Blurb- 2/3 of the journey still left :)

40 days have past since arriving in europe and 80 days are left for the taking.  And there is lots of taking to be done.  :)

Operas that I will be seeing in the next 80 days:
La Traviata
Madame Butterfly
The Magic Flute
Salome
Fidelio
Barber of Seville
The Ring Cycle (Das Rheingold, Die Walküre, Sigfried, Götterdämerung)
Tannhäuser
La Boheme
Der Rosenkavalier!!!!!

This is what Vienna looks like when I get up to practice at 6 :) 

silence except for the pigeons..

This is what it looks like when I go back after practicing!

Random Observations/Facts:

Did I mention that the transportation system here is based almost completely on the trust system?  I forgot to buy a ticket this week for the subway for instance, and nothing happened.  oops, yea I'll get one tomorrow!  But you only show your ticket if you are stopped by the Polizei, which happens sometimes when you get off the subway.  They stop a group of people and check them all, but it rarely happens.  I've never been checked!  

Turns out Sunday is an "all day quiet hours" day.  How are their musicians so good if they can't practice SO often??  I despise these noise restrictions :(

Daniel Barenboim is going to be giving a recital in Vienna.  I'm so there.  No matter what else is on that day (aka our first IES concert). ha!  I might be sick that night...

Soundproof practice rooms are tiny and sound horrible when you play in them, but they actually are going me a lot of good.  I sounded 10x better when I played in a live room afterwards.  :D  yea! 

More things that are hard/impossible to find in Vienna:

-hard shell tacos (we all miss mexican food)

-boxes of mac n cheese (a staple of my american life)

-brown sugar (baking necessity!!!)

And now I leave you to go celebrate Ryan's 21st Birthday :)  yeaaaaaa!  it's a wednesday.... :D

Baby's First Russian Orchestra

Theresa, Ross, Marion (language buddy), and I went to the Musikverein this evening to see a concert of the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra of Moscow.  The Program included the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto and Shostakovich's 5th Symphony.  I've been working on my critical listening skills, as you can tell from my analysis of the Wiener Philharmoniker.  :)  It's good for me!

This orchestra, also called Tchaikovsky Symphony of Moscow Radio Orchestra, was established in 1930 and the conductor, Vladimir Fedoseyev has been with them since 1974.

The soloist, Arabella Steinbacher, was quite good to my ears.  She's been a rising start since 2004, when she stepped in for someone who was ill and unable to play the Beethoven Violin Concerto.  She didn't push the concertmaster of Cleveland out of my mind though.. but what do I know about strings?  I really enjoyed her performance though.  She played really smoothly and had a beautiful sound on every note, even the really high ones came out perfect!  I couldn't quite figure out what I was hearing that sounded different in the string sections from what I'm used to.  I think I was hearing a fast vibrato going on, but I could be confused.  I also was hearing a "higher" sound, if you know what I'm talking about.  If I was talking about horn, I'd say it wasn't very dark.  The strings had a really nice section blend, they were very together too.  The one thing that really surprised me in the Tchaikovsky was the 2nd trumpet.  He was playing enormously loud in comparison to the first trumpet.  It sounded a little immature in terms of balance.  I could barely hear the first trumpet!

Transitioning to the Shostakovich..

The trumpets also had a very nasal type of sound with very harsh articulations in the Shosty.  They were obviously very good players.  It was a little overly full of character for my taste, but it was definitely the right style for Shostakovich.  The trombones sounded good, I liked their sound and they played with a lot of power in general.  The tuba was the same.  They both had less sustain than Chicago, and I thought the trombones got a little excited and out of control in the 4th movement.  Perhaps it was the distance from the stage and the fact that I was under the lip, but the woodwinds were very quiet in comparison and I couldn't always here their solos as well I would have liked.  The flute also played incredibly smoothly, but I couldn't hear a lot of phrasing, it was just a completely smooth line with almost no dynamic change for all of her solos.  But that could be due to my placement in the hall as well.   The orchestra as a whole had a lot of balance issues to my ear.  There were a lot of parts when I couldn't hear the solo or soli and I was hearing more of the accompaniment.  The beginning of the 4th movement had the clarinet or flute overpowering the brass.  I think the conductor could have done a better job of fixing these things.  He also took the piece generally quicker than I prefer it to go. 

