Deshou? Kirakira to kagayaku hoshi yo!
Wasn't I supposed to sing three languages for tomorrow's performance?
Now there's another change of plan.
Four languages now... *dang*
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Schade... Scheisse... Shimata... Doshiomashou?!
In the library again, heh heh.
Had a practice session with Miki just now... Just
one session, imagine that! And the performance is this Sunday... Schade... There's this two-piano work that we're supposed to play, and it turns out she gave me the wrong information (or that I was mistaken) when she handed me the score...
And so I had the wrong part learnt. Darn.
So both of us learnt Piano I part, and nobody touched Piano II's. I gave her the o_O when we started off playing the same part. Lol, that was hilarious!
So I'm supposed to play Piano II, dang... Nevermind, I'll sight read then, I told her.
I realise I sight-read the best under stress. Bingo! Perhaps because there are people around to judge you, so you'd concentrate more. I found out that I can't sight read fast when at home - my mind wanders off after a few bars, and then I'll be stopping here and there along the music. Which is
bad sight reading. The same time happened last night during IFC rehearsal. Tried to get myself familiarized with the
Requiem before the evening rehearsal, and I realised I can't even sight-read one page without plain stopping. Gave up and left it to the rehearsal later, which miracleously worked out. Sigh... So my sight reading ability is circumstances-based. -___-;
And I hit the high notes too (supposed to sing for Miki's concert too), when it was only 10 am. What an accomplishment. Surprised Miki with my knowledge of Japanese. We last-minute changed the songs - so it'll be Wolf's
Der Gärtner, Weber's
Pie Jesu and a Disney song (for the Japanese audience) on Sunday. The Disney song was chosen by Miki, and unfortunately the scores she has contained only Japanese lyrics. So I have to sight read, and sight sing the Japanese words printed on the score. Heh heh, I'm glad my six years of self-training (on the Japanese language) paid off. Me glad. Wha ha ha. ^^
Now my only worry is to learn up the Piano II part as fast as possible. Darn, all my effort drilling on Piano I has gone down the drain... Bleh. I think I'm finally feeling the pre-concert stress, which is a good thing. Now I have the motivation to keep things moving.
Such as memorise the lyrics for the three songs. Hmm, three different languages. I wonder if it's good or bad, lol. Three more days for preparation. Nya~~
Lieber Franz...
Thought I should celebrate Valentine’s Day in my own way on my blogs. Here’s a letter written by Franz Liszt to [whom-I-do-not-wish-to-name] in 1872 on 14 February (today’s date).
I can’t understand how I failed to send you a telegram last Thursday, 8 February—and am reproaching myself bitterly for this oversight. Certainly, my thoughts and my heart are constantly turned towards you, and all but overwhelmed with remembrance of you—but that even increases my faults of negligence. It would almost be better to love you less, and on certain days in the year to make myself a little more lovable! Having sincerely repented and made my confession, let me thank you for the gentleness of your reproach…
You accuse me of going to extremes—and of jumping from Proudhon to Saint Ignatius. As a matter of fact, most of the intermediary expedients have for me only a transitory value; in theory. I incline little to the clever manœuvres which conceal the goal. From time immemorial, the reconciling of liberty and authority has been the great social problem which the legislators, the philosophers, the dreamers, and the lunatics have sought to solve. The ancient Greeks held forth brilliantly on liberty—while the vast majority of the population was formed of slaves. St Ignatius, too, was convinced he ought to grant his disciples the greatest amount of liberty compatible with their salvation—and in America, classic ground of our modern liberties, slavery has been abolished only recently. People have conceived of the idea of freedom of property. All right; but isn’t it a bit like Montaigne’s 2-handed jug, which everyone pulls from his own side without caring about the jug itself, in the process often broken? For matters politicial, we arrive, if not at a perfect accord between authority and liberty, at least at a compromise sufficient for them to get along together—but in religion the problem is bristling with difficulties, and seems rather like squaring the circle. Since the divine element necessarily holds sway, it goes beyond outer submission to impose absolute faith, commonly called the faith of the charcoal burner—whose legend contains more wisdom than many big books. It relates that the devil disguised as a hermit entered a charcoal burner’s hut one day and, to tempt him, asked ‘What do you believe?’—‘I believe what the Holy Church believes.’—‘And what does the Holy Church believe?’—‘It believes what I believe.’…Yep, the letter ends somewhat here. I understand it’s not very romantic, if you’re expecting some passionate connotations in context to
Saint Valentine’s Day. There’s no such thing as Valentine’s Day in 19th century Germany, but this letter caught my attention – not only because of the date, but also because this is one of the more outstanding of Franz’s written correspondences.
