Monday, December 24, 2012

Another Semester Done

    And boy what a semester it was! This one was NOT easy. Not only was I taking hard classes, I had my theory teacher swapped for another one, and dealing with his teaching style was really hard. I had an insane string methods teacher who was very evil and horrible at teaching, and that's not an overstatement. I also was dealing with personal family issues that came up half way through the semester and that really sucked. Luckily through all this, my friends were there to support me, to answer any questions I may have had, to be the ears I needed when I needed to vent and just to be silly with. :) So, special shout out to Alexa, Claire, Becca and Roxanne for always being there even at the most random-est times, for being amazing friends and always somehow knowing when something was wrong. You all are some of my very best friends and I love you all :) Too bad only one of you reads this though :(

   Now that that's all mentioned, I am now in the middle of Winter break and really looking forward until it's over! Break is great and all but I'M BORED!!! Going from taking 20 units with nonstop classes then 4 weeks of doing nothing is like going super fast in a car then having to slam on the breaks! You feel like you got the wind knocked out of you! For the past week, when I'm not running carpool or helping clean around the house or whatever, I am literally sitting on our couch watching Grey's Anatomy, talking to people on Facebook, or spending hours on Pinterest. ( I love pinterest :) ) I've turned into a couch potato! (hahaha potato) Luckly, Christmas is tomorrow so that'll give me something to do and also my mom's bday party is coming up so that'll be fun, on on the 4th I'm going to Disneyland!!!!!!!!!! I'm so excited for Disneyland :D I haven't been in a very long time and it's going to be super duper fun!! Also, as soon as break is over, I'm heading back to school to get ready to go to the Music teacher conference in San Jose!!! I'm so excited, I get to room with my fellow music education club officers and it's going to be so fun. Plus me and my friend are of legal drinking age so we get to go to the Wine and Cheese thing that they have! Time to go make some friends with very drunk band directors ;) Last year when we went we had such a great time so I'm really looking forward to it!

    Let's see, let's talk about next semester now! Next semester should be super fun. I'm taking percussion methods (been looking forward to this since I became a music major), my third semester of Theory (I hear it's super fun), third semester of Ear Training, the last class of Piano (got to skip all the others seeing as I've been playing for 8+ years), 2nd semester of History of Western Music, Music for the classroom (elementary school classroom music), music technology, brass ensemble, band, either chamber winds or jazz band, guitar methods, rep class, and my lessons. Should be a good and hopefully less stressful semester.

   BYE!!

-trumpetgirly

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

School time soon!

    Well, home stretch time until I head back up to school for the year! This summer went by super fast. Lots of interesting things happened and went on! Went to Mexico on a cruise with my brothers and mom because my brothers got to play a performance on it with their HS jazz band and Chamber singing group. That was fun. Then I did my internship at the middle school, where I learned so much and even got an offer for a letter of recommendation from the teacher I observed and assisted. That's really saying a lot because he's a well known director that even got an award for his directing. Plus the fact that he even offered to write me one is great, because nobody ever HAS to write a letter of recommendation for anybody, and the fact that he offered it himself means so much to me. If I don't have anything to do next summer, I definitely want to go back and help out again.

    I am really really excited to be moving into my new apartment. My roommate is a really great person and I'm excited to get to live with her. Of course, I'm nervous as well, since she's a new living mate, and ever since the whole fiasco from my Sophomore year, I always get kind of nervous with new living mates, but I think everything will be just fine :) It'll be really fun! We had a nice skype session today, trying to figure out apartment stuff, and searching for the best internet deal, while encountering the Comcast chat representative and wondering if he was the creepy guy who used to follow me around last year, which then led into intense laughter as we anxiously waited to see if his last name was what we thought it might be. haha wow! That was a run on sentence!! Sadly, he refused to tell us. Apparently they can only say information that relates to their products! Bummer :P She also finally got to meet most of my family, that was very entertaining!

