16 November 2015
Finished going through everything on the excerpt list approximately one time. This is after a full working day at my day gig. And taking a pause in the middle of it all to pick up my daughter from choir. So even though little progress was made, I am satisfied. Not super-pumped, but at least I have no reason to be down on myself tonight.
It’s not nearly the high that yesterday was. There are some obvious flaws in my playing these passages. I worry of course that they won’t be resolved in time for the audition. What can I do but just keep working? There’s no miracle formula.
Andy Anderson said something good to me in an email today: “treat these excerpts just like you would a solo piece.” So that’s a cool piece of advice–it takes away the pressure to be “right” about how to play them in an orchestra. Haha, but in a subtle way it makes the pressure worse: now I can’t just say “I did it like the paper said.” I have to really think it through and have an opinion, at least for myself.
I can’t really describe how many different kinds of pressure an audition puts on you. Maybe you’re starting to notice. Near flawless and perfectly repeatable technique. Confidence. Deep knowledge. Enthusiasm.
And finding the time to put that all together. As you gather, since I’m only allowing myself five minutes to blog … and how to practice Wagner (full tilt screaming valkyries!) after the rest of the family has gone to bed? I regret the hours I did NOT spend in the practice room when I was an undergraduate, and again as a graduate student. Oh sure, I am the person who I am and I am where I am–and those are both pretty good things–because of the choices I made then, but sometimes I really wish I had chose differently.
Well.
That became kind of stream of consciousness, didn’t it? And confessional, in a slight way.
13 days (less) to the audition.