Back of the Balalaika Section
I believe I've been remiss at updating this fine thing again. Following is a brief summary of some of the fun I've been having.
On the practicing front, today marks my third day back in the trumpet mode. Last Friday I met with the director of the Sergei Rachmaninov Kaliningrad Regional Musik Colledge. He agreed to let me practice if there was an open room. I owe a very big thank you to Galina i-don't-know-her-other-name. She is a friend of the lady who gave me my season pass to the concert hall. Apparently, after hearing that I didn't have any place to practice she took it upon herself to help me out. After meeting with the director, we walked around Kaliningrad for an hour or so looking for somebody who could translate what happened for me. We never did succeed, but it turns out that I understood enough of what was happening. On the nice walk I found out that she has four children (maybe five, I can't remember now). The last two are twins. And she is two years younger than my mom.
Thursday when I got home from work, I attempted to call my family. After a couple tries (including one wrong number), I got a decent connection. I thought it was pretty funny because I could hear everything they said fine, but occasionally they'd lose me. It sounded as if the Thanksgiving holiday went on fine without me. My food was just as good as theirs though - a bowl of cereal, and some noodles.
My second semester is more than half way finished and I haven't even mentioned my students here yet. They are actually very good. This time around I am enjoying teaching the upper three levels more than the lower levels. In one class I had 13 students the first day, which is much larger than my biggest class (of 7) before. Now that class has dwindled, but enrollment does look up in my opinion. Some of the things I have learned are surprising to say the least. For example, last week I learned about the way real Russians bobsled. First you whack a small kid on the head and 'borrow' his sled. Then secure it to the back of a car with ropes and pile on. Here comes the interesting part. Your friend driving the car goes on a nice straight away strip of road and you (along with two or three other friends) hang on for dear life. Naturally, you must be ready to bail at a second's notice and skid on your back for a little ways. This becomes tricky when the road has lots of traffic, but definitely ups the thrill factor. I'll leave it to your imagination what the reaction of other motorists is when a car towing three grown men on a sled passes at 60 kilometers per hour!
What else did I learn last week? Currently it is very difficult to buy an apartment in Russia. Credit is not the same over here as in America, and even if it were most people wouldn't be able to get it. The reason is that taxes are deemed too high (somebody said 48%), so the average person only legally makes 600-1000 rubles a month. This figures out to about $30. All the other earnings are handed over in a nice paper envelope. Some people I've asked admit to having bank accounts, but by and large beneath the mattress is the closest most come to a bank. I prefer my piggy bank. To each his own.
The Sunday before Thanksgiving I broke out the Christmas music. I know, I know, I've committed the unforgivable sin - Christmas music before Thanksgiving. But I rather enjoy various aspects of the holiday. Besides the possible birth-date of Jesus, I like the commercial aspect - especially the decorations. Someday I wanna have an outside light display that doubles or triples my electric bill for the month of December.
Then yesterday. I had been practicing for what, two days, and two men knocked on the door to the class where I was teaching. They mentioned something about being musicians and two minutes and ten minutes. I didn't quite get what they said, but they left. It was during the sixth level, so the students are very proficient in English and I asked someone to give me the low down on what just happened. They weren't sure either. So the lesson continued. Five minutes later, they opened the door and motioned for me. Okay. First question: do you speak Russian? A little. Next question, do you want to play a concert with us tomorrow? Uhh, excuse me? Dixie land jazz. About this time one of the students came out to help me. To cut a long story short, in about twenty minutes I will be meeting the two fellows to go play some music. I hope they realize that one, jazz is not my strongest suit, and two, I haven't played for three months. Talk about hopping in up to my neck. Tune back in a few days to see if I survived.
Or maybe make that a few minutes. The guy showed up half an hour early to pick me up, so I just returned from rehearsal now. It turns out that the concerts aren't until later this week and today was just a rehearsal. Nice little combo: trombone, guitar, bass, drums, sax, and me. As I expected it was pretty obvious that I ain't a jazzer. But they liked me and I'll be playing with them on Saturday someplace. The trombone guy, Yuri, is middle aged and teaches around the area. Now I know some people in the music community.