    What's awesome, is my family finally decided to let me bring up the car, so that I didn't have to ride my bike home at night. I'm really grateful that they are letting me! Of course I will be paying for my own gas and helping pay for car insurance but I think it'll be worth it, especially since the school isn't all that far away from where I'll be living this year. Now the car just needs to survive the 8 hour trip up to school! (it's a very old car)

   Ok, I need to talk about this now, because I just stopped blogging for 6 minutes just so I could do this. But, my Sophomore year of college, we played a piece called "Arabesque" by Samuel Hazo. It was an extremely hard piece to play as a trumpet player, but, my goodness was it amazing once we got it down. There was one part in the piece where we had to clap on an off beat, and I've now realized, that it is impossible to listen to that song without needing to stop what I'm doing in order to clap. It's like listening to the "Friends" theme song and not CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAPPing at the clapping section. You just can't not do it.

   Anyways, that is all I can think to blog about for now. I hope everybody is having a lovely Summer break and I look forward to seeing all you peeps that I know very soon!!! 9 days and counting!! EEEEEE!!!! :-D

-Trumpetgirly

Here is the piece I was talking about :)


Monday, July 9, 2012

    It's almost move in day!!!!!!! Well, sort of :P I have about a month. I'm super super excited. I've never lived off campus so this will be a new experience for me! It's going to be super weird not having my roommate of 3 years living with me anymore though :( We've definitely been through thick and thin together, with certain roommate issues and emergencies and always being there for each other. It's going to be a strange thing to get used to not having her around everyday. I already miss her!!! We will need to plan lots of hang out days though.  
    My 4 weeks of helping out at the middle school are almost up this week. They are having their concert on Thursday. It's going to be weird not waking up everyday at 7:30 to shower and get into my teacher outfit! I've learned so much from this experience and it makes me want to be a music teacher even more. Not only has it helped build my confidence in getting up in front of an actual group of students who do not have an extensive musical background and if you say something wrong they will have no idea what you are talking about, but I now have more confidence in being able to TEACH other instruments. Through out the past 3 weeks, the director I've been helping has had me help warm up the three different groups, concert band, beginning Jazz and Advance Jazz; I've taken individuals and sections out to help them with their parts (which in turn has enforced what I've learned in my methods classes this past year! I've also learned to improvise (though I'll learn that next semester anyways :P) and seen how things may work with certain students but not others. I'm really glad I got this opportunity and I'm really grateful to my aunt who is the one who recommended I try to ask the teacher if I could help with his summer program. So thank you Auntie!!!!
   I get to go to the lake this Friday with the BF's family and a few members of my family! It's going to be super fun and we are going to use my BF's family's Wave Runners. Super stoked. 
  The BF got a new puppy yesterday. He is the cutest little guy ever. Got some great pictures of him too. He's going to grow up so fast!! He's a german shepard :)


Ok, well tootles!!!


-Trumpetgirly

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Musical Summer

    Well, I have to say, this summer has definitely been very musical for me. The first thing I do when I come back besides celebrating my birthday is to go start doing my Instrumental Conducting observations. Not that I need to be doing them right now but I figured it was better to get them out of the way! So far I've already done 10 hours worth! Though technically I've only done 2 hours because we got a list of requirements that we need to fill to equal 20 hours of observations. It's a complicated process :P
    Then I went on the cruise to Mexico to watch my brothers sing and play trumpet! That was super fun, though it makes me wish our group could go on a cruise because it seems really fun to go on with your best friends and stuff. :)
   My next musical endeavor will start next week, where I will be helping my cousin's Middle School Band director with his summer music program. It seems really cool and I hope it ends up being a really rewarding experience. I am sure it will be. I will be meeting up with the director this Friday to figure scheduling and talk logistics and find stuff out. Should be interesting and I'll keep you posted on how that goes!
   Another musical thing I will be doing is giving conducting lessons to my High School's new Drum Majors for their marching band. I'm a little nervous about that because I am not sure I have the right skill set and experience yet to be able to teach them, but I might actually. I guess I shall see how it goes. I do know enough about conducting that I might actually be extremely  useful to them so wish me luck!  
    I'm really looking forward to getting the audition music for Symphonic Wind Ensemble. I'm going to practice the heck out of it so that I can beat out our 1st Chair. I want 1st chair but I really don't at the same time because it's so much pressure, I'm not sure I'd be able to handle it. But I shall see what happens when I need to cross that bridge!! :D
    I'm super excited to go back to school! I miss my friends so much! Facebook and texting and skype and all that just isn't enough! I'm also actually kind of excited for school to start as well. I miss being constantly busy, sitting around all day is boring!! I need my 5 million things to do per day!! Plus I feel some really great opportunities are going to be coming my way this year. Not sure what they could possibly be but I need to make sure to keep an open mind!

