Friday, December 9th (Day 103) to Wednesday, December 14th

Ok, trying not to fall behind as much on the blog, especially since I am leaving in a week. However, my memory seems to be failing me on what I have been doing. Either that, or I have not been doing much that is memorable, haha. Probably that.

Friday I had jazz combo rehearsal in the morning. It did not go very well. In fact, Berend, the director, actually started yelling at our bass player (not that he was the only one) and stormed out of rehearsal. Yea. Pretty bad. I really don't think other ensembles have this problem with a blatant lack of professionalism. I guess I just got lucky.

After that I did a little writing. Trying to finish that violin piece in time for my lesson with Andriessen. Every once in a while I have productive spurts, but Friday was not really one of them, if I remember correctly.

After classes and such, I hung out with a friend of mine, Shanti, for a few hours. We had dinner at her place and talked till like midnight. Nice gal. Fun stuff. Yup.

Saturday I went to the book store that my friend's aunt owns to help Shani pick out a book for her father for christmas. Unfortunately, Beth was not there so I did not get a chance to talk to her. I tried to do a bit of Christmas/souvenir shopping myself, but it was too darned cold and such. So, if memory serves me, I went back to my room and sulked for a while.

After sulking for a while, I went to a conservatorie party at an apartment building on Palmstraat. Apparently this group, or apartment, hosts a big party at the end of every semester. It was straight crazy. Nutz. So many people, in this little tiny space. At one point the cops came, but I was on the roof, and they never made it up there kuz there was too many people, so I didn't hear what it was about, haha.

Sunday was the complete opposite of that party. Alone, in my room, all day, depressed, trying not to be, reading, reflecting, that kind of thing. It came to a real head when I was trying to look back on my past two years of college and reflect on my growth and progress. All I could come up with is how disappointed in myself I would be if I saw me now as a high school senior. I have been almost totally discouraged away from professional music, I assume the worst in people, I don't trust anyone, and I don't even call myself a Christian anymore. What has happened to me? Where did it all go so wrong?!

That being said, one of the first things I did Monday was call home and get a referral to see a psychologist. No more trying to do this alone. Surprisingly, after admitting total defeat like that, I felt a lot better! I went to the library to score study and read up on Andriessen (a total boss, by the way), and then went to write. I think I made more progress on my piece Monday than any other day this semester on any other piece. It just flowed. When I said I can't handle my struggles alone, it sort of took down the mental blocks, or at least lowered them. Everything just seemed to work well for a while. It felt really good.

Later, as usual on Monday, was live electronics ensemble. It was our last scheduled rehearsal before our performance Monday, so everyone was kind of on edge to make sure everything was right. It really takes a lot of energy to improvise and pay attention for two hours. I always feel so beat after just one run-through. It will be a good performance, though. I am excited to see what happens, live, with electronics.

Tuesday started early with an "emergency" rehearsal of our jazz ensemble. It was scheduled to start at 10:30am, but we weren't even close. Not only did people show up late, as usual, but we had no room booked. So for almost an hour, we just hopped from room to room, continually getting kicked out by teachers and such. It was a very tense rehearsal once we did get started. It was quite clear that we were not prepared for our performance Wednesday.

Afterwards, I had my final lesson with Lucas on drumset. It was bittersweet, to say the least. He is a really great teacher, one of the best I have ever had in any subject. I know I am not to the level that he usually teaches, and he couldn't help showing me that one more time by giving me a polyrhythm exercise to remember him by, haha.

After that lesson was my last lesson with Jurre, my jazz composition teacher. Unfortunately, I did not have anything new to show him, so we just score-studied for the lesson. He is another great teacher, but in a very different way. He has a very different teaching style, almost like "lets figure this out together". We parted ways with him inviting me to audition for the masters in film music program. While I am not particularly interested in film, it would be a great way to really round out my skills as a composer. I would love to be that guy that can pick up the phone and accept any and every gig, no matter the style or whatever.

Also, Tuesday we had our "farewell dinner" with IES. It was at this nice Dutch restaurant near the ABC, I forget what it is called. I was yet again taked aback by how many people in our program I didnt know, between living in PHK and being a CvA student. Good food and good friends; I am going to miss it here a lot.

Wednesday, today, began with a rehearsal for our live electronics trio, a small group withen the live electronics class. It went pretty well, but it is kind of frustrating when the three people have one chance to combine their very different ideas of what the work should be. I pretty much just gave in. I can give them what they want, weather I want it or not.

Wrote a little bit more. Feeling pretty good about where this piece is headed. I am still having trouble really sitting down for an extended period of time and just writing, but I guess part of that is our limitation to book rooms in 1.5 hour slots only.

And last but not least, the concert. Oh dear Lord, the concert. At 5pm we had our call time for soundcheck, which we didnt make because people showed up late. So around six, we had time for like 3 half tunes. Which, wasnt enough. Come performance time (which wasn't for like 4 hours, since we performed last in a "singer festival"). First tune went off without a hitch. Then the second tune. More Love. I will never forget. 3/4 intro, a bar of 5/4, and then a 4/4 ballad. Intro was too fast, the singer came in early on the 5/4, and somehow everyone lost any time and beat. It was awful. To top it off, I couldn't get us back to 4. Like, a drummer's only job. Couldn't. Not to save my freaking life. Really really feel like that was the worst public performance of my life. The plus side is, it can't get any worse. I will never have a worse performance than I did tonight. Somehow that doesn't make me feel a lot better...