A few comments on practicing. Usually after I take a week or so off from the horns, the first day back I am a god. Naturally, the next week or two is spent recovering from my lip-smash festival the first day. On Monday, I promised myself to take it nice and easy. After all, three months is a bit longer than a week. If I had wanted to play god, I don't think I could've. I was in the staff (the low part) for the 30 minutes I fiddled around. It is like relearning the instrument. In some respects it is nice. Usually I adjust each note a little bit unconsciously to make it in tune. None of that is going on right now, so maybe I'll get to know my horns a bit better. My goal (prior to dixieland jazz) was to take a month or two and get back to the basics: lyrical playing, good breathing, sound, and not so much techincal stuff. I still want to do that. I don't think I'll be a regular with good ol' Yuri and his swingin' chaps, but we'll see.
The rehearsal of the combo was in the music college. Interesting layout (for a non-Russian). To get to the small rehearsal room we had to walk through five practice rooms. It looks like it used to be a hallway and they just put up a few walls and voila - extra practice rooms. Maybe all the big universities with not enough practice rooms should take a lesson.
My concert for the weekend was the monthly offering from the local orchestra of native Russian instruments. At first it was interesting. But then the novelty of sitting in the front row and craning my neck to see anything wore off. Only today is my neck back to normal. There is a certain something to a bunch of tiny mandolinish instruments strumming a very high note in various degrees of tuneliness. Something that I don't think I'll be subjecting myself to again for some time. Halfway through the first half out came the vocalist clad in "authentic Argentinean garb!" Actually it was Russian, but I digress. From her first cowgirl whoop, until her acapella encore in the second half, I was blown away. Literally. The sound guy had her turned up way too loud. But I survived. Quite an entertainer she is. I've been humming a few of the songs she sang all week and will need to keep my eyes open for any other concerts by her - she is amazing. The title for this post comes from an interesting parallel I picked up on. In the orchestras I've played with the viola section has born the brunt of a copious amount of jokes. Some undeserved, but mostly rightfully earned. As my poor neck was at a ninety degree angle, I noticed similar behaviors near the back of the balalaika section. The first chair balalaika was great and his solo in the concert was quite enjoyable. But some of the third and fourth stand balalaikas looked as if they may have been strumming their instrument on a street corner a few hours prior. Maybe this isn't the case and I'm just not up on my balalaikonometry. I chuckled to myself in between cringes from the oh-so-high not-so-in-tune mandolinny things. Yes, the concert was worth my 33 cents. I should complain. Programs aren't free even for season subscription holders. What a crock!
On the practicing front, today marks my third day back in the trumpet mode. Last Friday I met with the director of the Sergei Rachmaninov Kaliningrad Regional Musik Colledge. He agreed to let me practice if there was an open room. I owe a very big thank you to Galina i-don't-know-her-other-name. She is a friend of the lady who gave me my season pass to the concert hall. Apparently, after hearing that I didn't have any place to practice she took it upon herself to help me out. After meeting with the director, we walked around Kaliningrad for an hour or so looking for somebody who could translate what happened for me. We never did succeed, but it turns out that I understood enough of what was happening. On the nice walk I found out that she has four children (maybe five, I can't remember now). The last two are twins. And she is two years younger than my mom.
Thursday when I got home from work, I attempted to call my family. After a couple tries (including one wrong number), I got a decent connection. I thought it was pretty funny because I could hear everything they said fine, but occasionally they'd lose me. It sounded as if the Thanksgiving holiday went on fine without me. My food was just as good as theirs though - a bowl of cereal, and some noodles.
My second semester is more than half way finished and I haven't even mentioned my students here yet. They are actually very good. This time around I am enjoying teaching the upper three levels more than the lower levels. In one class I had 13 students the first day, which is much larger than my biggest class (of 7) before. Now that class has dwindled, but enrollment does look up in my opinion. Some of the things I have learned are surprising to say the least. For example, last week I learned about the way real Russians bobsled. First you whack a small kid on the head and 'borrow' his sled. Then secure it to the back of a car with ropes and pile on. Here comes the interesting part. Your friend driving the car goes on a nice straight away strip of road and you (along with two or three other friends) hang on for dear life. Naturally, you must be ready to bail at a second's notice and skid on your back for a little ways. This becomes tricky when the road has lots of traffic, but definitely ups the thrill factor. I'll leave it to your imagination what the reaction of other motorists is when a car towing three grown men on a sled passes at 60 kilometers per hour!
What else did I learn last week? Currently it is very difficult to buy an apartment in Russia. Credit is not the same over here as in America, and even if it were most people wouldn't be able to get it. The reason is that taxes are deemed too high (somebody said 48%), so the average person only legally makes 600-1000 rubles a month. This figures out to about $30. All the other earnings are handed over in a nice paper envelope. Some people I've asked admit to having bank accounts, but by and large beneath the mattress is the closest most come to a bank. I prefer my piggy bank. To each his own.
