Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Recital and Other Stuff

I haven't been keeping up with my blogging.  I've been busy and also short on topics.  Therefore, I am going to start with shameless self promotion.  I am putting on a recital on Feb 26 at Christ and St. Stephen's church in NY at 8 pm.  8 pm, because I ain't singing at 8 am.  I will be joined by soprano Sarah Hawkey and pianist Martin Neron.  It's all American songs by Barber, Bernstein, Speaks, Dello Joio, Edwards, Roy, Bolcom and more.  It will be a fun evening and I promise to be funny.  Sarah is fantastic, and I am happy to have her on the concert.
   What else?  The voice studio is growing a bit.  I learned the other day that one my students is an auditory learner.  When I sang various phrases to her it helped her a lot.  When I just played the notes on the piano that didn't work as well.  I was losing my patients a bit, then after a while realized that I was learning from teaching her.  I think teaching helps the teacher more than the student sometimes.  This applies to everything.
  This is random, but I am proud of the fact that I have quite drinking caffeine, and have stayed off it for 30 days now.  It's been difficult at times especially on Sunday mornings when I have church.  However, it's been well worth it, because I feel calmer, my voice is stronger and more clear, my thinking is more rational, and I feel more healthy overall, so if was a good choice.  I'm reaching the point where I am not thinking about caffeine so much.  I mention all this because when I am on caffeine I'm hopped up, quick to anger and my attitude is much more negative.  In order to work on improving myself, concentrating better and most of all my attitude, I can't have a substance hopping me up.
   So, I guess what I was going for in this blog is self improvement, promoting my recital, and learning from teaching.  To apply the whole attitude thing I just mentioned, I can either think oh fuck I have to teach a lesson, or I can think about what I can bring to the lesson and what I can learn from teaching the lesson.  My attitude is always a choice.