An dem Mond
Well, I was walking home from the bus stop tonight. It was going past eleven, and there it was, a full moon on a cloudless night sky. All was quiet, and inspiration came… Here’s the result – a poem.
Coincidently, this was written on Valentine’s Day (after midnight). It was, however, not intended as a Valentine’s Day poem. Help yourselves –
You, the moon,
The moon stark and defenceless
Hung looking flawless and perfect
Against a clear starless sky.
You, the moon,
The moon who shines full.
You shroud the whole world
With your cold glare of light.
Elegant you look, and how lonely,
How sad it is!
To be peered at by thousands of eyes unappreciative
Who proclaimed to their beloved
“Thy moon is never as enchanting as thee!”
May I come hide your beautiful face from the world?
I, the clouds, will shield you from the ignorant lovers.
Why shine your glorious light at the ungratefuls?
I will embrace you and let the darkness devour occupied hearts.
While we kiss away!
While I whisper naughty verses in your ears!
While you embrace me with your overwhelming aura;
You are the world to me – I’d tell you that.
Oh beloved moon ethereal,
I blush with imperfectness, flaws aplenty.
I would never wished to be you,
For I am the clouds.
But I would dress you up in my sheets,
So that you would be tainted,
And never ever again a god will you be,
And forever within my reach.
Forever beside me.
Leben macht manchmal Spaß
Piano lessons are now changed to Mondays, and I think this works perfectly well for me. Or maybe it’s just the weather. There’s lesson this late afternoon, but the weather was pretty rainy and NOT SUNNY, so that’s a plus. Lesson was fun and enlightening; I ended up with an almost cramp right hand. Lol. This shows I still have a lot to learn.
Jardins sous la pluie was being played twice – that’s the source of the “cramp” for you. Nevertheless, I enjoyed playing it at w00t speed. It’s really an exciting piece when compared to the first two. So much contrast! It just takes a little courage to start the piece in bullet-speed.
There’s this one section of the 2nd movement (
La soireé dans Grenade) that I commit the act of
rubato at. But, er, it’s a little personal to talk about it. Recall the section where the RH is playing chordal accompaniment at the highest end of the keyboard while the LH has to carry the melody at the high range (also) of the instrument and then take a dive down to the lowest end to hit a bass drone note and swiftly return back to its previous position to continue the melody line. The LH’s stun takes place in a maximum time of 2 seconds. This is repeated consecutively in a couple of bars. I was putting in too much
rubato in the LH melody – because my breasts are reacting to the jerking movements of my left arm. =____________________=;; (Gawd, why did I even post this
shit here.) Laugh all you want, I’m sorry if
they’re big. BLAME IT ON NEWTON’S LAWS, PEOPLE!!
The first movement of
Estampes was pretty satisfying, given that I don’t have ample time to prepare it. At least my RH lost some of its previous tension while executing the rapid running figurations on the last three pages. There was this
very loud passage in the same movement where I at the corner of my eye spotted Lehrerin Low covering her ears with her hands (er, if I’m not mistaken). OOPS… o_O;;; Sorry, sorry… Was I that loud? *forces out a weak laugh*
Now for the SSC rehearsal! Yay!
