, and Ace of Base. But didn’t understand that they were people until I was much older.

Q: Was it sort of like finding out that Santa Claus isn’t real?

A: It’s kind of the same thing. You’re like “Oh my god, someone made this. This is like art, I guess. Woah.”

Q: Are you still coping with that realization?

A: It’s kind of hard to. I feel like making music and doing this has made it clear that musicians are human beings. But I still didn’t connect some of my favorite ones. Like Why? for example. I was like “I could probably meet so-and-so if I networked this way.” Or “I bet this person through this person knows person X.”

Q: So it’s still kind of non-people with artists that you’re into?

A: Yeah. I mean, especially ones from my younger years.

Q: Did you have any specific female influences in your life when it comes to songwriting or even getting into instruments?

A: Yeah. Definitely Bjork was a huge one. Joanna Newsom. So amazing. So amazing. It’s unreasonable. I remember hearing her for the first time. There was this kid that went to a different high school. I thought he was so cool. He had a band, and wore scarves, and was very glam. He had “The Book of Right On” on his Myspace page, and I was like “What is this? I’ve never heard anything like this before. This is so amazing. It’s kind of annoying and it’s so brilliant. And the lyrics are so amazing. And I’ve never noticed lyrics before. And holy sh*t.” It was a huge realization. So, Joanna Newsom. Really big one. And probably Greta, from Frankie Cosmos.

Q: I was actually going to ask you about shaving your head. Because I know you’ve done it, she’s (Greta) done it, and so has Adrianne Lenker from Big Thief. I was wondering if it was significant in some way or if you all just did it?

A: So, I was on tour with Oliver’s project, Bellows, and Felix’s project, Told Slant, and The Hotelier. Pride Weekend happened and my friend Meghan shaved her head, and I was like “Wow. You look so hot and cool. I just think I need to know if I could do it.”

Q: Are you into any other art form? Because I know that you went to University of the Arts.

A: For like a second. I went for like a month. It was so bad. Not that the University of the Arts was bad, I was bad. I just felt like they… First of all, I wanted to go for animation. And they were like you could go for animation or you could go for film and we’ll give you a half scholarship. And I was like “okay, what’s the jig here?” And I never found out because I only stayed for a month. I basically got offered to go on a tour with this band, and then I said yes. And then I called my parents from Indiana. And I was like “I’ve been on tour for a week, and I’m not in school. So…”

Q: How did they take that?

A: They were really pissed, obviously.

Q: When did they finally come around- Have they come around?

A: They’ve come around. They came around. I mean, my parents have always been really supportive. But they really, really, came around after Frankie Cosmos played at the MOMA. That was the moment, they were like “Oh, this is cool.”

Q: Was it a hard decision for you?

A: I didn’t like it at all. I was miserable. We were just watching Westerns, and it’s so unreasonable. There were kids in my class that had turtlenecks and low pony tails. It was like the black turtleneck with the round glasses, the low pony tail, and the beret was what really pushed it over the edge for me. You can do anything you want. You can dress that way and it’s totally fine! I just think that sitting in a class talking about which Western is the best in the summer, while wearing those things. And that being said, it was really air-conditioned, so I kinda wished I was wearing it too. But I didn’t give in. My point is that these kids just took themselves really seriously. And I feel that the point of art school is that you’re supposed to unlearn everything you know so that these professors can say “this is how you do it. This is what art school is all about. This is the technique you never knew. If you don’t allow us to fully give you what we know, you’ll just waste your money here.” But these kids were like “my name is Remington.” I don’t know how else to explain it. It was just a vibe that I got. The kids were just super like “I was the weird kid in my town in New Jersey.” That’s also fine. I don’t know, I feel really stuck-up saying all this, but. My priorities were just elsewhere. I also think I wasn’t ready to go to college, realistically.

Q: Were you trained on the instruments that you play now, or were you self-taught?

A: I took piano lessons very minimally from my grandma. It was nice, except I was an asshole. She was teaching me about all these important things like scales and I was super not interested in what she had to say. I was like “Piano sucks.” It’s super overwhelming. It looks like nothing, so it’s just really weird. But lo and behold, I play keyboard in Oliver’s band. Well, I play synth. It’s more like pushing a button and turning the knob. I do know the chords!

