you are eating breakfast while i am eating dinner.

Post-Order, Cold-Weather, Situation-Clarification

2012-02-13T16:50:00.002+01:00

Hello. There has been a dearth. The reasons are twofold. First, it's cold over here. (Needs no more explanation.) Second, everything I write sounds idiotic, inane, unpracticed, uninteresting. Several posts were started and left to moulder. But now I've decided that I don't care, I'm throwing them up online! Take that lovely image and keep it in mind when you read the posts that follow this one, they are from as many as four months ago. Anyhow. Here I am, in Copenhagen, future home of Megan. I took the train, with my bass. It's scarcely gotten above freezing for the entire time I've been here. Pity the Californian. There has been a good deal of faffing, practicing, waiting for Husband to get out of work, hanging out with Husband and Other American Musicians, going to concerts, minimizing the amount of time one must spend outside. Before I awoke this morning I dreamed I was walking through a park in late spring, I could feel the warm air on my skin. My feet were bare, the grass was a little damp. Plants were flowering. The leaves on the trees and bushes were so clear in their different shapes and hues of green and they moved in the warm breeze. Andrew's voice was asking me if I was ready for toast and tea. I opened my mouth to utter a noise like a sick sheep before rolling over to recapture the Better Season. When I was in London (see two posts down) I had about 45 minutes to visit the Victoria & Albert museum before meeting a friend. I made my way past the miniatures, through the stained glass hallway, to the print room (boring), and then on to the tapestry room, which was darkened and humid, like a greenhouse. On display is the collection of Devonshire Hunting Tapestries, and one in particular had so many different kinds of trees, all their leaves made clearly recognizable, and the sea, with whitecaps that looked like clouds. My current roommate in Basel, June, is leaving in a month to be an intern with the textiles collection at the V&A. I'm jealous. Looking for those tapestries exposed a third reason for the continued post posting delay: the internet is too damn distracting.

The day I left Basel it snowed so beautifully. At least when it's snowing the weather seems less depressing. On Saturday, I'm getting on a train in the evening so that I can arrive in Paris the next morning. I have a week of work in France, playing two Haydn symphonies (The Bear and The Chicken) before I return to Basel and begin working in earnest on my recital program. That's right, folks. I'm nearly A Master. What I have not yet mastered is riding the bike we found for me here in Copenhagen. It's one of these silly upright-style bikes with foot brakes (remember those, from when you were 5? Exactly.) and a basket and some little flower decals on the body. I think it needs some anarchist stickers or rough-talking decals to make me feel less like an overgrown child. Last night riding home in the cold I kept thinking, This is so stupid. And, also, Don't die. I know it will get better, I'll grow accustomed to the bicycle, the weather will warm up, snow will turn into rain, plants will make their leaves and wave them around in a warm breeze. Any day now. Seriously. Oops. I mean, Yay! Winter!

Delish

2012-02-13T10:19:00.000+01:00

Made dinner for my friend Amy tonight.

Last week was at her house, and we attempted to make a dessert crumble. I say attempted because early on in the process she encountered a container of sugar that had been webbed over by moths - I don't understand, and I didn't look at it, but I didn't need to, her face said everything I needed to know. I calmly asked her for a plastic bag, into which I double and triple knotted the container, and then left it on the balcony. We used white sugar in a different container instead; it was only after a great dinner, and 20 minutes of apple & fig smells wafting from the oven, that we finally tried the dessert.
"Mmhm, apples!"
"Huh, this is, uh, salty."
"Yeah, really salty."
So tonight was my week, and I didn't know what to make, but I came across a recipe for a savory crumble via a blog via another blog that I read. Seemed like the perfect thing.
I never use recipes, btw. I'm nearly categorically against them. But hey! This was great.
From cannelle et vanille, which has beautiful pictures, here's the recipe:
(I couldn't find quinoa flour or brown rice flour, so I used a little more cooked quinoa, and regular white flour. Worked fine. The cooked quinoa got a little hard so I'd use closer to the recommended amount. The woman who writes the blog makes everything gluten free, which explains the various grain flours and alternative ingredients.)
(Also, it seems complicated, but it totally is not.)

Red kuri squash, apple and quinoa crumble

serves 4 to 6

Crumble topping

1/2 cup (70 g) superfine brown rice flour
1/2 cup (70 g) quinoa flour
1/2 cup (70 g) cold cooked quinoa
1/2 ounce (15 g) finely grated Idiazabal or Manchego cheese
3 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
6 tablespoons (90 ml) olive oil

In a bowl, whisk together the first six ingredients. Add olive oil and stir until a sand-like crumble forms.

Chill the crumble while preparing the filling.

Filling

2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 medium leek, thinly sliced
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 medium red kuri or hokkaido squash, peeled and diced (about 3 cups diced)
1 tablespoons finely chopped parsley
3 sage leaves, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
2 medium Gala apples, peeled and diced
3/4 cup (185 ml) chicken stock
1 ounce (30 g) goat cheese, crumbled

Preheat oven to 400F (200C)

In a large saute pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Add the leek and garlic. Cook for 5 minutes until tender, but not browned. Add the squash, parsley, sage, salt, pepper, and coriander. Increase heat to medium high and stir. Cook for 5 minutes stirring occasionally.

Add the chicken stock and cook for another 5 minutes. Add the apples and cook another 5 minutes until soft but not mushy.

Transfer the filling to a greased baking dish or individual over-proof bowls. Top with the crumble.

Bake the crumble until topping golden and filing bubbling, about 30 to 40 minutes for a larger dish and 20 minutes for individuals. Serve warm.

Surprises

2012-02-13T10:12:00.000+01:00

Sometimes, just when you think there's no chance you'll pay your bills or do anything to make money or to be productive ever again, you get a surprise phone call while eating your oatmeal, and kapow, you're in the thick of it. A couple weeks ago, Sonja called from kammerorchester basel to see if I was available for rehearsals already underway, and I didn't even ask any questions - of course I said yes. Yes! I arrived at rehearsal an hour later and found I would be the only bass player. I can't even remember at what point I realized that the first concert was the next day; not until the evening, I think.

The program was a mixture of things, two contemporary pieces for which the composers were in attendance, a Haydn symphony, and a really wonderful piece for tenor, horn and strings by Benjamin Britten, called the Serenade. The tenor was incredible, his name is Mark Padmore, and I'm biding my time until his recent recording of the piece is released. The piece is really perfect, it was written in several movements, each with text from a different poet (Tennyson, Blake, Jonson, Keats) on the theme of night. Beautiful, terrifying, lulling. I think I'll remember our concert at Wigmore Hall in London as one of the highlights of my playing career. Plus I knew there would be some proper ale after the performance.

If you have any interest in Britten or the Serenade, there's a nice BBC program to be found on youtube (here) that talks about his life and the piece. It was written, as with so many of his works, for his partner, Peter Pears; they had been together in America, and were so disturbed by the buildup to WWII that they actually came back to England in 1942 and took a house near the seaside, where Britten wrote what are considered to be his best pieces. I also discovered that the piece was premiered at Wigmore. How about that.

Unfortunately, I didn't take so many photos when I was in England. In fact, I took none. But as proof that I was there, here is a picture I took of a crumpet, bought in London, and toasted, buttered, marmaladed, and consumed in my kitchen.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T20:34:00.000+01:00

2012! I'm sitting on the couch in my living room in Basel, surrounded by little stacks of things to do: bills I just paid, letters I haven't yet read, letters I haven't yet written, old things brought from California that need a new home in my new home, navy blue sweaters to put away. Andrew's plane should be arriving in Copenhagen in about 15 minutes. (Bet I won't have finished writing this by then.) I'll need to deal with all the piles tonight, because tomorrow our new roommate arrives and will be staying on the couch until the old roommate officially moves out on the 6th. Change! Two days ago I came back from a great, full, warm, busy, well-fed trip to California and Texas with a lot of new things: several navy blue sweaters, a big tub of vitamin C, two new suitcases filled with favorite old things, and, best of all, a husband. Indeed! We got married sooner than we said we would, partially because of visa reasons (this way I'll be able to work as soon as I move to Denmark in August) but also because it felt like the right thing to do. It was nice! Our parents were there. The weather was good. The building was beautiful. We met up with a justice of the peace at the Texas State Capitol building in Austin, had a swift little ceremony, then wandered around on the Capitol Grounds before heading back to my mom's house for champagne and a walk around the park. Here we are, in the Rotunda:

photos by a friend of the family, Ethan Ham.

It was a nice thing. We'll still be having a big party, of course, next summer, so we can celebrate with all our friends. For now we're back to normal, living separately, doing our stuff. School starts up again on Tuesday, I'll be playing a solo in a class concert on the 12th and I still haven't chosen the music (whoops), and then four weeks later the semester will be over and I'll be on Winter Break for a month. I'm planning on taking the train up to CPH with my bass and hanging out for a few weeks, practicing while my husband works, eating good food and drinking nice beer with him when he's not working. This is what married people do, right? I'll let you know for sure once I find out.

A new project

2011-10-22T10:50:00.001+02:00

In preparation for this whole wedding thing, we've delegated responsibilities to each other in a very Marxian system of wedding planning. Naturally, invitations fall squarely into the category of my abilities. The obvious thing for me to do would be to go to the print shop and whip something up. I just couldn't think of what. So I spent an evening drawing ideas, and came up with something that I liked.
Something that requires me to design my own typeface.
Yeah, I know.

This is a great project. I spent 12 hours working on it yesterday, taking a quick break to ride my bike to school so I could practice for an hour before the building closed. The idea is not for the letters to be perfect; I still want the project to look hand-drawn, so rather than "fix" my drawings so they're perfect in one of my computer programs, I'm keeping them basically as they are. How am I going to print this? I'm still thinking about it. There's the option to make a plate and print it from the letterpress, but of course that's not the only option; I might also get them printed onto a high-quality paper, and then letterpress some color over them. Oh, we'll see.
Here's the original drawing:

Realized yesterday I'm following in my father's footsteps - he also designed a typeface for their wedding invitations, which they silkscreened at their house in Pacifica, then hung on lines in the living room. I would say mine is more "modern" than theirs, but it was the 70s, after all.

I know, there are easier ways I could be doing this. Like printing from lead at the shop, for example. But I could also just make the drawing, hand-letter the whole thing, and then go from there. But this way, I'll have the letters... I don't know. Don't try to dissuade me. I'm having fun.

By the way - it was 28 degrees (-2˙C) here last night. COLD!!

2011-10-17T15:28:00.000+02:00

Alright, you disgruntled blog followers! Your delinquent author rouses herself.

But incompletely. Still distracted, I shoot nervous glances around the room, out the window, at the shiny ring on my finger. (An engagement ring? It is.) I think about going to the grocery store, about buying some more socks downtown. I feel grateful that my agony at being pinned here at this laptop will be soon interrupted by an appointment at school, where I'll be accompanying a singing class, as part of a renaissance consort.

School has been largely absent from my life so far this year. I have a total of 2 hours of lessons every week, and all on the same day. And nothing else for the rest of the week. Also, my fall has been largely devoid of work projects. This is an amazing opportunity for both extreme productivity, outside of school, and truly epic laziness. Take a moment to guess in which category I more often find myself. I'll give you a hint: not the first. I've lost track of how many books I've read. Of all types. Just finished another one today. My dearth of work has afforded an opportunity to spend some time at the print shop, where I met and was befriended by an American artist named Elana Gutmann, who has been working here for the last few months. She's an interesting person, and makes really beautiful prints. (http://elanagutmann.com/) She also introduced me to some chocolate cake at a hidden cafe not so far from my house.

In the next few weeks I'll start work on a really interesting collaborative print project, organized in part by a printer friend I made last February at Codex. She and a friend have cut their own wood type, and are recruiting artists from all over to make art prints from the type, which will be included in an exhibit and a catalog. More information can be found here, including pictures of the type being cut with a router, and some prints off the first letter.

Also, the wave of work begins, in November. Thank goodness. I've been feeling a little high and dry here. First week of November has three projects, all overlapping each other. Bass on a Train! In the in-between-moments, I think of all the things I hope to fit in when Andrew and I go to California and Texas this December. Really Looking Forward. (Tacos. Ocean. Family, Friends. Clothes Shopping [I Am Shallow]. Maybe some more of these caramels that Maggie sent me for my birthday, if she'll tell me where she got them.)

Pictures, you say? OK. Here is the scene of a nice bike ride & picnic we had last time Andrew was in town (yes - we found him the same kind of bicycle as me, a Cilo! Here in Switzerland they call that "partner-look"),

some strawflowers from my late summer garden,

pumpkins (kurbis) from the farmer's market,

and the strangest little bug I've ever seen - found it on my wall. Any clue what it could be?

Maybe you can see, it walks like a crab. About the size of a grain of rice. Appeared to be completely covered in dust, but I think it was its natural state. Weird! Cute! Creepy! Fascinating!!

Oh yeah, also, here I am, tending to the basil plant.

Trains. Plains. Boats. And a taxi or two.

2011-09-08T13:45:00.000+02:00

Venice, Bremen, Copenhagen. Basel, of course, though briefly. Right now I'm sitting at a yellow desk, with the patchy blue Danish sky out the window. Andrew is working, I'm faffing on the internet, watching Deadwood (for the second time. Highly recommended!), reading Wallace Stegner. Snacking. Sounds like vacation. After Bremen, I don't feel guilty; it was a week of all-day rehearsals, a concert, and then three intense days of recording. On the last day, the baroque guitar player asked me if I was tired. I, somewhat unable to put complete sentences together, said, Hm, yes, I'm tired. "I'm not tired," he told me. "I'm destroyed." Summed it up pretty well. Though I find it helps me to have a good book during those kinds of things, and I did. Arthur & George by Julian Barnes. Also, the music was nice - Handel and Hasse arias and overtures. That day I took a train home to Basel, only 6.5 hours, and got in around 01:30. The next morning, trying to pack for Copenhagen, I found myself at a complete loss. So sleeping in and watching tv on dvd feels just about right.

Venice. Was a mixed experience. As the only time all year I get to devote all my time to printing, I had high hopes. I prepared. I read books, brainstormed ideas, experimented on the press in Basel. Spent time just hanging around the print shop in Basel so that I could get used to the atmosphere. Stared at the wall, or the ceiling, or out the window, to vacate my brain enough that good ideas could make themselves known. Took the train through the Alps, the breathtaking Italian canton of Switzerland, through Milan, and across the bridge that links the mainland to the island of Venice. Saw friends, made a big dinner, talked about California, drank cheap and delicious Italian wine. Went, on the second day, to the print shop; discovered that our ideas and expectations of the upcoming week and a half were different from the ideas of the man who ran the shop. My impression is that he was expecting a teacher and her students, all of whom would be working in the same medium. He had prepared zinc plates for us to do our etching, and knew what size paper we should be using. As he had thought, all of us were associated with a university (the Academy of Art, where I used to teach), but we were all experienced printmakers already, and wanted the freedom to use the print media of our choice. We got yelled at. Michelle, the print assistant and the girl who made everything about our stay possible, got yelled at. Again, and again. The air was thick with hostility. We all made concessions, and tried to smooth things over, but he wasn't having any of it. ("Why would you want to do your artwork on the letterpress?" he asked me. And, later, "Never in my 50 years printing have I seen someone want to ____!" Blank filled in with any of a variety of things.) The next day, more of the same, before he disappeared into a room in the back of the shop. The day after that, we arrived to find a cover over the letterpress, with news that it was "broken." I was tempted to return to Basel; I'm not interested in being yelled at, and besides, I wanted to get some work done. But I stayed, and over the next few days it was clear that he was going to stay out of our way, that I was going to be able to use the (obviously perfectly sound) press, and we'd all be able to work in peace. But that start was disruptive, and I think everyone's work and state of mind suffered. I'm still glad that I went, because it was great to see my friends, and to discover a part of Venice away from the giant crowds of camera-weilding, sunburnt tourists that clogged the streets every hour of the day. It took a while to convince me that Venice was more than a shell of itself, made for people who don't want to visit a real city, but finally, on the last day, I saw it - that mythical Venice, stone rising from the sea, a miracle of bridges and water.

The water everywhere reflects the bright, hot sunlight and so unshaded areas are nearly blinding, but somehow in a good way. When I look at my print now I still like it very much, but the colors don't look as vivid as they did in that studio, surrounded by light.

Reduction lino cuts, printed on the letterpress. A total of 27 runs (you can see 7 in the blue there, AKA "lagoon #2"), and an edition of 18. One to the city of Venice, one to the region, and one to the archives of the Venice Printmaking Studio; one to the Academy of Art, for supporting us, and a full set of prints to each artist. Which leaves me with 5. One of which is getting framed sometime this week. Someone has offered to keep it in a frame at his house for me. How generous.

Did this post live up to its title? I think I wanted to tell about my train ride back to Basel, during which the train was delayed by a track fire, and I arrived nearly 5 hours late, at 05:30. But to talk about that would sound like complaining. So I'll leave it there.

preparation report

2011-08-06T22:30:00.000+02:00

Off to Venice in one week, to do some printmaking about Venice. Since I've never been there, I've been spending my free time with some books. Started out with 'Venice: Pure City' by Peter Ackroyd. He's kind of a know-it-all goody-goody who likes telling his readers what to think. Which is fine, I guess, if you like that kind of thing. To try and find something a little more objective, I went to the university library. Quite a perplexing experience. I hope you people appreciate your Dewey Decimal System, because it is Excellent. Here, books are grouped into general categories with a letter label (eh, kk, and AB being a few of them, and standing for Geography, Music History, or Architecture) then organized by Date Acquired. Date Acquired. Seriously? So, they're just in numerical order. But not left to right, top to bottom; these numbers run bottom to top. I was muttering obscenities before I found my first book, 'Paradise of Cities,' by John Julius Norwich, which was on the bottom shelf, at the end of the 10,990s, just under the 11,000s.