More cracks and more jokes. Why am I always looking forward to every Monday’s rehearsal
even though I didn’t learn up Missa Solemnis properly? Herr Lim is definitely one fun conductor. He could lecture a section for
hours minutes about a couple of bars and then close his speech with a “and then what you need now is a pencil” – he did that to the basses when he spotted none was taking down notes. In another occasion, Beethoven imposed a dance in a particular part and Herr Lim, still seated on his conductor chair, danced and stamped like a monkey. o___O All that just to show everyone Beethoven meant the “Glorificat” section as a dance. Plentiful of nonsense jokes, but the one that set me to a non-stop laughing mood was when he tried to explain Beethoven’s way of adding melodic sequences and suddenly changing the mood (technically: diminution and monophonic in texture). The sopranos, who enter last, has the duty to switch the music to another mood, and Herr Lim gave an out burst of “it’s coming… it’s coming!” while we (sopranos) sang shorter and hence quicker notes (putting it in layman terms, guys…) and at “cum sancto spiritu”, this part with everyone punctuating the rhythm in unison and setting the mood for the climatic entry of “Gloria in excelsis Deo”, Herr Lim interrupted the whole thing with his eye-popping “vroom vroom!” sound effect, him physically imitating the action of starting the engine of a bike as well. Oh my gosh! Everybody stop singing on the spot and endless laughter soon began. What’s wrong with him? A screw came loose? I was doing this (o_O) expression to my partner beside me… I could see his passion and enthusiasm, but that was almost disgraceful! Shane (our fantastic pianist) was also enjoying this “act”, lol. When we repeated the section (since we stopped) I couldn’t stop myself from bursting out in laughter at “cum sancto spiritu”. Luckily, (the rest of) the sopranos’ high notes drowned me out. I don’t know what might happen if I was heard. Face Herr Lim’s wrath? Or become the next victim of his jokes? Herr Lim is just so unpredictable, and that’s why we love him. ^^
Eis essen, haha! Ich bin jetzt so kalt XP
I realise Valentine's Day falls on next Tuesday.
And my voice lessons fall on Tuesdays.
And, I will be singing Schumann's
Du Ring an meinem Finger on 14th of February.
In case you don't know what the song symbolises, the title can be translated to "You ring on my finger", and I'll continue the lyrics... "My little golden ring. I press you close to my lips, and then bring you near my heart..."
... For the ring is a wedding ring.
Get it? I'm going to feel weird singing that song next Tuesday. Wonder how Lehrerin will feel. And let's pray Herr Lim won't be at home to "overhear" that song.
o_O
Hontou ni subarashi no hi ne~~~!
Yay! Lehrerin complimented me for my work with
my the primary school children!! Her praises are my license to remain as a kid! XP
I believe our relationship are improving, and yet the amazing thing - we are still capable of differentiating our student-teacher relationship and being colleagues at the same time. The choir lacks an Asian piece for the upcoming competition, so both of us brain-stormed for more than an hour at the school. During singing lessons later in the evening I presented a managable piece (in Hokkien, ROFL!) to her, and boy, was I in cloud nine. I was already honoured when she treated me in the morning (during work) as her colleague instead of her pianist/assistant. I was really delighted to realise she is now sharing her burden with me, a gesture that acceptance that I'm also an instructor of the choir. If not of formality, I would have hugged her on the spot (haha, so childish of me!! ^^).
Was really tired when afternoon came - lack of sleep, dears... Took a short afternoon nap (45 minutes), watched some Japanese drama on Cable and slept for another 45 minutes. Haha, I don't think you'd call that enough sleep right? XD But my voice was easily warmed up before I left the house for my evening voice lesson. ^___^ I like to think that's because I've improved tremendously
although I did not revise my Schumann songs for more than two weeks. And my facial muscles was really relaxed! The jaw was loose, cheek bones working, blah [technical] blah [terms] blah... Hee hee, Lehrerin liked it! Liked the song as well. Just glad I'm in control of my voice although I'm deprived of sleep. A fruitful morning and a glorious night. Gawd, I'm not tried anymore. I'm hungry...
Ein tolle Tag!!
Now on the promised post. About Herr Lim. *snickers* He cracked a joke/mock us in German = o_O. Did he realised where he was? He was mocking the sopranos for singing the "resurrection" section too tenderly, and said this "Dein in mein ganze Herz!" (meaning lit. "Your in my entire heart). That wasn't any spelling mistake; that was actually a grammatical error in the German sentence. Should have been "Du (bist) in meinem ganzen Herz!" which would correctly mean "You (are) in my entire heart", literally translated. But well, the joke was lame, and I bet he impromptu'ed it without thinking - if not, why the errors? I'm just proud I'm one of the few Singaporeans who understood his sentence. Herr Lim said a lot of things without thinking last night! There was this once instance he compared the basses' singing to Italian pasta. There was this once instance we sopranos sang beyond his expectation and he was jolly he stood up and shouted "Well done!! Happy New Year!!" o__________________O. I'm so dead'ed. Killed by the lameness and carelessness of it all. And sometimes he laughed at his own jokes while nobody got what the funny part was, and then we laughed because we lived in disbelief for what he just did. It's a kind of cute. It's also a kind of bizaare. My guess is his New Year holiday break did him more harm than good. Lol!