Q: How was growing up in New York? Did you feel like you had a normal childhood?

A: I think so. My parents work so hard. My dad is a lawyer. And my mom’s had a bunch of different jobs, but they’ve always in the finance department of whatever thing she’s doing. Right now, she works at this humongous insurance company. I think they insure business, so like malpractice insurance. I only know this because I worked there for a little while, and they gave me this really fancy title. I was a “Junior Financial Analyst.” However, I was scanning W-9 forms and digitizing their clientele. I was basically a scanner.

Q: It’s fine. I just gave myself a job. My sister has this madrigal group so I made myself their “administrator.” But now I’ve actually started to do things!

A: What are you doing?

Q: I’m booking a gig for them! It’s crazy.

A: Wow, a madrigal choir. That’s so cool. I love that.

Q: My sister’s all about renaissance music. I’ll be listening to my music in the car and she’ll just be like “can I put on my recital repertoire?” and I’ll be like “Oh my god, okay fine.” And it just completely ruins my day, but it’s fine. She’s actually really good, so I don’t mind. But I don’t really like other people’s voices.

A: There was one day where for a few minutes we listened to Gregorian chants. And it was so amazing. Jack is really into this mash-up artist named Neil Cicierega. He just came out with a new record Mouth Moods. So, you should totally check it out.

Q: Is it what it sounds like it’s going to be?

A: Yeah. Well, he’s really about All Star by Smash Mouth.

Q: Why is everyone all about that song?

A: It’s just what it is.

Q: SO confusing.

A: It’s just the most amazingly horrific pump-up jam. You’re just like “yeah, I think I can do whatever I set out to do today.” So one day, this guy, Neil Cicierega, decided to mash up the YMCA to the Inception soundtrack. It’s really moving and really emotional. So we’ve been pranked a lot with that. You should just listen to it. It’s bad to describe it. You should listen to it even though you shouldn’t.

Q: I understand. Back to All-Star, the radio station played All-Star for 24 hours straight once.

A: That’s like two- two stories about that. One day, we tried to listen to Build This Pool by Blink-182. We tried to take the 45 minute challenge. We made it like 10 minutes I would say, but we had to stop. The other story is that I used to go to this camp, called Camp Lohikan. It was on the New York/Pennsylvania border. It was a really shi*ty camp. But the camp owner thought it would be really funny to play Hero by Enrique Iglesias for a full day over the loud speaker for the entire day of camp. So I forever know all the words to that song. We tried to cover Hero actually. We learned it one time, but forgot it since. So, we’ll have to learn it again!

Q: If you weren’t doing music what would be doing? What would your dream job be? Because I’m assuming this is your dream job.

A: It is my dream job, definitely. Well, I have this back-up plan. Which requires a lot of money. So it’s not really a good Plan B. But my friend and I are super passionate about animals. She works at the ACCT in Philadelphia. It’s a kill shelter, but her job is getting animals to rescue. So she calls rescues all day to promote animals that are ready to be adopted. She’s very cool. We have this pipe dream to have an animal sanctuary. And there was a moment this year, I guess it was last year, where I was just feeling super down on everything. I was like “What the f*ck am I doing? Why am I doing this? What does this mean? This is super weird. Well, you know. This is such a weird job. And it’s based on validation which doesn’t always come. Or like when you’re not on an album cycle, what are you doing? You’re just living your life and it’s weird. And I grew up in a choir, so being like “listen to me” is a weird impulse that I don’t really possess naturally. So anyway, I was having this whole moment of crisis, and then I called up my friend. We were talking about it and saying “we could just have an animal sanctuary.” And she was like “There are a bunch of goats in my job right now. You should come down and pet the goats.” And I was like “I can’t come down, because if I pet the goats I’m going to take them home.”

