Musical Ban Lifted

Hello friends!

Due to some health problems, more than a year ago I was banned from playing my beautiful clarinet. However I am happy to report that, as of yesterday, the ban has been lifted!

Tonight I stuck a reed in my mouth, pieced my Buffet R13 back together, and played 5 minutes of long-tones. While my clarinet could use a little cork grease, my embouchure many more minutes (hours) of long-tones, and my fingers some cleaner transitions between octaves, it felt nice to place again and a little more than mildly invigorating. So after my long-tones I dug out a good old Hite study, put a fresh battery in my metronome, and stumbled through the study stopping nearly ever 2 measures because my embouchure was gushing air.

I was impressed at my ability to blow a few throat tone As with really nice tone quality and a few nice Es just over the break. Last week when I wasn't sure if I would play again I thought about how I would really miss that E and I was happy to start to re-acquaint myself with it tonight, even if only for a fraction of a second.

 I ended my session by skimming a few pages of the Bonade book I bought right before I stopped playing. I skimmed a few pages but paused and more thoroughly read the section on reed adjustments. Like most clarinetists, I've always been very picky about reeds and often struggle with warping, reed irregularity and inconsistency. Bonade recommends a reed rush for scraping reeds as opposed to razor blades, knives, or sandpaper (though he mentions the proper use for a sandpaper file later). Now I'm considering investing in a reed rush. They seem pretty reasonably priced and might be fun to play around with.

Any recommendations on reed rushes?











                                                                        

image from: http://www.runyonproducts.com/reed.rush.html

Addictive Musical Mystery

Have you ever heard a song on the radio, playing in a store, in a movie, wherever and while it's playing all you can think about is how you want to hear it again? I love when that happens, except when it takes me years to figure out what the song was. I'm always on the lookout for new music and today I was graced with a new song to add to my Spring 2012 Youtube playlist.

We gave presentations in my organic chemistry class on important named reactions in organic synthesis and one group showed this video called "Enolate Love Story," with Calvin Harris's "Feel So Close" as the music; it was great. The movie was also really well done and obviously a laborious process using lots of stills of pipecleaners.

Other notable music mysteries:

"Let the Drummer Kick" by Citizen Cope was probably the song that took me the longest to figure out. I think this mystery spanned about three years in high school. I was really drawn in by the piano. I heard it in a car commercial on TV twice. A few months later I heard it in a clothing store and then finally I think I found it by looking it up a movie soundtrack.

What's your latest addictive musical mystery?




P.S. I'm so obviously behind in pop music trends. I thought I discovered this awesome new pop song (for all you pop song haters, no, awesome new pop song is not an oxymoron) and both people I shared my new music find with already knew the song.