Okay, let's not ruin his reputation too much! Enough to share last night's amusement and crackiness with all of you. For he's still my much respected conductor after all! ^^
Das Abendessen wird mich traurig gefuehlt
Tonight's rehearsal is a total crack. My guess is Herr Lim caught more than a cold from his holiday in Beijing. He was so frighteningly hilarious!! And making no sense at his jokes - that's why it's so funny. He's behaving abnormally tonight.
Tell you more tomorrow. Gotta wake up at five tomorrow morning. That leaves three hours more for sleep. Oh bother.
Kanashimi no namida wa koete...
I cried.
For reasons I don't know. But it's about time I cried.
Now to prep myself up and
ganbete desu!!
Eine Ueberauschung...
It never crossed my mind that the
Saint Seiya animators found themselves enough fundings again. For that, the first two episodes of
Saint Seiya Hades Chapter - Inferno is out. That's right, Pandora, you got that right. So should we assume that there's going to be another following OVA titled
Purgatory? XDDD
That is
so Dante-influenced.
Früher habe ich Johann sehr nett gefunden, aber jetzt habe ich Angst für ihn!
Monster "2nd season" is officially released. The VCD covers are real pretty (3rd box onEp 26-37, 4th box on 38-50), and mark my words - full of spoilers. I regretted turning over to look at the back of the box. Oh my gosh... Why did Johann...?! There's hardly any Tenma in the screencaps, and one of them has Tenma holding a longgun. o_O... No... I can't picture him armed at all. Not with that gigantic weapon... The Johann on the 3rd box's cover scares me too. He's facing an old man (a possible new important character I've heard rumours about) and is looking pretty insane. Oh, someone kill me now. There's another even more disturbing screencap of him at the back of the 4th box. Mum deduced that Johann got crazy and Tenma decided to shoot him instead. XDDDDD;;;
What fantastic imagination she has! =________=;; Looking forward to seeing the DVD cover. Hopefully something not as spoiler-filled as the VCDs.
And
Monster is coming to Cabletv on the 15th. Banzai! Now I have a reason to make Mum stay up with me!! ^___________^
Bring Kantarou down to earth! - Issue 4.5
This is not really about Kantarou. Nor
Tactics.
But something to do with the
kuji-in.
Note this: Keiki practise the
kuji-in in the 17th episode of
Juuni Kokki. That just caught my attention tonight. He also "cuts" (another kind of gesture) with the
kuji grid while reciting the chant - meaning, instead of performing the complex nine gestures (which I posted in
Issue 4), one can "cut" the air with the fingers following a grid pattern consisting of nine lines: five horizontal and four vertical. This is known as
kuji kiri.
Keiki in the episode shouted out a nine-word
in, but it's a deviation from the standard
kuji, the norm being
Rin-Byo-Tou-Sha-Kai-Jin-Retsu-Zai-Zen. Keiki (and later Taiki in the next episode) used
Rin-Byo-Tou-Sha-Kai-Jin-Retsu-Zen-Gyo accompanied by the
kuji kiri. This is acceptable, for I've read that some historical person did devise another set of nine-word chant based on the normal one.
In conclusion, the animes that involved themselves with the
kuji:
- Tactics (Ichinomiya Kantarou)
- Rurouni Kenshin (Jinpu)
- Inuyasha (a priestess)
- Juuni Kokki (Keiki)
Wow, all the cool characters!
Back Issues:
FourThreeTwoOne
Ich kann nicht genuk Zeit finden!!
A snippet from Angela Carter's
The Magic Toyshop:
'The nun brought us, Francie and me, in our stiff best suits and creaking shoes. She came with us from the orphanage back home, two hundred heads in two hundred beds and two hundred broken hearts under two hundred army surplus blankets and the good nuns to look after us. She brought us across the Irish Sea, trusting to God, but God chose her to suffer from the weather and she puked her guts into St George's Channel, poor thing, and Francie crying because he closed our mother's eyes, since there was no one else to do it. And he only fourteen years old, then, and already a wonder on the fiddle; but he couldn't get the feel of her eyelids off his hands. Like water-lily petals, he kept on saying. White and moisty. But dead.'
Unexpected last-minute assignment for tomorrow. Gawd, when will I ever find time for myself?! It was the travelling time that made me read Angela Carter. And I don't regret that. It does more than kill time. It keeps the brain alive from all the routine stuff I've involved myself in, and I'm really sick of routine. More unpredictable stuff, please?
