#AMWRITING #BLOGGING – THROWBACK THURSDAY – PLAYING THE VIOLIN AND HOW TO AVOID IT

GALLLNNNN

Note: This is the post that was famously "stolen" and was being sold online when I first began my blogging/writing, or whatever this phase of my life/career is. It was brought to my attention by Aaron Brinker, a good friend, who was running a Dad blog and posting about his son. In a show of solidarity, I went along and raised hell, although at the time, I wasn't living on my writing, as many of the people who had had their posts hijacked and sold online were, so it was important that I go along, as well. I'm glad I did. Intellectual property is the property of the person who thought it up, and stealing anything like that for profit, when these wonderful men and women were trying to eke out a living was awful. With the advent of different net security features and ways to track your own work, it's much, much harder for people to get away with things like that now. Yay!

Ring ring!

Me: "Hello!"

Manager: "Hey, Mary. Are you doing anything the week of November 20^th to the 25^th?"

Me: "Well, let me check my calendar." Sound of pages flapping in the breeze. "Hmm, nothing but the "Merry Parade of Turkeys" and "Turkeys, We Got Your Turkeys Right Here with The Skitch Henderson Sound-Alikes." At this time, I am living in Charlotte, North Carolina. I am also still playing in Tampa and pretty much driving all over the south. I am also exclusively playing the viola, because I loathe, despise and generally hate playing the violin (Note: This is called "foreshadowing" in Great Writing, which this isn't.)

Manager: "So, you have open time?"

Me: "Yes." To my everlasting regret, I said, "Yes."

Manager: "Great! I need a violinist for..."

I didn't hear the rest. I was in shock. I told people for years that I didn't play the violin. I never played the violin - well, except for those five years, when I first started out in the Los Angeles Public School District, but we didn't have violas, we had 3^rd violin parts, which were TREMENDOUSLY boring, and even in my first all-district concert, I somehow weaseled my way into the 2^nd violins, which I thought pretty much sucked too. If I hadn't found violas, I might have given up the whole upper string things altogether and taken up the cello, but my hands are way too small, and all I've ever been able to play on the cello is stuff in micro-tones that sounds like “Singapore's Greatest Hits”, so I'm so grateful Beethoven wrote boss viola parts and made my life forever happy, but I'm really rambling now and if I talk about Beethoven, Mr. Wells will haunt me and give me another “C-” on a paper that really deserved an “A”. But Bobby Lee knows all about that! Oh God, I'm doing it again! Stop DIGRESSING!

So, I'd rent these god-awful violins with tin strings and "play" in these violin sections, in the hopes that people would get the hint and quit hiring me to "play" the goddamned violin. I'd tell my managers shit like, "why the hell are you hiring me to play the violin? Did every other violinist in Tampa die/migrate/go into the Witless Protection Program, where they belonged, the idiots?" They still hired me. 

These horrible bricks of wood that were rental violins also had tapes on them for the "Suzuki" method, were just terrible; my fingers would "trip" over the tape, thus un-enhancing my playing. That pussy Suzuki shit with tape is beyond horrible. How in the hell are you going to understand that when your hand shifts from From 1^st to 2^nd position, all of the intervals change from – for a D Major Scale – open D string, whole-step, whole-step, half-step, whole-step (or open A string), whole-step, whole-step, half-step in 1^st position to - for 2^nd position - (3^rd finger on the G string, whole-step, whole-step (or high-position on the “D” string), half-step, whole-step, whole-step, whole-step, half-step. These configurations change for every mode (Major or minor, Aeolian – being natural minor, Mixolydian; there are seven in all) and for every scale. String players routinely shift to whatever position suits their playing style; I tend to jump all over the place; 1^st, 4^th 6^th, 2^nd, 3^rd, whatever. For Shostakovich's Big Symphony Number 5, we're in about 11^th position I think for the famous viola solo. We, and be we, I mean all string players are subject to this, are at the mercy of physical laws and the higher up the fingerboard we go, the more important are ears become. Some of the intervals are micrometers apart. That's where our “hand-framing” exercises come in, and that's the last of any kind of facts you'll read in THIS post. I truly digressed!

If you learn the "Suzuki" method you're hand is frozen in one position using the tape system, and if you can't use hand-framing and play by ear, and LEARN your goddamned fingerboard like the God, the Pedagogue Ivan Galamian intended, burn that hunk of wood! You don't deserve to call yourself a non-fretted string player.

I tried drinking my way through rehearsals and that didn't work. I started ending up in first violin sections. You know what really, really sucks? Playing Mozart on the violin. Yes sir, there is Hell in a barrel right there. The only two things that Mozart ever wrote that were worth a shit were “Don Giovanni” and his “Great Mass in C minor”; the latter left unfinished at his death. I have NEVER liked any other piece by Mozart; no passion, and he was too fussy, but he made up for it in spades with Don Giovanni and his Mass. Playing Mozart on the viola is a big enough pain in the ass; all precision and no payoff; playing him on the violin is just sheer torture. A lesson in pointillism to me, with all the fussy pretentiousness of that day and time. Ick.

Anyway, the other fun thing about the violin, is the climb. Lots of heights on the violin, especially in the 1^st violin section. Since the dingbat managers were seating me in the 1^st violin sections, bizarre things were happening around me. Sheesh. Eighteen ledger lines above the staff and I'm playing "guess the note." I can't even read that shit. It's in soprano clef. I normally read the viola clef. Okay, I read soprano clef just fine, but when you're up towards the direction of the sun weird shit starts to happen, physically. Colors aren't normal, and they begin to have an aroma. Sightings of the dead were not uncommon when I was in the 1^st violins. I'm surprised the stage didn't melt or something, when I hit some of those harmonics. God knows my ears are still ringing.