If I have to make a library confession I will tell you that I'm not very good at using them. They overwhelm me. This is an embarrassing thing to admit, as someone who loves reading. I hate to use the computers and the catalogs and I feel unenthusiastic about cross-referencing or using a bibliography. Really, I enjoy them about as much as I enjoy cooking with a recipe. Spoils the fun. I've done my best work in libraries by grubbing around in the specific section I need (Geography: Italy: Memoirs) and coming up with things I never could have found on a computer. I like seeing the way that librarians have decided to order and classify things. I enjoy looking at groups of books, they're like rocks of a similar color or those US stamps that have cross-sections of different ecosystems. I can recognize that my method has serious flaws, and would be woefully inefficient if I were trying to write a serious research paper. That doesn't make me less stubborn about liking it, though.

Apparently, there was one more level of difficulty I would have had to face at this library only half a year ago: in order to get any books, you had to look them up on the computer, then order them at a desk. You couldn't go into the stacks yourselves. Like a giant special collections library made up of EVERY BOOK EVER. Fortunately it's not like that any more, but the library's history meant that I had to ask two different people before I figured out how to go through the tiny little passageway to the left of, and behind, the check-out desk; past the copiers; and finally into the long, low collection of books. Is this kind of thing normal? It's not what I'm used to from the various public and university libraries I'm familiar with. With the exception, I guess, of Stanford. Their stacks are in similarly long, cramped quarters with low ceilings made hazardous by pipes and sprinkler heads. I think of my tall coworker risking his life every time he'd walk through those tight mazes of books.

I was successful, though, in the end, so you can breathe that sigh of relief. Do you know that thing that happens, when you finally begin to penetrate the mystery of a library? it's a kind of impression of wonder, that it can even exist, that people have been writing things down for so many hundreds and hundreds of years, and an enthusiasm or giddy excitement, that it's all available to me. Then, not long after the giddiness, I start to get a little sleepy from the warm, musty air.

Postscript, regarding the Ackroyd book: I've been reading one or two others of the books I brought home from the library, and I'm ready to admit that the way his book is organized is more-- well, okay, I think because it's trashier, it's a lot easier to read. He doesn't use a lot of dates, and with my limited amount of time to get all this information, it's more what I need. I hereby rescind my earlier disparaging remark.

I leave you with a picture of all that was left this afternoon of the birthday cake that one of my friends in Basel made me. It's some kind of Transylvanian nut cake. I took to eating a little bit of it for every meal. I will miss it, now that it's gone.

There's no pool at home

2011-07-27T20:21:00.000+02:00

but it's still nice to be here. Hello, Basel. I'm back from Aix, my visiting friends are on their way to Paris, and I've got two weeks of completely unscheduled time to faff away. Thought it might be nice to faff some pictures up onto the interwebs. After debating the virtues of chronology, I've decided to throw order out the window and go for a random selection.

Starting here with a little video I took of some of the trees in the park behind the Grand Saint-Jean in Aix. Though you can mostly hear the sound of the camera's inner workings, the trees made a particular sound, I'm sure you can imagine it, of all their leaves clattering together in the whooshing wind. You could hear it during the performance sometimes. Oh yeah, the performances! I haven't forgotten, since the music is still in my head nearly constantly, but it's growing fainter. There's a video online where you can watch the whole opera, and see my bass scroll in silhouette against the bright stage a few times. It's only an hour and a half, maybe you could watch it on a lazy evening indoors? It'll be online til sometime in early October. 100 days from the original performance, July 17. And, here's the link.

Since the last blog post, I saw that Shostakovitch opera, The Nose, it was crazy and interesting - Shostakovitch was 22 when he wrote it, and it's clearly his work, and also loud and difficult. There aren't so many moments of rest in the production, and the sets, designed in part by Wm Kentridge, reflected the action. Sometimes a wall, tall as the entire stage, would move forward or back, would open up with doors or windows in which the action would happen, would disappear. I brought with me the libretto on an iphone and followed it for the whole performance, which really helped; otherwise the constant stream of conversational and theatrical Russian (why aren't there repeats and da capo arias, like in Baroque opera??), clarified by French supertitles, would have pretty much left me in the dark.

An orchestra from Lyon was down there in the pit. They did a good job. I saw one other performance during the festival, a dramatic staging of my favorite book, Austerlitz, by WG Sebald. It was all in French with no supertitles, but having anticipated that I read the book again before going to see it. The staging was simple, there was only one actor, and he half acted, half spoke text directly from the book. In the back of the stage was a contemporary music group, Ensemble Ictus, based in Belgium, made up of clarinet, prepared piano, flute, trombone, viola and cello. They were playing music composed for the production, and it was mostly a succession of rhythmic chords in clusters. The whole production exuded anxiety. There is anxiety in the book, it's essentially the story of a man discovering his identity and uncovering the fate of his parents, both of whom were forced to leave their homes during the war and ultimately perished in concentration camps, but the book is so much more than that story: it's a meditation on architecture, moths, libraries, human nature. Discovery and wonder. The production did have a spare and architecturally evocative set, and it used images from the book and images from the director, who had followed the same path of the protagonist in the book, and taken his own photographs; these were all well done. But for anyone who hadn't read the book and didn't speak French, I think it was mostly an opportunity to space out and think about things. Way to hang in there, Andrew. Props to Andrew also for his zen-like patience during the several performances of Acis & Galatea for which we couldn't get him a ticket, spent sitting backstage while singers darted in and out and the music was piped in on tinny speakers.

We did do some things aside from opera performances while Andrew was in Aix, of course. There was plenty of obligatory eating of beautiful farmer's market food and poolside relaxing,

and we also took advantage of my one day off to rent a car and drive all around the area. We looked at the sea from the top of a cliff, while lunching on goat cheese spread on fruit bread and sweet ripe apricots and nectarines. We drove north in the direction of Gap and looked at a river, and an abandoned chapel. We wandered around the "ancient" part of a town in Provence in which every charming old building, including something that looked like a castle and the city hall, had been converted into residential units, either by adding a block of mailboxes outside or by building a mismatched structure (apartments, a corner store, nothing classy or matching) directly into the side of the hill or the old brick. There were TV antennae attached to the battlements of an ancient stone tower, and xmas lights strung around the oldest chapel in the city. We kept walking around thinking, oh, here, maybe now we've found the historical center! and instead of Good King René's castle, we'd find laundry strung between houses and deserted streets. Weird. I'm hoping my understanding of the situation there will change or develop though I'm not sure how I'd add more information to my confusingly incomplete picture. Wait and see, I guess.

Lest it seem I only swam in the pool while 30 km from the Southern coast of France, here are a couple shots from a delightful day spent with my housemates and one of the singers on an island called Frioul, a short ferry ride away from Marseille, swimming and floating in the clear, salty water.

Oh, good weather, aren't you grand. (Just looked up and out the window at the pokey, puffy gray things in the sky out there.) Summer continues anyway. I spent the last three days with friends in town from NYC, we climbed an Alp (more on that later), and in about two weeks I'll travel to Venice to do 11 days of printmaking. Summers are nice, it's great to have a job with a distinct season. Will this change? Let's hope not.

festival time

2011-07-04T14:50:00.001+02:00

Hi from France - I'm in Aix-en-Provence for the month, playing at one of the world's largest opera festivals. My production is of Handel's most popular opera, Acis and Galatea, written on a pastoral, mythological theme. Acis is a shepherd, Galatea a nymph. They've seen one another before the opera begins and spend the first few arias talking about their love, and trying to find each other. They're reunited, and sing a couple lovey-dovey arias - "Love in her eyes sits playing", and "Happy we". But alas, "no joy shall last" - Polyphemus the Cyclops sees Galatea and falls in love with her ("O ruddier than the cherry, O sweeter than the berry"), then pursues her. Acis stands up to the monster and is killed when Polyphemus hits him on the head with a rock. Galatea is heartbroken, but uses her powers to give her lover immortal life, as a spring - the source of a river. (Here is a link to the libretto.)

The venue is in the middle of the countryside, at the site of a derelict stone house; the stage is attached to the side of the building, and is in the open air. Behind the stage is a big field, with several disused ponds and stands of trees. This is a shot of the stage from the field. Below, a terrible picture of Galatea on stage, with dusk and trees in the background:

looking past the side of the stage, to the field; and

a view of the continuo section, with the stage above/behind them.

It gets quite cold at night here, and can be very windy, so many layers of clothes are necessary. More layers even than I brought, so sometime this week I'll do some searching for one more long-sleeve black thing for the concerts. If I can't find anything I may end up wearing my black raincoat during performances.

The music is really, really nice. It's clear why the opera has remained popular for the past (nearly) 300 years. Handel was born in 1685, the same year as Bach, also in Germany, and after many years of schooling, traveling, and working in many different places in Europe, he settled in England, and in fact became a naturalized English citizen. That's why so many of his pieces are in English - this opera, and of course works like the Messiah. The longer I live in Europe, and work and travel throughout the continent, I understand how old this tradition is, and how many peripatetic musicians there have been throughout the centuries. In many ways I think it must be at least similar now to how it was in Handel's time, in that you follow the work through the different countries, and meet an international crowd of musicians doing the same thing. It's nice, actually, to find myself inside that tradition.

Wretched lovers, view from the pit.

Aix-en-Provence is a charming town around 30 km from the sea. Marseille is the closest big town. It has a well-preserved old center, and while many of the shops are geared towards tourists, it seems overall to be focused on pleasant summer living. Cafés in squares, plane trees, restaurants everywhere. A big Saturday market, with perfect ripe nectarines, fresh goat cheese, gorgeous olives. Beautiful bread. Did I mention that it's nice here? I'm staying with five other members of the orchestra in a house just outside the city center, it's got a pool (!) and plenty of space to lounge around. With the big backyard and stone floors it feels like some kind of villa. In the backyard we've got a fig tree (nearly ripe), olive trees, a pomegranate bush, lavender, rosemary, and some small palms. The only downside I've found so far are the hordes of mosquitoes waiting to bite me any time I let down my guard - the first night I got bitten on my eyelid, and had to spend the first rehearsal (Hi everyone, I'm Megan, don't mind my half-closed eye) squinting at the music and trying not to scratch my face. Little jerks. I've bought a fan, though, and started wearing bug spray to bed, and that's helped.

Everyone is really nice. The orchestra is an extremely friendly bunch of people, I'm among the oldest but not out of place. I think the youngest is 21. The singers, too - occasionally charmingly obnoxious, but very very nice. Yesterday we had a wildly successful party at the house and most of the people from our production came over. Nothing like a pool and a bunch of bottles of rosé to make a good party. By the end we were dancing in the living room to French radio.

I'm looking forward to the beginning of the productions. The rehearsal schedule has been really long and taxing; on Saturday, and also today, we rehearse at the outdoor venue until 12:30 AM. Goodness me, I'm not used to this schedule. The opera is only an hour and a half long, so once the run begins we'll be done at 11 every night. Fortunately we rarely have anything during the day, so it's possible to sleep as much as we need. There are a number of other interesting operas up this week, and we have the chance to attend dress rehearsals for free. I'm planning on going to see The Nose, an opera by Shostakovich, based on a Gogol story, directed by the South African artist William Kentridge, who also helped with set design and created videos to accompany the production. (Link to a NY Times article about it.)

Well. This post seems to be going on forever. I'll add a few more pics and leave it at that.

summer things

2011-06-04T23:00:00.000+02:00

Last summer was a Salad Summer. This one, so far, is a Pizza Summer. How many delicious variations can I make? Tonight's is a Pizza Mandala. Potatoes spiral inwards. Second level, tomatoes to infinity. Then cheese, gently. Salt. And I'm going out to pick some of the chard I've grown, to saute with olive oil and white wine, and then put on top. Chard:

With drops from a recent rain shower. I had a rehearsal this afternoon, and during a break we opened a window, and there was rain, but there was also thunder like I've never heard. For several minutes I asked my colleagues if it was thunder, or someone rolling a dumpster down the street, because it just didn't stop. On and on, rumbling, no cracking, and nearly constant. I really thought it was someone with a dumpster. But then I looked, and the street was deserted. The sound seemed to be coming from all around. The it started to hail. Summer! The rehearsal was for a recital in which I'll be playing, of renaissance consort music. It's great. I'm playing "consort bass" which is the renaissance equivalent of the g-violone from a couple posts ago; it's got 5 strings, instead of 6, but the string order, and fingering, is the same. All the viols were made by the same maker, and I'm sorry to say it but they've got faces that only a mother would love. They sound great, though! Playing in a consort is amazing. It's so different from anything else I've ever done. My part is equal to the other parts, and there are only 5 of us. Rhythm and melody are much different from later music, and playing the instrument is challenging but in a way that helps me play better. I can feel myself becoming more adept throughout the course of a rehearsal. Skills! Happening.

Since I won't have the chance to go home for the summer, my mom will come for two weeks. She arrives on Tuesday, and though I'll be pretty busy while she's here I think we'll be able to do some fun things. Especially if she enjoys all the concerts I'll be playing. The day after she gets here I'll be playing in Thun, a very beautiful town on a picturesque lake, surrounded by Alps, in what is known as the Berner Oberland (the high land near Bern). She'll also get a chance to see the consort concert (I've been waiting for the chance to write that). And to eat some of my chard. Maybe I'll have peas by then?

I have some more pictures for you. We get a lot of moths flying in the windows at night, this was one of them, in a jar, just before I released it out of a window on the other side of the house:

Last night my roommate Diego had his Master's recital. Someone gave him some incredibly beautiful flowers. Peonies?

I spent some time in Copenhagen recently visiting Andrew, and then he came to see me here. We had some really nice weather, in both places.

Copenhagen spring is a little behind Basel spring. It's still pretty nice.

And, what's that? BABY DUCKS? Yes.

Back in Basel, we found this bike that hasn't seen a lot of action recently.

Then we took a walk in the big hike & bike area near my house, the Lange Erlen. Look, it's me.

Sorry this blog is nothing but news lately. It's not that I don't have as much to say. I think going on those tours made me a little anti-computer and I've never really gotten back into it. In other news, I got a pretty cool bloodstain on the book I'm reading when I crushed a mosquito against the wall at 5:30 this morning. Take THAT, you little jerk.

Promising, again, to write more, better, sooner. Or, at least, imagining that might be a nice thing to do. Encourage me? It helps.

first swim!

2011-05-07T23:33:00.000+02:00

Is it unseasonably warm? You could ask me, is it the perfect temperature? I would say yes. Apparently summer has come about 4 weeks early here. Cheers to that! Today I walked over to the swimming pool near my house, Eglisee, which is celebrating its 100th year of existence. It's a complex of several pools, for kids, and laps, and even an area just for women. (Nur für Frauen!) The water was cold still, obviously, but by the third time I got in I felt well adjusted to it. Then, I came home and started prepping for a taco party with some kammer orchester basel people. Fun fun! Also I took some photos of the little sprouts from all the seeds I planted. They're so cute.

planter boxes, with some strawberries in pots

someone left their stanley knife to rust on the roof.

peas and cornflowers

nusslisalat

chard! it already has red stalks.

hmm, tomato, i think, and red leaf lettuce.

my house, the trees, and what looks like a storm cloud.

some mourning doves (wood pigeons) being pigeon-y

view from the terrace

view of the terrace

(look at all those planter boxes waiting for plants!)

the missing month

2011-04-29T16:13:00.000+02:00

Wow, a month, sorry about that. It can only partially be accounted for with the excuse of "busy-ness" since the past week or two has been spent largely reading books, staring out the window, cooking, eating, reading more books. Or sitting in the sun, on the terrace; or, imagine, practicing bass, or harpsichord, or g-violone. I realize not all of you are familiar with the Violone en sol; hell, I barely was, a few months ago. It looks like a viola da gamba: 6 strings, 7 frets, funny pointy bow. It is tuned similarly to a bass, with g-a-d-e (or f) as the top four strings, and then another c-g accounting for the other two. It took the role of the bass in small ensembles, but the notes sound at "8-foot" - that is to say, one octave higher than contrabass (my instrument) which sounds at 16-foot. Those "foot" descriptions refer to registers on an organ. Is this boring? Probably, I'm sorry. The gist of all this is to say that it's a useful instrument for me to play, if I'm going to keep doing old music, because sometimes the contrabass is just too low for certain ensembles. Here, for your enlightenment, is a picture I took of myself in the mirror in my practice room, with the g-violone.

Yes, yes, taken with my iPhone. At school. I think this particular instrument isn't the best example of its kind; it's pretty hard to make a nice sound. Forging ahead anyway, of course.

Probably I mentioned at some point in the past that spring was on its way, or that it had arrived. By now it looks like summer around here: trees teem with clusters, fistfuls of the greenest leaves you've ever seen; fields are full of dandelions; beer cans fill all the trash cans by the Rhine. Today we're having what I hope is a temporary break from the mid-70s weather we've been enjoying, but yesterday I managed a nice long bike ride in a north-easterly direction, toward a town called Riehen ("ree-enn"). I ended up following a little paved path into the middle of a field, then into something larger than a copse but smaller than a wood, past an overfull pond and a canal and something that I imagined would be called a sluice, if I knew what that was. There was a stone wall coming in at an angle from the edge of the canal, and a ledge that seemed to be slicing into the water, allowing it to run over the wall and into a lower canal and tunnel. Photos? Yes, of course.