And of course, the horns need their own paragraph..

 For some reason, it had completely caught me by surprise at the first solo entrance when I heard the obvious Russian vibrato!  I had completely forgot about it and wasn't expecting it!  It's not my style, but it was cool hearing in real life!  After taking that out of the equation...  They had a very open, mellow sound.  I don't like to use the word dark if I can get away with it, but if it helps, it was a dark sound, but unlike any that I've heard before.  They never got loud enough for my taste, and they never had any brassiness in their sound.  Being truly critical, because I'm used to CSO, the solos were not up to par with Chicago, Vienna, or New York (the big 3 that I've heard live).  The trouble that I've always had with the solo in the last movement was where to breathe without breaking the line.  This wasn't a problem for this solo horn because he cut a few of the notes short.  He didn't play it with the connected line that I've always gone for, it was a nice tone though.

Overall, it was a very interesting experience!  I'm really glad I'm getting to hear so many different approaches to orchestral playing!  It's really exciting to start being able to hear what I really want to sound like and pick out things from each player that I like or dislike and add it to my idea of what I'm going after. 

oh, how time flies...!

It's the end of week one!  Finally!  It's been a wipe out week of first classes, organizing, scheduling,  weather changes, and of course... PRACTICING!

Here's a long one :)

School:

Classes seem like they're going to be great.  I'm a little exhausted with my Deutsch class because my teacher, Frau Johnson, still expects us to just know things already and have the "Deutsche feeling" for some things that don't have grammatical rules; you can just feel that it's right or wrong.  Philosophy is great, and it's only Monday and Tuesday, so not a whole lot to worry about there and it's incredibly engaging.  Music history has a lot of reading and listening and writing, etc. but I'm learning.. and hopefully we will move beyond Gregorian chant soon.. ? 

Ensemble:

Performance workshop.  This is the most unorganized class I've ever been a part of.  I understand that it's difficult to organize a bunch of musical groups with random instrumentation with 4 different coaches, however, the whole this is such a mess.  The brass is working with Bill McElheney, former 2nd trombonist of the Wiener Philharmoniker.  He's a really nice guy, from Tennessee I believe.  For the first 3 or 4 weeks, we are having a masterclass setting on Wednesday evenings where we have a couple people play a solo and he and we give comments.  It's just an opportunity for us to get more performance experience.  We are also starting rehearsals for the groups that we've been put in.  I'm playing a piece by Franz Lachner, for soprano, horn, and piano, a Mozart trio for 2 horns and Flute, and the Finale from the Brahms trio.  I'm going to lobby for the 3rd movement as well.  What's the 4th without the 3rd?!  (or the rest...)  I'm not sure when I'm rehearsing these or performing them.  All I know is that it will happen sometime, so I should start to learn the music.  I'm so used to having the entire schedule at the beginning of the semester (thanks IU! <3), so this is a little perturbing, but I'll make it out alive.  I think. 

Horn:

I'm really glad I'm not going to Oktoberfest so that I can practice diligently without a break.  It's also very expensive and I have so many other places that I really know I want to go!  Anyway, I had my 2nd lesson with Manuel a few hours ago and it went really well again.  He's a really funny guy.  I asked him if he does a warm-up or exercises (übungen) because he's so good and he told me, "No, not really, I play lots of staccato scales.  I think this is good."  I said, "You must do something more, how are you so good?"  He replied, "I don't know, I'm not good!" Nein.  Das ist falsch.  He's bringing übungen for me next week.  lol.   Today I played for him the 3nd and 4th movements of the Brahms trio.  I will write about this in my horn blog so as not to bore the non-music readers ;)  He's also going to let me go to more rehearsals, and even said my parents could come when they're visiting!   I'm so excited because that rehearsal was by far the best part of my week.  Overall, he says I sound very good.  Next week, he will be in Altösterreich, another region, so I asked if I could get a lesson with Wolfgang Vladar, the horn play that Jenny Smoak and Darcie Kozlowski (i think?) studied with when they were here!!  Very exciting!!  Manuel said Wolfgang's english is better than his. haha.  By the end of this semester, I'll find out how he's so good though, I'm determined. :)