After a while, I kind of resigned myself to this violin thing, but not really; I've taught it more than I've played it and I did end up buying a few of them and then sold them just as quickly as possible; they were taking over my house; I felt like the Pod People had invaded. I'm just not a fan of the instrument, as far as playing it goes. I certainly appreciate the artistry and love listening to them, but, I adore playing viola. Go figure.

I was laughing about it though, when I talking to a fellow "road warrior" about all the variations of different types of gigs and positions we've played. I played with Styx and I can't remember how this came up, but it was also the same with a Johnny Mathis tune about Brazil. "Sail Away" which is so lovely, is an absolute bitch to play. It consists of 64th notes, practically in its entirety. Everyone runs up and down the fingerboard in both tunes, and in all string sections. It almost reminded me of band music from Marching Band and then, I remembered that I didn't play in Marching Band, except that I did, for my last two years in high school. I played the glockenspiel. Badly.

Denis Deyoung's father was part of the OSS in WWII and was one of the first to reach Paris, with the Allies. You can hear the Chopin and Debussy in Styx's music. An interesting little bit of trivia along with the silly today. There, aren't you edified? And didn't I write myself out of that little digression neatly?

Styx's music is challenging and we had a lot of fun playing it. But, one of the things that does happen when playing that type of music, is you do lose the edge on your heftier musical "chops" as they're called. We were touring pretty extensively at the time with Styx and "Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto" -ing all over the place and having a hell of a lot of fun. In the midst of this tour, we had a layover and my trio picked up a gig. Myself, a violinist and cellist; none of us were exactly slouches. Being the, uh, "professionals" that we were supposed to be, we showed up for this luncheon or whatever the hell it was to provide "background" music and proceeded to play trios, for a couple of hours. I just grabbed a bunch of my trio music and off we went.

Now, it is axiomatic that the fewer instruments you have, the more difficult the music is going to be, especially if you are going to play, oh say, Beethoven. If we were going to play Mozart, or "Life Is Just A Bowl Of Cherries" (Pizzicatto all the way!), we might have had half a chance, but Beethoven? It was... interesting. I have played all of his String Quartets. They rock. His Trio in C minor rocks. It also requires lots and lots and lots of practice. Playing Styx's "Mr. Roboto" for 18 weeks straight does not constitute practicing Beethoven's trio. We all learned a valuable lesson that day. That lesson is this: Do not play the Beethoven C minor Trio, until you know the audience is drunker than a bunch of hoot owls. Thank God for alcohol that day!

#IWSG – SEPTEMBER, 2016 CHECK IN – HOW DO YOU FIND TIME TO WRITE IN YOUR BUSY DAY?

This is a really great question because, my other muse, music has come roaring back into my life, and this is what I've been focusing on for a while. Rehearsals started up again for the Tampa Bay Symphony with some wonderfully interesting music, in Dvorak's 8^th Symphony, Edward MacDowell's “Woodland Suite” and Richard Strauss's Horn Concerto; the not-inconsiderable string parts for any of us by any means. Strauss enjoyed writing neo-Romantic music and writing it as difficult as he possibly could. Once, a flute player was complaining to Herr Strauss that a passage in “Ein Heldenleben” (A Hero's Life) was unplayable. He looked at the part, and then looked at the score to see that the 1^st violins had the same passage. “Liebchen, do not worry," he said, "it is unplayable in the 1^st violins, too.” When I lived in Michigan and basically lived in my car, driving from symphony to symphony, we played that thing in the Lansing Symphony. There is a “battle scene” and if any viola player played more than 2 out of four correct 16^th notes in the entire passage, I'd be surprised. The thing sounded like chaos, but it didn't sound any better played by the Cleveland Orchestra. Strauss just wrote some crazy stuff!

Okay, so, Richard Strauss's string parts didn't look as horrible as "Faerie's Aire and Death Waltz" by Fibich (it's a parody piece, like the "Viola Fight Song), but his string parts are pretty formidable. Herr Strauss was also one of the founders of BMI, which is why I'm not showing any excerpts here. ALL of his music is still under copyright!

Because I do have “essential” (there's that word again) tremor, I have to “work out” daily, with scales, intervals, string crossings, hand-framing, and a bunch of other gobble-de-gook that string players get, but is meaningless to a non-fretted string player, who uses a bow. Doing so enhances seems to enhance the muscle memory, or embed it in my pea brain. It's a good daily routine, but unlike a physical work-out, I'm not trying to get ahead necessarily, but just maintain my groove. It also makes it easier to read the music and run the patterns.

Viola Clef. The viola is the only instrument that uses this clef. We all play in Soprano (violin) clef and occasionally, some dimwit writes a part for us in Bass Clef or Tenor Clef. We tend to go on strike if this happens. My better 2/3 thinks we should all just add a 5th lower string to the violin (that would sound tubby and woody and awful) and we should just get rid of this clef all together. Somewhere, Beethoven is laughing, because he actually found a use for violas! (We also had a joke that violas only played in 3 positions, 1st, 3rd and EMERGENCY! I don't know why that is, because I "memorized" my fingerboard, and it's a lot easier to crawl around in 1/2 steps than to take leaps, although I can do that accurately, too! ;-)

It also requires discipline, which then I can turn around and apply to writing. I try for an hour a day. Sometimes, it gets so crazy around here, I'm lucky if I get five minutes. With all of the hoo-ha of getting passports, work visas for Japan (which got pretty hilarious I thought) and trying to get the SSA to put my money in the right account, so I can pay my bills while overseas (I'm beginning to suspect the government is incompetent) and deal with “new” insurance rules that I believe are designed to kill us off in a more spritely manner, I'm flabbergasted that I'm sitting here at 10:36 pm on September 6th, writing this for September 7th, 2016, after I just returned from a rehearsal and being gone all day. I guess planning is not my long suit, most of the time.

