100 days of practice - week 14
Wednesday - day 92
Second day at RSNO, so I moved back to my seat for the concerts, seat #4 on second desk. It was insane how much of a difference just one desk back is - immediately it was harder to hear the violins, the sound was less balanced, I had to work much harder to come in right on time and match the energy of the front. I was very grateful to have had the time on front desk, and hold on to how that had felt and try and keep that, even though it felt very different.
After work/rehearsal, I made dinner and we took it as a picnic to the park to soak up some sun. Then I had to hustle a scholarship application - man those things just are so awful. It was amazing how, despite feeling very confident and, frankly, successful recently, writing a scholarship application STILL fills me with doubt and insecurity. I wrote a draft and went out to meet my friend for a drink and we had great music/life chats and dropped by a gig - a weekly jazz session. It was really lovely to see people and catch up and I feel very grateful for how many people around me Get It.
Thursday - day 93
First concert day! Had a little sleep in and a slow morning at home. Went to the gym in our building (have cancelled my other membership! Big changes - just needed to save money and now the weather is better wasn’t going so often).
Bussed to Dundee, did a rather long dress rehearsal, and took myself for a walk to eat my packed dinner by the river. Thought about all the orchestra tours I’ve been on in my life - and relished that feeling of “I’m being PAID to do what I love and see new places!”. Ate a Terry’s chocolate orange in the sun. The concert went well, it was a beautiful hall with a great acoustic, and as it was the first concert I was focussed and excited to perform. It felt SO good to perform outside of RCS. The bus ride home I chatted to a freelancer about his career - it was cool to hear his perspective on different career paths and why freelancing suits him.
Friday - day 94
I put on yellow socks and a yellow jumper and shorts and headed out to the Southside. I dropped film off for developing and went charity shopping. I bought: a table cloth (maybe could double as a picnic blanket?), two books (A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian by Marina Lewycka, and The Faraway Tree by Enid Blyton, for the nostalgia), a beautiful brown top, and summer PJ bottoms that have butterflies on them.
Today’s RSNO concert was in Edinburgh. Clarke started work this week (woo!) and his office is in Edinburgh so I met up with him and we went for the quickest dinner on the whole world (I ate maybe 5 bites of Kadai Paneer) and rushed off to sound check. He came to see the concert - it makes SUCH a difference to me having someone I know in the audience so it was really lovely to have him there to talk about it with afterwards. The soloist, Jess Gillam played an incredible incredible encore - she is so amazing. I felt super inspired after listening to her play to work on my saxophone sonata - combining her control and sound quality with the explorative, creative way the principal violist played. I made a mental note to play around with that tomorrow.
Saturday - day 95
Another chill day, except for practice. Tidied the flat, went to the supermarket, made focaccia and brownie, visited the Glasgow Photography gallery that I’ve been meaning to go to for ages. Hung out with Clarke :). I did some of the practice I wanted to yesterday - skipped the boring technique practice and just played with colour, trying new shifts, vibrato, fingerings. Made lots of new creative decisions about the sonata. I feel like by watching the way amazing musicians experiment with sound in a way that isn’t quality-obsessed, I unlocked a whole new realm of my playing. I’m really working on letting go of control and tension - trying to get a wider vibrato, slower/softer shifts, more flexibility, and in that flexibility, strength. I’ve been inspired by a balance between incredible control and a lack of self-consciousness, using control to really draw sound from the instrument rather than to “control the sound”.
Celia came to the concert tonight, which I was so grateful for, because again having someone I know in the audience really makes a performance more enjoyable.
Sunday - day 96
Off to London! Holiday time! Boarded the train with a bag full of abundance - a thermos of coffee, 2 boiled eggs, a container full of brownie, a loaf of focaccia (offerings to friends who I’m visiting), a banana, half a cucumber, and a tub of hummus. Listening to nostalgic music, and I know it’s cheesy, but can’t help think of 12 year old me, who was so eager to be independent and exploring the world on her own. She’s so excited to see me coming off a week of playing in a profesh orchestra and headed to London to visit a bunch of wonderful friends. And that’s where I am now!
With 4 days of 100 days left, I’m thinking about what’s next. This has been a really really great way of practicing posting casual, easy posts. I feel on a roll with live laugh lemon, and really want to keep up the posts. I’ve got some ideas for topics I want to write about, but I also was reminded recently that I wanted this to be a shared space, and collaborative. If anyone would like to contribute to LLL PLEASE let me know your ideas, and I would love to have contributions. It can be a piece of writing, a video, a piece of art, anything!
See you next week for the final 4 days xoxo
