Tuesday, July 5, 2011
Post Perfect Summer-Not a Great Start
June has come and gone, was dominated by concern for my father-in-law and culminated with the inevitable. Dad had been dealing with kidney failure as a result of diabetes and he passed away on the 28th. My husband, John, sister-in-law Andrea and I kept vigil through the night. At around 5am, Andrea was the first realize that the steady yet dwindling cadence of his breathing weakened and ceased. So far we are all handling it pretty well. We knew this day was approaching as he had several health issues multiplying and his refusal to take dialysis sealed the deal.
He suffered a serious physical crisis the previous week that forced him to be hospitalized for a few days. When it became apparent that he was very near the end of his time, hospice care was arranged and he was moved back to his assisted living facility. Even though he was quite ill and not always lucid, he expressed pleasure when informed that he was going back home. He did like living at Inwood Hills, his assisted living home. His health deteriorated rapidly after mom died, forcing a move from the independence of living alone in his own home to somewhere that he could have the daily chores seen to and his medications monitored and administered. He had made friends at Inwood, mainly lady friends and the staff seemed to do good job attending to his needs. He will be dearly missed by us. The funeral consisted only of the three of us and my daughter, Naomi, son-in-law, Dan and eldest grandchild, Austin. A few visitors showed up for the viewing but it seems that the majority of dad's friends had pretty much lost touch or had passed before him. His siblings are quite elderly and could not make the journey to South Bend.
Through all of this I have found it difficult to play guitar very much. It is not ignored but I think for the time being I am a bit emotionally drained. Thank goodness it is summer and I have not had to deal with going to work through this whole ordeal. I'm trying to be a support for John and Andrea but I'm not too certain how well I'm doing at that. Anyway instead of immersing myself in creative efforts, I find the couch frequently pulls me off my feet and forces me to collapse. So in a month's time I've gone from being horribly plagued with insomnia to near narcolepsy. Hopefully by the time August rolls around I will discover the middle ground.
Even though I'm not absolutely consumed with the guitar at the moment, I manage to play each day. My lofty goals of being prepared for the Troy Gillacamp threaten to be stalemated. I wanted to be able to have each of the targeted pieces of music sorted out and on the road to memorization. Seems that will be an impossible challenge since there are only four short weeks until camp. John and I are trying to make a couple of trips this month, a three-peat to the Original Hammered Dulcimer Players Festival in Evart, Mi and I will tag along as he participates in his first mandolin workshop in Bloomington, IN. and conducted by Jim Richter. The mandolin workshop should provide me with the chance to tuck myself away and focus on my playing while John is in his classes. This event is being held at what looks to be a very nice B&B and there is a porch off of our booked room that beckons for me to use as a practice space.
I am still working on trying to memorize the Beatles' tunes When I'm 64 and Imagine. I have Yesterday and Across the Universe pretty much committed to memory but they are in need of massive amounts of polishing. These are arrangements by David Walbert and they are phenomenal! I am trying to get Richard's hypnotizing arrangement of Sunflower River Blues in open C tuning, squared away. I find myself easily slipping into improvisation when I practice this piece. Sometimes I find the groove and sometimes my fingers stumble over each other and it becomes counter-productive. I've been keeping my Breedlove J22 in Open C and using it exclusively for playing this piece. Recently I strung it with D'addario's EJ24 strings for DADGAD and boy does this guitar thump with that combination. I've been especially drawn by Gilewitz's arrangement of this John Fahey tune ever since I heard Richard play it over 2 years ago now. I think the alternating bass must be in synch with my own heartbeat.
I have acquired a nylon string guitar. It is a classical model with a cutaway body,solid red cedar top, solid mahogany sides and back, and rosewood fingerboard. It is produced by Lag, a French company. It is a Tramontane TN100ACE. I have been using it primarily to play in DADGAD tuning and I must admit it has a sweet tone and is very responsive for a relatively reasonable price tag. I believe although there is no marking to note it, that it is actually constructed in China. The build and materials quality are excellent and the sound has actually improved since March when I originally received it. Adjusting to the wider fingerboard is a bit of a challenge although.
He suffered a serious physical crisis the previous week that forced him to be hospitalized for a few days. When it became apparent that he was very near the end of his time, hospice care was arranged and he was moved back to his assisted living facility. Even though he was quite ill and not always lucid, he expressed pleasure when informed that he was going back home. He did like living at Inwood Hills, his assisted living home. His health deteriorated rapidly after mom died, forcing a move from the independence of living alone in his own home to somewhere that he could have the daily chores seen to and his medications monitored and administered. He had made friends at Inwood, mainly lady friends and the staff seemed to do good job attending to his needs. He will be dearly missed by us. The funeral consisted only of the three of us and my daughter, Naomi, son-in-law, Dan and eldest grandchild, Austin. A few visitors showed up for the viewing but it seems that the majority of dad's friends had pretty much lost touch or had passed before him. His siblings are quite elderly and could not make the journey to South Bend.