But, it's the discipline and not all of what I write during that hour, or one-half hour or five minutes is always good, or half-way good. It's a lot of dross and ends up in the Virtual Paper Shredder. Music is the same way. You have to be your own worst critic before you'll be any good at all. Luckily, there are tons of people in both Arts who are willing to assist! Happy #ISWG'ing!

GORBACHEV'S WARNING AND THE FALLACY OF A “SHARED VISION”* - WE SAY GOODBYE TO LUDWIG; FOR NOW

When Mikhail Gorbachev was Premiere of the USSR he first adopted perestroika (перестро́йка), in the mid-80s, along with glasnost (гла́сность) and primarily did so to try and restore a moribund USSR to some kind of economic pre-eminence that it had really never enjoyed, not even under Stalin. To be sure, the power-house that was the USSR had done amazing things, such as improve it's literacy rate from less than 5% to over 95% under Lenin's first five-year plan, even while fighting a civil war with the Royalists; it was Trotsky's magnificent pen and organizational abilities that allowed the Red Army to be built, fight and finally prevail against arrayed enemies sent from Poland and even from the U.S. In an attempt to halt the rise of Bolshevism. But Communism was an idea that took firm root under the hands of Lenin, Trotsky, Bukharin, Kamenev, Zinoviev, et al. and would have remained rather benign had not Lenin died prematurely in January of 1924.

Russian Postage Stamp, circa 1988, celebrating Perestroika in the USSR

Copies of his Last Will and Testament had been distributed to several party members of the Duma and stated simply that under no circumstances should Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, better known as Stalin, be allowed to become Premiere, and preferably, should be reduced to a minor role; in short Stalin was dangerous, narcissistic and given to paranoia. Unfortunately, Stalin found out about the will and managed to reclaim every copy and then to do away with everyone who had possessed one. His long-simmering feud with Trotsky grew to epic proportions and Trotsky was forced into exile, all the way to Mexico City. Not content with having him even on the planet, Stalin had Trotsky assassinated in 1940.

Trotsky, my Russian Blue, not Leon Trotsky, the writer and Bolshevik Party Red Army Leader.

When Stalin died in 1953, his mark was firmly embedded on the USSR. The zeitgeist of the country was one of suspicion of outsiders, paranoia, a deep sense of inadequacy regarding it's place on the world stage and yet, a hatred of anything really new. At least that is how it would seem to a westerner. The reality, I believe was much different. The old USSR and now, Russia is a country of brilliant scientists, poets, artists and critical thinkers. It is also a country of some of the toughest people imaginable. No other country has been invaded so many times. They withstood sieges at Stalingrad and Leningrad. The Nazis made it as close as six blocks from the outskirts of Moscow, before the tide was turned against them. This is the country that lost anywhere between 20,000,000 to 55,000,000 people, both military and civilian, in World War II, while the USA suffered 450,000 casualties. The reason the numbers are so disparate is because, while “official” numbers tend to be lower, independent researchers, over the years, have painstakingly pored back over birth records and talked to surviving relatives, in villages in the west. The other issue is that so many people were also still sent to P.O.W. Camps and D.P. Zones (displaced persons) tended to be rather haphazard in identifying remains, as battle fronts were still fluid. Anyway, I digress.

Mikhail Gorbachev and Margaret Thatcher, in 1989

This is really about Mikhail Gorbachev and what he said recently on the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Mr. Gorbachev was “elected” Premiere of the old-style Soviet Union after a series of gray-heads came and went. When Stalin died, Georgi Malenkov inherited all of Stalin's titles, but lost out within the month in a power struggle to Nikita Kruschev. As Premiere, no one dreamed that even with all of his shoe-banging and hollering about “burying the United States in the ash-heap of history” that he was a closet subversive and would allow Alexander Solzhenitsyn to publish his “A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” (an un-put-downable little tome about a little prisoner's day in the gulag) and THEN allow it's reprint in the west, where it was an instant sensation (READ IT! If you haven't, it's great!). Well, Nikita remained Premiere from 1955 until 1964, when while vacationing on the Black Sea, he was recalled by Leonid Brezhnev, and in a fiery clash, he was “let go” and basically declared a non-person; he quietly retired to a dacha on the Black Sea and is buried in the Novedevichy Cemetery, not in the Kremlin, although he was a Hero of Stalingrad. His son lives here in the United States, now and is a charming man.

courtesy: www.quotessays.com

Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary until his death, and a series of “gray-heads” followed: Yuri Andropov, and Konstantin Chernenko. Their one constant was Andrei Gromyko, who also worked in concert with Eduard Shevardnadze (who along with Stalin, was also from the SSR, Georgia). Gromyko and Shevardnadze had been around during World War II and had negotiated with von Ribbentrop and were people who really got things done. But, again, I digress. When Gorbachev became General Secretary, in 1985 upon the death of Chernenko, he embarked on a series of reforms with the approval of his Cabinet (Duma).

Still, facing the west, with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher proved daunting at first, with the abjurement from President Reagan, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” Shortly after that, Mr. Gorbachev announced his ideas for perestroika and glasnost, the two ideas wedded together, essentially meaning “transparency within government and a willingness to open a dialog with the west”. Although this was viewed positively in the west, it became a very hard sell for the Russians; once again, Mr. Gorbachev and his visionaries were battling centuries of suspicion of the west, paranoia and again, perversely a lack of self-confidence on the world stage – even Peter the Great bemoaned the fact that Russians were medieval, as he brought them kicking and screaming into the 1700s, in his effort to join the "enlightenment" then going on in western Europe.