Etc:

A guy smiled at me while he walked by me the other day.  He was the first one the entire semester!  It threw me off so much, I gave him a confused "oh wait, smile" look in return. haha.  As I said in earlier posts, it's not really normal to smile at people and I've had a lot of trouble not smiling as I pass people.  I've gotten used to people just kind of staring.  It was a nice change of pace.  :)


My new favorite food is officially.... eggplant!  nöm!  :D   I put some in my stir fry tonight!

I met my language buddy!  Her name is Marion and she is really cool.  I definitely picked a good one.  She's studying english, education, and music.  She plays blockflöte (recorder!) and wants to be an english teacher.  Her english is very good.  We met at Stephansdom (the biggest/most famous church in Vienna that my school is 5 minutes from) and we had pizza (she is vegetarian) and gelato.  She taught me how to order correctly. yay!  Then she took me to see the Naturhistorisches Museum, which we will go to sometime and the Kunsthistorisches Museum.  We walked around a little bit, I showed her my school, and she told me some places that I could get some cheaper clothes.  She's coming with to the Musikverein this sunday to see Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto and Shostakovich 5th!  So excited!

It's getting colder here!!!!!  It's crazy how suddenly the temperature changed, but here comes fall!  :D

So, ahead of me waits this concert on Sunday, another concert on Thursday (Mendelssohn's Italian Symphony and Mozart's Haffner Symphony) with Claudio Abbado!!!!!  In real life!!!!! OMG!!!!!!  I love the music scene in the city... Vienna is amazing. 

As I finished my first week of classes here in Vienna, I suddenly realized that I've been here for over a month.  This realization generated another realization that I never thought I'd actually have:  this semester abroad is going by incredibly fast.  My time here is over 25% complete and I feel like it's just begun still.  Normally this is the time where the abroad student says, "Now I'm really going to take advantage of what I've got here, it's truly an experience of a lifetime that not everyone gets!  It's time to squeeze the juice! (IES joke <3 kent)"  However, I'm not that student.  I'm really proud and happy to say that I really have been living the life here.  I'm doing exactly what I came here to do: play horn, experience the European music scene,  explore Vienna, and become more culturally adept. 

Alles gut Heute in Wien  :) 

Meine ersten zwei Tage :)

My first two days were amazing!!!!!! 

Monday may have been the best day ever possible.. we'll see :)

Mein Montag:
6:30- Horn Yoga/Routine practice stuff
8:00- Shower, become a real person by 9:00
9:30- Search desperately for the Wiener Phil ticket box that Manuel showed me.  However, being the directionally challenged person that I am (in this case depth perceptionally challenged), it took my 20 minutes of wandering around to find it.  Turned out I just didn't walk quite far enough on the street...
10:00- VIENNA PHILHARMONIC REHEARSAL OF BRUCKNER's 4TH SYMPHONY. aka. highlight of my day :D
1:00- After being thoroughly inspired, practice some more. then eat a bit
3:00- 401, music history
3:45- After being let out 2 hours early, I used my time wisely and read half of the required reading for wednesday.
6:20- Cross Cultures Philosophy.  WOW.  My teacher's a genius.
8:00- Go home. Dinner. Practice. Bed.

BEST DAY EVER!

 That's the horn section, with some strings in the way =P (jk!! i promise!)