Ta ta for now!

-trumpetgirly 

Monday, May 28, 2012

Summary of me for now

Here's an update of stuff because I'm too lazy to not do bullet points!!!

* Got a 3.75 GPA for this spring semester! Made it on the Dean's list, BOO YA!!!!!
* stuck at home doing nothing! Not so Boo ya :/
* Have an apartment which I am looking forward to moving into!!!
* Going on a cruise to Mexico! Not saying when because I don't want people to come find my house and rob it! But to all who truly know me, I'll take lots of pictures!!!
* I got new socks!
* I had my 21st birthday! And before I went home for summer, my friends threw me a surprise party and it was super fun and I was so happy!!!
* I'm using lots of !!!!!!!!!s
* I'm a senior this year! But I'm not graduating :(
* I've been having fun posting random videos on people's facebook walls. Let me know if you want to be next :)
* I've just saved 15% or more on my car insurance by switching to GEICO.
* I didn't actually switch to GEICO
* I like playing flute
* I have a trumpet (actually it's a cornet) Pencil sharpener
* picking out a desk is hard
* I really did switch to GEICO
* No, I really didn't
* I started a Pinterest account so if you want to follow me, feel free
* fdsasdfgjklgfdsdfg
* the above statement is beautiful
* Cows go moo
* My brother said Murr

OK, that is all. If you actually know me feel free to talk to me because I'm super bored and have nothing to do till I move in.... :) BYE!!!

-Trumpetgirly

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Random Thoughts

Here's a list of random thoughts!

Things I love:

* Hugs!!!!!! If you see me around feel free to hug me! Odds are, I could most likely use one at that moment, plus I really love just hugging people, especially if I care about you a lot, then I find them extra awesome :)

* Animals. In case you didn't know for some reason, I used to want to be a vet. I adore animals and have adored them since I was a small child.

* DOGS. They are animals too, I know but they are my most favorite. I hope to own a few when I have my place one day.  Favorite breeds..... Golden retriever and Husky

* Music!!!! As if that wasn't obvious seeing as it takes up my life only 24/7 and I don't talk about it in every post or anything :P

* My friends. They really are amazing. They are always there for me and are patient with me and don't judge my random out bursts of excitement and my intense hyperness that I tend to have sometimes. Plus they always make me laugh and just make my day better. I love you guys :)

* My family. They are always there for me no matter how I am and love me unconditionally and they are just amazing :D I love you guys too!!!

* Trumpet. I better love it seeing as it's my instrumental focus and I've been playing it for 11 years. It's an awesome instrument and IT'S NOT JUST FOR GUYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Take that all you guys out there who think I can't play just because I'm a girl. :D


Onwards with more random things!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have you ever wondered what animal you would be if you were not a human? I'm pretty sure I'd be a dog, and it's not just because I love dogs. I'm pretty sure my personality fits to a "T".

Sountracks are awesome.

Did I mention that I am now the treasurer for our Music Education club? YEAH! It's awesome :) I will be going to the school's Charter meeting tomorrow with our new club Prez, to make sure that we are still considered an active club!

Sadly, it looks like our Brass Ensemble won't be having a Brass Ensemble party. :( How sad. Last semester we had one and it was super fun and apparently me and my friend made the party! We are such the party animals fo sho! ;)

COWS GO MOOOOOOOOOO

I've been told by many people that they want to feed me nuts so they can practice using my epi-pen. At least they are willing to save my life if needed!!!