Tsar Pyotr spent 18 months traveling incognito in the west and learned how to build ships and bridges, use telescopes and microscopes and build armies. What he didn't learn, he hired and brought home with him. For several years, he had Dutch and Scottish shipwrights, scientists and astronomers who were part of his vast retinue. Many stayed after his death and they are much written about in Neal Ascher's fine book, "The Black Sea". 

Nevertheless, the wall came down, as both sides really did wish to see this happen. With the fall of Eastern Germany, the rest of Eastern Europe was not far behind. Eduard Shevardnadze resigned and went home, to become Georgia's first ever President and to secure for his former SSR, it's lasting independence. Czechoslovakia broke into two separate states, which they had been under the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Poland elected her first president. The Eastern Bloc was no more. Ukraine elected a president, but as a buffer state near Russia, Ukraine, like Belarus and Chechnya are unique. Ethnic Russians have lived in these countries for centuries and as such, they live and speak both Russian, Ukrainian, or Russian and whatever the home country's language is.

This presents a very unique problem for these regions and problems that we, in the west cannot begin to understand. Mr. Gorbachev has recognized this and addressed it today. “We are on the brink of a new Cold War. Some are saying that it's even begun.” This was said at an event marking the 25^th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, close to the iconic Brandenburg Gate.

The Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany

Mr. Gorbachev's comments echoed those of Roland Dumas, France's Foreign Minister at the time the Berlin Wall fell. “Without freedom between nations, without respect of one nation to another, and without a strong and brave disarmament policy, everything could start over again tomorrow. Even everything we used to know, and what we called the Cold War.”

President Barack Obama seemed to share some of Mr. Gorbachev's concerns, but I feel that he really doesn't quite get it. Even Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher had a clearer understanding of what Russia and her place on the world stage is about. The conflict now in Ukraine is one, that is not about sovereignty so much as it is about appearances. What we perceive here in the west, is not how it really is in Ukraine. The ethnic Russians and ethnic Ukrainians have lived in that region for centuries. As I have mentioned before in my posts, they will feel one way one day about rule or directives from Russia, or a pro-Russian Leader, and then another way, another day. Then, there is Vladimir Putin himself. He will concern himself with Ukraine for a bit, and then get side-tracked by Syria. It was ever thus. Sanctions against Russia will not do anything but cause ill-will and frankly it is ill-will we really cannot afford. We in the west should frankly, butt out. One of the things the Russians DO NOT WANT from us is advice on how to run their internal affairs, and strictly speaking, this is still an “internal affair” even if it does involve another country.

courstesy of: readditing.com

The perfect map for "busy Americans on the go..." circa 2012, but hey, wait five minutes and it changes, and then changes back, so, this could all be correct, again. The "Commies" part of it is still in play, I believe, and some may have moved farther south to Sevastapol. Whatever. This is a good example for why we should keep our noses and sanctions to ourselves.

President Obama is using a fallacious argument by paying “tribute to the East Germans who pushed past the East German guards to flee to the west”. This is a wholly different situation and Mr. Gorbachev is right to bring Mr. Obama to task. We all want freedom and equality in all nations, but we must look at these situations realistically. Those ethnic Russians in Ukraine are a huge part of the country and they must have a say in their governance as well. That is something Mr. Obama has overlooked time and again. It's time for him to get real; his “shared vision of peace in all nations” is not attainable by his methods. The west must seek an accord with Russia that is acceptable to both parties; not just impose sanctions on a country with no understanding of the real situation on the ground. Mr. Reagan and Mrs. Thatcher understood this better than Mr. Obama and they were supposedly more conservative than the current President.

*My second largest readership resides in Russia. I'm not quite sure how that happened, but I am appreciative for that and for each and every one of you. Спасибо

Well, last Tuesday, we put on an absolutely stellar show at the Palladium Theater in St. Petersburg, Florida. It was even better than the concert we had on the previous Sunday. Tomorrow is our last concert of this series and then we say goodbye to Beethoven. . . for now. It has been an exhilarating, frightening and thoroughly enjoyable experience! I've fallen in love with Beethoven all over again, and it's a love that is deep and wide and will never end. There are times in playing certain figures and passages that still take my breath away with the creativity and the depth of his development; from a simple theme to a 16-measure run of 32^nd notes, in the celli and violas, that are meant to be tossed off, light as air and are then echoed in the violins. It is sublime in it's perfection and the execution has been as near-perfect as can be. We have done honorable service to Beethoven's and then some; it is as a benediction and such a privilege to play. Our conductor, Mark Sforzini, Music Director is wonderful and under his guidance he has wrought a miracle. I am so fortunate. Next up, Edward Elgar and Enigmas.

#ROW80 - SHARPIE LADY - AN UPDATE ON BEETHOVEN'S FIFTH SYMPHONY

I live in a neighborhood that veers wildly from the supremely dumb, to the frighteningly dangerous and somehow meets up seamlessly with the batshit insane. Sometimes, it's all three, like dude two blocks away who decided to see if his Hogwarts' Cloak of Invisibility still had a good warranty after his crack ho washed it, and tested it against the Tampa Police Department's finest. After making them stand around in the hot sun on a Sunday afternoon, and after making them evacuate an entire city block who was looking forward to Brunch at the Three Coins Diner after Church, but being unceremoniously kicked from house and home, couldn't get all swanned up for services, so they stood around and participated and bitched for several hours, and after someone in the TPD ranks said "the Hell with this noise" and stormed the house, dude found out the hard way, that alas, his cloak's warranty was invalidated and yes, he was in fact visible to the cops, whilst crammed beneath a bed in a back bedroom. Either that, or he was just one stupid idiot.