We discussed the pros and cons of having a goat as a pet in New York City, but decided that it probably wouldn’t be a good idea. However, according to Gabby, a goat would likely be one of the few animals that would understand her dog. She’s had her dog, Frankie, for 4 years. He’s a smallish pitbull-esque dog that a lot of their neighborhood kids are scared of. However, Gabby stated that he’s a very good “muffin.” We talked a little bit about the Chinese zodiac, along with the origin of the line “2011, the Year of the Rabbit.” (It was a “really good rhyme” that was incidentally true!) This led to a discussion about reading horoscopes and being a Taurus.

Q: What do you embody about a Taurus?

A: Well, we’re really stubborn. And we love food and money. And aren’t really good about either of those things. In that, because I have such a high standard for what food should be like, I’m really picky about quality. Though I’ve been trying to get better because obviously touring is a nightmare. It’s more of just like an “oh my god, this texture is disgusting” type of thing. I’m really weird about food. Like, I don’t like fruit. Yeah, none of it, it’s gross. I mean, I like lemons and limes.

We discussed the correctness of calling lemons and limes, “fruits.” Ultimately, we decided to be honest and call it what it is. They’re more along the lines of sauces and stuff to make lemonade with. Lemonade, according to Gabby, is just “sauce in a cup.” Back-up Plan C for Gabby may well end up being “Cup Sauce” lemonade. She’s even come up with the slogan: “Buy it. Do you like it?” A slogan that I immediately shot down and told her that she’d likely need to hire a better PR person. Gabby then brought up her stage banter during her set and said it’s not very good at selling. I, however, disagreed. Her understated and meek “thank you’s” perfectly compliment the direct tone in her songs.

She did tell the crowd earlier in the night that she was in a really bad mood. An issue that started earlier in the day with a looming phone call that she had already pushed back. The ride to DC was also stressing her out, and causing her to be angry and grumpy. (Something that I could never imagine!) She was able to turn it around though, and it ended up being totally fine. There were also some issues with the voltage of her second-hand Japanese amp. She was getting shocked during soundcheck but the sound guy helped her out with all the technical bullsh*t!

Q: Have you ever felt that you’ve had something to prove, because you are a female musician, to people who might know a lot about the technical stuff and things like that?

A: I think that I did when I was younger and first starting. I feel like I was really, really, adamant about being my own producer and recording everything myself. And whenever I enlisted the help of other people, it was as an arrangement kind of thing. I had a really big, well it wasn’t a really big deal, but I had this other bandmate who was a man. For a while, it was just the two of us. And a lot of times, people would come up to him, asking him questions. Or they’d be like “producer, Him, and songstress, Gabrielle Smith.” It was just like “Ew. F*ck. Uh, no.” So it took a lot to kind of re-write that. But, that being said, I am super, super, lucky. All of my friends have been supportive and treat me as an equal even though most of them are male. We all share secrets about songwriting with each other, and it’s this super reciprocally nice supportive process. So I’ve been in a bubble basically, for my whole coming up time. (She’s referring to her music collective here.) It’s been easy in that way, but I do think that people, even on this tour don’t assume- like, I work my own merch table, and a lot of times people are like “oh, is this the opening band? Are they good?” And they just assume that I’m not in the band. Most times, people generally know who we are before we get there. Yeah, it’s been really chill, to answer your question. I feel like it was harder when I was younger, but now I don’t really care, so I don’t think about it.

Q: What are you working on now?

A: I feel like, usually all of my songs have already come out before we come out with an official record. So yeah, this time, we have a whole record written. I’ve written a couple more songs on this tour that I want to see if they’re better than some of the other songs. Because some of them are kind of like- they’re good, but they don’t make sense on the record.

Q: Is there a theme that they’re not fitting?

A: Well yeah. The record, I think, the overarching theme, is sort of the opposite of O.K. Where O.K. was very like “and this moment is this, and I’m in love with this person!” and “ this moment is this, and I like you.” And “this is how you’re affecting me in this moment.” It was very descriptive of external observation and how I was feeling about them. The new songs are a lot more internal, and more about trying really, really, hard to exist in the present and not being able to fully be there. It’s a lot more impressionistic. There’s more color rather than nature. It’s a lot more internal and hard to escape yourself kind of feeling.

Q: And this was around the time you were having your “goat moment”?

A: Oh yeah! So sick- I’m gonna call it that from now on.

