Home to Home

While it feels like a lifetime ago, the recordings at the beginning of this week went pretty well – I found that I was able to relax and just make music. The pressure of the microphone being right in front of me added a nice adrenaline to everything and actually pushed me to give my all in every take, which turned out to be more of a fun challenge rather than a stressful nightmare.

Making music again at the University rekindled some of the musical fire within me. Almost all of my musical beginnings were there, from my childhood violin lessons, to youth orchestra and youth choir rehearsals during my teenage years, to my time as a voice major in college. I was reminded of how hungry I was to learn when I was a student there, and how I was so passionate and voracious in my quest to learn, study, and perform as many songs and concert pieces as I could. It was like I was swimming in lieder and chansons, luxuriating in the myriad of ways each composer set the texts. It was a time when I was beginning to understand the mechanics of how music worked and how much beauty and emotion it was capable of conveying, and I immersed myself in that wave of discovery. With some recitals that need to be programmed looming over my head, that refueling of the fire couldn’t come at a better time. More importantly, it was a great feeling to revisit my musical roots and be reminded of what brought me to devote my life to this art-form in the first place.

I returned from my childhood home to my adult home Tuesday, and the days at home before the tour flew by. I resumed immersing myself into my newfound New York home life, with much more success this time. I have discovered that it is vital to get myself out of the house early on, otherwise the day escapes me and I find too many items on my to-do list left undone, leaving me with a rather unpleasant feeling. The biggest drama of the week turned out to be a horrifying experience at a hair salon in Chelsea where apparently there was a miscommunication, and most of my hair was cut from my head. I’m still recovering.

The brief sojourn at the homestead ended with cooking a friend a Greek dinner for his 30^th birthday and then a frantic packing episode before rushing to meet ACB for our journey to the airport. On the plane to our first stop in Ohio, I found myself wondering exactly what it is that I left behind that I need…it turns out it was my scarf.