Fresh off that triumph, we have Sharpie Lady. This was brought to my attention by my alert neighbor and "adopted" son Alex, who is of like mind. We've spotted Moses, Jesus the Vampire Killer running around da 'hood and Sharpie Lady is actually a close neighbor; she's just a bit avaricious and her avarice makes her, well, a bit dim-mish. Or, maybe it's the other way around. She's the lady in the neighborhood who wants what everyone has, even if she doesn't need it, or particularly want it, unless you have it. We all know people like that. She doesn't seem a bad sort; just odd. 

Anyway, one of the other denizens had found two Sharpie pens, a black and red one, and he gave Sharpie Lady the black one. Here's Sharpie Lady prior to her use of the pen:

I don't draw; I don't pretend to draw. I have a motor disorder. This is what you get; live with it.

This is Sharpie Lady AFTER she used her new black Sharpie pen that neighbor guy (not Alex) gave her:

I've met Sharpie Lady; I'm pretty sure she knows what make-up is and what pens to draw on boxes are. How in the HELL you'd possibly confuse the two is beyond me. Yes, according to Alex, her eyebrow lines were all jagged and crooked. Of course, you can't wash that crap off.

What makes this even more bizarre, is she THEN went back to the neighbor who had the red Sharpie and asked him for it, so she could use the "lipstick". Now, I realize it's getting to be that time of year, but, as a woman with more than my share for tics and oddities, I've NEVER considered using materials that would be better served for construction as items for beauty enhancement. But, to each his own, I guess. Anyway, here is an "imagining" of how the red Sharpie pen would have gone down:

Kinda like Roz Russell on her downhill slide or someone equally hideous. We've seen a lot of weird stuff here on Nebraska Avenue, but this was pretty noteworthy. 

Obviously, no names are being used, and I will NEVER mention this to the woman when I "see" her face to face. I am not unkind. As I said, maybe it's the wanting, or being so poor, that has unhinged her. I really don't know. Poor people have existed throughout the history of civilization, and Beethoven was happy to be paid a commission of a suit coat with brass buttons for a towering piece of music he wrote, when he was in his forties. Poverty didn't faze him.

We had our last rehearsal before we start a cycle of concerts featuring Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. The critics of his day and now are correct; it is a terrifying piece of music; in structure, style and presentation of his material, particularly his 4-note motif. The "V" or Roman "V" for five was used as the sign for victory in WW II by the allies. The rhythm of the opening phrase "dit-dit-dit-dah" is also used for the letter V in Morse Code (thank you, Daddy). Historians claim coincidence, although I have stated throughout my life and continue to believe that there is no such thing as coincidence.

Anyway, the Fifth sounds wonderful, considering that we are also playing that horrible "La Gazza Ladra" (The Thieving Magpie) overture by Rossini, and that is one that is on EVERY audition list for all of the stringed instruments. For violas, it means a lot of playing in 1/2 or 2nd or 4th position, something violists resist. They're uncomfortable positions; the 1/2 and full steps between notes no longer lie naturally between your 1st and 2nd fingers, but between your 2nd and 3rd fingers and your mind must be agile enough to make that transition. It's more a mental trick, than a physical one. Meanwhile, you're madly trying to keep the spiccato bow going (a light bouncing, almost insouciant type of playing). Spiccato on the viola is akin to road-racing a semi. I also have a very heavy hand, and with a very heavy bow. Strength training and developing other ways to "back off" have made it easier for me, with my e. t. It will show up occasionally, especially during repetitive motion. 

So, I've practiced the HELL out of all of this music; is it the best I've ever played? No. Am I happy with the results for right now? Yes. Between, August and to right now, I've mastered everything I set out to do and then some. This is going to be a great year and they will just keep getting better. I know that in my heart.

ROW80 4TH QTR 2014 CHECK IN – MY MUSE

                       "Anyone who tells a lie has not a pure heart and cannot make good soup."                              ~ Ludwig van Beethoven

He was born in the city of Bonn, in the Electorate of Cologne, in what would later become part of Germany, on December 15, 1770, or perhaps, December 16 of that year. His happy father had the boy's birth registered at the town hall as was customary at the times, on 16 December early, so scholars differ on the dates of his birth. As mine is the December 15, I choose to think that his was as well. His father, a musician of some renown, known more for his drinking than his singing, was determined that young Ludwig would be another Mozart. Actually, the world really didn't need the one it already had, with the exception of Mozart's “Mass in C minor” and “Don Giovanni”, the last two pieces Wolfgang wrote that are truly worth hearing; the rest is just the same piece written 600 times. But, that's a story for someone who actually cares enough to write anything more about Mozart, so we're safely done with him.

"I shall seize fate by the throat." ~Ludwig van Beethoven

Young Ludwig didn't fulfill his father's wishes of becoming the “next Mozart” nor even the “next Haydn”, which is really okay. Young Ludwig, when not busy fighting off the night terrors that his drunk father visited upon him, if he caught Ludwig trying to play piano after bedtime, took up the viola at a rather young age and played in both of the orchestras in Bonn. Like every viola player everywhere, while he was sawing his way through some boring part, written by you-know-who, he must have been thinking to himself, “Mein Gott! We must have better viola parts around here! These are terrible!” Just kidding. But, the music of the time had already seen the peak of the Classical era and the viola parts had always been awful. Haydn, who danced a merry tune to his patrons managed to write 104 symphonies, while Mozart wrote 41. Other composers wrote just as many and have been lost to history. If they're anything like any piece of music written by Louis Spohr, this is a good thing. Spohr is a bore; bland found a home when Spohr was writing music in the 19^th century.