Hipster colors courtesy iPhone and my own bad judgment, exercised while squinting at the tiny screen in full sunshine. Color manipulation stops here.

so. nice.

slicey-sluice?

In one of the fields that bordered the canal, I saw two herons, and a little falcon of some type, hovering in the air awhile above some quick mouse. Quick, because I got off my bike and watched until the bird flew around looking for a new victim. I thought of that, just now, because a heron flew over my house. That happens pretty often here. Oh nature.

(A little aside here for some brain-vindication. Observe: "sluice, n. 1. a. An artificial channel for conducting water, with a valve or gate to regulate the flow: sluices connecting a reservoir with irrigated fields. b. A valve or gate used in such a channel; a floodgate: open sluices to flood a dry dock. Also called sluice gate." That is certainly what I was attempting to describe. So, if any of you already knew what a sluice was [DJ2!], you were not mislead.)

Upon arriving home, I gave my bike some of the tender loving care it needed after a winter spent in close proximity to snow, and unpleasantly cold rain, and other gifts of nature. The chain was entirely rust-colored, greasy dirt was clumped around the (hmm, which part could this be describing?) sprocket (?), more streaks of dirt covered - oh, who am I kidding? I may know what a sluice is but I couldn't label a diagram of a bicycle to save my life. Seat. Pedals. Okay. Anyhow, I cleaned it all off with a rag, and then I even put on new bar tape, since the old stuff was literally falling off. Riding to school today I was quieter than a cat on a carpet, everything was working so smoothly.

What else can I show you? A picture from the town of Eglisau, situated on the Rhine but upstream from Basel by about an hour, and as close to a paradise as I've ever seen. The river cuts a valley between high hills, both of which are covered in vineyards. Several of the surrounding towns (and maybe also Eglisau, I don't know) have natural hot springs. And the river is so much different than in Basel; it's a lazy, transparent green and still stretch bordered by trees and high banks on one side, and the town and fields on the other, rising sharply to vineyards. I didn't get any really good photos, I hope these give you a sense:

lunch by the Rhine

some lucky person's yard

on the left, the church where I played.

What else am I missing here? Hmm, the last big tour I went on? Right, Istanbul was at the beginning, Innsbruck in the middle, and sad, cold and gray northern Germany at the end. In Istanbul, it rained. And I had a cold. Also there were cats everywhere.

excellent-looking bookstore next to a well-stocked candy store

inexplicable hollow space between buildings filled 4 feet high with trash

cat.

On the way back from Istanbul, my bass must have gotten a little extra-jostled, because at the next rehearsal we noticed light coming from between the fingerboard and the neck. The next morning I took it to my Geigenbauer - "violin builder" - Lubomir, who promptly gave it a little tug and pulled the whole thing off. I don't know if it's clear from the picture, but some previous repair had used PLYWOOD. Plywood, folks. And, what's that in the next picture? A nail?? Yes. A nail.

Lubomir holds up the sad old fingerboard. Note plywood at base of neck.

Clearly, a nail.

Needless to say, I decided to get a new fingerboard put on, as the old one was on its last legs. The new one is really nice and well done, though it's taking me some time to get the setup adjusted the way I need it. I bought some files. It's satisfying to make tiny adjustments and then feel large differences in the response and sound of the instrument. I'll keep fiddling around until it's good again.

The rest of tour was spent playing someone else's bass, not an ideal arrangement for a big tour with a nice orchestra. Alas. Also, I was sick nearly the whole time. Life can't be great all the time, I guess. I still had a nice time. The music-making was good, even if my part of it was stressful (how to play in tune? and other questions of that nature), and the people were nice. Funny thing about tour, after it's over you spend the next week or so seeing orchestra members on the street, in the grocery store, on the tram - everywhere around you, even if they're not actually there. Maybe you just get really used to seeing the same faces. I have another concert with the same group next week, which I see as a chance to redeem myself. Healthy Megan that Plays In Tune. Then it's a quiet month and a half of school work and long bike rides before I head off to France. School? Remember that? Me too, but only barely. No time like the present to get reacquainted.

a quiet day

2011-03-29T22:35:00.000+02:00

Yesterday it rained, really a lot, but only briefly. It started when I left school and walked to the tram, and ended after my nine minute wait, once I had boarded the tram. I was wearing my wool jacket and smelled like a wet dog. The guy next to me on the tram was blinded by his completely fogged-up glasses. People stood around me in a wide range of wet-rat poses; the tram was full, and kind of stinky. As I walked home, the sun was out, though it was still sprinkling lightly, and as I felt a chill against the back of my neck, I thought about how it wasn't until recently that I considered going out in the rain to be a precursor to illness. It had been more of an exciting pleasure to get soaked by the weather, then come inside and dry off. Then, recently, someone admonished me for allowing myself to get wet, and ever since I've gotten sick after a good drenching. Damn my suggestive mind. True to form, I had a sore throat by bedtime (despite the bath and tall pot of vegetable soup I made), and it was still there when I woke up this morning. So I canceled everything and stayed at home, drinking tea, lots of tea, and this gross mix of store-bought carrot and apple juices. Also I did laundry. And I lay in the sun for about an hour -- the skies were clear all day. I took some pictures of the planter boxes my downstairs neighbors are cleaning out. The real evidence of my quiet day, though, was this little net I crocheted for an avocado pit, since we don't have any toothpicks.

The alternate title for this post could be, "I am a dork." Here are a few of the mossy planter shots I took, too:

view from above

peering in

edge-of-world

perfect little plants

Staying home and having an excuse to avoid responsibility is nice. I also took some pictures of a piece of furniture I bought this weekend. I've been looking for something for a long time, I thought it was a bookshelf that I was looking for, but I was wrong. It was a mini-wardrobe! Ein kleiner Schrank. It came with old wallpaper covering both front doors, but that came off easily with water. I really like it. Here are a few views:

(I still need to use some furniture polish. Oh yeah, and I got that nice chair, too, at a different thrift store [aka Brockenstube, aka Brocki], it's got a little brand on the bottom: Made in Sweden.)

stuff

I feel quite pleased with the general blue-purple-pink feel of this arrangement

my other little favorite furniture piece got moved by the bed

and, finally, computer table, and evening light on the door.

Speaking of Made in Sweden, last night I found Lukas in the kitchen stirring his food with two spatulas and making little "borg de borg" sounds. MY ROOMMATE IS THE SWEDISH CHEF. He wasn't entirely pleased with the comparison.

the second half of that tour

2011-03-20T22:29:00.000+01:00

Sometimes traveling puts me in a talky mood. A result of the thinking you do when you're away from home. Or, you stop thinking so much, and just keep moving forward, which is a little closer to what happened to me the last two weeks. New, new. Brain can't keep up. Or, can, but isn't compelled to.

After that day in Basel, I caught the 7:06 (AM) train to Zurich, and from there the plane to Vienna. I'd never been there before, which seems crazy, but there you have it; Willkommen in Österreich! We only had a few hours before the rehearsal and concert, and left early the next morning, so I had to be serious about my sightseeing.

I walked from our very nice hotel past this building, on my way to find something to eat. I ended up, somehow, at a place called the Imperial Hotel, where I had a huge plate of gnocchi and winter vegetables; then I set off to find the music instrument museum, where I'd heard the oldest bass in Austria was located.

Here it is. 1672. ("Earliest surviving Austrian Bass. Note the special detailing on the F-holes.")

This is the building in which the music instrument museum was located. Right behind me as I took this picture was a "dude" in armor on a "horse" wearing those fancy horse-clothes. You know what I mean.

This is the hall in which we played, the Konzerthaus. Certainly one of the great halls of the world.

This concert was really a pleasure to play. The orchestra had a little more room, so I didn't have the percussion right behind me, and could play the whole concert without earplugs. The sound was great, the backstage fantastic, the hall beautiful. Really nice. After the show a bunch of us went to a good schnitzel restaurant that one of the bass players knew about (those bass players! we ate a lot of good food together) and I had some cheesy noodles. JB would be proud, when we were on tour together in Germany she always looked forward to the restaurants with cheesy noodles. Also there was a lot of beer, and some apricot spirits.

The next day was a travel day, and after 8 hours of bus, plane, and more bus, we ended up in Amiens, France. It's in the Somme region, north and on its way west. Not so far from the coast, and close to some of the major battlefields of WWII. A lot of the town had to be rebuilt after the war, so much of it had a consistent brick-and-mortar look, but a few parts of the town were original, including the incredible Gothic church. 2.5 of the Paris Notre Dames could fit inside the Amiens version:

Can you tell how big this is?

The church is quite close to these little canals, flanked by houses and stone walls. Super charming.

I made sure to take advantage of my time in France by visiting one of the little markets you can find around town with local food items. I got a beautiful little round of goat cheese, some basil-olive tapenade, and incredibly sweet strawberries, and then went across the street for my hot baguette. Yes, France, your food is better. (Have I written this before somewhere? I think so.) The best thing I ate on tour, though, by far, was this pastry I got in the next town we went to, Dijon. I didn't take any pictures but let me tell you about this pastry. It was called Millefeuille praliné, and it looked a little like this:

and I simply cannot express how much I enjoyed the flaky pastry, filled with squishy-yet-firm nut cream. Mein Gott. I make it sound so commonplace. That photo is from the website of the actual boulangerie/patisserie. Put it on your to-do in Dijon list. Or even your to-do in Europe list. Dijon is only 3 hours from Basel. 100% worth the trip.

So. Just another week or so, and I'm off on a second tour with this group. I feel fortunate to be playing with the orchestra, and look forward to the next set, which is on gut strings, and includes a concert in Istanbul.

I keep looking at the picture of that pastry. It's completely irresistible. Maybe I've never enjoyed any pastry as much as I enjoyed that one. Hell, maybe I've never enjoyed any other food on the whole planet as much as that pastry. Hmm. I don't want to sound melodramatic but look at it. Try to tear your eyes away. I know. You can't. Neither can I.

I went to Hong Kong!

2011-03-08T11:53:00.000+01:00

What an unexpected thing. I got the call while I was in California, about three weeks ago, I guess someone realized at the last minute they couldn't go on the tour, and the orchestra needed one more bass player. Luck! Fit perfectly in my free dates in between things. So last Wednesday we boarded a plane in Basel and flew over to Hong Kong, through London Heathrow. Around 13 hours to HK from LHR. Had the good fortune (mostly) to sit next to a Swedish man living in HK, working for "a company called H&M" ("Hmm, I haven't heard of that company." "Yeah, most people haven't.") and figuring out good restaurants and bars and hikes in the area. He wrote me a neat itinerary in between the printed engagements on the orchestra schedule, and all of his suggestions were right on the money. The only bad part about sitting next to this guy was the time he spilled his red wine on my coat. It mostly came out, he gave me money to get it dry cleaned. As someone in a lavender cashmere Izod sweater, he felt really bad about it. Oh well. The first night I got the other bass players to come with me to the Sichuan restaurant he recommended, and it was great. The menu had no English (unlike most things in HK, which was an English colony for ca.150 years) and so we told our waiter what we wanted: fish, beef, and "no meat or fish" and then we got beautiful, big plates of food. Delicious, good atmosphere.

It can be funny at first to walk around the city, since all the streets have very British-sounding names; our hotel, the Luk Kwok, was on Gloucester Street. Walking around feels a bit like being in a tropical NYC. Between the tall buildings and busy, noisy streets, there are flowering trees, parks with fountains and carefully manicured topiary, and of course in early March the weather was warm and humid. The Chinatown areas I've been to in SF & NY really aren't so far from the feeling in the "real thing" -- restaurants and markets are everywhere, lots of the residential towers had clotheslines in the windows, and neon signs line the streets in Wan Chai, the district where our hotel was located. There's a good subway system, lots of double-decker buses, and a fleet of vintage, colonial-era double-decker trams. To ride a tram costs $2HK, two Hong Kong dollars, which is roughly the equivalent of 30 cents in USD. $10HK is equal to €1, and everything is really inexpensive. Our huge dinner, plus three giant Tsing Tao beers, cost $330HK. Taxis are absurdly cheap. On our last day, a few people and I went to the south part of Hong Kong island, a 30 minute ride away. Cab fare? $80HK. I got a sunburn. Hey, beach! We were able to really packed in activities, for having two full days and two partial days; with only one rehearsal and one concert, there was plenty of time to wander around, eat things, look at stuff.

One highlight was the ferry ride we took on Friday night at 8, the right time to see the laser show put on by all the buildings lining the waterfront. There's a lot of waterfront. Someone (Lukas?) asked me today if it was like Star Wars. Kind of like that. Another highlight was another recommendation from my seat-mate on the plane: Café Gray Deluxe, on the 49th floor of the Upperhouse hotel, with harbor views. Pretty spectacular. Most of the time the weather was what you might imagine if you tried in your head to mix SF fog with LA smog.

The orchestra played as part of the Hong Kong International Arts Festival, and everyone we met was really nice. Organizers, stage managers, bus drivers. Related/unrelated, there's this interesting and cool phenomenon you can see everywhere in the after-work hours: all the pedestrian bridges, which are covered, are lined along the walls by women, presumably just come from work, who lay out pieces of cardboard, then sit on them in groups of maybe 3 - 10 people, eating food someone has prepared, playing cards, giving each other massages, painting each others nails. Generations of women, from the really old to teenagers and babies. A few men, but really, mostly women. Shoes were all left outside the cardboard-picnic-blanket; in some cases, rather than settling for just a flat surface, the groups had created a little wall from the cardboard, held together with string at the corners. There was something really great about the whole thing, and it was clear that people were having a great time, relaxing and unwinding after a long day.

I'm back in Basel at the moment. Second part of the trip starts tomorrow, heading to Vienna for the first time. I feel lucky to be part of these things. There's some amount of loneliness and alienation that comes with playing with a new group, in a foreign place, halfway across the world from anyone you know. It was weird to stand in the HK airport and see flights to SF & LA getting in sooner than my flight back to Europe. Tempted? Heck yes. Still glad to be here, though. Obviously.

TV brand: "ComeMon"

Imagine you're my Transylvanian friend Maria when you say it: "Oh, come-mOn."

"Which one is your bass?" "The little cute one."

sunrise over Heathrow

snapshots

2011-02-27T08:35:00.000+01:00

My new flatmate Lukas eats a kiwi. I've taken to affectionately calling his broken hand the "kangaroo paw."

He doesn't seem to mind my jeering. Good thing, as it's pretty much constant. Look at that excellent Swedish sweater he's wearing.

The flat:

Looking from the bathroom down the central hallway in the flat. Coat rack just outside the door. First door on the left, just past the front entry, is Lukas' room; doorway on the left closest to the camera is the living room. Diego's room just on the other side of that. Across from Diego's room is the kitchen (see below), then the doorway on the right you can see in the photo is my room, followed by the hall closet that I have taken over as my own personal clothing storage. Thanks, guys.

eat-in kitchen

view from the eat-in part

My room:

yes, it's kind of narrow.

But look at that light!

And across the hallway, the living room. Gets great morning+ light. This shot also highlights Lukas' feet. He gave me permission to use this photo.

Oh, look how nice.

Finally, a thoughtfully posed picture of me in my new winter jacket. Did you know that it can be cold outside, and you can be outside, but you don't have to be cold? It's crazy.

Looking deeply into the water, I contemplate my future. Also the practicality of fishing the money from the bottom of the fountain. Pretty impractical.

Dear California.

2011-02-24T19:20:00.000+01:00

My last view of the California coast is hazy and golden. The plane swings out over the ocean on its turn toward the east. Los Angeles, Malibu. The Channel Islands in the distance. Sun in my face, so I close my eyes, but don't turn my head away. The coast is beneath me, it is rapidly receding behind me.

A friend here in Basel asked me if I was going to be like James Joyce and write about, long for, mythologize my home while living in self-induced exile in another country my whole life. I think I shrugged noncommittally. (Wait for the blog entries to use more and more of my own special language.) Life in California remains unfinished for me. More specifically, my life in California, the one that I left, still feels the same as it did when I left, even though all kinds of things have changed. Every trip back starts with several days of disorientation. It makes it difficult to be clear about my nostalgia. Does seeing video of LA traffic make me homesick because I miss sitting in traffic? Seems more likely that sitting in traffic in LA was part of who I was as a person. Driving up to Santa Barbara, right after I got off the plane from Europe, I really felt like myself. So we can establish that I spent a lot of time in a car. But then, on my way up to the Bay Area, I was sick of driving by the time I got to King City (I know, only halfway there), which proves that I have changed, after all. The "I" is not a static thing. Or, at least, not entirely.

How was the trip, anyway? Good, short, intense. Half the time the weather was incredible, warm and sunny, but I'd still say this trip was Cold. Why is it always cold inside? You think people would have done something about it by now. First there was the Codex Bookfair: a serious 4 days of sitting at a table explaining my Swiss friends' books, and my own, to students, collectors, and other artists. Also some looking around at other people's books, though not much; it was busy. I bought one book (from the table across the aisle from mine) and traded for two others. A former student from the Academy came and helped me out for two days, and damned if she didn't sell as many books as I did. I had a feeling the twinkle in her cute Brazilian eye would move the unsuspecting fair attendees to reach for their wallets. Then there was the talk I gave, about the Swiss books; the class I taught at the Center for the Book; and then the three days of hanging out before I got on the early BART train to the airport and flew back down to LA. My very nice friend skipped going to work for the morning so she could drive me to get Japanese food before putting me on my plane to Basel.