The Rehearsal was so incredible.  They can really play, that much is obvious though.  Maybe I should tell you what's not obvious.  They really know their hall.  They sounded amazing in there.  They are an amazing powerful brass section.  When Chicago play here, the trombones were too loud, and not really in a good way unfortunately.  It's not their hall, they're not used to it, no big deal.  Vienna knows their hall and you can tell.  I sat in the middle of the hall instead of under the overhang in the Stehplatz, so it was much more resonant. Oh, and I'm pretty sure it was Christoph Eschenbach conducting, almost positive actually.  He was great, I couldn't really understand what he was saying to them, but he made some good changed.  He would sometimes sing what they were doing, and then sing what he wanted them to do.  Then it was really obvious.  He actually asked them for more sustain once.  The tuba sounded huge, I'm not really used to that, although one would imagine I would be.  I think I was hearing a lot more of individuals than an orchestra blend, but there was still a blend.  It was just something new to my ears.  The trombones were really loud, and sounded fantastic.  The trumpets were on rotaries, so they had less of a center to their tone (like Herseth) and more of a spread, flat sound that cut like crazy.  The strings, to my ears (for what they're worth), sounded more rough than what I'm used to.  I'm comparing everything to Chicago, as it's really the only other top notch orchestra that I've heard a lot of.  To my eyes and ears, the strings were also not as together as Chicago.  I loved the clarinet.  The oboe was.. European. lol. Actually much less than I expected.  I'm not so experienced in judging flute, but he sounded nice, less full and huge that Dufour or Robertello (sp?), but still very pretty.  I couldn't really hear the bassoons much. haha.  The horns.  I'm not sure what I was expecting, but they had a really rich, dark color when they play solo or quietly.  Much darker than my horn color.  Then when they get loud they are crazy brassy sounding.  I definitely knew that was coming.  Much brassier than my horn!  It's really cool to hear it live.  They sound really resonant and smooth and beautiful.  The opening was incredible.  I got goosebumps and my eyes began to water immediately as Wolfgang Tomböck (I'm almost positive) came in so cleanly and beautifully on the first note.  What an amazing experience.  The orchestra as a whole does not use as much sustain as Chicago generally does, however they are still quite convincing in their approach.  

Although the best part of the day was right in the morning, what was left was still wonderful and productive.  History seems like it's going to be interesting at times, and painful at other times.  I've already started reading about gregorian chant.  Thus beginning the painful part.  ;)

Philosophy seems really interesting, after 2 days of it now, I can tell that it's going to be a really interesting class.  Even after 3 hours of History or after Deutsch class, because it's a completely abstract way of thinking, it's going to be engaging.  I was dreading the first reading because it was semi long and we only had one night.  Aber!  It was sooooo interesting, I read it right before I went to bed, and I don't think I could have put it down if i tried.  It was called "The Wall" and it was by Sartre.  It was really intense and then our discussion was even better.  I feel like I'm going to have a whole new way of looking at things after taking this course.  I'm so excited!!

These days have been great, but exhausting.  I'm getting up at 5:30.  I need some sleep.  night night!

Final days of break!

Currently listening: Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto in D.  In preparation for the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra of Moscow's concert next Sunday :)  (also playing Shostakovich 5!)

Quick Update:

Wednesday: Went to Carnuntum, an old Roman City an hour outside of Vienna, with Ross and his language buddy, Esther.  Language buddies are students from universities in Vienna who want to work on their english who are matched up with one of us IES'ers, who want to work on their german.  They are great.  I can't wait to meet mine!

So, Carnuntum!  We got to see these old gravestones from the first century that were uncovered in this city!  SUPER OLD!  They also rebuilt a small percentage of the city, including a small house and a Mansion, and a few other buildings.  They are still digging too!  One of the more interesting things that they recreated was the heating system, which was similar to a wood stove.  It was actually up and running in the mansion, and as we went deeper into the building, it got warmer!

 

This is the last room, and it was hot!  Ross is standing in front of this fancy bathtub.  It would have been a warm bath!

Thursday: Mostly practicing.  I cooked an awesome dinner of chicken pot pie soup.  It was actually pretty amazing!

 Friday:  Again, lots of practicing!  Ross and I also attempted to venture to the Jewish district.  It was a fail.  We went to the old parts of it to go to 2 museums, but one was closed for renovation until October and the other closed at 2 and it was 3.  boo.  Then we went to the 2nd district, which is the current jewish area.  We found a kosher butcher.  But that was about all we found.  Next time we need more specific directions for that trek. haha.  But, we got some exercise, so not all was lost!