Anyways.... that concludes my list of random thoughts. Ta ta for now

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

I have roommates!!!!

    Everybody! It has been resolved! I officially have roommates for next year! Super excited, I've been stressing so much about what I'm doing for my living situation for next year since I can't live on campus (Thanks school.... thanks a lot) I truly am very excited because the people I will be living with are really great people and some of my closest friends at school. And no, I'm not just saying that because they read my blog. :-P Or maybe I am! Hahaha no, I really am not just saying that.  But yeah, now the next big step is actually finding a place to live. We've been raiding the internet in search of places but we need to hurry because half the school is looking for a place to live as well.... We will find something!!!

     Oh yeah! So TAHOE!!!! In summary, it was the best band trip I've ever taken. I finally got to be in the snow, we had an epic snowball fight, made a snowman, played our brains out at 5 concerts in 2 days and had a blast. My hotel roomies were the best (again, see above statement). I really hope we can go on another trip next year! Next stop, South Korea with the Brass Ensemble!!! (Hopefully?) The rest of spring break was a blast as well! The first half was kind of bleh since all my roommates went home so I was by myself and stuff, and I really didn't get much done. I honestly have no idea what I did for those 3 days.... be unproductive I guess. Then my friend came on Wednesday and I went to stay at her house until today. That was super fun!! We played for cows (hehehe), I got a tour of the her home town, hung at our other friend's house and played mario and made music and got a tour of HER home town as well! We also had to wake up at 5 in the morning to go watch a HS choir for our class (That wasn't so fun....) did a butt load of hw, walked in the creek (I should go figure out how to dry my boots....), got dinner and a show by a diner at another table (That was hilarious!!!!!) went to her church and bible study and watched movies!! Wow, we did a lot! OH!!!!! And I learned how to play the flute!!!! I will be learning that this week anyways, but I got a head start. :) 


    Let's see, what else is new in my life? By the way, this paragraph is now being written the next day because I got tired when I was writing earlier and felt like sleeping. So, sorry! My little bro and his HS drumline are doing really well in their competitions! They just recently got bumped up to open class last week and this week they got first in the open class division! That's pretty intense.... I'll have to post the video up here so you guys can see it. It's pretty cool actually. Their show is called "Revenge of The Vampires". Now, since the whole twilight craze is a foot, you'd probably NOT want to watch it because it's about stupid vampires and all that annoying stuff, but you really should watch it. It's actually really cool.


     So all my life I have had music constantly running through my head, which then results in me humming, singing or drumming on things constantly. I do have the ability to turn it off when needed but it's more fun to let it play in my head. Apparently this is not as normal as I think it is.... Apparently most people do not actually have music running throught their heads for 97% of their day. Anyways, I figured that it would be a good idea to actually make a log of what music runs through my head so I can see what and how much there is in my brain! Turns out, I have a whole iPod up there :P So here's the list of songs from Saturday in order.

1. It's Raining Sunshine (Not the Miranda Casgrove version)
2. some walking music from Mary Poppins
3. Beautiful Dreamer
4. Tomorrow from Annie
5. Viva La Vida
6. Tomorrow from Annie
7. Muppet Opener
8. Ricercar By Andrea Gabrieli
9. Bootstrap's Bootstraps (Pirates 1)
10. Barbarian Horde (Gladiator)
11. Some drumline cadence we did in high school
12. Romeo and Juliet Love Theme
13. Incantation and Dance
14. Maximum Strength Warm Up
15. Some choir music we are singing
16. Bararian Horder
17. Something From Danserye
18. Sesame Stree
19. Danserye (The trumpet movement
20. American Salute
21. Ricercar

Fun stuff!!! Anywho, I was going to post some videos of these but this is already so long of a blog post so, sorry!!! Bye for now!

-Trumpetgirly

Saturday, March 17, 2012

Heeeey there!

     So I finally decided to write a post after a month! Honestly, I feel nobody except one or two people really read this.... so I don't think I was really missed. Anywho, onward with my post!