Basel, now, is cold, in the 30s, raining. I've spent a few days getting organized in my new flat, and I really like it (not least because the heating works so well). It feels excellent to play the bass again, that is a large part of the "I" and it is a part I'm enjoying. I've only got a few more days here before I join an orchestra on a little tour, two weeks on the road, concerts in Hong Kong, Vienna, Dijon. I'm lucky to be able to do these things.

On my east-bound plane, into the darkening sky, I think of looking out over the City from the windy top of San Bruno Mountain, of drinking wine, of walking all over Berkeley. Eating, eating out all the time, Ethiopian food, vegan Mexican, non-vegan Mexican, Vietnamese, Chinese, sushi, sandwiches, soups, salads, beautiful California food. Looking around, drinking beer, doing things. There are so many things. My airplane window is dirty, or fogged up, or both. And behind me, my coast very nearly glows.

Dear Switzerland,

2011-02-03T16:54:00.000+01:00

I like you as a friend, but...

Marina del Rey, Catalina Island. Hello, Los Angeles!

Sunrise in Santa Barbara (I'm cultivating my jetlag to see early mornings)

Arroyo Burro Beach, Santa Barbara

Don reflects upon the waves

tangerine from the orchard

peach blossom

driving up to SF

It's nice here.

shimmying toward the finish line

2011-01-26T21:12:00.000+01:00

Oddly, this is the last night I'll be sleeping in my bed in the room in which I've lived for nearly a year. It's not my last night in this room, as the new flat isn't free until Sunday (just in the nick of time!) but tomorrow we'll be moving all the big things, and most of our stuff, into the basement.

I'm pleased to report that I don't have so much stuff. Nearly everything ended up fitting into three large boxes, three small boxes, one crate, and about 5 partially-filled bags with fragile kitchen things. I carried it all down to my own basement tonight to make moving easier in the morning. Either from lack of sleep or poor fitness habits, my legs are so tired that they're shaking. Which is why I'm now ready for bed and under the covers, although it's not even 9 PM. It's not a bad idea, anyhow, as I need to disassemble this bed tomorrow morning before I go to pick up the van we've rented. Some Mercedes thing, Vito? Automatic, apparently. I should hope so, ha.

Rrrr.

I've got my eye on the prize, here. Or, prizes, as it were; finally settling in to the new flat is followed quickly (fewer than 12 hours later) by my departure for California. Thrilled, thrilled, thrilled to be on my way to the Golden State. We haven't had bad weather here recently, it's been sunny and in the high 30s, but I'm looking forward to no pants-under-pants. I'm not even going to bring my pants-under-pants. Take that, Switzerland.

Here's a preview of the new place, just from the outside. The window on the left is the kitchen; on the right is my bedroom. They face roughly west. Pictures from inside to follow.

Heyyy, California! Can't wait to see you.

I am a blog slacker

2011-01-19T00:14:00.000+01:00

and I am sorry.

It was only yesterday that I finally had a day off, a true day off, with nothing to do; it's been a good run of concerts, having my mom in town, and more concerts, going all the way back to December 22. Nearly a month. And now I've got just a week and a half before I go to California for the Codex Bookfair, and some much-needed hanging-out in the Bay.

Things I failed to write about:

New Years Eve, complete with a tiny bottle of champagne (too tiny?) and some adorable tiny glasses;

taking a walk the next day to my new neighborhood, near this nice river and park called the Lange Erlen (cold and snowy now, but just wait for summer! Yes!),

(the river is called the Wiese)

then going the next day to the largest canton in Switzerland, in the far eastern part of the country, called Graubünden. Cantons are about the size of counties in California, but they function like states. There are 26 in the country, each with their own customs, dialect, holidays, flag, etc. Graubünden borders Austria and Italy, and has the mountains to prove it. Check it out.

looking toward Italy, from somewhere around 6900 feet

the view above we got leaving the village of Bergün, where we stayed a night. In order to get there, we rode the Rhaetian Railway, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site; it's truly spectacular.

view of a viaduct, from our railway car

The photo above is of the town of Bergün. The large hotel you see in the center top of the photo is called the Kurhaus, and is full of Art Nouveau architectural details: chandeliers, painted ceilings, stained glass, built-in cabinets. Here's a photo of the Speisesaal, or dining room:

Though we didn't stay at the Kurhaus, we did have dinner there. This (below) was our table (in a different dining room):

Yes, that is an apple, impaled by a fork, with angel wings, stuck in a creamer. I can't explain it to you.

Walking around Bergün you find charmingly painted houses, like these:

note the goat above that center window: it's the symbol of Graubünden, found on its crest & flag

some crooked painting here

Needless to say, it was a really nice trip. So nice that after we got home I knew nothing could beat it, so I got sick. Nothing serious, and it didn't last too long, but it did prevent too us from making too many more excursions around Switzerland, or even Basel. We did, however, get the chance to look around at the Brockenstuben (Brockis!), the thrift stores, for useful items for my new place. The goal was to spend less than 100chf and we didn't do too badly, if you don't count the furniture we got, which I'll be able to resell when/if I move away. Now all that stuff is sitting in my cellar, waiting to get moved into the new flat, and it's going to have to wait a little longer because the current occupants of the flat -- friends from Druckwerk -- are taking a long time to move out. Not that I blame them; with two kids and tons to do, I'd take a long time, too. But I'm getting impatient! I'll be living with my friend Diego, who plays viola, and a Swedish guy, Lukas, whom we found through the magic of the internet. Lukas is coming to Basel to be an intern at Herzog & de Meuron architectural firm. You know, the guys who designed the Tate Modern, the de Young museum, and the Walker Art Center, just to name a few. Fancy! I hear there will be lots of cocktail parties ("Aperos") that I should try to get myself invited to. Okay, yes, I agree to that.

Overlapping with my mom's last days in Basel was the start of a concert set with the cellist Christophe Coin, famous in the historical performance circles for his recordings, several of which are considered definitive. He also teaches at the Schola. In the concert he led two pieces from the cello, an overture by Haydn and a concerto by Romberg, and then ditched the cello to conduct Schubert's Symphony #5. The concert was wonderful! It was a pleasure to play 19th century music for a change, and to really get that lush string sound you hear in later orchestras, and working with Coin was a real pleasure. I'll stick in a video of him playing Vivaldi, and here is a link to a video of a piece by Mozart, which shows (in bits and pieces) my teacher, David, playing bass in the background. I knew it was him because I recognized his bow, and that's about all we see of him. Anyhow. The Vivaldi. Oops, it won't let me embed the video. You'll just have to go watch it yourself.

Guten Rutsch!

2010-12-31T19:48:00.000+01:00

Awaiting the new year. Full of soup, avoiding laundry, with the contract for my new flat signed and ready to send off. Having a nice time over here in Switzerland, even though our puzzle was missing a piece. Check out those Alps.

Guten Rutsch, btw, means Happy Sliding (as in, into the new year). Makes me think of a giant toboggan to the future.

Weihnachtszeit (Christmastime)

2010-12-28T01:44:00.000+01:00

It's been a while. (Actually, it's been even longer. I wrote this over a week ago. Whoops.) I'll mostly post pictures, since my wit seems to decrease along with the daylight. Good news, it's only going to start getting lighter from here on out, which means pithy Megan will be back soon. Theoretically. Some things happened in the past month. I rode a giant Ferris wheel at one of the festive Christmas fairs Basel sets up. It was really nice. Also I drank glühwein, which turned my tongue purple. I kept it a secret but maybe it was obvious to everyone. I hope I never know the truth, if it's that.

My orchid has decided to stay alive a while longer, apparently I'm doing something right.

An orange peel got snowed on, along with everything else.

This is a tree in Winterthur. They got way more snow than we did in Basel. I had to carry my bass through 4 inches of slush. It wasn't ideal. Also my shoes are not entirely waterproof. Alas.

orchard

Simone wonders why I'm dallying. Shuko and Zin Young are oblivious. I stayed the night at Simone's house, which is in the country just outside of Zürich, but only 20 minutes by bus/train from the city center. She's got this view from her window:

Wow! Also there are 15 Icelandic ponies down the road a bit. And some dairy cows. And quite a lot of quiet.
My mom arrives in a day and a half. She brings with her many things from the glorious land of the United States, including a pair of gloves sent by the Jacksons, as a response to what I thought was a fairly amusing photo series, Floppy Mittens:

I'm also looking forward to some tacos, tomatillos in a can, blades for my x-acto knife, jalapeno-stuffed olives (she swears they're good), a new swimsuit, etc. And a haircut. And her souffle recipe. And family for the holidays! I'm working on Christmas, but that doesn't mean we're not going to have a good time.

***

zürich at night

Indeed, we ended up having quite a nice time, especially at dinner after my last show in a mysteriously windy and bone-chillingly cold church. Some fun facts about the Grossmünster: its twin domes have been compared to pepper mills (by that great old jerk, Richard Wagner); it was stripped of all interior decoration (and perhaps insulation and heaters?) during the Reformation (since the Reformers didn't seem to want to have any fun); and it's got these lovely stained-glass windows made by Sigmar Polke out of agate. See photo. In addition, there's a special room in the back where lots of old books are kept:

Maybe because he knew the cold was nearly unbearable, the director baked us these little buttery bread things shaped like birds. Cute! And delicious. Those are raisin eyes. I enjoyed eating them. My mom ate the little tail part.

Including that last performance on Christmas (while it snowed enthusiastically outside) I've played the piece - Weihnachtsoratorium, the Christmas Oratorio, by Bach - a total of 5 times, not counting rehearsals, with two different groups. I've gotta say, it's a nice piece and all, but I prefer the Nutcracker. Two hours of dancing candy! And I like that the Nutcracker doesn't include a strong religious message. It's inclusive, especially if you ignore that one part about the giant Christmas tree. And seriously, who *hasn't* dreamed about dancing candy at one point or another?

Anyhow. Tonight was the last performance of the Bach. No more concerts for 2010! I'm so excited I can't persuade myself to go to bed. Soon. Tomorrow we've got some sight-seeing to look forward to, and also some black beans to cook, which will, post haste, be turned into taco-filler. TACOS TACOS TACOS.

Happy days getting longer, everyone!

miraculous discovery

2010-12-02T19:12:00.000+01:00

In these:

I found these:

And this note:
"Hi Megan, have some Christmas cookies (Grietzli!) down there in the boxes

I made them with my sister"

Yes, alright, don't mind if I do.

real snow

2010-12-02T01:22:00.000+01:00

I just took this picture, walking home at half past twelve. I had forgotten what it was like to be out in the snow late at night. It's not dark, really, and it's special. The snow! It snowed all day. Everything was so beautiful. I think maybe I can bear the cold, when it's so lovely outside.

I took some pictures during the day, too, though not many. Some boys having a snowball fight (I threw a few snowballs of my own, later, I couldn't resist, including at a friend who quickly opened her umbrella and deflected my loose snow-grenade - so crafty!), and the courtyard at the Schola.

Blue-hat lobbed a good one, you can see it hurtling toward Hooded-jacket.

Not one of these bikes is my dear Cilo, of course.

If you can bear it, here's a little video I took while walking through the Matthäusplatz on my way home tonight. Then I went up Oetlingerstrasse, past the bakery, past Matthäuskirche, and the book store with the typewriters in the window, and the boy who has his painting studio next to the book store. He was working late.

snowing prettily

2010-11-29T11:47:00.000+01:00

Right now, actually. Big fluffy flakes, and enough of them to seem dramatic. The last time I saw this much snow was on stage during a performance of the Nutcracker. It's nearly sad to think I won't be doing my annual 10 services of that; I'll even miss it. I am, of course, onto a new phase of my life; here in Europe, you get multiple performances of Bach's Weihnachtsoratorium, the Christmas Oratorio. My first will be in Winterthur in a couple weeks. It seems long. I'll let you know how it goes.

I took this picture yesterday as I rode the train to Zurich, for a Bach B-Minor Mass at the Tonhalle. It's a truly great hall. It also has some truly impressive chandeliers. And I think this photo gives you a good idea of the size and general feel of the hall. Not huge, but with a certain warmth and quality.

Ah, before I forget, Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! A group of Americans here in Basel had a nice dinner, it was just like any family gathering--people unwittingly acting out their roles as the crazy uncle, the bossy older sister, the mildly annoyed cousin. There was a turkey (which had been draped with bacon prior to baking; apparently it was especially flavorful) and gravy, two kinds of stuffing (one vegetarian), three salads, two kinds of mashed potato, and for desert, three pies: apple, pecan, and pumpkin, with vanilla ice cream and hand-whipped cream. I ate too much apple pie (couldn't stop) and quickly transformed into the annoyed cousin until, several hours later, I became less physically uncomfortable. I would have laid down on the floor but it didn't seem appropriate.

The night before I had had my first ever raclette, which is a Swiss "recipe" that calls for pouring melted cheese over boiled potatoes. The complicated part comes when you're actually melting the cheese; there's a device that looks like a parking garage plus a grill that you plug in and set on the table. It's got these shovel-like scoops that you fill up with cheese, then slide into their parking spots, under the heating element, which melts the cheese. On the top of the garage you can - what, grill? toast? sear? who knows - put - different things like zucchini and mushrooms, or better yet, bacon and ham, to get cooked, which can then be draped over your melty cheesey potatoes. It's important to have white wine on hand so that the cheese doesn't turn into a hard lump in your stomach.

What I mean to convey here is that I'm really porking up. Watch out, folks, the next Megan you see may be a real fatty. Prepare yourselves. On the other hand, I do so much running around with a bass that I must be (at least partially) offsetting my fat intake.

At any rate, I'll have to watch it because it looks like I'll be having some beach time in southern France this summer. Turns out that audition went well, and I got accepted to the festival. Heyy! Maybe I'll be able to make it through this long, cold winter after all, by imagining the month I'll spend in hot, sunny Aix-en-Provence. Here's what Cézanne had to say about the area: "I go to the country every day. The scenery is beautiful, so my days pass more pleasantly here than anywhere else." Sweet.

busy week

2010-11-18T10:38:00.000+01:00

This is one of those weeks. Yesterday was one of those days. Rehearsal from 10 - 2, then an audition, then rehearsal (for a different project) from 6 - 9. The audition went OK. It was for a festival in France, they round up (by audition) an orchestra and a cast of singers and spend the summer putting together a production of an opera, then spend parts of the next fall taking it on tour. It's well-paid. They take just one bass for the orchestra. So I'm not going to hold my breath waiting to get it. But I did practice a lot. It went as well as it could have, considering my crazy morning, commuting with bass (not too far but up hills and on trams and down long blocks), trying to put together a quick CV, and warming up for about 3 minutes. I could feel my legs shaking under me, and hear myself giving inane answers to the questions I was asked. It was video recorded (though not the question-answer session, thankfully). Maybe it was better to have been running around before hand; I had less time to get nervous.

In the evening I had the second rehearsal for a Haydn Schöpfung (the Creation) I'll be playing in Basel, my third Schöpfung of the year. This one's got something on the others I've done, and not just because it's local; it's with a boy choir. It's really quite different. When rehearsal started, you could see on the faces of everyone in the orchestra, we couldn't keep from smiling; there's something about their voices. Also, they're damn loud. It's a Wall of Sound. I tried to find a good video of them on youtube but everything up was shot by a parent, and so is invariably from a terrible angle, with bad sound. One of them (a bit of Messiah) shows my favorite kid (that I could see last night), one of the little ones that sings soprano. So earnest and cute! One of them was wearing a t-shirt with a dinosaur on it; my favorite was wearing stripes. Then there was a kid wearing a shirt with the Wheel of Fortune board on it, on which it was spelled out, "G_ F_CK Y__RS_LF" and the text at the bottom, "Would you like to buy a vowel?" Yes, a kid. This happens elsewhere here, too; at the fall fair, you could hear loud disco songs being played that drop the f-bomb on every chorus. Oh, German-speaking world. It's not that they don't know, I think, but maybe just that it doesn't have the same impact? Weird. Anyhow. It's fun working with these kids.

I don't have any new pictures. It's mostly white-gray and rainy outside. (Weird how I only want to show you the city when it's pretty and sunny; I also manage not to take pictures of the ugly parts, like all the smokestacks right on the French/German border, from the pharmaceutical companies, or the refuse-burning station. I'd say they mar the quaint skyline here. Everyone tries to ignore them. So now the secret is out. Sorry for any bubble-bursting there.) In other news, I found a pool close to school, and have been swimming a couple times. It's pretty great. I'm starting out conservatively so I don't end up with arms too sore to raise over my head (it's happened before).

Hmm, wait, here's a food picture for you: this chard, carrot, tofu, ginger, garlic thing I put over delicious tiny noodles from the Asian grocery, with cilantro.

absent, and return

2010-11-14T22:55:00.000+01:00

So, I know, it's been a while. I got sick, last weekend, I guess. Then I had kind of a lame week. Too much not-understanding makes for a sad Megan. I've upped my per-day studying amount, I hope it sinks in quickly. I want to know what's going on in my classes.

As usual, a lot has happened since I last wrote. Is this how my life used to be? I was certainly busy, but maybe I had less to report, since the things I was busy with (like ancient printed books and playing Mahler in cow-towns) were too commonplace to mention. Anyway, duh, now my life is all *foreign* and weird. Today, for instance, I traveled to Frauenfeld (have I mentioned Frauenfeld before? I played some Haydn there not too long ago. North of Zurich) to go to the Buch- und Handpressen-Messe. In other words, a hand-printing and artist's book fair. Wait, that's not so unusual, I've been to these before. (2 hrs from closing on the last day, everyone's got a glass of red wine...) OK, I take it back. Some interesting stuff!