Beethoven's viola. Vienna, Austria

Ludwig was an entirely different matter. Here, for the first time in a long time, well, really in forever, a composer had arrived in Vienna (the happening place for Classical music; very cutting-edge back then) and proceeded to turn the place on it's ear. No longer would the composer bow down to the whims and desires of the nobility. When Ludwig played piano, he was the prince and expected to be treated as such. Salon evenings would turn into competitions, with the young lion raging up and down the keyboard furiously and with a technical prowess that none had seen before. He was also lighting up the musical world with his compositions.

"To play without passion is inexcusable." ~Ludwig van Beethoven

His writing career is traditionally broken out into three periods, although that is a simplification; his first period is considered as occurring during the last years he spent in Bonn and his first years in Vienna. They mark the time when his first piano trios were written and his first two symphonies. This music is still very much in the Classical mold, although there are signs beginning with his 1^st symphony that something different is going on in his head. The first movement opens with a forte and immediately drops to a piano, unheard of at the time. This is a reaction to the “stepped” way dynamics were approached previously. It's a small distinction, but a telling one. His 2^nd symphony, like his 1^st are charming works; almost too airy for Beethoven. This was all about to change in 1803.

"I am a rock-and-roll violist. I kick ass." ~ViolaFury

Firstly, he declared to a colleague that he was unhappy with the way his writing was going; he didn't think that he was achieving the clarity and force of spirit that he was looking for. He didn't want to be thought of as just another salon artist, or have his art be trivialized. It was a higher calling to him and he wanted to bring to it the proper attention and sought to honor his own muse and he was passionate about it.

Secondly, he started the rough draft for his 3^rd symphony, and was going to dedicate it to Napoleon; it would be the “Bonaparte” symphony. Then, Napoleon got the bright idea of conquering the world, and Beethoven was furious. He said “So he is no more than a common mortal! Now, too, he will tread under foot all the rights of man, indulge only his ambition; now he will think himself superior to all men; become a tyrant!” Ludwig angrily scratched out the dedication page and renamed the mighty 3^rd, the “Eroica” or “Heroic” symphony in E♭ Major. And it is truly a magnificent work! I've known it since I was a kid and I've played it several times.

In the third movement, Beethoven completely shreds what remained of the Classical era and goes on a towering rampage of fury. The movement starts off sounding like a funeral dirge and it is dark indeed. He approaches the development with trepidation and just when you think he is going to hesitate and return to the main theme, he cuts loose with sixteen measures of unmitigated rage. It is almost Mahlerian in it's complexity and breadth. Spent, he then returns to the quiet, and ends with a syncopated, almost jazzy little fillip that ends the movement; it's almost as if he's saying “there, I got my musicrage out and I'm good, now, Nap”. But, not to be flippant and undermine the importance of this symphony and this movement and those particular 16 measures; it changed the musical world. We went from the Classical era to the Romantic era in that small amount of time.

"Music is a higher revelations than all wisdom and philosophy." ~Ludwig van Beethoven

It was also the end of Beethoven's early period and as he moved into his middle period, he would see some of his most productive and audacious work written and performed. He wrote his string quartets, along with the famous opus 18, which I love to play. Beethoven's central key is C minor, which puts him in the relative key of E♭ Major. Being a viola player, this is a natural state for us, as it encompasses our lowest register. I don't know if he thought along those lines, as he once told a violinist “What do I care about your damned fiddle, when the Spirit seizes me!?” So, there's no real indication that he favored violas, although playing anything written during and after Beethoven's lifetime is infinitely better for violas.

"Don't practice only your art, but force your way into it's secrets, for it and knowledge can raise men to the divine." ~Ludwig van Beethoven

But spirit and muse were all with him; when we think of the terrifying 5^th symphony, it really beggars belief to think that a composer would so audaciously build an entire symphony around four notes: Da-Da-Da-Dum. These notes are repeated throughout the entire work, not just the first movement. There are a few things about this symphony that once again, set it apart from so many other works, then and now. The constant interweaving of the thematic material between all sections has to flow like electricity and the entire work is in constant flux. The other thing that I find remarkable and I've played too many symphonies to count, is that the only other symphony that I've ever played that has a bridge (meaning no pause or break) between the third and fourth movements is Sibelius' 2^nd Symphony and that is just as brilliant and astounding as it is with Beethoven.

"The goosebumps start at 4:10." ~ViolaFury

Beethoven was not an easy person to like or get to know. Like many artists and composers, he lived inside his head, but he had an additional reason for doing so; he began to go deaf at the age of 23, and by age 30, was profoundly deaf. He thought nothing of standing up in a pub and yelling “So and So is a Donkey's Ass!” and he was irascible and often seemed unkind. But, through his music; through the splendor of his “Missa Solemnis” and his 9^th Symphony, with the most-cherished theme of all time, the spectacular “Ode to Joy” you know that Beethoven understood the human condition and that he tried his best to express that greatness and the humanity and heart that lie within us. There's a very good reason he is my muse and always has been, since, like age 4. He's always been a part of my life and he expresses the greatness I would love to be able to say I've tried to achieve as a human being.

For those of you who may not know, I am under treatment for essential tremor, and have been for the last year. It is inherited and my mother had it. It prevented me from playing viola for several years and I was symptomatic as long as twenty years prior, with worsening symptoms over the last five years; diagnosing was difficult and arduous, but my neat-o, keen-o neurologist figured it out. The Parkinson's Disease Foundation is paying for my treatment. 

However, being a Wallace, and more prone to kick ass, take names and make retribution four-fold when at the top of my game, I am not one to let this sort of thing stop me. Seeing as I can't really take take vengeance out on a condition, or a disease, I chose the next best thing: I undertook an audition for the Tampa Bay Symphony and am playing viola again, beginning this season. SQUEE! Our first concert includes Beethoven's 5th Symphony, which is an amazing work. We will be playing Elgar and Shostakovich later on and I am so very excited and proud to be a part of this excellent group. 