The Sunday before Thanksgiving I broke out the Christmas music. I know, I know, I've committed the unforgivable sin - Christmas music before Thanksgiving. But I rather enjoy various aspects of the holiday. Besides the possible birth-date of Jesus, I like the commercial aspect - especially the decorations. Someday I wanna have an outside light display that doubles or triples my electric bill for the month of December.
Then yesterday. I had been practicing for what, two days, and two men knocked on the door to the class where I was teaching. They mentioned something about being musicians and two minutes and ten minutes. I didn't quite get what they said, but they left. It was during the sixth level, so the students are very proficient in English and I asked someone to give me the low down on what just happened. They weren't sure either. So the lesson continued. Five minutes later, they opened the door and motioned for me. Okay. First question: do you speak Russian? A little. Next question, do you want to play a concert with us tomorrow? Uhh, excuse me? Dixie land jazz. About this time one of the students came out to help me. To cut a long story short, in about twenty minutes I will be meeting the two fellows to go play some music. I hope they realize that one, jazz is not my strongest suit, and two, I haven't played for three months. Talk about hopping in up to my neck. Tune back in a few days to see if I survived.
Or maybe make that a few minutes. The guy showed up half an hour early to pick me up, so I just returned from rehearsal now. It turns out that the concerts aren't until later this week and today was just a rehearsal. Nice little combo: trombone, guitar, bass, drums, sax, and me. As I expected it was pretty obvious that I ain't a jazzer. But they liked me and I'll be playing with them on Saturday someplace. The trombone guy, Yuri, is middle aged and teaches around the area. Now I know some people in the music community.
A few comments on practicing. Usually after I take a week or so off from the horns, the first day back I am a god. Naturally, the next week or two is spent recovering from my lip-smash festival the first day. On Monday, I promised myself to take it nice and easy. After all, three months is a bit longer than a week. If I had wanted to play god, I don't think I could've. I was in the staff (the low part) for the 30 minutes I fiddled around. It is like relearning the instrument. In some respects it is nice. Usually I adjust each note a little bit unconsciously to make it in tune. None of that is going on right now, so maybe I'll get to know my horns a bit better. My goal (prior to dixieland jazz) was to take a month or two and get back to the basics: lyrical playing, good breathing, sound, and not so much techincal stuff. I still want to do that. I don't think I'll be a regular with good ol' Yuri and his swingin' chaps, but we'll see.
The rehearsal of the combo was in the music college. Interesting layout (for a non-Russian). To get to the small rehearsal room we had to walk through five practice rooms. It looks like it used to be a hallway and they just put up a few walls and voila - extra practice rooms. Maybe all the big universities with not enough practice rooms should take a lesson.
My concert for the weekend was the monthly offering from the local orchestra of native Russian instruments. At first it was interesting. But then the novelty of sitting in the front row and craning my neck to see anything wore off. Only today is my neck back to normal. There is a certain something to a bunch of tiny mandolinish instruments strumming a very high note in various degrees of tuneliness. Something that I don't think I'll be subjecting myself to again for some time. Halfway through the first half out came the vocalist clad in "authentic Argentinean garb!" Actually it was Russian, but I digress. From her first cowgirl whoop, until her acapella encore in the second half, I was blown away. Literally. The sound guy had her turned up way too loud. But I survived. Quite an entertainer she is. I've been humming a few of the songs she sang all week and will need to keep my eyes open for any other concerts by her - she is amazing. The title for this post comes from an interesting parallel I picked up on. In the orchestras I've played with the viola section has born the brunt of a copious amount of jokes. Some undeserved, but mostly rightfully earned. As my poor neck was at a ninety degree angle, I noticed similar behaviors near the back of the balalaika section. The first chair balalaika was great and his solo in the concert was quite enjoyable. But some of the third and fourth stand balalaikas looked as if they may have been strumming their instrument on a street corner a few hours prior. Maybe this isn't the case and I'm just not up on my balalaikonometry. I chuckled to myself in between cringes from the oh-so-high not-so-in-tune mandolinny things. Yes, the concert was worth my 33 cents. I should complain. Programs aren't free even for season subscription holders. What a crock!
posted by Troy on 14:00
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Glad to hear you really started playing again. Hope you find it opens more doors for you in the foreign land.
Victor
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