Her hope is that the band will hit the studio after this tour and the next tour (w/ Frankie Cosmos). She’s hoping they’ll be done tracking the record by July, and that it’ll be done and ready to release by the Fall. She’s very excited about it. In a new song, there’s even a visual of a goat that is trying to stand on a moving truck bed, but is having a difficult time standing up. She was hoping they would play this new song on tour, but they couldn’t due to instrumentation needs.

Q: What’s your favorite part about coming to DC?

A: Well, usually. This is going to sound like a humble brag, but I’m really good buddies with Bob Boilen. He’s the best, and so nice. Kate Tempest is in town, and he was like “I’m so sorry, I can’t come to the show. Usually you know that I’d come make it work, but you’re playing at exactly the same time as Kate Tempest. She never comes here, so.” And I was like “it’s totally fine,” but now I’m really sad. We just like chill. He’s so chill. The last time I saw him, Eskimeaux came here and played at Rock and Roll hotel with Japanese Breakfast, and he stopped by the NPR office. And we had written this Christmas song the night before that we performed on All Songs Considered. It’s really good. I actually stole- for one of the new songs that we played tonight, I realized that I actually stole one of the melodies and chord progressions from the Christmas song. And I had to text Michelle and be like “I hope this is okay. I’m really into this song that I just wrote, but I know that I stole the “Christmas tree-ee” part, and I know that it’s maybe not chill to do that. And she was like “oh my god, it’s fine.”

We then discussed the fact that interning at NPR’s Tiny Desk is my dream, our love for HBO’s Bored to Death, and methods for figuring out the name of someone you’ve forgotten. If you’re wondering, the right way to do it is by introducing another friend to the aforementioned forgotten friend, and just hope that they’ll say their name.

Gabby told me about her favorite things about touring: amazing food and being touristy. (Places that she recommended include White Sands National Park and Meow Wolf in Santa Fe.) Along with seeing friends from other cities and getting to tour with bands that are super inspirational to her.

“This is so surreal, and it’s really amazing that I was able to get so out of it that I was in a bad mood.”

When I told her that it was completely human to feel bad, and that she shouldn’t be apologizing or feeling bad for feeling bad, she said something that made me realize what an amazing artist (and person) she is.

“I just want so badly to not normalize this experience at all- and have it be this overwhelmingly amazing thing.”

We talked a bit more about the pros and cons of touring. According to Gabby, the worst thing about tour is that she’s not as available to be a good friend. It’s hard to be like “just so you know, I’m still your friend. Tell me if you need anything, I love you.” Another things is navigating her coffee addiction. Something that started when she was working at a coffee shop in New York. She told me a bit about her experience there, which she asked to have off the record. She now drinks two cups a day, but Oliver is on a very rigorous coffee schedule. She goes along with it, but now has gotten into buying tinctures, so that she won’t need coffee as much. Apparently they taste like sh*t, but she’s been putting it into Kevita. (Which is basically just “bubbly cup sauce.”)

Q: Super weird question, but would you be willing to take a mirror selfie with me?

Written and transcribed By No Boys Allowed DJ Ava Mirzadegan

#dc #interviews

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americanahighways · 4 years

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Barbara Stephan is passionate about her music as well as spreading the gospel about the rewards, and risks, of a musical career.

Based in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin area, Barbara Stephan has made a name for herself for her sultry R&B voice and versatile styles as leader of the Barbara Stephan Band, as part of her current duet with singer/songwriter Peter Mack, and as a soloist. She has performed with national artists such as Susan Tedeschi and Jon Paris. During September 2019, she released her first CD, Motown-inspired Come on Over to Me, with her 10-piece backing band.

Among her many accolades are nominations for the Wisconsin Area Music Industry (WAMI) awards as 2020 Singer/Songwriter of the Year and, with the Barbara Stephan Band, 2020 R&B/Soul Artist of the Year.

Singing and songwriting are part of Barbara Stephan’s makeup and DNA. While she has tried many paths in her life away from music both educationally and professionally, she has always been drawn back to her life’s blood of music willingly forgoing luxuries and making the sacrifices necessary to dedicate her life to music.