    So it's, what, the 8th or 9th week of the semester now? So much has happened since my last post! Let's see.... I found out that I won't be living on campus next semester because I'm #164 on the wait list, so now I need to figure out some way to live off campus and close enough to campus to be able to bike when needed. I love how all my plans for my living situation next year totally just went down the toilet, but something will work out!! Just need to stay optimistic.  My professor, who has been on maternity leave all semester has officially come back! You have no idea how excited I've been since she's back. We are getting so much done now in my classes now that we no longer have substitutes in them. She's also just a great person and teacher so it's nice having her back.

     We've already had one concert in Symphonic Wind Ensemble, and we ended up playing it really well. I was very happy about that, because I was a little bit worried, since we have been doing ok in rehearsals. This week are going on tour to the high schools in the surrounding area to perform our program and hopefully recruit some new comers for the upcoming semesters. :) I've been excited about this trip since our director has mentioned possibly doing it, last year, but now I'm even more excited now that it's almost here. As excited as I am about getting to perform, I think I'm mostly excited to get to spend time with everybody. My trip roommates are amazing, and I'm so stoked to get to room with them!!!! I think I'm annoying them with being so excited... I'm sorry!!! But yeah! Can't wait for Thursday!!!

    Speaking of music, I LOVE BEING A MUSIC ED MAJOR!!!! I'm soooo happy, apparently it's obvious. I've been told by at least three people in the past 2 weeks that I seem so much happier than when I was a biology major. I find that really interesting, but they aren't wrong! As full as my days are, they aren't boring and all my friends are always around, and I love it. :) 

   Anywho, I shall leave you with a really pretty piece that one of my friends introduced me to a few weeks ago!! My favorite part is around :50 where the violin melody comes in. It's so pretty. :)


Tootleloooo!!!

-Trumpetgirly

Monday, February 13, 2012

Woo

    Changed my blog title today. I feel like this new title fits me a little better because my last one, "Every musician needs music notes" isn't entirely true. There are  musicians out there who don't even know how to read music and are amazing at making it. Take my younger brother as an example. He can sing, but he has no idea how to read music, nor does he know how to play piano, but he creates the most amazing music on the piano. I have no idea how he does it! He says choir is what helps him create the chords and melodies, but I'm still amazed at his ability, I'm horrible at doing anything like that. I feel, that if he ends up not pursuing acting or singing, he would make an amazing composer.

    Played my rep piece again last week! This time with my friend as my accompanist! We did a really great job for only playing it together twice! The second rehearsal together even included a new section that we had both been working on but it sounded great when we played it for the class. There are a lot of things I still need to work on such as being much more expressive with my playing, how I attack my notes, and making sure not to let my longer notes waver in sound. I was told that I have a rosey tone though, which is cool even though I'm not really sure what that means, but I was told I sounded nice. :) Can't let that get to my head though! I'm far from making this piece sound the way I want it to and I need to make it better if I want to be able to play it at our upcoming concert!!!!

    This pep game was even more fun than last weeks! I didn't even know that could have been possible! After our meeting, a group of us Pep banders went to our Amecis on campus and had a grand old time being goofy and taking amazing pictures. I really love all my fellow music people. :) The game was super fun as well. I do feel that I was less boring for sure! No creepers afterwards either!

    As I depart, I shall leave you with a piece we are playing in our brass ensemble and has been constantly stuck in my head due to the fact that it's pretty much an inside joke now so it shows up randomly sometimes when I least expect it. :P Have fun having it stuck in your heads because it's so catchy!!!

    Lastly......... I do declare!!! :)

-Trumpetgirly

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Do Re Mi Fa So La Ti Do!!

    Woo! So I'm hoping this feeling isn't going to go away as the semester progresses, but I'm already really enjoying Choir. I honestly don't think I'm even singing really well, but I'm still trying really really hard, and I can already tell my sight singing has really improved and I've barely just started. Hopefully, if I improve enough in both my singing and my sight singing, and I still am enjoying singing by the end of the semester, I'm going to try out for chamber singers. They are really good though, so I don't know if I'll even make it in but it's always good practice doing the audition and all that anyways. Oh, and I sing Alto 2, yay for having a lower singing voice! :P

   Yesterday, in Big Band, me and 3 other students were asked by our director if we could come play in his piece that he is composing at our school's faculty composer's concert. I'm so stoked! I'm so not a jazz person, and I'm still getting the hang of it, but I guess he doesn't consider me a total loss at it and a decent trumpet player if he was willing to ask me to play in the piece when he could have easier grabbed someone better to fill my position.

