Concerts, Concerts, and more Concerts!

This past weekend and the previous weekend were my performance weekends for both of the orchestras that I play in. Last weekend I performed with Southampton University Symphony Orchestra on both Saturday and Sunday. It went really well, except for our first piece, "Short Ride in a Fast Machine," by Adams. That was the only piece that we had a student conductor lead, and I think that was the root of the problem. If you're not familiar with the piece, it has a very complex orchestration of rhythms and can be quite difficult to put together. I am disappointed that it didn't go well, because the piece is absolutely brilliant and was our only representation of an American composer.

The other pieces that we played were: Bartok, Concerto for Orchestra and Tchaikovsky, Violin Concerto. The soloist for the violin concerto was only seventeen years old, but she was amazing. I am fairly certain that one day in the not so distant future I'll be able to brag about playing with such a famous musician back when she was just getting started. The Bartok was played very well, but I can't say that it is my favorite. I tend to prefer music from the impressionistic period, specifically french music (my favorite composers are Ravel and Debussy).

Yesterday, I played with the Southampton University Sinfonietta (which is simply a smaller version of an orchestra, but not quite a chamber orchestra). The concert went extremely well, and I think we may have even had a better turn out than the SUSO concert (which is surprising, since last concert, they performed to an audience of about 10 people). I was pleased that so many people got to hear us play such beautiful and amazing music! We played Mozart, "Overature to Don Giovanni", Ravel, "Pavane pour une infante defunte", Prokofiev, "Peter and the Wolf", and Weber, "Clarient Concerto." My favorite piece was the Ravel, which if you've never heard it, you should definitely listen to--it is simply serene.

In upcoming musical news, I will be playing with the Southampton University Operatic Society in their production of Carmen (sung in English) in January. I'm really excited about this performance, because I love the opera and the music is incredible! I've been listening to a recording of it (although in French) for the past several weeks, and I'm starting to think I could play the whole thing by memory!

For the winter SUSO concert, we will be playing Shostakovich, "Symphony No. 7, 'Leningrad'" and Sibelius, "En Saga." I haven't been told the program for Sinfonietta yet, but I'm sure it will be great. I must say, that while I love playing with SUSO as a traditional orchestra with all of its ambitious music and challenging violin parts, I really do love playing with Sinfonietta. I've never been a part of an orchestra that small, and it reminds me of when I played in trios and quartets. It is nice to feel like your part is really critical to the whole group sounding amazing. When you are part of a violin section of 30 violins, it's difficult to feel that way sometimes!

I am told that I will be getting a recording of the SUSO concert, so I hope to have that up (or at least a small clip) once I get it!



Until next time,
Sarah

Snow Day!

I think it's been about seven years or so since I've had a day off because of snow, but I've just had two days off! The UK has been getting blasted with unusual winter weather the past several days, and now, Southampton is getting its share of it as well! We accumulated around 6 inches over night, and since Southampton rarely gets much more than a dusting, the University had to close. The picture above is the view from my room that morning.

So, my colleagues from my program and I took the opportunity to wander around the common areas (basically, parks) around the university and took some really pretty pictures! The first picture I took in one of the commons, and the "Christmas tree" in the picture is really enormous, possibly the biggest I've ever seen. It doesn't look that big in the picture, but standing next to it was rather impressive. The second picture is of a snowman that I made with my classmates. We would have made a bigger one, but I was not prepared for this kind of cold and snow when I came and so my rain boots weren't doing a good job of keeping my feet warm! Finally, the last picture is of me in the common.