The accompanying photographs are from one of the last live performances of the Barbara Stephan Band in early March 2020 at the ACA Entertainment Original Music Showcase, before Wisconsin’s stay-at-home order took effect. Her band is just beginning to perform again in limited public appearances.

Barbara has a lot on her mind these days about a lot of subjects—her music and influences; the headwinds aspiring musicians face as they embark on a musical career, including the discouragement they typically receive from family, educators and others; and the need for education in the business of being a musician.

Probably the most important tips Stephan would have for aspiring musicians interested in building a career would be to persevere and pursue the dream.

Barbara Stephan has found some interesting ways to use her creative talents during the current COVID-19 epidemic turmoil —including providing remote vocal lessons and spreading her wings as an aspiring fantasy author.

I had the pleasure of doing an extensive phone interview with Barbara Stephan during the height of Wisconsin’s governmental stay-at-home order. Here are some edited highlights from our conversation.

AH: When did you begin to sing?

Barbara Stephan: I first discovered I could sing, or when people told me I could sing, in church when I was at a really young age. Our family had just moved to small town of Afton in southern Wisconsin. I started going to church when I was five. By the time I was 7, they put me in the adult choir. This really helped me develop my ear with singing harmonies at a very young age.

AH: Describe your earliest influences.

BS: My dad is a guitar player and was really into jazz. As I got a little older, he was teaching me a lot of jazz and had me singing Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn at a really young age. I grew up listening to classics and standards like Louis Armstrong. I became a huge Chrystal Gale and Patsy Cline fan. That’s what I grew up listening to. Singing along with my dad and playing the guitar.

I took jazz piano lessons up until about 16 years old. Then I really wanted to start playing and singing more pop and rock—stuff my friends were listening to. I always did appreciate jazz, but I started to get into Prince, The Cure, Wham, George Michael and Michael Jackson. I’m a huge Michael Jackson fan.

AH: When did you start performing professionally?

BS: I actually had my first tavern gig with my dad at age 13. I remember we had to fight with my mother because, oh my gosh, she did not want me hanging out in bars. Which of course I understand! That was when I started playing keyboards and singing in my dad’s band.

I started to branch off and left my dad’s band, singing in little jazz duos and combos. When I was in my early 20’s, I auditioned for a band called Wall of Sound in Madison. That was so much fun! I was also listening to bands like Earth Wind and Fire, Tower of Power and Aretha Franklin, which was the kind of stuff they were doing. That really satisfied my love for singing harmonies. I was with Wall of Sound for a few years and then I moved to the Milwaukee area. Later in my 20’s, I auditioned for a band called Cold Sweat and the Brew City Horns.

I was always working full time jobs and rehearsing and gigging on the weekends. And I was working as an administrator for the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra. But I hated office work –sitting under fluorescent lights all day in my cubicle. There was a lot about the job I loved, but a lot that I hated.

AH: You have been influenced by many different styles, genres and performers from different backgrounds. Your band feels like a “big band in a small package.” How would you characterize your band’s music?

BS: Definitely a soulful R&B-ish horn band kind of approach is the style I like the best. Some of my songs lean more into specific genres than others. Overall, I really love the style of music from old school Motown R&B horn section bands or a little bit older. And then I try to infuse the music with a little bit of pop and a little bit of modern-day soul.

AH: You also sing frequently in a duo with Peter Mack. Contrast the style between your band work and your duo work.

BS: It’s different but it’s similar. Peter mostly plays acoustic guitar. We both have a penchant for blues-soul-R&B type music. But we also do classic rock. Most of the feedback we get from people who know us as a duo and then know my music is that we take all of the covers that we do, and we fashion them around a more soulful R&B style. For instance, we’ll do Led Zeppelin, we’ll do an Ozzy Osborne song, we’ll do ZZ Top, Alice Merton, and DJ Aloopa, and more current stuff. All of it lends itself to this soulful R&B approach.

What I love so much about my duo with Peter Mack and what I don’t necessarily experience with larger bands is that the arrangements are so free flowing. Every week it’s something different and the solo sections can extend that forever. This is the most artistically freeing place we both can be because it is just the two of us. We have the freedom to do whatever we want – we can do every kind of style and genre.