Saturday:  All practicing :)  I had my first lesson with Manuel Huber, who plays principal and 3rd horn in Vienna Philharmonic.  He's only 23 years old.  almost.  :)  He's completely professional and I really like him.  His english isn't the best, so I'm learning a lot of german musical terms!  And he's learning a lot of english! haha.  He had a lot of trouble with the word slur.  He kept attempting it and saying slow? sloor?  Bindabung!  Yea, it's slur. lol.  It's actually really fun!  He's not afraid to jump around and make funny sounds to make sure I understand him. lol.  He had a lot of good thoughts on my playing, so I think this will work out well.  My Horn Blog has more specifics on the lesson!

I made sure to ask him if there were any rehearsals that I could go to.  He said sure, how about monday.  :D  So, tomorrow at 10 am I'll be watching the Vienna Philharmonic rehearse Bruckner 4!  Life is good.

He also said that he'd look into loaning me a Wiener horn so that I could learn it!  yayyy!!!!!!  So excited!!!!!  This is going to be good. 

I'm feeling a lot more at home now, just after having one lesson.  Starting classes and playing in ensembles is going to be so refreshing.  It's been too long!  School tomorrow!!!!!

Tonight I just got back from a concert at the Musikverein that Ross was really excited about, and now I know why!  These 5 euro standing room tickets were his birthday present from me. lol.  We saw Phillipe Jaroussky, a countertenor and the Concerto Köln!  He was absolutely incredible.  You would never expect the sound that he produces to EVER come out of him, but it does and it's fantastic.  It's like a woman singing, but with this manly tenor sound that makes it almost obvious that it's not a woman, it's pretty much indescribable.  Also, the Orchestra itself is a very small early music ensemble.  Ross informed me that they were using period bows, however the actual string instruments seemed modern, except the lute and harpsichord of course!  They also had no conductor, which was very cool and it worked very well for them.  Phillipe did 3 encores, and he ended the last one with the entire group singing the very last line instead of himself!  It was quite the way to end the concert.  There was also a moment in the first encore that was incredibly striking to me.  The very opening was just Phillipe holding a long note with no vibrato, he slowly crescendo-ed, and then added vibrato and continued on, I can barely describe what it sounded like, it was incredible.  It was in this one note that I realized how amazing it is to be a part of a culture that is completely awed by one single note.  We appreciate that one note so much that we talk about it as an amazing feat (it was).  I'm just so grateful to be part of a group of people who appreciate the little things and pay attention to those kind of details.  It's pretty amazing if you ask me.  :)

And that's what I leave you with tonight. 

Independence Week.

Currently listening:  Mendelssohn's 4th Symphony, "Italian".   In preparation for the "Orchestra Mozart" Concert conducted by Claudio Abbado.  NO BIG DEAL! ahhhh!!!!!!!

I've got to post more often.  I have a lot to talk about before I forget it all!  My week of independence has gotten off to a pretty decent start!  Everyone in my apartment was gone on Monday early afternoon.

So, even after 14 full days of antibiotics, I'm still not feeling 100% better unfortunately.  Looks like I'll have to wait the rest of this one out, but the worst of it is very much behind me.

On Sunday, since nothing is open except museums, and it was free museum weekend, Sara, Emily, Ross, and I decided to venture the the Hofburg Palace.  This palace was the winter home of the Habsburgs, as opposed to Schönbrunn, their summer home, which we visited (the gardens) in earlier weeks.  This palace is unbelievably gorgeous.  I might have to say it's my favorite building as of now.

View of the main hall from the top floor!

Down a staircase... everything is marble!!!

An outside view.  It has incredibly intricate designs and I just love that everything is ivory colored!

Later on Sunday, Ross and I took a little trek to one of the 3 Flaktürme sites in Vienna.  These Flaktürme were in a basic sense, attack towers and command towers from the 2nd world war.  They are huge buildings, looking very similar in my eyes, to the MAC (if you're an IU student!).  

This is the view.. my apologies for the trees and sun. stupid nature ;)

This specific Flakturm was turned into a modern art museum.  Now, I've been to quite a few mdern art museums, mainly in New York.  However, this museum was really odd.  It was also a little bit difficult to decipher whether some objects were part of the art, part of the history of the building (which was why we were there), or just junk laying in the corner because it's a dirty old war tower.

This was one of my favorites.  It really looks like a drawing in air!  It's made of wire.  

