Home Run...

So this will be my last post for a month or so as I will be in England in front of the fireplace sipping Baileys in about 3 days! It's safe to say that I've wanted to be at home for probably the last month and with all the exams/deadlines and the statutory winding down that every university seems to experience, things have been a bit rubbish recently. Nevertheless, I seem to have kept myself busy and happy for the most part (probably because I need things to write on this blog! haha).

Okay, so I should probably begin chronologically in the hope of not missing out too much...

Thanksgiving, was an odd experience and if I'm honest is just a dry run for Christmas. Joe, Tim and I went round to Jesse's swanky apartment and ate A LOT of food. We were joined by 2 couples (woodwind & brass geeks from UNT!) as well as 2 of Jesse's close friends from Tennessee. The turkey was delicious and it wouldn't have been the same if it didn't have the statutory cranberry jelly from a can and macaroni cheese with bacon in it! I would say that "mac 'n' cheese" is probably the staple food of America. After stuffing ourselves silly with ridiculously calorific homemade deserts we 'watched' Hook (more like snoozed through). Then we decided to teach the Americans some drinking games - they love a good game of Ring of Fire. The addition of rules such as 'when an English person drinks, the American's have to drink' has become a statutory rule now. The only issue was that unfortunately the only people drinking alcoholic beverages was Joe and I. Of course I managed to control myself, having cans of Coke Zero in between, but it's safe to say that by the time we left Joe was skipping down the stairs and flapping his hands as only Joe can do! Needless to say, the whole weekend was a lovely, chilled, boozy relaxation and a much needed break from the intense life of the music student at UNT.

While Thanksgiving was a welcomed break, I had definitely not anticipated the onslaught of weeks that would follow. As soon as we returned juries were upon us and I was frantically rehearsing with my accompanist to try and get the Bernstein together. I also had a lot of concerts to attend which are mandatory if you are in one of the wind ensembles here. I also foolishly volunteered to playing in a new composition for clarinet octet, the concert being the same day as my repertoire jury. My experience with working with the student composers here is definitely a bizarre one. They are literally a different breed. On one occassion we spent 30mins listening to them debate about whether a note in the 6th clarinet part should be an F# or a Gb. In the end we stepped in as any remotely sane person would with "Who actually gives a sh*t?". It was very frustrating to say the least, but the piece was actually very clever (and tonal!) which no-one could really complain about.

The following week was D-day (or maybe J-week as nothing seemed to happen other than an obscene amount of juries). My accompanist cancelled the last rehearsal before my jury so it's safe to say that I was a little anxious before going in. However, it went fairly well and although she messed up the piano part a couple of times I slotted back in with her which definitely earned me brownie points! The next day was technique juries. This one I was a little worried about. You basically have five minutes where they keep throwing scales and technical patterns at you until you fail miserably in a heap on the floor! To make matters worse, everyone is sitting outside listening in intently, hoping for a small slip somewhere that might give them the upper edge. It's very nerve-wracking stuff. Luckily I'd prepared fairly well, so there were only a few small errors where I just took a scale too fast and fumbled on a harmonic. I did enough to get me an A- from my clarinet teacher and an A from the rest of the panel for my repertoire, so I was pleased.

This week is finals week, so most students are just at home studying for exams. I only had one, this morning (Friday) at 8am. As you can imagine, I was a little bit annoyed about the fact that I had to wait around an extra week when I could be in England. With this in mind Sarah and I went to a house party on Friday. It was absolutely ridiculous! They had 4 bands playing, my friend's band not starting until 2.30am. The police seemed absolutely fine with it, but obviously I wasn't going to get caught for underage drinking so I only had a glass or 2 of wine. We eventually got back (after an obligatory stop off at 'What-A-Burger' - the dirty burger place) at 4am and crashed! The next morning, we left dull-eyed and definitely not bushy tailed to go to a high school football in Waco, about 2-3hrs away. It was absolutely brilliant, and although mine and Michael's team, 'Stony Point' lost, we still had a lot of fun tailgating. The evening was obviously spent drinking our sorrows and watching American football films after an IHOP dinner haha. I then spent the rest of the week suffering with a cold that Joe had kindly given me. I suppose it gave me something to do!

This brings us to Friday, today. The exams are over, the other English lot are all on planes back to England and I must begin packing for my departure. It seems odd that I'm half way through and I haven't yet decided whether I'm looking forward to another manic 4 months of music. I feel that I've grown both musically and personally and would definitely say that the study abroad experience has benefited me greatly. I'm absolutely ready for home comforts now and I'm just praying that the airports don't get snowed in. The thought of spending my 21st birthday in an airport is not a pleasant one!

See you in 2010!

xXx