AH: You have been nominated this year for two WAMI awards, as Singer/Songwriter of the Year and your band as R&B/Soul Artist of the Year.

BS: I am very excited about that! To be recognized by my peers on a local level is really exciting. I’ve never been on the WAMI radar before. It’s nice to see my name listed with all of these other Milwaukee and Wisconsin artists that I admire so much.

AH: What kind of challenges have you faced in your music career?

BS: As I was coming up through the ranks as a teenager and in my early college days, people told me I would never make a living as a musician. There was no support for me at all in what was a dream that seemed to be completely unachievable. Back at that time, looking around, there was no one making a living as a musician. So I floundered around from office job to office job and college to college. I tried this degree and that degree, and I was so unhappy and languishing in this belief system that there was no way for me to make a living as a musician. Knowing what I know now, that was completely untrue. There are many avenues and many ways to make a living as a musician.

I did spend years living in studio apartments, paying pretty low rent and driving a cheap economical car in order to do what I wanted to do. Marriage and children, and a big house and fancy cars and all of that stuff were not a part of my dream at that time. Part of my dream was waking up whenever I wanted and performing when I wanted to perform and teaching other people to realize their musical goals.

AH: What advice would you give to an aspiring young musician?

BS: My overarching message to anyone thinking of a career in music is to do it if you absolutely have to do music. If there is really nothing else that speaks to you, then do it. A music career will challenge you at every level of your being. If you are pursuing music because it’s what you must do, then make a commitment of potentially living in one room with few possessions.

My husband and I recently did a presentation about making a living as a musician for Career Day at Brookfield Central High School. I have quite a few high school students in my studio. We had a really long list of potential careers as a musician or ways to be involved in music, including being a teacher or being a hobbyist musician or a salon or a professional musician. We have friends who are in a symphony orchestra who went that route. If you want to practice violin for 8 hours a day, that’s amazing. Go that route. Or do you want to be Lady Gaga famous? Set your goals.

The question I always ask high school students is about the climate they see currently. What feedback are they getting from guidance counselors and educators and parents about what seems to be an unachievable dream. I would say that 90% of them were being discouraged at every level from going into music.

But then there was one girl who raised her hand who said she was from a family of professional musicians who had a completely different angle and were very supportive of her.

It’s important to seek advice from people in the music industry. What kids don’t understand, especially when they are being discouraged, is that being around people who have already made a living as a musician are the kind of people who are going to be able to tell you all of the different ways you can achieve a music career. They will also give you encouragement and advice on how to succeed.

It might take you more work and effort than you ever thought you were capable of. For any person who is going through entrepreneurship or going to be self-employed, this is probably going to take you a lot more time and a lot more effort than you could ever imagine. But it’s going to challenge you in ways that will enrich you so much as a human being.

AH: How are you maintaining your sanity in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic and social distancing restrictions?

BS: This has been quite a test for my husband, Mark Antoniewicz, and me. We are working together professionally, and we just got married in November 2019. While we are at the same time going from these extremes of being incredibly fearful. You know, we have our days where we are totally despondent and fearful about what’s happening and we have our days where we are very hopeful. In the meantime, I always wanted to do an online video-vocal series of lessons because I have so much to say about my own journey of being a singer.

I completed two videos that I sent to all my students to keep us connected and to give them a daily means of practicing all aspects of having a really healthy vocal technique. I’ve always wanted to do online videos but felt I didn’t have the time. Now I have nothing but time, so the online video vocal series is really exciting.

AH: In addition to your voice coaching, what other projects are you involved in?

BS: I am actually writing a book. I am in the middle of the second draft. It’s kind of a strange story. The inspiration happened from a song that I wrote called “Willow.” As a child, I was really attached to a beloved willow tree in our backyard. As an adult, when that tree died, I couldn’t believe the grief I experienced. I was completely unprepared for the emotional upheaval. So I wrote this song and for some reason out of this song I began to have this vision involving the Baba Yaga and all of her wisdom.