I wanted at least two of these little books. They were only Fr. 25.- each. Shoulda. Next time.

I'm starting to get a handle on how to recognize Swiss typographic design. Sparseness, using type elements in decorative or artistic ways (for instance squares, circles, curves, etc -- things beyond just the type), using clear and basic colors (black, blue, red). I had neglected to take out any cash before I went, which was probably a good thing, since I would have spent it. I didn't buy anything, but I did come home with a few things. I learned, for instance, about something called Gautschen; once upon a time, you did your apprenticeship with the type shop, and learned how to become a setter, or a caster, or a printer, or whatever. Then you would get grabbed, at some unknown-to-you place and time, and thrown in a fountain. Kind of like a fraternity hazing. Then they'd give you a certificate, and you'd be a Real Printer. I made the mistake of telling one of my local printer friends that I had never been Gautsched (how'd you like my Engli-fied German?!?) and he warned me there might be a dunking in my future. I asked him to wait until summer, if he would be so kind. Near the end I met a British printer who lives near Munich, who had seen my books at the Druckwerk table ("I asked the woman why there were so many books in English and she had no idea") and we had a nice chat, as often happens with native speakers. After some probing he found out I also play bass, and then he told me I wouldn't be able to do both music and printing, if I wanted to be really good at either, and he said I knew it. I guess so. I told him I try not to think about it. Ahem.

What else? Well, a couple days ago my friend Maria had to turn pages at a concert at just the same time her mom was arriving at the airport on a plane from Transylvania, so I offered to go pick her up. We had a jolly time! She doesn't speak English, but has some German, and so we were able to ask basic questions (How Was Your Flight, When Were You In Basel, etc) until we got back to Maria & Sam's place, and I pulled out some paper and a pen. Then, hoo boy, we got onto the big topics, primarily Hungarian culture, independence, and the way the war subjugated the culture of Hungary. Observe this diagram. 1956 is the year of revolution.

You can see how the country, which was formerly quite large, got carved up into smaller sections. The dot in the middle, which is technically in Romania, is where she lives. Speaking Hungarian, while being forced to learn Romanian, etc. Some generations-old angers; this all happened after the first WW. Then we started talking about just one of the many things she brought as gifts from home: curds. Or, if you're speaking Hungarian, Topfen. Does it come from a cow, I asked? "Kuh?" She said no. I didn't know the word for goat, so I "Baaaanh"ed and she said no, "Baaahhh." Ah, of course, sheep. So I drew those little pictures to make her laugh. It was successful. Then I tried to say that I used to buy curd at my local farmer's market (shout-out to Grand Lake!) and I couldn't get it across in my limited German, so I drew the man with the veggies. She got it. Phew.

And we had a little bit of awesome weather. THANK GOODNESS. I thought I was going to be slowly dulled by the gray, gray days entering my soul, like a melancholic parade of blah. There was a rowing race on the Rhein on Saturday, what lucky planners of said race. People got excited about it. Yelling from the banks, etc.

Not everyone was yelling, of course. I think this girl had just about the right idea.

Last night I had the pleasant experience of falling asleep to the sounds of my radiator percolating away. Sounded like crickets. Reminded me of the more rural times in my life. I slept soundly.

Civic Pride

2010-11-02T22:54:00.000+01:00

Photo taken Monday, the day the Giants won the World Series. As far as I could tell, I was one of two people in the entire city wearing a baseball cap, and certainly the only girl. People kept looking at me. I felt more than a little self-conscious. But you know, it's worth it, to show some civic pride. That is an Oakland neighborhoods t-shirt, by the way.

back in Basel.

2010-10-31T16:22:00.000+01:00

The time changed in the night. Therefore it is fine for me to still be in bed right now. I was expecting a Sunday of relaxation anyway, after my crazy week and a half, so I feel absolutely free to enjoy every lazy bit of this morning.

The rest of the week in Darmstadt was fine. The music part was good, except for all the standing, but that's normal (it's my life). The rest, though! The drive up, of course. Then on Thursday I had to get back to Basel for a Friday morning presentation at Druckwerk for my Notation class (How Music Was Printed). Fortunately my rehearsal on Thursday night ended early. Oh, wait, did I say early? I meant late. As in, quarter to twelve. As in, nearly midnight. My new theorbo-playing friend and I hopped in the car I rented for the trip and made it back to Basel by 2:30, which seemed pretty good. People drive really fast on the autobahn. There aren't any speed limits, you know. It's pretty impressive. We were driving as fast as seemed safe in the sad little rental car, which was only about 130 - 140 kph (about 85 mph). He was going home to see his wife for a night, and helping me out with the manual transmission at the same time. Thanks, man.
By noon the next day we were headed for 4 hours through traffic back to Darmstadt, and the one performance of the opera. Here are some pictures I took at the dress rehearsal; the opera was done with traditional Baroque gestures, there was a choreographer helping the singers with their hands and expressions.

The woman in the bottom picture was definitely the best of the vocal group; great voice, good presence, elegant, fit the part. But, funny, I noticed during the recitatives -- the part where the singers move the action along, have dialog, etc, and are accompanied only by the continuo group (harpsichord, cello, theorbo) -- she would just say whatever she wanted, and sometimes only vaguely stick to what was written. Mostly her notes were right, but more importantly, I guess, she Seemed right.
One really nice part about the production was the background "sets"; the stage set had been constructed with a screen in the back, and throughout the opera they projected old images (prints, duh) of palaces, gardens, etc from the time. You can see an example of this in the top picture. And from the audience, the effect was quite convincing. Well done, creative group.
All in all, for the trouble of getting up there, getting around in Darmstadt, and finally coming back to Basel, I'm not sure it was worth it. I know that it wasn't my problem that they hadn't secured a bass player for the opera, but somehow I made it my problem. Lesson learned? Probably not.

taking pictures during the recitatives.

Here are some sights from the drive back up to Darmstadt from Basel on Friday (a perfect, beautiful day, too bad we were in a car).


fall colors

awesome 18-wheeler

A few pictures from the time in Munich, too:

rainy day

felt store

All of a sudden, I found myself a little jealous of any friend of mine who has A Job and gets to play in a hall like this all the time. What a pleasure. I didn't get a great picture of the Gasteig (the hall), but here's one that somebody else took and put up on Wikipedia:

It's maybe a little hard to tell from the picture but looking into the hall from the stage almost gave me a sense of vertigo; all the angles, and the seats swooping toward you. Nice.

manual transmission? no, please, no.

2010-10-26T23:40:00.000+02:00

Hi from Darmstadt, Germany. It's near Frankfurt. Getting here today easily shaved a week or two off the length of my life.

Yesterday I was also in Germany, for a little while. I'd had a concert in Munich (at the same hall where the Munich Philharmonic plays, more on that later!) the night before, then got on a bus and lay around for 6 hours while we drove back to Basel. Back to my flat around 2 PM, first thing I did was check my email. "Dear Megan, we missed you yesterday, we are hoping you can make it to one of the rehearsals today" -- in Darmstadt.

Here's the deal. Three weeks ago, I got a call at 10 PM asking if I could do an opera with the Kammerchor Darmstadt. I said yes, but I'd have to miss the first rehearsal; I'd be playing in Munich. But let me know, etc etc, and then I could travel directly from my other concert. I heard nothing, nothing. I called the guy who had called me, twice even, and heard nothing; I assumed it wasn't happening. Literally the FIRST confirmation about the gig I got was yesterday, sent at noon. Yesterday! What happened to, Here's the rehearsal plan, Here's the location of the concert, or, better yet, Here's A Contract?!? It seemed impossible to do anything but go, so I looked at the train schedule and figured I'd take the 9:13 this morning.

8:45 I got to the train station. Oddly, it wasn't crowded at all. I went to a ticket counter and asked if I could buy a ticket up here today, and was informed that the entire German Railway was on strike, there would be no trains at all today. So. I still had enough time, Darmstadt is near Frankfurt, and about 3 hours from Basel. My first rehearsal wasn't until 2, so I figured I could find a car and be there with time to spare. I walked next door to the train station to the rental car place, and discovered it would cost me around Fr. 500.- which, certainly, was too much. Oh, let me remind you that I have my bass and a suitcase with me (ready for 4 nights away from home). Heavy.

500 chf is too much, duh. So I went home (Heavy!!) and started looking around for a cheaper car. After an hour of calling different rental car agencies and talking with the organizers of the project, I finally decided to rent a car just one way, Switzerland to Germany, and I could get a cheaper price on it because it was originally from Germany and wouldn't have the one-way fee. It would come to approximately Fr. 270.-. Also, I was told it would be automatic transmission.

They were wrong, as it turns out.

It was a Mercedes, something kind of resembling a Toyota Matrix, hatchback-style. They didn't even have time to clean it, I needed to leave so quickly. Crumbs all over the floor. Anyway. I can't drive a stick. I mean, I can, sort of. I did. I got here. I was able to drive home, mostly in second gear, telling myself the whole time, People who are way dumber than I am do this all the time. I can do it. And I got back to Efringerstrasse with only one stall, so I was feeling OK about things. Bass and suitcase in car, I headed for the autobahn; that went fine, too. The weather was beautiful, the trees red and orange, and southern Germany is all wheat fields and far-off hills and dark woods of skinny trees. Lovely. I checked the radio, heard Karma Chameleon and some random German-language pop songs. Then I hit the construction. Oh My God. Two lanes, but so, so skinny. The choice was either be in the slow lane behind all the trucks (What Gear Should I Be In? What If I Have To Stop Suddenly? What If I Stall On The Autobahn?!? What If I Destroy My Bass On The Way To This Dumb Gig??!?!?) or to be in the fast lane (Can I Successfully Navigate This Car With Only An 8" Cushion Between Me And The Wall, and Me And The 18-Wheeler Beside Me?). I went back and forth, as needed. White-knuckled. Alternating feeling feelings of panic and dread kept crushing up my shoulders, and I kept feeling tired, probably from all that panicking. When I finally got to Darmstadt, around 2:05, I made my way to the hall, and started stalling. I stalled at the first stoplight. Then I saw a parking spot, and stalled turning around to get back to it. Then I stalled turning onto the street. Then I tried to park and stalled three times in a row and ended up asking someone on the street to help me park it but no one would and I finally was able to pull in the wrong way into a different spot across the street. Stall. Stall. Stall. Oh My God.

Reading back on this it sounds like a comedy. Isn't there some movie like this? Someone driving and Jerky Stop, Jerky Stop, all over town? That was me! Almost funny. Not funny really at all. But maybe kind of funny.

Plus, by the time I got to the hall, sightreading an opera that no one has ever heard, four rehearsals in, didn't seem so bad.

I will never, ever, ever rent a car with manual transmission again. Remind me. Don't let me. It's not worth it. I'd rather pay the extra.
Anyway, I found some people in the orchestra to help me drive the car around, so you don't have to worry about me getting it back to the rental company... phew.

Now, a well-deserved rest sleep. Pictures to follow!

Well How About That.

2010-10-21T21:18:00.000+02:00

Got an email yesterday from the College Book Art Association. Back in August I submitted sum-of-parts to their Juried Show, which will be up at their annual conference this coming January. Turns out, it got in, and also won an award -- the Best Crafted Student Work Award. Hey! But also, huh? I wrote them immediately to make sure it wasn't a mistake; I only got the student membership because I am a student, not because I am a Student. (I know that makes sense.) I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm a professional! I just happen to be getting a Master's degree right now. (It's nothing. I play the bass all day. And learn how to play the harpsichord. And about fugue structure. In German.) Anyway, they wrote me back and said Of course they knew it was me, and since I am technically a student right now I totally qualify for/deserve the award. I guess I don't really understand the parameters, I would reserve that award for people who are just starting out in the field, not "seasoned pros" or however I think of myself, but maybe it simply means, People Who Are In School. For anything. I feel fraudulent in the same way as I feel about getting a Master's in music after receiving my Bachelor's in studio art. But whatever, man. They've seen my CV. I accept. Oh yeah, the award is $100, plus a $400 travel grant to fly to Bloomington, Indiana in January and attend the conference. I told the CBAA they can give that $400 to some real Student somewhere who otherwise wouldn't be able to make it.

School is going fine. In some classes, I feel pretty smart. Yes, I Understand the structure of a Minuet written during the classical period. In other classes, I feel super dumb. No, I don't understand German. No, really, I don't understand German. OK, a little, oh, wait, nope. Also, it seems like some people in this one class in particular (the one in German) are fresh from a bunch of other theory classes and so have answers that I'm not even prepared to look for. But maybe if I had just a little more German. I'll keep you updated. Today was less awful, I kept interrupting the teacher to ask questions in English. It seemed to help some of the other people around me, so I didn't feel bad.

I tied some frets on David's bass this week. It was a bit trying. I've mostly gotten it, and it seems pretty good so far, but my fingers were pretty raw for a day or so after. Here are some arty shots of the frets.

pegbox.

And, look at this nice day! What would you guess the temperature to be out there? 50? 60? 70? It could have been any of those, I thought. Wrong again. It was 31. Holy Crap. I didn't think it was allowed to be that cold when the sun was out. Against the rules of nature, or something. Alas, no.

HAND-kerchiefs.

2010-10-16T16:25:00.000+02:00

Duh.

it has taken a turn toward winter

2010-10-15T23:00:00.000+02:00

Foggy, almost like San Francisco, but not so low. And cold. About as cold as the East Bay gets in winter. Except here it's only cold outside. Heeeeey. Did laundry today, and put it out on the balcony hoping the sun would come out. Heh. Nope.


Hankerchiefs: a very important part of my existence in this cold, cold world.

Getting to know more of Basel, I've been walking to and from school because it seems too cold to ride my bike (weak!) and have found some nice things on my way. Today I noticed this public flowerbed that I've passed a number of times and never seen, which astounds me, because it is full of some pretty epic chard and kale plants.

I took this picture of my glove on one of the chard leaves for scale.

Basel is funny. It always kind of weirds me out how small it is. For instance: the other day I was in a shoe store buying these funny slippers for myself (10chf).

I dawdled on my way up to the counter and a girl slipped in front of me to exchange a pair of shoes. Zing. Later that day, while on the bus, I saw the same girl (across town) riding her bike down the street. Then, in the train station on my way to Zurich, I saw her again. THEN, two nights ago, I was walking home from having dinner with some friends, they live in another part of town from me, and Who Was Going The Other Way? Yes. Same girl. Weird. I wonder if she notices me. There are other people I've seen twice, but three+ times? Crazy.

I've been a little stuck in a cooking rut lately. Rice. Vegetables. Rice. Salad. Rice. What else do I know how to make? Besides cereal? Yeah. Well, anyway, I got up the gumption to make a pumpkin curry for a friend who came over for lunch, and decided to make the curry paste from scratch. Amazing! So good, so easy. Onion, garlic, some kind of hot pepper (we don't have serrano or jalapeno peppers here), a bunch of cilantro, a little bit of water. Grind up with food processor. Put in a pot with coconut milk. Add vegetables. Cook until done. Yes.

Since I've been walking instead of taking the tram, I rewarded myself with this plant. Cost the same amount as tram fare. Hello Viola.

I also finally have a key to the bass locker at school, and now can keep one of the whales there as needed. Plus, it means I can practice at school. It feels like I get a lot more done at school than at home. Ah, look. I appear to be doing work. I wonder how long I can keep it up? What a skeptic!

it is fall

2010-10-07T18:24:00.000+02:00

Scenes from around my neighborhood. This is the play yard behind Matthäuskirche, near my house.

Cat stepping inside. Note the ladder.

Good old Oetlingerstrasse. I hope to live on this street someday. It's nice.

Paper collection day, it happens once a month.

I guess those posters count as "paper"

View from the Johanniterbrücke of the river, golden trees in Kleinbasel, and the spires of Münsterkirche. You can also see the Mittlere Rheinbrücke there in the lower right.

Looking back to Kleinbasel from just across the Rhein.

This is in the old part of the city, near the Schola Cantorum.

In the yard at the Schola.

This one's for Maggie. I wanted her to know how the agricultural economy works over here in Switzerland. A farmer grows some vegetables. He then picks them up off the ground and hands them over to a nice man from the Migros supermarket chain. It may not be the most efficient system but we believe in it.

One last view of Kleinbasel trees, the quiet morning Rhein, and Grossbasel across the way. Lovely.

more excitement in one week

2010-10-05T21:26:00.000+02:00

My friends back home made the comment, "You have more adventures in a week than I could handle in two or three months," and I can say that the same is practically true for me. One long day of classes and traveling past Zürich for work and I am loathe to leave the house the next day. Even for things I love to do.
I did, anyway, make my way to the farmer's market, and I got there just in time. I managed to get some good bread (finally!), and really at the last minute; I was saying hello to the nice lady who sells hand made mustard and she asked if I wanted to buy some bread. Yes, why not! Anyhow. On the way home I passed by a parked taxi with a copy of Gilgamesh in the front window. What a literate working population.

Not much else happened this weekend. I made a squash curry with coconut milk (Thai-style, yum!), played the smallest amount of bass possible to still call it practicing, and then brought some curry over to my friends' house.

