this side of it all

week one down, and already in the middle of week 2.
i feel as if the semester has started without me!
i managed to get quite horribly sick on tuesday night of week 1 (good start, ey?). we (helen, dave, ace and me) went to see the HP movie on monday night - i really enjoyed it! i suppose i won't do a review...if you want to know what i thought, came have a chat to me. i guess i really don't have the energy nor effort to write a review. in summary, i guess i could just say that i really enjoyed it, and although i didn't envision everything as it was portrayed in the movie, i didn't not agree with it, and it was definitely interesting.

had a lesson with lily with caroline on wednesday morning, which i sniffed my way through. i was supposed to have two rehearsals that afternoon (one with lily, one with trio), but i felt so ill that after my piano lesson, i came home, got into my pj's at 11.30am, and hopped into bed for the rest of the day. i kept waking up quite periodically to try and eat, but i felt so ill that it didn't really happen.
it was probably the first time in a very long time that i spent most of the day in bed due to illness.

on wednesday night, i had to page-turn for the seraphim trio concert at melba hall. i sniffed my way through this one, but surprisingly, managed mostly not to have to blow my nose like a trumpet on stage. penny, ace and sal also helped out with catering etc. thanks guys, you're all stars! as for the concert, it was an excellent one - the pieces were fantastic, and the ensemble was great. going to these concerts makes me think about how much i want to play in my own piano trio, because there is so much music for this genre. i just have to find a suitable violinist now...

on thursday, lily and i played the entire beethoven in concert class. both of us were feeling quite blah about it, but we did it anyway, which was good, because it was a chance to get through it all. we nearly fell apart at the end (we were like, a beat out for about two bars) but apparently nobody seemed to notice..? oh well, we got to the end. it turned out alright, we both weren't quite feeling it but it was good to play the whole thing.

had a lesson with zoe on friday, which was really helpful. zoe truly is amazing, and a fantastic teacher - i really enjoyed lessons with her. i had to write a bio about myself (which didn't end up being used), but it was quite boring. i had to try expand it a bit. this is what it is:

Gladys started playing the piano at the age of four, quickly surpassing her fellow students in her group class. Her piano studies continued after relocating from overseas to Perth, Western Australia, at the age of five; her principal teachers for the subsequent twelve years included Ann Taylor and Stephanie Colemen. Gladys is currently a Faculty of Music Merit Scholar at the University of Melbourne, studying music and economics, and has been studying piano under the tutelage of Caroline Almonte for the past two and a half years.

see? boring....i really haven't done much in melbourne, apart from playing in class.

i was supposed to meet xing for coffee (or equivilent) on friday afternoon, but there was a miscommunication, so that ended up not happening. hehe. oh well, we'll just re-schedule. friday night we had connect, which was enjoyable, as always. the vic always seems to fit more people in everytime i look! the new-look vic was most exciting, and the lemon slice cake was beautiful! hehe.

saturday was meetings and trying to get stuff organised. we went to the Idea of North concert at chapel off chapel on saturday night, for their Live DVD launch!
again, it was another fantastic concert. Fields of Gold, and the Aretha Franklin number were highlights, so too was Staying Alive. As well as a little bit of the extras from the DVD...hehe pizza. :P it was ace's first ION live experience, so that was pretty special - she enjoyed it!
wow, all i can say about the concert was that i thought it was awesome, and wish that it could have gone on for longer! there was a point where andrew (the bass) winked at somebody in the audience (i SWEAR it was ME...!!! not the 50 other women sitting on the left block..) and every one of those 50 women must have smiled because he grinned back. haha. ace and i had an argument to claim rights to that wink haha.
of course, afterwards we bought some stuff (i got the live DVD) and said hi to them all again. and it was nice, they remembered us :) well, i kinda expect gina to be remembered (nick surely did!), but i was kinda pleasantly surprised that naomi said, "And who could forget this group?!" hehe...and Andrew said "Ooh yes, I recognised your group, particularly...." (and picks out specific people, including ME! hahaha. I was most amused). So, had a good chat to them, and can't wait for them to come back (again! hehe). Indeed, they are an amazing live performance. for the meantime, the DVD and cds shall have to suffice.

sunday was a lot of rehearsals for urinetown. this show is overcoming my life, but will be over in just over two weeks, which is a scary thought. one this week is over, i can have my rightful pianist in :) yay!