The Baba Yaga is the old crone who lives in the woods who eats children. She is the quintessential witch out of Russian folklore who lives in a hut with chicken legs for stilts. She runs around in the forest in this chicken leg house and is a very scary intimidating character. I started to have these visions and this story line began to come along of the Baba Yaga who appears to be monstrous, but who is here to tell the story that she has completely been misunderstood as have all of the monstrous characters in all of the stories.

Her message is that it is actually because of the monsters, and not in spite of the monsters, that humans evolved. The Baba Yaga and other monsters like her are actually here for human evolution. While it’s been their job to scare us, to make us hide under our beds and in our closets, this occurred to make us more aware of the fear within us so that we can eventually transcend the fear. Without that fear, humans would not have the tools to evolve.

AH: You have also been involved in promoting original music and musical talent.

BS: Yes. Matt’s role is as business owner and president of ACA and North Coast Management. My role is to support him and his vision, which is to provide as much work and performance opportunities as possible for musicians. Because of the incredible quality and integrity of the people he has been able to surround himself with, I couldn’t help but want to be involved. It feels really good to provide a sound structural foundation and provide every level of support as possible for musicians coming up through the ranks who want to pursue a music career.

AH: Will you try to reflect our current experiences during the COVID-19 crisis into any of your songs?

BS: I am working on a song about what I would really like to do right now, which is to get in the car and take a road trip to the mountains. If I could hide away in the mountains until this is all over, that would make me really happy. I would love to sequester myself in a mountain cabin somewhere and do a lot of self-reflection. This poses a lot of questions like what would I do if my music career went away? If everything we knew and loved and valued was stripped away from us, which has happened to countless millions of people throughout human history, how would I cope? What would I do, who and what am I really, and what really does have value to me?

AH: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

BS: I would like to be doing what I am doing now, but on a larger scale, such as regional tours with my original band. I would like to build more of an online presence. I also want to write more music, including more show and television music. Maybe another full album’s worth so that I have a show with all my best music. I have a 2 hour show now, which is exciting, but I would like to write more music for it.

I don’t aspire to have a big touring gig—I have two step-kids now, I’m married and kinda rooted to where I am, which is wonderful and beautiful and amazing. I wouldn’t mind going out for a few weeks at a time to smaller theaters—more intimate venues, regionally and then in different areas of the country. My shows lend themselves very well to those places.

To find out more about Barbara Stephan, visit her website, barbarastephanmusic.com. Barbara’s upcoming performances with her band as well as her duo work with Peter Mack are on her website, as well as at ACAEntertainment.com.

INTERVIEW: Barbara Stephan: Passionate Soul-Infused R&B and an Inspiration to Aspiring Musicians @barbarastephanmusic @brookbillick #americanamusic Barbara Stephan is passionate about her music as well as spreading the gospel about the rewards, and risks, of a musical career.

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zappingclaudia-blog · 6 years

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Brava! Interview with an Opera Singer: Luisa Fernanda Munster

Colombian Soprano Luisa Fernanda Munster is well known for her beautiful lyric voice and exquisite musicality. A cantor for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Newark and the Diocese of Paterson, she has been heard as a soloist with the choirs of the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart and with the New Apostolic Church. After her early training as a violinist, Ms. Munster continued her studies at Rutgers University, the Universitat Mozarteum — Salzburg, Austria (under Gudrun Volkurt & Norman Shetler), the Conservatorio di musica "A. Pedrollo" — Vicenza, Italy and most recently with tenor Marcello Nardis in Rome. She has been seen in recital throughout the NJ/NY area as well as in Tallahassee, FL, and as part of the InFondi Musica Festival in Fondi, Italy. Most recently, Ms. Munster placed as a national semi-finalist in New York Lyric Opera's annual vocal competition.

I'll start simple though when did you first start playing the violin?

I first started playing violin in the 4th grade through my school's music program. I started learning the viola in 7th grade and in 8th grade I sang for my first audition for a spot in the NJ All State Chorus as a singer (I got in btw)

My focus now is much more in vocal than instrumental, though I do still play the violin. As a matter of fact I have a performance this weekend with a local orchestra, The Bloomfield Symphony, where the players are both amateur and professional.