There was also a really strange piece that was basically a machine that was made to shoot large canisters of red goo into the corner every 30 minutes.  I'm not really sure of the significance.  The video said something about a room can't really be a room without a corner.... modern art is really something.

There was some history still left intact!  This is definitely a toilet from WWII.  Super cool!  

The best part of this was definitely the view from the top of the Flakturm.  It's pretty neat, we can actually look around the city now and see things that we recognize!

I was able to use my panorama shot again :)  

There were also some really strange things like furniture with cut out faces and a blob of twisted up colorful plastic noodles that was titled, "I thought I saw a pussycat."  At that point I was about ready to leave and Ross was more than ready.  I really did enjoy this outing though quite a bit.  

Monday:

I navigated around Vienna all by myself 2 days in a row now!  I got myself the the Kunst Haus Wien to see the Hundertwasser exhibit (for only 5 euro!!!  yay half off mondays!).  This was a really neat exhibit.  I really love his paintings and architecture.  I think I mentioned him before, but he was all about the environment and how the earth was our equal.  He created apartments that had trees growing out of them and on top of them.  He thought by building apartments on top of plant life, we're killing the environment.  So, he built apartments and put the environment on top!

This is the Kunst Haus Wien.  Cool, eh?   I thought so too.  Hundertwasser had a really amazing idea for design.  I would love to live in a building like this.  I would actually be really happy to see a town made exactly how he wanted.  One of his really important paintings was one of a town made how he would create it, within nature.  He painted it before even looking into architecture!  So it was like his first attempt at what he would do!  And then he did!  I think his ideas were really something. 

After my trip alone to the Kunst Haus, I was dying to use my vocal chords, so I met up with Ross and another friend, Alex, and we went to a Turkish restaurant for some authentic food in the 16th district.  It was amazing.  I never thought I'd say this, but I ordered lamb.  It may have been the greatest meat I've ever tasted.  The end.

Tuesday:
My second day of navigating all by myself.  I ventured to Mariahilferstraße, the main shopping street in Vienna!  Shopping is expensive here.  I didn't buy a lot, but I got a new purse so that I'd have a larger one for day trips.  It's super cute.  :)  I also bought some boots.. with heels.. because I'm really short.  And they were awesome.  Mariahilferstraße is really long.  I barely made a mark in it and I was there wandering for hours.  Besides the prices, I like shopping in Wien.

After another long day of independence, I once again was very lonely and invited Ross over for dessert.  Aaaaaaand....

As far as the cooking competition is going, I do believe I'm winning as of now.  Ross joined me sunday night for stir fry that I concocted, which consisted of eggplant, zucchini, onions, garlic, red bell pepper, and salmon, all from the Naschmarkt, mixed with noodles.  Tuesday, I made a very similar dish, just adding yellow zucchini, and replacing the more expensive salmon with chicken.  I then proceeded to make a zucchini cake with nutella swirl.  It was incredible.  Definitely a keeper.  Ross agrees.  He ate half of it.

If you eat the whole thing, it's a full serving of vegetables!  .. and many full servings of other things... ;)

On another food note, I've developed a taste for bell peppers!  I never thought that day would come. :) hooray!

So, I basically already knew this, however, after the past few days on my own, I've come to the definite conclusion that I really like people.  I miss people. So, besides being incredible quiet and lonely, all is well in Vienna.  But really, I need someone to talk to!  Skype me?  :)

More to come very soon!!!!!!

The end of German Intensive!

Finally!  A moment of peace as most of the other IESer's head off on the 3 city tour for the next 10 days, I can finally sit down for a much needed blog post!  This week has been full of excitement, emotions, stress, tea, and not enough sleep.  As I sit here with my cup of perfectly made green tea, I'll tell you all about it. :)

 After touring through Salzburg, Lucerne, Luxembourg, Paris, and Dresden, the CSO finally hit Vienna!  That's what I've really been waiting for all this time.  ;)  I couldn't help myself from going to both nights of their concerts here.  The program for the first night was a piece by Rands (if you go to IU, the guy who wrote Vincent), Death and Transfiguration, and Shostakovich's 5th Symphony.  The second night was Hindemith's Symphony in Eb and Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet.  Both were wonderful concerts, as usual.  The Musikverein is an incrediby beautiful building.  I asked Dale Clevenger how he liked the hall and he said, "It may be the greatest hall in the world."  Need I say more?  It's pretty small, but it's gorgeous.  Chris Martin also told me it was one of his favorites.  As you can see, this is the view of the stage from the Stehplatz (the standing room).