Through all of this I have found it difficult to play guitar very much. It is not ignored but I think for the time being I am a bit emotionally drained. Thank goodness it is summer and I have not had to deal with going to work through this whole ordeal. I'm trying to be a support for John and Andrea but I'm not too certain how well I'm doing at that. Anyway instead of immersing myself in creative efforts, I find the couch frequently pulls me off my feet and forces me to collapse. So in a month's time I've gone from being horribly plagued with insomnia to near narcolepsy. Hopefully by the time August rolls around I will discover the middle ground.
Even though I'm not absolutely consumed with the guitar at the moment, I manage to play each day. My lofty goals of being prepared for the Troy Gillacamp threaten to be stalemated. I wanted to be able to have each of the targeted pieces of music sorted out and on the road to memorization. Seems that will be an impossible challenge since there are only four short weeks until camp. John and I are trying to make a couple of trips this month, a three-peat to the Original Hammered Dulcimer Players Festival in Evart, Mi and I will tag along as he participates in his first mandolin workshop in Bloomington, IN. and conducted by Jim Richter. The mandolin workshop should provide me with the chance to tuck myself away and focus on my playing while John is in his classes. This event is being held at what looks to be a very nice B&B and there is a porch off of our booked room that beckons for me to use as a practice space.
I am still working on trying to memorize the Beatles' tunes When I'm 64 and Imagine. I have Yesterday and Across the Universe pretty much committed to memory but they are in need of massive amounts of polishing. These are arrangements by David Walbert and they are phenomenal! I am trying to get Richard's hypnotizing arrangement of Sunflower River Blues in open C tuning, squared away. I find myself easily slipping into improvisation when I practice this piece. Sometimes I find the groove and sometimes my fingers stumble over each other and it becomes counter-productive. I've been keeping my Breedlove J22 in Open C and using it exclusively for playing this piece. Recently I strung it with D'addario's EJ24 strings for DADGAD and boy does this guitar thump with that combination. I've been especially drawn by Gilewitz's arrangement of this John Fahey tune ever since I heard Richard play it over 2 years ago now. I think the alternating bass must be in synch with my own heartbeat.
I have acquired a nylon string guitar. It is a classical model with a cutaway body,solid red cedar top, solid mahogany sides and back, and rosewood fingerboard. It is produced by Lag, a French company. It is a Tramontane TN100ACE. I have been using it primarily to play in DADGAD tuning and I must admit it has a sweet tone and is very responsive for a relatively reasonable price tag. I believe although there is no marking to note it, that it is actually constructed in China. The build and materials quality are excellent and the sound has actually improved since March when I originally received it. Adjusting to the wider fingerboard is a bit of a challenge although.
Friday, June 10, 2011
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
The Lilly Fellowship School Year is Coming to a Close
This summer will be quite different from the summer of 2010. An obvious change will be that I will spend much more time here in No. Indiana. I confess to having developed an "itch" for travel. Now that my grant funds have been spent scratching that itch is much more difficult. For all intents and purposes my Lilly project has concluded. The changes I've gone through, the people I've met, the challenges I've faced, the places I've visited, and the time I've devoted in the pursuit of becoming a better fingerstyle guitarist have easily culminated into one of the most rewarding years of my life. The wonderful thing about all of this is that I will be forever positively changed for the experiences.
Now I face the summer of 2011 with a definite increase in my skill level as a guitarist, a bit more courage as a performer and the desire to build on the phenomenal foundation that my grant activities facilitated. I've come to the conclusion that I must take the time to really plan out my practice time. I have so many pieces of music that I want to learn but there is not enough time to absorb them all. Quality is intrinsically more important than quantity. So a fair share of my time will be spent improving and internalizing the pieces I have memorized and then add some other pieces. I do not want to trade off tunes in my repertoire. I want to strengthen and build my repertoire. I want to play a core set of pieces without fear of stumbling through them and instill expression into my performance as well. Perhaps this summer will bring with it a spark for musical composition.
Now I face the summer of 2011 with a definite increase in my skill level as a guitarist, a bit more courage as a performer and the desire to build on the phenomenal foundation that my grant activities facilitated. I've come to the conclusion that I must take the time to really plan out my practice time. I have so many pieces of music that I want to learn but there is not enough time to absorb them all. Quality is intrinsically more important than quantity. So a fair share of my time will be spent improving and internalizing the pieces I have memorized and then add some other pieces. I do not want to trade off tunes in my repertoire. I want to strengthen and build my repertoire. I want to play a core set of pieces without fear of stumbling through them and instill expression into my performance as well. Perhaps this summer will bring with it a spark for musical composition.
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