To put this into a better historical context, I am playing on my wonderful Italian viola that was built only ten years after Beethoven's death, in 1827! I'll be writing on the other concerts that we will be performing as time comes closer and I'll put up links as they will be broadcast, as well. I'm also taking 2 programming classes through the good ol' University of Michigan, and this is a lot of fun as well and am looking forward to #NaNoWriMo, where we will continue "Music of the Spheres, Again." No, really, that's the title of the sequel. If they can get away with that in "Sharknado" I figure I can pull it off here. Happy #ROWing!

PLAYING THE VIOLIN AND HOW TO AVOID IT – REDUX

courtesy of: Copyscape.com

What a riveting start to a post. A list of the post you are about to read and the places you can currently read it. All are legitimate, with the exception of "Otto Benjamin Violins, blah blah." Unless you are fluent in Cowface and Dingbat the site is unreadable, but this is how my friends, Andi Roo and Aaron Brinker brought to my attention the fact that my deathless prose had been gasp! stolen.

(IT SHOULD BE NOTED, IN THE INTEREST OF OPEN AND FAIR DISCLOSURE, THAT THE READER WILL NEVER FIND OUT HOW TO AVOID PLAYING THE VIOLIN BY READING THIS POST)

I first unleashed this little gem on an unsuspecting world back in early August of 2012, and it went on to become one of my most “popular” pieces, right up there with my “nameless guy who fell down in the Falcons' Superdome and was horrified” and “E. T. Phone Home” posts. This piece also has the erm, distinction along with a couple of other nameless pieces of being stolen and sold on a now-defunct “for-content” website. How ironical, I jestically say, as I've never earned dime one for my blatherings. There's a reason for this. I get PAID (or I used to) to play music and not for writing verbiage. Maybe I should be paid to not write verbiage; I haven't a clue as to whether I'm any good or not as a writer, I just know that from the age of fifteen, I wrote, and understood English at a post-doctoral level.

Einstein wrote his “General Theory of Relativity” and I read an English translation of it. I cannot say whether it was riveting or boring; it got the point across, but it lacked something of the elegance of his little E = MC² equation by pages and pages and so on and so forth. I think my writing is a lot like that. It's kind of hilarious to me that someone “stole” my piece and sold it, when I wouldn't have the balls to try and peddle my own jun -, er, work, yet, in solidarity to my writerly friends, and I owe them much and they depend on their writing for a living, I went the whole route of writing the “publisher” and kindly requesting they remove my piece. I kept it light and airy and the piece was removed within 24 hours. The website disappeared shortly thereafter.

I'll bet he was fun in a string quartet!

I owe what little writing talent I possess to my parents who were very well-read, and downright scholarly in their own ways. My mother held two degrees, and my father, never having graduated from high school, lied his way into the Air Force, went to the Flight Academy and flew B-29s for roughly three years in the Korean action, until he mustered out on a medical discharge, after two crash-landings. That's two whole more flights than I ever want to have endured, WITHOUT the crashing. He continued to fly, privately, as did my mother; I think they were both a pair of loons. I loathe flying. 

 

 He was the epitome of cool; he brought me home from the hospital and was my primary caregiver until I started kindergarten. He and my mom were great together, until they weren't, due to her own mental illness, but she was a star, too. My folks had the hearts of lions.

He then attended college; went year-round and graduated 3^rd in his class. Maybe there were only four students, but he was pretty bright. He did all this while caring for me, as my mom was working three jobs. To keep me quiet, he played a combination of Glenn Miller, Beethoven, Richard Strauss, Tchaikovsky, Tommy Dorsey and Debussy on the Hi-Fi, but not all at once, so he could do his homework. I was a preemie and tended to be fussy. Music was the perfect panacea and the only thing I ever loved deeply and passionately. I love working with computers, but that is more about problem-solving and it kind of sucks as performance art; no one is going to pay for an evening of watching me code, or resolve a system issue caused by the r.schmitt trojan virus. Boring stuff.

My Ma was no slouch in the brains department, either. While working on her second degree, a B.S. in Psychology, she was programming in Fortran, a machine language hardly anyone uses. I found her books, after her death. Since she was taking no classes, she was either plotting a takeover of the world, or writing games for her own enjoyment. I would bet the former.

I went to college on scholarship, and was a lazy student, due to having perfect pitch. But, I have since learned that without music in my life, my life had lost it's anchor. To make this short and sweet, I was diagnosed with essential tremor, after having exhibited symptoms for years and harboring latent symptoms for decades. I finally had to stop playing altogether. This is a condition much like Parkinson's Disease, without the heavy medications; call it “Parkinson's Lite” if you like, but it can be every bit as horrible as Parkinson's, with core tremors and psychosis. I have all the inherent symptoms; tremors, drooling, no sense of smell, I stagger, occasionally and stutter when excited. It also has deep psychological components and at times those were ruinous. But, I found an awesome, awesome neurologist, who found a good medication that mitigates the core tremor and has allowed me to resume my mostly abnormal, life.

Me, the sole offspring of the two pilots above, on the left, with a touring buddy and my partner in crime, "Wolf", a superb viola made only ten years after the death of Beethoven in 1827. I'm happy, because I'm NOT playing the violin!

In fact, I have started playing AGAIN, and have auditioned and am playing in the Tampa Bay Symphony, a group I started with 20 years ago, when I first moved to Tampa. So, I'm currently practicing up a storm, and participating in some clinical trials that I hope helps people farther on down the road. The Parkinson's Foundation has been very, very good to me and I am fortunate indeed to have found them. But that is not what this post is about. It's about playing the violin. Now, that I'm back in the harness, I have to say once again, it is to be avoided; at all costs.