Classes seem to be fine. Baroque and Classical Theory, Notation, German for foreigners (Auslanders). My Notation class is interesting. The idea is to place the piece in a time and location, based on the physical clues you can look at. Like Art History for musicians. This includes looking at things like instrumentation, why and when different markings were used, how you can tell which country the music was written in and where it was printed, and, consequently, what technique was used to do the printing. !! The teacher is great, she's smart and funny and very enthusiastic about her subject. She also wears a little watch on a chain around her neck so she can end the class on time (charming). She explained a little in class about different printing techniques, but the students seemed generally confused about the concepts. After class I asked her if she might be interested in having the class come over to Druckwerk so I can show them what copper plate etching, lithography, and letterpress printing actually are, and how they work, and she liked the idea. So, we're setting something up for the end of the month! How exciting.
Every student also has to do a presentation about one subject at the end of the year, topic of our choice, and she has approved further research on my part into how and where music was printed. I plan to do a few physical experiments, too, of course.

I have homework for other classes, too. Come up with 6 - 8 variations on La Follia. Write a 4-bar minuet using a specific chord progression. Look at this, I'm back in school. Weird. Well, in typical form (as far as I can remember) I am putting of my homework. Hopefully not until the last minute. That would be depressing. I'm 30, after all. One would hope I've learned not to procrastinate so much. Ha.

little web of roots I found while cleaning up the balcony today

Meanwhile, fall is starting. Pictures to follow.

people are nice

2010-09-28T22:59:00.000+02:00

some examples:

Ella (friend, horn player, Icelandic) and I arrived in Kilchberg to find pouring rain and the wrong bus. She thought she might ask the bus driver how close he would stop to the church, and it turned out the drivers were just about to have a shift change, and the one who was just going off-duty actually DROVE US IN HIS CAR to where we were going.

Earlier, on the train, I realized that I had left the endpin for my bass at home (it's a long story why it wasn't with my bass, involving having a lesson on a different bass and leaving mine at the church, etc etc) and was not planning on returning home for two nights. This would mean six rehearsals/concerts with no endpin. What to do?!? Ella made a few calls, got the number of this Latvian guy (Raitas is his name) who lives not too far from me, but whom I had never spoken to, and who would be arriving only for the second rehearsal since he was one of the vocal soloists. Before he left, he went over to Efringerstrasse, my roommate let him in, and he picked up the endpin for me. So Great.

(Also, she gave me some Icelandic money, in exchange for one of the new pennies, which she quickly proclaimed to be "just shit.")

And, she told me all about this really stunning version of "If you're going to San Francisco" and even sang it for me, truly enlivening my train ride home. And now I will share the video with you. Because I'm nice, too.

Bass wheel saga... I should have just replaced the wheel by now. But instead, I've tried to just fix the old one, spending nearly the same amount of money and roughly 7x as much time as I would have otherwise. There have been some helpful people along the way. I should mention them. Marcel, of course, at Druckwerk, has done a lot of drilling, fixing, finding parts, tightening, re-tightening, finding new parts, etc. Also some guy at this random machine shop I went to near Voltaplatz (how's that for the name of a neighborhood?) drilled, fitted parts, and assembled, all out of the goodness of his heart. (Unfortunately, his fix didn't work, and as I was wheeling my bass through the Zurich main station I heard some little "ping" noises behind me just before the wheel completely fell apart. I went the next day to the Home Depot equivalent [OBI] and found some parts that worked well enough to keep me going until the next fix. Why have I not just replaced the whole wheel? My stubborn nature, I can only assume.)

Oh, my roommate, of course, who allows me to not give her my rent until I get paid. Wow. So nice.

Also nice are plants. I finally replaced the ones that died over the summer with a couple for the indoors, an orchid and a succulent. I was so busy admiring them this evening that I accidentally turned my roasting potatoes (thinly sliced) into incredibly delicious potato chips. What a delightful mistake.

late night blog writing

2010-09-27T00:51:00.000+02:00

It's nearly midnight here, but it's been a while (and could conceivably be a while longer) so I thought I'd try to get something down. Just got back from Zurich, where I played a concert (with choir), Pergolesi Vespers, ends up being nearly 2 1/2 hours without a break. Goodness me. The church (Predigerkirche) was interesting, built 1308-1350, and all white on the inside, with an impressive teal-colored organ. There is quite a lot of ornamentation along the walls, including these fatty cherub/baby faces with pink-colored lips and bulgy fatty baby eyes. (I was trying to find a picture just now but I could not. Sorry about that.) Tomorrow I'm off somewhere else, I think it's called Frauenfeld, to play Haydn's good old Creation. Busy, busy. Plus, classes begin this week. Now you see why I can't find the time to write some blog, yes?

School! I know you are wondering. At first it seemed Very, Very Complicated. A bunch of pieces of paper on a wall, lists of classes, teachers, things you had to sign up for, things you didn't have to sign up for, things you could sign up for if you wanted to, and no clear way to differentiate between all of these. Another wall, with a list of all of us (who's on top? I'm so easy to locate.) and one of the classes we'd been assigned. I got Generalbass, which basically translates to figured bass, which refers to the little numbers you see under the bass line of Baroque music, telling the keyboard player which chords to play. My class, though, is not so much about that, as far as I can tell. In fact, it's a 30-minute-per-week private lesson with a very thoughtful, gentle, scattered-seeming man whom I watched sit on a harpsichord (what?!) and who spent a number of minutes with his forehead scrunched up trying to decide what he would teach me. In the end, he asked me to play some chords (d minor, A major, d minor, C major, F major, C major, d minor, A major, these are the chord progression of La Folia (from Wikipedia: "La Folía [also spelled "Follia"] is one of the oldest remembered European musical themes, or primary material, generally melodic, of a composition, on record"), for which, in the next couple weeks until our next lesson, I am to devise 6 - 8 variations. I think I can handle that.
I am also to take something called the Kompactkurs ("compact course"), from which I can choose one of three sections (Medieval and Renaissance notation and theory; 15th century - late 18th century; Baroque and Classical notation and theory) this year and one next year, preferably sections 1 and 2 or 2 and 3 although it's not clear which they'll let me into. Anyway, there are a lot of other classes offered, and let me just say I was Very, Very Confused trying to sort it all out.
Fortunately, there's a gentleman on the administrative side (who also teaches lute) named Jeremy Llewellyn, he's from Wales, and hey, he speaks English. In the chat we had, he explained that technically all I *have* to take each semester are lessons, Generalbass, and the Kompactkurs; I will need to get some more credit points, which can be had by attending other classes and also by playing concerts (so, score, for every gig I play, I can submit the program at the end of the semester and get credit points for it!). But really, it took this man telling me the information before I understood it, because the signage is extremely complicated. Even people who speak German think so.
I have found a couple people to be friends with. Yes, you may all heave a sigh of relief; little Megan will not be sad and friendless this year. One of them is another American, Lydia. She's a singer, and I'm told she's very good. Perhaps she does not yet know how rewarding it can be to work with a bass player, but it is my plan to show her.

Oh, I'm sorry, I just realized I haven't included any pictures yet. I've been leaving the camera at home, but I did get a few nice pictures before the weather turned rainy and Cold.

So lovely! I was walking home from school when I noticed this bug on my shirt. So I took its picture.

Also on my walk home, I passed by my favorite fountain. Have I already included a picture of it? Perhaps. Well, here it is again. Little Goat!

OK, lots going on here. I initially wanted to take this picture for the little post bird on the bow of the boat, but then I noticed some loud noises, and a commotion. Then it became clear that the loud noises were actually people, fake fighting and singing opera, acting out the staging right there at the Schifflände (ship landing). Wow! Pretty neat.

I think there's tons I'm leaving out here. Playing with me in Zurich was another bass player, Sofus, he's from Norway, and does mostly modern orchestra playing. We had a long discussion today about work, and rehearsal length. Turns out modern orchestras here adhere to very similar rules and regulations as those in the States: 2 1/2 hr rehearsal time, break no later than 1 1/2 hrs in, etc, etc. Why are these things lacking from the Historical Instrument orchestra world? Because we're amateurs? I know that's not true. Because we're so thrilled to have the chance to play this old music that we don't mind going for 4 hours? Again, it seems absurd. In a country that loves to follow the rules as much as Switzerland, I'm surprised there's not any kind of system in place for ensuring that we have professional workplace conditions. (Speaking of rule-following, Sofus told me that at some point he put his trash out on the wrong day, or in the wrong place, and the police went through it, found his name on something, and came and talked to him. He almost got in trouble with the police! Wow.) Well, anyway. I am happy to be playing this music, even if I sometimes complain about the conditions.

Well heck, it's almost 1 in the morning. I guess I'd better get myself to bed. Remind me to tell you a funny story about my endpin.

assorted

2010-09-18T18:45:00.000+02:00

Not as warm as it used to be, here in Basel. When it's cloudy and chilly, I have to admit feeling like it's summer (corrupted by the Bay), but when the sun is out, and it's still chilly, I know fall is on its way. While I was gone, all the plants I'd been growing died (alas), but the one volunteer - hardy little bugger - managed to hold on, and now one of its tomatoes are turning red. Amazing!

I'm pretty confident it's going to be inedible; I think that particular tomato has been on the plant for a long time. Still feels like an accomplishment. Not my accomplishment, obviously, but one nonetheless.

This little bee seems to have died peacefully on the rug on our balcony. I'm sure it lived a good life. Probably even helped with my tomato plant. Thanks bee.

Inside, meanwhile, we have some double-bass.
Perhaps it is becoming clear to you how little I'm doing these days. Recovering from my summer, maybe. I practice around an hour a day (total... I'm working my arms and fingers back into shape); make food (today I made soup, yum yum), stare at the walls, eat, read, etc. I did go have dinner the other night with Maria and Sam, Maria made stuffed bell peppers the traditional Translyvanian way, which involves boiling them for 40 minutes in this flour-water-milk-oil-fresh tomato juice mixture in a pot on the stove. Delicious. We also watched a lot of folk music from her country on youtube. Do check out these videos:
Here's a band called Muzsikás performing with the famous Transylvanian singer Marta Sebestyén. I can't really get enough of this one. So good.
These people are apparently the most "authentic" musicians still around, seen here, playing a party. It's this old couple, she's playing a "gardon" (which looks like a rustic cello) by hitting it with the bow, and using snap pizzicato on the strings at the same time. Wild.

dodging the police

2010-09-14T23:40:00.000+02:00

The sunset tonight turned everything pink. My room, the street, the sky, everything. It was incredible. You know, clouds are different everywhere. I had noticed the difference between Texan clouds and Californian clouds, but the point wasn't really driven home until I moved here. Seeing all those Titian paintings, with those epic puffy clouds, I thought, Ha, You wish, Mr. T. But you know what? We have those here. It's just a European cloud thing. I don't want to say they're better. But they're certainly more dramatic.

I'll try to get some pictures at some point. In the mean time, I thought I'd share just a few things I've been noticing the past few days, through my jetlagged fog.

First of all, I have seen more police in the five days since I've been back than I did in the six months I lived here in the spring. How is this possible? I don't know. Active season, looking to up their quotas, something. I was biking to Germany the other day and got a little confused about the route I was supposed to take; I knew right away I was going down the wrong part of the street, and what do you know, a police Mercedes pulled up next to me, rolled down the window, and shouted something in German. "I'm Sorry!" I shouted back, still riding up this little hill. "You are not supposed to ride in this part of the road!" the man shouted at me. "I'm Sorry!" I shouted back. "You cannot read the signs?" he yelled. "I'm Really Sorry!" I shouted back. Finally, I pulled over. "Where are you staying?" I hesitated because I was out of breath, maybe it was to my advantage. "Klein Basel." "So you come here all the time?" "No!" "First time?" "Yes!" (Lie. But, it had been two months, in which time the excessive amount of booze in my system essentially erased any internal map I had developed here. So, partial truth.) "You need to read the signs!" "Yes! I'm Really Sorry!" "[Rolling Eyes.]" "I'm sorry!" "Go." "OK! I'm Sorry!" It was funny, at least.

Then today, I got my bus ticket checked for the first time. It was all in order, of course; I try to be an upstanding citizen. I've had two more near run-ins in the past 24 hours alone, so I am aware that I need to be even more upstanding than I'm already inclined to be. I suspect Swiss police are particular sticklers for Right Behavior.

My ticket got checked on the way to another bass player's house, across town, where I picked up a bass of David's I am bass-sitting for the year. Yes, that means two basses in my tiny, tiny room. Kiersten suggested "maybe wood will become the new cotton to you; basses will feel like pillows or friendly clouds that came inside to keep you company" and that is possible, I guess. It will actually be useful; I can string the bass up with an alternate tuning, and keep my brain in knots for a time.

I also went to school today, to try and figure out what my schedule is for next week (when classes start). Interestingly, the secretary told me that I can choose my classes on the first day of school, next Monday. What? I asked her when to come, and she said I should just come. What classes should I take? There will be signs. [Why Can't I Get Any Information?!?] I said, "So, it will become clear to me when I get here?" "Yes, yes." Mmm hmm. I'll let you know what happens. Then I rode my bike home, very, very fast.

resuming bloggerly duties

2010-09-12T00:28:00.008+02:00

Goodbye to California; to friends and family; to the ocean, tamales, and Barton Springs. Hello Basel! It felt a little heartbreaking to leave, but after my first day in town I can say that I'm thrilled to be back here. It's really nice.

It was kind of funny to put the blog on hold for the summer, since I had such a fantastic time and wanted to write all about it, but somehow I would have felt silly continuing this babbling from home. And frankly, there wasn't the time. At any rate, this may have been the best summer on record. Do a google search, I'm sure I'm right. How about a quick recap?

There was all that printing, of course. Hours of challenging, satisfying, absorbing typesetting, designing, and actual press time.

Gaps between printing during those three weeks were spent soberly discussing deep topics with my colleagues. Ahem. By which I mean, I ate a ton of great food, drank what must certainly have added up to gallons of various microbrews (and is it necessary to mention each of the cocktails I got to try this summer?), ate cupcakes, and got my Funny back. It only took a couple weeks to regain most of my vocabulary, and shortly thereafter the timing started to return. Thank goodness. I was nervous it (The Funny) had taken a crippling blow to the knees. Let's hope that never happens.

I was certainly helped along by the two great weeks I spent hanging out with good old Sydney The Cat, too. Best Cat Ever? Yes. It's not worth it to argue. You will be proven wrong.

Then I went sailing.

Angel Island, fog.

And my, did I get sunburned. After those 6 hours in the sun, I hitched a fun ride (Thanks H.!) down to Southern California to visit friends in Santa Barbara, some of whom miraculously arrived from Texas, others of whom happen to miraculously reside there.

We went to the beach.

I am not unlike a small car. This was on our way to my celebratory 30th birthday meal; on the way back I was a little more like a mid-sized sedan. So. Much. Delicious. Dessert.

And then to LA! I knew making these boxes would be fun. I was right. Plus, I was fortunate to work with someone who not only understood my ideas for the box and figured out ways to make them work (and look even better than I had imagined), but was able to masterfully build 24 of them. Amazing. I helped, once he showed me what to do. I don't want to brag, but I think we did a damn good job.

My goodness, look at that hinge. Epic.

We got to have a little beach time, too. How about that.

Then back to the Bay, where another generous friend helped me silkscreen the image on the front of the books. So many friends! So much help! My dad helped us with some last-minute registration issues we were having. Then, we took an amazing trip up to the Headlands. We must have hit the beginning of the Bay Area's famous Indian Summer, because it was heartbreakingly clear.

Immediately after he left, I threw a party for my book, which was fun. All my friends came! Thanks, everyone. I bought as many varieties of 2-buck Chuck as Trader Joe's had, and we all did our best to sample each one.

How about that dress? There's a Megan who is good at sewing. It is not me.

I only had a few days after the party to gather my things from where I had strewn them throughout the apartment, take most of the books to the storage unit, and, more importantly, hang out with all my dearies one more time before I headed off to Texas and what can formally be called Kitten Time.

My mom recently rescued this little kitten from an uncertain future. She (Bug, the kitten) has a ridiculous and adorable scratchy little voice, and we were trying to get her to talk for us, but she resisted our efforts. Oh well. She's pretty cute even when she's not talking.

I think my mom and I had plans to do a lot of things around Austin, but instead we ended up mostly lazing around the house. Well. That's not true! Not only did my mom sew these great muslin slipcovers for my books, we also took a day to clean out my old closet, inside which I found some relics from childhood. Here's an example:

There was a nice stack of little book projects I made as a young kid; it is somehow satisfying to know that you are the person you are even before anyone knows about it yet.

(my retainer-tightening key.)

I also managed to find the time to hang out on the East Side with some friends, and spend some very quality time floating quietly on my back in the cool, clear waters of Barton Springs. Oh ideal pool, would that you could be everywhere I am.

From Texas, I flew to Boston, then took a bus to Northampton, where I got to stay with the incredibly wonderful Ms. JB. We rode bikes around her little town of Hadley, Mass, past old houses with little farm stands in the front yards, across old bridges, and along the Connecticut river.

On the way home we stopped to look at some headstones from the mid-1700s. Look at that incredibly beautiful ligature! Rests. Gorgeous. The golden age of serif faces. Warms my heart.

Speaking of a warm heart, I was in town because two great people got married. (Sorry, M&B, I'll send you all these pictures ASAP!)

There was dancing. I did it, too.

Yes. I am wearing a gold skirt.