   Anywho, on with my random spurts of information!! Today I FINALLY got to play in the Chamber Wind Ensemble in a piece called "Dances With Winds" by Shelley Hanson. I am enjoying that piece already! It's super fun! The first movement reminds me of the Sherlock Holmes soundtrack (First movie), the 2nd movement is so pretty and I actually get a little soloish thing in it, the 2nd half of that movement is crazy fast though but once we get that down we are going to sound awesome. 3rd movement is super fun as well :D

   Another pep band/basketball game is coming up! If it's anything like the last one, it's going to be amazing! PLUS, I'm going to work on being less boring! Because I felt I was being pretty boring at the last game until near the end (Yeah Final Count Down!).  We have a meeting before hand to get some business covered for a festival our school is hosting this weekend but apparently we will have a break between that and the game to get some food so I was thinking of talking to some mus ed/ pep band peeps to get together and grab a quick bite to eat. I'll need to remember to actually ask about that! Though I know one of the people I need to ask is reading this, ;P soooo what do you think? Sound good to you? :D

   I shall now depart with a piece from Sherlock Holmes, and just say it's my favorite one from the entire soundtrack and it doesn't need reviewing because it's awesome. Though, my favorite part is somewhere in one of these two videos (it's a total of 14 minutes so obviously it's not going to fit in one youtube video)  But enjoy it anyways because I love it and I'm sure you will too. :) Also, I will give some words of wisdom:

        Don't wave at people in cars as they drive by because they could end up being creepers.

Ok that's not creepy at all! Anywho, tootles for now!

-Trumpetgirly





   

Friday, February 3, 2012

♫♪ MUSIC ♫♪

     Already 3 weeks are gone in this semester. It's pretty amazing and I'm having so much fun! My days are packed to the brim with music classes and I don't get much free time, but honestly all my classes are fun and I have my friends in each of them so that makes them even more fun to go to. Because I have so many classes in one day, I just stay in our school's music building until they are all over, even if I have an hour break in between, because honestly, what's the point of going back in forth when you are just going to have to turn around right when you get home anyways? And there is always someone to talk to anyways when I'm just sitting around doing HW in the lobby as well.
     Being a music education major is so much fun. Everybody was so welcoming, and it's such a tight nit little community to where everybody knows each other. I really feel like I belong here and I've already made so many friends. We have so many fun and funny moments that I will always remember. For example, after our pep band played at the women's basketball game, me and two of my friends had quite the adventure as we were leaving the music building resulting in creepy people in cars and lots of laughing.
     Even though some of my classes are a little complicated, I always feel so smart after I figure them out because I'm technically talking in another language! Not everybody knows what 8th notes are or what a Perfect Authentic Cadence is and how to build one. So I must leave a note for my ex major....

Dear Biology,
    I love you dearly and I will always continue to find books about you in libraries and book stores so I can read about everything science and be a total geek about it. I will continue to gawk at any animal that walks by and yell "PUPPY!!!!!!" at any puppy that walks by as well. I will continue to find anything science related absolutely amazing, which others would find gross. But, you and me, we did not have the kind of relationship I was looking for in a major, I feel that you were abusive in ripping apart my GPA even when I tried so hard to keep it together. I've found someone else, who is more accommodating with me and willing to work with me. I will always continue to love you, but I feel that the time has officially come to that point of me moving on and us going our separate ways, educationally speaking.

love always,
Me!

And now, with that depressing note to major who is now probably crying over the fact that I broke up with it, I leave you with no review today because I'm tired! Sorry! Feel free to suggest a piece of any music you'd like for review in the comments though! Tootles!

-Trumpetgirly