Ring ring!

Me: "Hello!"

Manager: "Hey, Mary. Are you doing anything the week of November 20th to the 25th?"

Me: "Well, let me check my calendar." Sound of pages flapping in the breeze. "Hmm, nothing but the “Merry Parade of Turkeys” and “Turkeys, We Got Your Turkeys Right Here with Skitch Henderson Sound Alikes." At this time, I am living in Charlotte, North Carolina. I am also still playing in Tampa and pretty much driving all over the south. I am also exclusively playing the viola.

Manager: "So, you have open time?"

Me: "Yes." To my everlasting regret, I said, "Yes."

Manager: "Great! I need a violinist for..."

I didn't hear the rest. I was in shock. I told people for years that I didn't play the violin. I never played the violin. I hadn't played the violin since I was sixteen, and here I was at 45. I play AT the violin. I still don't play the violin. I hate the screechy little suckers. They're all under your chin being little and screamy. What the hell is that? I just hate it. The only reason I started to "play" the sons of bitches is because I got sucker punched and caught unawares. I didn't even own a violin for years. I refused to buy one. I rented one for years and a student model at that. I figured since I didn't play the bastard, I wasn't going to be pretentious about it and get some big, souped-up Lamborghini violin or something. I have a Lamborghini viola. I rented a violin with steel tuners, tin strings, and tape on the finger board which I never, ever, ever allowed any of my students to use. That pussy Suziki shit with tape is beyond horrible. If you can't use hand-framing and play by ear, like the God Galamian intended, burn that hunk of wood. You don't deserve to call yourself a non-fretted string player.

courtesy of: collectibleviolins.com

Aargh! No, it's not "Talk Like a Pirate Day!" Those tapes! When you shift positions, the intervals change! It's impossible to develop your "ear" assuming you have one to begin with, if you're using tape as a "guideline" Fluidity counts. Not everyone is meant to play non-fretted instruments; those folks need to stick to "Guitar Hero!"

So, I'd rent these god-awful violins with tin strings and "play" in these violin sections, in the hopes that people would get the hint and quit hiring me to "play" the goddamned violin. I'd play loud. Real loud and shrieky, when the music asked for piano. I'd ask my managers shit like, "why the hell are you hiring me to play the violin? Did every other violinist in Tampa die/migrate/go on vacation?" They still hired me. I tried drinking my way through rehearsals and that didn't work, because everyone else was out smoking blunts during the breaks; they couldn't tell stoned from drunk.

People thought I was a good violin player; I guess because I didn't give a damn and was reckless; I was the Nic Cage of violinists raging around on my rented violins. I started ending up in first violin sections, so it got exponentially suckier. You know what really, really sucks? Playing Mozart on the violin. I hate Mozart. I hate Mozart, MORE than I hate the violin, if such a thing were possible. Because Mozart's a pussy. He gets right up to an idea and says “never mind” and plays mezzo-forte, before limping off into the 600^th pianissimo iteration of the same shit he wrote over and over and over and over. Yes sir, there is Hell in a barrel right there. Eighteen ledger lines above the staff and I'm playing "guess the note." I can't even read that shit. It's in soprano clef. I normally read the viola clef. Okay, I read soprano clef just fine, but when you're up towards the direction of the sun, weirdness starts to happen, physically. Purple becomes yellow. CRYSTAL-BLUE PERSUASION! Mountains walk. Cats do algebra. The horn section is being played by The California Raisins. I look down, unsurprised to find that the stage has turned to lava, when I hit some of those harmonics. My stand partner's hair catches fire. God knows my ears are still ringing.

I was laughing about it though, when I thought about all the variations and different types of gigs and positions I've held. I played with Styx and I can't remember how this came up, but it is also the same with a Johnny Mathis tune; one of his “Brazilian” set. "Sail Away" which is so lovely, is an absolute bitch to play. It consists of 64th notes, practically in its entirety. Denis Deyoung's father was part of the OSS in WWII and was one of the first to reach Paris, with the Allies. You can hear the Chopin and Debussy in Styx's music. An interesting little bit of trivia along with the silly today. There, aren't you edified?

Styx's music is challenging and we had a lot of fun playing it. But, one of the things that does happen with playing that type of music, is you lose the edge on your heftier musical "chops" as we call them. We were touring pretty extensively at the time with Styx and "Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto" -ing all over the place and having a hell of a lot of fun. In the midst of this tour, we had a layover and and my trio, myself, a violinist and cellist, picked up this "fun" gig and none of us were exactly slouches. Being the, uh, "professionals" that we were supposed to be, we show up for this luncheon or whatever the hell it was to provide "background" music and proceed to play trios, for a couple of hours. I just grabbed a bunch of my trio music and off we went.

Beethoven is my muse; he's always been in my life. I auditioned on his 5th Symphony and won it. I am a rock-and-roll violist!

Now, it is axiomatic that the fewer instruments you have, the more difficult the music is going to be, especially if you are going to play, oh say, Beethoven. If we were going to play, Johnny Mercer, we might have stood a chance, or maybe, some Beatles transcriptions, but Beethoven? It was... interesting. I have played all of his String Quartets. They rock. His Trio in C Minor rocks. It also requires lots and lots and lots of practice. Playing Styx's "Mr. Roboto" for 18 weeks straight does not constitute practicing Beethoven's trio. We all learned a valuable lesson that day; leave the Beethoven at home, if you haven't looked at it in the last, say, week or so. Thank god the Luncheon guests were drunk.