The ceremony was beautiful, the location was awesome, and the beer was local and delicious. (I'd recommend the Farmer's Brown Ale.) And M & B got married! One of B's friends sang them a song at the reception and I still have it stuck in my head. ("Sigel-Goss, Gossel-Sigelman... Hey, hey, hey hey.") And there was a square dance! Have I ever gotten to dance at a square dance? Not since elementary school, and I'm not sure I properly appreciated it back then. It's fun, I'll tell you. Having played at roughly a thousand dances, I knew what all the dance calls were, but somehow had never actually done any of them before. And then there I was! Helping the rest of my square with the Grand Right and Left. Everybody swing your partner! As an added bonus, the band played Indian Ate A Woodchuck, my favorite fiddle tune from the old Jades days. I told J (my old bandmate, of course!) the next day and we cheered for our shared memories, and for the brilliance of the tune.

Here's a post-Jennie & Megan version on youtube.

Then, to NYC for three nights, hanging out with my oldest friend and his boyfriend and their two great cats, Walt and Tony. Walt likes to be vigorously petted and will submit to being "stretched" and scratched all over his belly, and Tony favors a good game of fetch (yes, fetch). "Go get it!" you shout as you pitch the pink folded pipe cleaner down the hall. Tony hurtles after it, then brings it back and drops it, a little wet, at your feet. Adorable.

Then a few hours in a plane (and some heavy sedatives) later, I found myself back in Basel! It's already been a busy day and a half. Bike-riding, seeing friends, playing the bass, what a relief. And look at this incredible produce I got from the market today:

All that for Fr. 10-, and take a gander at those wonderful, crisp apples. Late summer in CH seems to be my time of year. All the produce I thought I couldn't get! Chard, and butternut squash. Here it is. I even saw corn at the grocery store. Not just for pigs, as it turns out. You know what I could use, ahem, is some kind of wheel, that would show me what food was in season, and when. Gosh, that would be so great.

Anyhow. I miss everyone, so much! And I'm very happy to be back. What a wealth of good I have. Lucky, I tell you.

Basel post, from Oakland.

2010-07-23T08:20:00.000+02:00

I finally dumped photos from my digital camera onto my computer today, and found some delightful things from my last night in Basel.

This is my Chard. I cut it, finally, and made it into this:

and it was so delicious.

After dinner, Maria and I went down to the Rhine to drink prosecco and eat these little strawberry tarts she had brought us for dessert. It wasn't as warm as it had been, by which I mean I wasn't tempted to go swimming, but we were out in shirt sleeves until 11. This is particularly sweet-sounding now that I'm in the Bay Area and freezing by 6 PM.

Dreirosenbrucke in the background. This is in the NW corner of the city, close to Germany/France.

July 4: Independence / Good Riddance Day, depending on whom you ask

2010-07-04T16:22:00.000+02:00

Alternately, you could call it, Let's ride our bikes to the old river and swim around a bit, have a picnic, swim around a bit more, and enjoy the summer time. Yes!

You ride into Germany, and pretty much follow the river north/northwest. The destination, up close. We left early, around 8:45, and had the roads mostly to ourselves.

Maria and Sam up ahead of me. I was unsafely trying to take photos while riding my bike. It turned out OK, however. Nothing to worry about.

We found a nice rock to hang out on (look at this gorgeous day! and not so hot, because of our impressively electrical thunderstorm last night).

picnic, and foot.

Speaking of feet, I'm so accident-prone right now! I smashed my big toe on a rock while swimming along. It bled, I took a picture, but I know you don't want to see that. You're welcome.

Instead, here is my shadow. It wasn't until the bike ride home that I remembered the date; I had a jolly little discussion with Sam, the British half of the couple I went with, about Independence Day, where he decided that he could celebrate "We Didn't Want You Anyway" Day, otherwise known as Good Riddance Day. The other half of the couple is Maria, who is from Transylvania. Hungarian is a crazy language, I'll tell you. I learned one word. I have no idea how to spell it, but it sounds like this: "boo-djee." It means "underpants." How did this possibly come up? Well. There are many amusing things about British English and American English which do not cross over, as I'm sure many of you know. In this instance, we were noting how American "pants" are British "trousers" and British "pants" are American "underwear" -- and now you see how this boo-djee fits in to the conversation. Hilarity ensued.

The only thing missing from this 4th of July is corn. Fresh, sweet, delicious corn. There's a bbq being hosted by someone from Vermont later in the day, so I'll probably go see if he was able to scare up any. I bet he wasn't. Sam told me that in Europe, corn is for feeding pigs. Sigh. Just think, if there was good corn, there could be good corn tortillas, and tortilla chips, and... oh. Heh heh. Did I already mentioned that I'm excited about eating Mexican food again? Just another three days!!!

alternative transportation

2010-06-30T13:30:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I thought I'd try a different method for getting across the Rhein; it was too hot to ride my bike without sweating all over my nice shirt, and I'm sick of the trams, which are stifling this time of year anyway. Good thing Basel has the ferries, called "anachronistic" by some and "entirely charming" by others (source citation? heh heh heh). A cable stretches across the river, and by putting the boat at an angle into the current, the ferry is pushed only by the force of the water from bank to bank. Hydro-power! The boat's got a tiller, but no engine. Somehow I managed not to get a picture of it from far away. Here are one or two representative examples.

On a hot day like yesterday, you may find yourself tromping past ice cream vendors and mostly-nudes on your way down to the tiny dock.

how nice.

The ferry pulls up, you climb on, and a man with no pants on swings the boom attached to the cable to the other side of the boat (shore side); it's not even necessary to push off. As you're gently pushed across, little heads bob along beside you, swimmers with their bright "säckli" (little sack!) basically keeping heads-up in the fast current, on their way towards Germany/France.

(you know you can click on these to make them bigger, right?)

Anyway. Many snobby Swiss people say that they prefer to swim in pure glacier ("glah-see-air") water than in the dirty Rhein. Yup, pretty dirty:

In fact, it is almost ridiculously turquoise and shimmery at the moment. I'm going to wait one more day for my claw-wound to heal a little more,

but I should be back in by tomorrow. It's supposed to be 90 this weekend. Wow. Somebody needs a hat.

(ps. thanks to Ryan for the glah-see-air reminder. I don't even notice these things anymore.)

summer time!

2010-06-28T23:56:00.001+02:00

Well, it's definitely summer. And not just because it's damn hot outside. The Rhein has chilled out (and warmed up) enough to allow for some casual swimming, and day by day the numbers of floaters-with-the-current increase. Also, of course, the World Cup figures heavily in everyone's plans for each day (including mine). My friend in Denmark even had the time of his orchestra concert changed to accommodate a soccer match. People are having picnics, in parks and by the river. Beer is consumed, with little fuss or notice. My personal level of inactivity has reached a nearly startling peak; I do still go to Druckwerk daily, but most other things have gone by the wayside. I finished a 400-page book in two days, for instance. And today, finally, I swam in the river, and was inhibited only by the multitudinous cuts and scrapes I have from a stupid bike injury received yesterday on my friend's sorry excuse for a bike. I couldn't get it going on a hill and just fell over, alas.

Then today, maybe 30 minutes ago, on my way home from watching Brazil vs Chile, I had another stupid experience (this time with my own bike) and got this little doozy:

Oh well. Good thing I'm such a tough cookie.

The Rhein swimming was great. I'll go again as soon as my little bear-attack scabs up. I haven't been working on any new projects at the print shop, but we've been cleaning up after a bit of excitement, in the form of a new press, delivered last week through the window. The window came out of its frame,

leaving a big hole in the wall for the press to come in through. (Remember that we're on the third floor.)

As Marcel and I watched through the hole, the press arrived on a truck,

then was transferred onto a hydraulic lift,

and slowly brought up to the window.

I thought I'd be able to catch the press on video, slowly gliding into the shop. Ha. It took about two hours of slowly moving it a few inches in, strategically placing blocks of wood underneath it, moving it in a few more inches, moving the blocks, etc. At first everyone couldn't get enough of the show. Here are Marcel and Florian:

And the neighbors across the way:

But we eventually realized it was going to take a long time, and let the workers continue with their incremental bits of progress and their man-grunting, unwatched.

I'm happy to report that the new press is a Vandercook (American!) with a giant paper size. From the 1950 catalog:

Vandercook 42-28 Power Test Press
Bed: 42″ × 50″
Maximum sheet: 41¾” × 30″
Maximum form: 41″ × 28″
Floor space: 4’10″ × 9′
Weight: 5650 lb
Price (1950): $7740
“The largest test press in the Vandercook line for proving one and two-color plates and forms.” The automatic frisket is optional.

It's nice having something from the home-country in the shop. It probably won't be hooked up to electricity before I leave, but that gives me all summer to think up some projects printed on giant sheets of paper.

(More photos and some video of the press in the air coming soon to my flickr page.)

Alternate titles for today's post:

Bike Injuries

Fußball? Fußball!

How early is it OK to have a beer?

Rheinschwimmen!

Three Tons of Cast Steel In The Air

"pick-nick"

2010-06-27T01:41:00.003+02:00

Tonight I went to a picnic. Why didn't I bring my camera? It was dumb. I didn't know how nice it would be. You go behind the Bahnhof (train station) and through the neighborhood called Gundeli to Margarethenpark. There's a open green space surrounded by trees, and a playground and fountain on your right, and a path leading uphill. You go up, and keep going up, to the left, and all of a sudden you find yourself in the middle of fields of grass, and cultivated strawberries, and you're above the town and isolated from it by trees, and something else, like quiet.

In the group the following countries were represented: France, Brazil, Turkey, Spain, Germany, Colombia, and the US, of course. A generous mix of French, German, Spanish and English was spoken, and many delicious French cheeses were eaten. I even tried some hard salami made out of duck. I know. Since it is light so late, we didn't even meet until 8; we stayed in the field until 10:30, and it was only just getting too dark and cold to be out in the grass. Then another two hours were spent at the hostess' house, where some neighbor Argentinians joined the group. The South American contingent sang us songs and played skilled guitar while the rest of us drank red wine in admiration for their talents. What an international city I live in.

In other news, the river seems to have quieted down, and the weather has certainly heated up, so there may be some river-swimming in my future. We'll see.

To avoid a photo-less post I'm including this poppy from the botanical garden. A present for you.

technical difficulty

2010-06-23T23:49:00.003+02:00

I've noticed that clicking on the movie opens up a large version of the picture of Maggie on the tram. So here is the video by itself, in all of its tropical, poopy glory.

such a nice time.

2010-06-22T20:27:00.006+02:00

Dear Maggie,

Please come visit me all the time!

love,

Megan

head-lick

botanical garden,

complete with pooping bird

music instrument museum

tram ride

not pictured: 6 cups of brown rice we made, then slowly ate; weird cereal-filled chocolate balls we couldn't quite convince ourselves to enjoy; the many beers drunk while watching the World Cup; pretzels consumed under the same circumstances; the rain, which refused to let up the entire weekend; the waterlogged farmer's market; look of joy on my face as Maggie cooked yet another meal; the fake-grass-covered benches outside of Art Basel on which I waited to meet Maggie after we had each spent two hours looking around the giant expanse of art works; look of enthusiasm on Maggie's face after I managed to return her defective coffee maker to the department store, then exchange it for another, entirely in German (plus hand gestures); the absurdly swollen river, thanks to our absurd amount of rain; speed with which I ran after realizing (thanks to a call from Maggie's mom, her first ever international call!) that I had the date of her arrival wrong; delicious lentil soup we ate at my new favorite neighborhood cafe, ZaZaa; and some other things, too numerous to list. It was pretty nice.

found in idleness

2010-06-16T10:12:00.000+02:00

some Robert Johnson

and

some early Mississippi John Hurt

this, and that

2010-06-15T21:10:00.000+02:00

Not much going on here at the moment. I have very little playing to do; my teacher is out of the country, teaching at Tafelmusik (where I met him), and I don't have any work, though I do have one concert this month, the Master's recital of one Marie Schneider, blockflote player of Alsace (France).

I can't print, at the moment, because the building has been taken over by the giant art fair; yesterday I went to the opening of the show (and skipped the entry fee by sneaking in the back way, ha) and saw a couple decent things, along with a lot of really uninteresting paintings. There were two publishing collectives from Germany, one from Berlin called AKV, and one from Leipzig, called Spector Books; I ended up talking for a while to the Spector guy, and in the end traded one of my we are eating breakfasts for a book set of theirs called Liner Notes. The "set" includes the English translation of the text, and is pretty interesting: it's a record of four days of conversations about books, making books, organizing books, designing books. One of the Spector people I talked to even suggested I come up to Leipzig and do some printing, or perhaps teach a workshop, as they're pretty interested in letterpress up there (as much as they can be; no one is as enthusiastic about the old technologies here as they are in the States).

So. This makes it sounds like I've been doing things. Maybe, although I also am getting into the habit of sleeping late, then taking a nap during the day, then... looking at the internet... and... uh...

Well. In other news, alas:

I'll have to buy a new bass wheel when I go home this summer. I can't complain too much, I did buy this when I was at USC (1998). I've definitely gotten my money's worth.

And, I did have the chance to print one thing before Art Basel started:

look at these fatties!

2010-06-11T19:59:00.000+02:00

When do I get to eat them?!?

In other good news, I got a bed. It's the first mattress I've called my own since the mid-nineties; since then, it's been an unending parade of futons. I kind of feel like I'm sleeping in someone's guest bedroom. I'm confident, however, that I'll adjust.

Alpine Adventure

2010-06-10T11:22:00.000+02:00

On Tuesday, with the calls of mountain marmots (Murmeltier!) ringing in the air, Eva and I had a vigorous hike through the Alps, by the famous "top of Europe" -- the Jungfrau, Mönch, and Eiger peaks were visible above us nearly the entire time, and below us, little towns, ski chalets, and farms.

The mountain region we went to is in the Berner Oberland (giving the railway, the Berner Oberland Bahn, the initials BOB); you can take the regular train to Interlaken and go from there on an assortment of funiculars, buses, and cable cars up to various high places, from which you can do quite a lot of up-and-down between transportation points. (On the way up you pass many a dairy farm, where you can hear the clanging of cowbells. O Switzerland.) After some low-key sightseeing, we took a hiking path (Wanderweg) that runs roughly from Kleine Scheidegg to Männlichen (map), with an exceptional stretch of "up" right at the end. The map I link to shows how high we were, in feet as well as meters; I thought we were high at Kleine Scheidegg, at 6762 feet,

(Eiger and Mönch here)

but it was quite a push to get us up and into Männlichen (because there had been quite a bit of down) which sits at 7317 feet. Crap, that's high.

(Skilift Tschuggen, about 45 minutes down from Männlichen)

Fortunately, summer seems to have finally arrived, because we could hike with bare arms most of the time. As we got close to Männlichen and took a food break (or, more accurately, collapsed in a heap by the side of the trail to stuff bread and cheese into our hungry, tired mouths) the wind picked up and it got a bit cold. But all in all, it was just what I was hoping for: incredibly high mountains, some sweat and hard work, and then something unexpected at the end. Once you reach the top, you get to ride in these little gondola cars that dangle from a cable, all the way down to the town of Grindelwald, which turns out to be the longest ride of its type in the world. 6 km, just about.

We shared our gondola with this very nice old couple from the Canton of Bern (so, not the city, but the state, so to speak); the husband spoke decent English, and I could understand much of their slow, charming Swiss-German as they spoke with Eva. They told us about the line, and its length, and a number of other things I couldn't quite follow; then the husband explained that Switzerland has a constitution modeled somewhat after that of the States', with a Congress and a House of Representatives, and elected officials coming from each of the Cantons in the same system as ours. Also, we saw a few sleek, fat marmots peering out from their large holes in the ground and chirping their extraordinarily loud call. I think they must just like to hear the echo (I enjoyed it too).

I realize I've left out the more "touristic" part of our day: Trümmelbachfälle - you can see it on the right hand side of the map. We took a bus up from Lauterbrunnen, then shuffled in line with some Americans, British, and plenty of Japanese tourists through the entry gate, past the white-cold glacier stream, and up to an elevator that would take us to the middle of the mountain, where we could see the chutes of the falls. Icy blue water rushing through tunnels in the mountain. Noisy, even thunderous. With mist everywhere. The chutes have been nicely framed by walkways, steps, and little viewing chambers carved into the mountain.

The rock is worn smooth. I was mildly embarrassed that it reminded me of the water park of my youth, Schlitterbahn (you Texas people know the wonders of that place), but about 500x scarier, more beautiful, more powerful. And outside the mountain, exactly what you might hope for in Alpine scenery; fields of wildflowers, singing birds, all surrounded by dramatic cliffs, dotted by waterfalls made tiny by distance, though their drops are epic in height.

Hey, it's pretty nice here. You should come visit.

oh dear peas of my heart

2010-06-06T11:25:00.000+02:00

Please grow quickly, friends. I want to eat you.

the supplies are dwindling

2010-06-03T21:08:00.000+02:00

I always wondered how long it takes to go through a tube of toothpaste. About three months. Same with conditioner, and lip balm, and most of the other things I brought from the States and now have to replace with weird Swiss products. Mostly I make good choices, but there've definitely been some failures, too.

dejected

ready to take over

There have been some inquiries about the state of the plants. Peas have flowers, chard needs to be repotted, lettuce is delicious. Some of it smells like the tomato plant growing in the container (also waiting to be repotted) and I like those leaves the best.

The fried areas happened while I was gone, do you think it's sunburn, from water?