I did see you have a performance coming up, that's exciting! I have this very faint memory of going to see you play way way back in Clifton High School! Is there any reason you're focusing more in vocal? And for your singing is there any special training you did/do?

The reason is actually quite simple - I'm much better at singing than playing! heeheehee

I played violin and such all through high school, but never really took private lessons that would be key in advancing my skills with such a technically complex instrument like the violin.

Not that there isn't a ton of training involved in signing, particularly in classical singing (which is un-amplified), but for me, it came must more naturally. In the case of singing, we are our instrument.

As far as my training, though I always sang in some capacity through high school and college choirs or the school musical, I didn't really start as a soloist until much later . I started through a series of summer intensive sessions in Salzburg and then started with private teachers. I have a voice teacher/mentor who is in Rome and I work locally with my voice teacher here in NJ and a coach in NY. I've also had the fortune of going back to Italy a couple of times to attend master classes, as well.

That's amazing that it came naturally to you though. I take after my mom who says “canto bien pero se me oye mal” (Roughly translated:I sing well but it sounds bad) Was your masters musically related?

More of a "car and shower" diva, huh? lol

My sister and I have some pretty epic duets

Funnily enough, I didn't study music in college. I studied Criminal Justice (I was on a pre-law track). But performing and music turned out to be my path. So I'm a bit of an alternate track kinda gal.

Wow! So do you think if you hadn't chosen music you would have been a lawyer?

As a kid I always thought my ideal "when I grow up" job would be to be a judge.

Go figure

Like I said, though, there is lots that goes into this profession, only one element is the actually singing. There is working with various languages, stage movement, knowledge of musical styles and historical performance practices, the business of music (i.e knowing how to organize a concert and pimp yourself out).

You're right, my professor talks a lot about what goes into music and it amazes me because there's so much to learn in the arts. So what did you do to study it all and become more familiar with how to organize a concert and “pimp yourself out”?

You know, in addition to taking workshops and things, a lot of it is practical experience. The pimping is absolutely related to networking. As you get hired for gigs, you learn what different directors are looking for. You learn the value of good camaraderie in these musical projects (particularly since they are usually short-term) and also the value of being prepared and professional. Directors remember , even more than someone who has a golden voice, someone who is easy to work with.

Much of what I do currently is actually liturgical work. I sing in various churches throughout the area and am currently director of my own small spanish choir at a church in the city. The training for that is similar - I took workshops to learn about liturgy (the order of mass, the role of a church music ministry) and added that to what I know musically

That's a situation where I, as a soloist, work entirely through networking. Touching base with people, sharing work with colleagues too is a big help. This is very small musical world so word gets around - the good and the bad alike-

That sounds like a good takeaway for everyone and definitely like good advice for those pursuing the same path

What advice do you think you would've given your younger self?

That's a great question. I'd say absorb as much as you possibly can. Every performance , either as a performer or a spectator, is an opportunity to grow as an artist. Take in not only the things you enjoyed about a show/experience, but also what you didn't enjoy - the "What not to do"

Great! Just one last question and we can wrap this up. What are some of your favorite pieces to sing?

Another great question! Well I'm a Mozart gal - 100% - so anything I can get the opportunity to sing by him I do. As a matter of fact, this past summer I made my Italian debut at an opera festival singing one of his more challenging arias "Martern aller Arten" from the opera "Abduction from the Seraglio". It's also known popularly (from the movie Amadeus) as the song with "too many notes".

I'm also enjoying singing Puccini and enjoy cheesing it up with a show tune or two in my recitals

(I sing "Granada" playing castanets...delightfully corny but a crowd pleaser - lol)

This is perfect thanks so so much again! This was really fun.

For anyone who wants to watch and listen to Luisa singing “Martern aller Arten,” or the song with “too many notes,” I highly recommend you click this link:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8EPCbbYe9QxbEdncEFvTVotVmc/view

“O Holy Night (A. Adam)” Performance

youtube

Like what you hear? Follow her on these!

https://soundcloud.com/luisa-fernanda-munster

https://www.facebook.com/lfmunster/

https://www.instagram.com/musicalmunster/

#musician #artist interview #opera #mozart #marten aller arten #classical music #soprano

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