This is the view from the middle of the hall on the side, looking at the standing room.  If you can zoom into the heard of people back there, you can see Ross's hands flailing and Ryan's head in the left hand corner.  The Stehplatz is incredibly crowded and it's first come, first served.  So, we arrived an hour early and got in line outside the building, then they open the building so form a line on the inside before checking tickets (which we picked up ahead of time!).  Then, they check your ticket and you're let up a set of stairs that enters directly to the standing room.  You wait until 30 minutes before the concert, when a buzzer goes off, similar to the ones you might hear at say.. a horse race.. and then everyone sprints to the stehplatz to get the best spot.  Men, women, children, short, tall, young, and even the old, literally run to get a spot on the railing.  I didn't run, so I didn't get a spot on the railing.  However, I'm tall and don't really need one!  Very interesting experience, and for 6 Euros.. totally worth it!

The front of the Musikverein.  Seriously... one of the most gorgeous buildings around.  

While the CSO was in town, I was fortunate enough to get a lesson with Dale Clevenger, the principal horn.   It was a fantastic lesson.  I played a little mozart's 4th horn concerto for him, then he started shuffling through my music and marking (more) correct slurs into my Mozart quintet part. Very Dale-like :)  So, I played a bit of that for him, and he played a bit of it for me.  It was really good to get a lesson, and I haven't had one in a while, and I've also realized that I'm growing.  Instead of becoming flustered at being asked to play something that I hadn't planned on playing, I felt completely confident in playing whatever he asked of me. 

After the lesson, Dale, Blair Sordetto, and I all went out to dinner!  It was so amazing to see Dale and my hometown orchestra in a different hall.  After each concert, a few of us waited outside the "Künstlereingang" (the artist's entrance) and acted like the usual CSO groupies.  We said hi to Michael Mulcahy, Chris Martin, Dave Griffin, Charlie Vernon, Tage Larson, Jim Smelser, Li-Kuo Chang, Charlie Pickler, and of course Dale.  We also saw Pete Ellefson, along for the ride just in case he was needed.  This picture, is of course, my favorite 4th horn player (tied with Sarah Willis hehe), Dave Griffin, who I chatted with for a while and hopefully I'll get a lesson with when I'm back in Chicago!  (If you haven't heard his album, you must!  It's called "For You") 

I also went out with Dale for a preconcert dinner the second night as well, which was just wonderful.  He helped ease me out of my homesickness a little bit more.  He had some very good advice for me and his thoughts are never taken for granted.  I really enjoyed spending time with him and was sad to see him returning to Chicago.  I had to say a heartfelt goodbye to him and the orchestra after the concert on Tuesday.  It was definitely the high point of my week, and a memory I'll hold dearly forever.  

And because it was the high point, nothing else really mattered to me, so I did the bare minimum in my german intensive class!  This made the rest of the week someone difficult, as it was the last week and I had my final today.  It was a very difficult exam, on which I didn't actually know how to do everything.  We'll leave it at that.  GERMAN INTENSIVE IS COMPLETE!!!!!!!  Now is the beginning of break week.  Yayyyyyyyy!!!!!!!

My favorite pic of the week :)

Random occurences of the week:

Ich habe meine Finger geschnitten mit einem Brotmessern! aka.. I cut my finger with a bread knife.  Which was a new experience for me.  It hurt quite a bit and bled for about 20 or so minutes.  For future reference, don't try to cut the wobbly end of a hard loaf of bread.  Schlechte Idee!

I discovered Paprika chips.  They taste similar to BBQ chips.. but better :)  nöm!  I thought I was going to get fat from Nutella... 