And to close, two evening sun-on-wall shots, taken during the only 30 minutes of clear skies we got today. (Late spring is turning out to be depressingly cold and wet. Unusually so, I hear.) My room really displays a dramatic difference in the position of the sun throughout the year. When I moved here, we'd get sun on the north wall around 6 PM; now it's sun on the south wall at 8. Fascinating.

out a car window

2010-05-30T22:15:00.003+02:00

Today, I rode in a car. Two, actually. It's really a different kind of life, being in a car. I mean, I saw little villages, and empty hillsides; running cows; old people drinking their afternoon beers outside the Gasthaus; it felt more like Living. People say that having a car makes you disconnected from the place you live but I feel just the opposite. All this train travel gives me a one-dimensional view of this country, and not a sympathetic one. The same shitty sandwich shops, and all the funny town names you see as you speed by (Wankdorf is a current favorite). The truth is, this country is beautiful, and it was like I felt it for the first time today, looking out my car window at the green, green hills, and the trees touching their branches to the ground.

Then, of course, we parked in a garage, and walked (not through the city center) to the church in Aarau where we were playing a Vespers service. If I hadn't taken the train yesterday, I wouldn't necessarily know what is charming about the place, its odd fountains and curving streets. If, if. We could go one step further, and I could mention the impression I got from the train station, each time I've gone to Zurich (it's on the way), and how, if I'd never played there, I would think Aarau dumpy, depressing, industrial, and sad. Too many "a"s all squished together in one word, it makes you wonder. Heh.

On the way there, I rode with Fredrik, oboe player of Norway. He has a station wagon because he has two children. On the way back, I rode with Joanna, violist of Poland. (Tangent: it occurred to me that the presence of "foreigners" in cities throughout Europe is not unlike the presence of people from Connecticut or Minnesota or Texas living in California; in this giant landmass, travel is easy, and relocation can be done for reasons like a job, or a relationship, or a whim. The only real difference from relocation in the US is that we share a language, television shows, Triscuits; while my childhood in Texas was undoubtedly different from my friends' childhoods in their respective states, we still operate under the same giant economy.) She has a station wagon because her husband plays harpsichord. She joked that the only people who drive this particular model of car are harpsichordists and retired people; she pointed out several examples of old-folks while we were on the road. My thoughts on foreigners moving freely throughout Europe (her husband is French) prompted me to ask her about her childhood in Poland. I think I initially won over this girl by proving my interest in Polish culture; I've read several books by Czesław Miłosz, who taught at UC Berkeley, and have of course seen all the same Krzysztof Kieslowski movies that everyone else has seen (The Double Life of Veronique; Bleu; Blanc; Rouge); plus, fortuitously, I had just read an interesting NYT article about the irrational tight-fistedness in Polish banks' willingness to give out loans to even wildly successful businesses, despite Poland's relatively stable economy. So. Joanna told me about life, as a child, under communist rule, where nearly everything was difficult to come by. The three things she was obsessed with having, she said, were bananas, chewing gum, and coca cola. Life in communism seems like such a foreign and ancient thing to me, I can't believe I have a friend--someone my age--who experienced it first hand.

I didn't manage to take any pictures today, and have only a few from my recent trips out and about. I'll include a short movie from this old church I visited in France, where, incongruously, someone was playing, with gusto, Pictures at an Exhibition on the organ. Other visitors to the church seemed annoyed that the music wasn't something predictable, or Baroque. I thought it was funny.

(Have I already mentioned how much my neighbor yells? He's really outdoing himself tonight.)

Here are some other random pictures. Charming statue of an observant boy.

Obscenely expensive shoes I bought and returned in Paris.

And, finally: what happens when your old bow is a little bit too tight, and the room gets colder, or drier, or something. I wasn't using it; I was, in fact, playing my other bow, when all of a sudden I heard a tremendous crack, and then, down at my feet, saw this. Shocked me to my core, I'll tell you. To my core. Oh well, it wasn't the best bow, and it can be fixed. It did have a really nice rehair, though, alas...

Je suis en Grenoble.

2010-05-21T21:35:00.000+02:00

It's in the southeasternish part of France, in a valley surrounded by dramatic mountains, quite close to Italy, which explains in part the incredible meal I had tonight at Angelos, a tiny restaurant off one of the squares in the old part of town. I went several days ago with some other people, and had a great meal; we tried to return a few days later, but came just as the restaurant was closing. Tonight I was alone, I had arrived too early and had to wile away about 40 minutes waiting for the restaurant to open. Naturally I was the first to be seated. Angelo remembered what I ate the other day (I had asked halfway through the meal for a side of garlicky chard, which one of my table-mates had ordered) and came to my table to ask me if I'd like it the same way again. His wife (I assume) does the serving and the parmesan cheese grating, along with any sous-cheffery that is required. So. I had gnocchi with tomato sauce and parmesan, and a side of garlicky, tomatoey chard, and a 1/4 litre du vin rouge, which is about at the limit of what I can drink myself. It is difficult to eat well when you're away from home, I find, and the relish I took in tonight's meal should not be underestimated.

Two days ago afforded enough of a break in the schedule to make an excursion into the mountains. In walking distance from the hotel is a 19th century prison, the old Bastille, and it's a brisk little hike up to the top of the fortress, although not quite to the top of the ridge. I'm looking at it now, through my open hotel window, gauzy white curtains blowing in a late spring breeze. The view from the top (or, as high as we went) is impressive, to say the least. Clumpy, rounded mountains, their sedimentary layers visible, piled on one side. Sharp points on the other side, graduated, growing higher and sharper into the distance. In the middle, a valley floor, cut by the river Isère, with the old city in a huddle of twisty streets by the river, and the rest of Grenoble surrounding this, gradually built up as it has been along straight roads with the ugliest run-down blockish architecture you can imagine, standing like a blight against the verdant mountains.

I have decided that wherever I choose to live, finally, has to have some dramatic element to set it apart. The Pacific Ocean, for example. Or these Alps. Basel, it has the river, that's something. It may not be enough. We'll see. Paris, I think that's the problem with it. Many internal draws -- the varied Arrondissements, things to see, people to watch, culture, shops, etc, but then only the river running through the middle, and I don't even think you'd want to swim in it, as in Basel.

Several views from the Bastille.

Meanwhile, en France, je parle français. Pas très bien, et pas tous les temps, mais j'ai un peu de vocabulaire et c'etais bien pour moi à comprendre ce que les personnes disent. Two nights ago, I had a conversation Entirely In French, for maybe 20 minutes. I couldn't believe it was happening. We didn't talk about anything terribly complicated, but my ability to pull words out of my head after a break of 14 years is astounding to me. If only the German language could be so smooth for me. Quel dommage.

Alors, the wine has gone to my head, and I feel over-eager to nod off. I have been sleeping poorly the past few days, though I anticipate a good sleep tonight due in part to the quiet side of the hotel, and the window that opens. Small things like the window end up making a gigantic difference to my personal happiness and well being, away from home. I do, by the way, miss Basel. I'm looking forward to getting back to my bicycle, the print shop, my brown rice-lettuce-carrot-toasted almond salads. The excessive amounts of chocolate I was eating before I left. And, in June, several visitors, for whose visits I am extremely excited.

less-domestic

2010-05-09T00:40:00.000+02:00

Went yesterday to see the Botanical Gardens here in Basel; they're funded by the University, along with some local pharmaceutical companies (Novartis, etc), so walking around is free. There are several greenhouses; one with cacti and succulents, one Victorian-style building with all the wet species (giant lily pads, rice, etc), one for nurturing the new plants before they get properly placed in the other themed spaces, and then the tropical greenhouse, pictured above. It is several stories high, at points, and includes a spiral staircase so you can look down from above at, excitingly, several species of tropical birds, chasing each other through the giant leaves and spongy-barked trees. It's like the CA Academy of Sciences but without the steep admission and the noisy crowds. I think this place will save me during the unending winter months.

The humidity was too high to get a proper, un-fogged picture, but here you can see some kind of bird that was maybe a yard from where I stood.

new growth in the potting greenhouse

the Victorian greenhouse, and the University library in the background

awfully nice, it was.

plant update

2010-05-08T20:51:00.000+02:00

Hey, peas!

If the weather will warm up again, these might be ready to eat in the next few weeks.

The lettuce will be ready even sooner, methinks, and that tomato will be expecting its own pot before too long.

Rough equation: one sunny day = 3/4" growth.

I just made that up. Based (at least somewhat) on actual (vague, lackidaisical) observation.

it's official:

2010-05-07T00:31:00.000+02:00

I've been living here long enough (two and a half months, just about) that I no longer bring my camera with me wherever I go. Train rides? Just commuting. Old churches? Old hat. (Ha.) Although it spells doom for this blog (who wants to read a bunch of picture-less text?) it does mean that I'm more comfortable, and more adjusted, to my life here.

Or, maybe my arm is just too sore to type. (Not entirely a joke.)

At any rate, I don't want to imply that I don't still miss California desperately. Because I do. (Lately: sourdough bread. Dori and I would always have a loaf on the counter, and we ate so much of it that it was usually fresh.)

This week I've been traveling every day to Bern, for a program of Pergolesi and Michael Haydn. The concert has no intermission. What is it with these people? As part of the continuo section I don't get any breaks, and I simply cannot play for two hours straight, it's too tiring. Someone needs to tell them. Maybe once I learn some more German.

The church is pretty cool, it was built in the 1270s (I know). As the only one on kontrabass I'm quite exposed, and it's a good opportunity for me to play extremely well in tune. In general I'm rising to the challenge, but you know, being a good bass player isn't the easiest thing in the world. It takes a lot of concentration.

The other funny thing about this concert is that there is a violinist who looks like an almost perfect combination of Dominic West (Jimmy McNulty on the Wire) and Bradley Cooper (has been in some movies lately, though I haven't seen any of them). When he plays, he slouches in a way so reminiscent of how McNulty would slouch if he were a Baroque violinist that I almost can't believe my eyes.

Something I wished I had had my camera for was a transitional window display in on of Bern's major department stores. During the day, I suppose, they had been prepping for the new beach scenes by putting out manikins and setting up props. They saved clothes and hair for last, and must have run out of time, because when I walked by there were at least 8 separate displays of nude, bald figures (women, men, children) in poses that could only be described as suggestive. Or, even, extremely suggestive. I couldn't help but notice that all the lady manikins had articulated nipples. Maybe an acknowledgment of how cold it can be in Switzerland? Yeah, maybe. I'm sure accuracy was the goal with that one.

missing the good old Local 6

2010-04-30T23:28:00.000+02:00

I used to take it for granted that an orchestra rehearsal was 2.5 hours long, no more, no less. That my first break would come no later than 1.5 hours into the rehearsal. That there would be no less than 1.5 hours in between rehearsals. For these things, I happily paid $200/year; and I would again here, if they were available.

Yesterday, in an ornate 17th century church right on the river in Lucerne, surrounded by epic mountain views bathed in glorious spring sunshine, swans heckling tourists for food just beyond the church's doors, my colleagues and I spent four hours (Four. Hours.) rehearsing Haydn's Creation. We were then given a two and a half hour break, after which we returned for an almost three hour run-through. When I got home last night, my right arm was so tired that I could barely brush my teeth. I tried using my left hand but it just wasn't as effective.

The church interior is quite ornate, mostly white, with decorations in shades of coral and turquoise, with tons of gold for that added effect. It reminds me of the carriage and chandelier I saw at the deYoung made out of crystallized rock sugar.

The audition, by the way, was just fine. The theory exam saw me butchering some Bach on the harpsichord, whistling my way through two-part dictation, and trying my best to remember anything about 7th chords. In an amusing example of language ideosyncrasies, the head of the school contemplated which program I would be best suited for given my "advanced age." Ha! Like I'm some kind of matron. "Well, sonny," I almost said back to him. He wouldn't have gotten the joke. Story of my life, what.

I failed to bring my camera with me to Luzern, so I don't have any new pictures of the interesting ducks (tawny heads, red bills, red eyes!), coots, and swans, not to mention those epic views of the Alps. So, instead I'll leave you with some artsy shots of my bass I took for a newer, better, slimmer, hopefully cooler website.

new book project!

2010-04-27T23:03:00.000+02:00

Finished.

Printed onto antique topographical maps of Switzerland. Wood type on front, handset lead on reverse. Edition of 12. More info, I guess, on Etsy.

Also, for your enjoyment, two crappy pictures of a hilarious window display in Groß Basel (across the river from me, in Kleinbasel, or as I've started calling it, "Meinbasel" - my Basel), a picture of these little things printed with the symbol of Basel embedded in the sidewalk all over town, and a photo I took of this bow I'm playing on, while describing it via Skype to my dad.

Thursday is my official audition for the Schola, wish me luck!

just some pictures.

2010-04-25T23:40:00.000+02:00

sunset, sans contrails

delicious Korean lunch cooked by my friend Zin Young; many curious pastes and powders were involved. Beverage seen in lower left is sparkling grape juice, it tastes less like grapes than I expected

man in summer suit

biking next to the tram (him, not me)

twilight over Rhein, flag in warm breeze

Hey You Breakfast-Eaters

2010-04-23T20:17:00.000+02:00

Dinner tonight rocked.

Fresh spinach-ricotta ravioli; giant mystery chard-like green cooked in olive oil, garlic, red wine and rosemary salt, topped with toasted slivered almonds; Duvel. Balcony, 7 PM.

Recently moved the plants into a sunnier locale, have been rewarded by a comeback from the chard and a tomato hatching from the lettuce pot. Also some very enthusiastic peas.

As a respite from the high-minded (read:dry) Memoirs of Hadiran I've been reading James Fenimore Cooper - The Last of the Mohicans. It was mentioned in another book I read recently, and I thought I'd try it. I'm not entirely sure I want to finish; it's filled with the bigotry of its time, and the rancor towards the non-whites in the book proves difficult to swallow. Also, it goes from one melodramatic scene of handsome men ("he was a perfect specimen") and mind-blowingly beautiful women of strong character in situations of high danger and near death that it makes me a little tired. It's no wonder the movie did so well; the book is perfect for a screen adaptation. I'm even more tempted to stop when I look at my magnificent and largely-unread library; I reorganized my room, and stacked all my books (28 now, including the JFC, thanks to two recent and much-appreciated care packages) where I can easily get to them. Seeing all those delectable titles is enough to distract me from practicing. Not such a bad thing, as I've recently overdone it; the last bit of work I had caused me fairly acute pain in my right arm, and I've been laying off a bit to avoid injury. And my "busy month" has not even begun. Thanks to the folks a new (old) lighter bow is on its way. What do musicians do who don't have luthier/archetier parents? It must really suck.

Alternate titles considered for this post:

Ack, this is so good

Why go out when you can stay in

Cooking with red wine: ruining my wardrobe, one shirt at a time

Holy Crap My Dinner Is So Delicious

Mom was right, plants like sunlight

YUM

JFC: Bigot, or just Melodramatic?

What is Duvel's alcohol content?!

Chekhov! Lessing! Tolstoy! Gaskell! Nabokov!

Bären in Bern!

2010-04-22T10:13:00.000+02:00

Yes, my friends, you are seeing right: Baby Bears (2) with their sleeping mother. Oh, and some bear poo.

Supposedly, the man who founded Bern (back in 1191) went and killed a bear in the woods just beforehand, and thought it a fitting name for his new ville. A pit - the Bärengraben - was built just outside of town (now, it's quite central, directly across the river Aare from the old part with city hall, the big church, Einstein's house, etc) where bears were kept in situations not exactly sympathetic to the bears' personal needs. As of a few years ago, this has been taken out of use, and a terraced piece of land on the bank of the river has been turned into the new Bear Park; it's not the biggest piece of land, but more than your average bear gets in a zoo. There's also a passageway to the old bear pit, if they decide they'd like to amble back in.

At the beginning of this year, the bears had these babies, and the he-bear had to be separated from the rest to keep him from eating the cubs. In his enclosure, practically every sapling tree has been broken in half, or uprooted; seems he's got some destructive urges, so it's probably for the best. If I were to anthropomorphize, and, why not, I'd say he missed his mate; on the glass wall between the two areas, there are many dirty paw-marks.

Here's a nice view of Bern from somewhere above the city. If you follow the higher of the two bridges in the foreground across the river from the center of town, then walk to your right and down to the river, you'd be looking at these bears. The river, like the town, is very beautiful; it is turquoise, and quite clear, and it veritably sparkles as it rushes past. It's almost too perfect to be real.

Photos (taken from the Bärengraben) not doing it justice. Suffice it to say, beautiful, quaint, delightful. My friend Eva and I decided that although we were glad we lived in Basel, we certainly wouldn't mind living in Bern.

Wandering back across the smaller bridge, we made our way down cobblestone streets, between old houses and buildings, along the river, then up a path -

- to get back to the center of town, where we planned to tackle the longest covered shopping promenade in Europe, the Arcaden. We both got a little hung up at a used book shop, books here are so different from the books I'm used to. They seem to be simultaneously made with higher production values, and lower quality materials. Or, the mass-produced books look like someone decided it was OK for them to be a little nicer than average.

Two examples. And, of course I didn't take this next photo to discuss the crappy binding method used, but maybe you'll notice anyway. Or, maybe you won't.

And why would you, really.

Before our exploration of the City of Bern, Eva and I had a nice little walk through the hills outside of Bern, although it was too rainy to catch a glimpse of the majestic mountains we had come with specific hopes of seeing. At the top of the Wanderweg (hiking path), there was a lookout tower, and even though I'm afraid of heights (surprised?) I braved it for a chance at the view. Mostly rainy. But you could see that the weather was starting to break, and light hit upon some snow-covered peaks in the not-so-far distance. My next pleasure trip should be into those peaks.

And, I just tried to make this panorama shot in photoshop, but either a photo was missing, or the computer did it wrong. Well, it's basically the same, and it's kind of funny to see this false landscape. Enjoy.