on monday night, i went out for dinner with my cousin, aunt and uncle. my cousin actually lives two colleges away, but we are so busy that we don't really get a chance to hang out! we see each other more often over the holidays when we're at HOME instead of in melbourne! hehe. i didn't get a chance to see myaunt&uncle over the winter break because they'd left for europe before i got home, and returned to perth after i came back to melbourne, so it'd been since february that i hadn't seen them. so, we went out for dinner, which was nice. and of course, they tried to stuff us with lots of food, which we couldn't manage because there was SO MUCH!!! i went to visit my cousin's place at ormond, which was cool., and then my aunt and uncle came to queen's to see my room. the last time they came to queen's was when they came to melbourne to help us move in at the very beginning of this exciting melbourne adventure. they loaded me up with some gifts of clothes and food (necessary items!). it was GREAT to see them :)

on tuesday i had the LIVE AT THE CONVENT Broadcast of the Beethoven Project!
Heck, this probably deserves its own post, but i'm too lazy...so here i go...!

went to class in the morning, which was quite distracting. hehe. then lily and i headed to abbotsford convent, where the 3MBS studios are. we kinda missed the turnoff at first, then had to double back after driving for a little while trying to find a road to turn into and out of. we finally got there, and walked into the convent complex, to be faced with a map and confused directions of which building the radio station was actually housed in! we finally got there, and had to wait for a while for our sound check. we got a little mini-tour of the place, which was cool. i should totally listen to 3MBS more, not just ABC...
we got to go inside the studio where the guy (peter?) would be fiddling with the knobs to make it sound like we were in a much larger space rather than just the performance studio, which was quite small. we got our run, our 3rd movt kinda fell apart...eek! but it was a good run, we were feeling alright about it.
we had to wait for an AGE for the whole thing. the concert actually started at 1.30pm, instead of the information about 1pm that I'd received. oh well. at least some people managed to tune in - many thanks guys :) i know some of you had class, or got a lot of static from the con (who would have thought..?!) i'll be getting a recording (hopefully of all of the sonatas) so that we can re-create the whole effect hehe.
i page-turned for the first two, which was quite exciting....i definitely hadn't heard the beethoven cello sonatas, so it was a good opportunity to hear them all!
of note...the first cellist was emma ayres, whom i'm pretty sure is the same emma ayres on ABC (who does afternoons..?) i should have tried to say something intelligent to her. or at least just something (even if it was unintelligent)...because i really enjoy listening to her on the radio. oh well.....hopefully zoe remembers me when she has students who want to do stuff.

so, lily and i went pretty well. the 2nd movt was great, it felt very comfortable. the unique thing about the 5th cello sonata is that it is the only one with a complete 2nd movt, as a well-developed musical movement. so that's pretty exciting. zoe said some nice things at the beginning, of which i found out later hehe. the 1st movt stuck together, and i started pretty well, so i was quite comfortable. and the formidable 3rd movt has lots of double 3rds, 6ths and 8ves and is feindishly hard for the piano- and it all stuck together! the whole sonata felt fairly comfortable, the nerves really melted away after the first 3 lines or so, and we really enjoyed the experience. at the very end, just as we were finishing those V-I-V-I chords at the close of the 3rd movt, lily and i had fairly stupidly big grins on our faces, because we knew we had made it stick, and we'd gotten to the end together, and we both knew that THAT was the best we could have done at that time, which was pretty good!
so lily, thanks so much for such an enjoyable time playing beethoven with you! we shall look for more repertoire..! :)

right, my piano lesson this morning got cancelled, so i have no classes today, but some recording for urinetown to do, as well as a trio rehearsal. and i should really nip down to the library to photocopy some stuff. and to drop something off at the con.
and i should really go into work, at least for a little while....it'd be pretty horrible to have to say, 2 weeks in, that i'm too busy to work!
and i should get some homework done.....
i'm only taking 3.5 subjects this semester (i did 4.5 last semester, for a reason..!) and 1.5 of those are practical (prac 3-2, and chamber music....mmm..i should practice..), so i don't have too many hours, but somehow my time is being filled up..?

anyway....
sorry this is a mammothly long post....if you got to the end, congratulations. now you can go stare at that white wall to relieve your eyes....!