I was assigned my horn prof for the semester!  His name is Manuel Huber.  Very excited to meet him!  He is currently on tour with the Wiener Philharmoniker!  He has been with them for 4 years, and as of this past year, he became the new principal horn.  He is VERY young.  Ein Wunderkind.  I sent him an email (in german thank you!) and my first lesson is in a week!  We'll see how it goes...!

I went to the Naschmarkt for the first time today.  It's amazing.  It's essentially an outdoor market.  It's very cheap and amazingly wonderful.  I got some dried apricots and apples, a giant piece of really yummy bread, hummus, falafel, grapes, a cucumber, and an eggplant!  All for very cheap.  They also have a lot of really neat authentic handmade goods, like clothing, purses, scarves, and jewelry.  I have a feeling I'll be spending a lot of time there.

Also, exciting... When I met Dale for a lesson, he brought along CSO photographer, Todd Rosenberg.  He's a really nice guy and I had remembered seeing his name from playing in the Chicago Youth Music Initiative under Dudamel.  He was the photographer for that as well.  So, he took some pics and I just happened to show up on the CSO's tour page :)  check it out!  CSO EUROPE TOUR 2011

I leave you with this picture... b/c it's weird. but I like it.  =P

Overwhelming joy :)

This weekend has been a whirlwind of sleeping until noon (if you call waking up every hour not being able to breathe sleeping), blowing my nose, finding new medicines to try, and laying around and making food, waiting for the time to take another antibiotic to increase my chances of getting better sooner. (With an occasional practice session, which hurts, but makes me happier.)

UNTIL!  I decided that I needed to get out and walk to the CSO's hotel to leave Mr. Dale Clevenger a message with my cell number and an invitation for dinner.  I took my time with this walk to the U-bahn and the hotel.  This hour long trip gave me in return, the overwhelming joy of seeing familiar faces in an unfamiliar setting.  It's a feeling one rarely experiences.  The utter joy of seeing someone's face (in this case Dan Gingrich's face lol) and realizing how amazing it is to be in a different country with the same amazing people from home.  I had this enormous smile on my face as I looked around the hotel, and I recognized a bass player as he walked by and said hi to me.  I didn't even know him, but I wanted to cry with excitement and joy just because I saw him and knew him.  I had to tear myself away from the hotel after leaving a message for Dale.  Walking down the street I was listening extremely carefully for any english that might be coming from other CSO players. haha.  Just a little taste of what I'll be feeling at tomorrow night's concert.  :)  can't wait!  Lesson with Dale tomorrow!!!!!!!!

Some things I recently learned about food:
Pesto is amazing!  I just discovered how easy it is to have a yummy pasta.  Put pesto on it. :D
There is no maple syrup on this continent.  *dies a little*  Peanut butter, I can live without for a while, BUT maple syrup. I'm not so confident...

there be sickies among us.

Ich bin krank!  nein!!!!!!!!!!  But, yea.  I'm sick.  However, in being sick, I've discovered that getting antibiotics for sinus infections is MUCH easier in Vienna than in the states.  I literally walked into the doctor's "office" (more like apartment), said, "I think I have a sinus infection" "Why, have you had them before?" "Yes. lots. I have *symptoms*" "Ok, yea, here's a prescription."  And that was that.  Now I have medicine, so even though I'm not feeling any better, I feel better in my mind because I swallowed a pill.  

So, this is my official challenge of Ross Wertjes (if he reads this, otherwise i'll make it official tmrw) to become a better cook than I by the end of our 4 months here.  It's a challenge for both of us.  I have more of the basics already down, however Ross is a very quick learner.  I also have the benefit of being female.  It's just a benefit all around.  lol.  And for those of you who don't know Ross, here is my competitor:

Epic.

I will be fair and say that I think he's winning right now.  He made a lovely egg thing and I attempted mac n cheese and got this:

I think the main problem was the gouda and swiss combo... or.. maybe not.. I have no idea actually.  But the challenge continues... soon.

I'm posting this rather late in the evening because I was not aware of the caffeine content of green tea, which I recently drank 2 cups of to sooth my throat.  That said, I should attempt sleeping as I have another early day tomorrow with our 3rd german test and end of week 2 of the intensive course!  Woot!

Bis später!