Trip to Colorado

I am back! I wanted to take a few minutes and post a short blog to give you all an update on how my trip to Colorado was, earlier this week. First of all, my #1 favorite thing about the trip was seeing the Rocky Mountains! Almost 4 years ago I spent the summer at the Aspen Music Festival & School in Aspen, CO. I felt so inspired by that trip, and it was just as wonderful seeing those mountains for the second time! My professor and a former student of hers shared a hotel room with me on the 14th floor of the Hyatt Regency. We could see all the way out, several miles, to the mountains that bordered the city.

In case some of you are wondering, I was in Denver attending the MTNA (Music Teacher's National Association) National Conference. This was my first time, and I got to go for an extremely low rate due to the WVU Collegiate Chapter fund which helped sponsor me, and the fact that I still get in for the college/student rate. College-age students were definitely in the minority at this convention. I was surrounded by many of the top music pedagogues, publishers, and music clinicians in the country. I will admit, some of it was kind of boring. I still haven't fully adapted to the idea of "conformed business atire". During some of the events I wanted to jump up and down and say "Music is FUN not Business!!!" But I also have to admit, in all fairness, that behind the staleto heals and suits, there were some very friendly and light-hearted musicians, who had a lot of wisdom and experience to share with me. In fact, one of the nice things about the MTNA conventions is that unlike many other business gatherings, people feel completely comfortable sitting and talking with strangers and making fast friends. It is just part of the advantage of meeting others who share a common love for music.

While at this convention I attended three seminars (I would have attended many more but I have been struggling to over-come a cold for almost 2 weeks now). One was focused on the "Celebration Series" which I found very applicable since I am currently teaching 4 piano students out of this series. One seminar focused on the generational differences between most current music educators, and the current rising generation. They discussed ways that teachers need to learn to understand the way children learn today, using technology and group learning. The third session I attended focused on how to make your students fabulous and fearless performers. The speaker focused on transposition, improvisation, using MIDI technology in the lessons, and much more.

Aside from seminars, the high-light of the trip for me was the performances. I was able to hear all of the national winner recitals for the Junior and Senior divisions, as well as the Young-Artist winners. The students were so inspiring to me! In addition, on the final night of the convention, aprox. 2,000 of us crowded a down-town United Methodist Church to hear a very memorable performance by the world-famous concert pianist Lang Lang ( I should mention here that he is only 25 years old!). This was my second opportunity to hear Lang Lang, just in the past year or so. He also performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony last time I heard him. This pianist is so phenominal that they are beginning to rank him in the same category with Horowitz and Rubinstein. He has been performing since age 5 and has already performed in every major city in the world. If you ever get a chance to hear this musical-wonder perform, I strongly encourage you to take it!!!

The rest of my time in Colorado was spent eating some great food, doing some church-music shopping at the convention sales booths, and even visiting the Denver Art Museum where I saw some beautiful Impressionist art work, including pieces by Renoir. For the first time in my life, I actually understood the definition of Impressionism, as opposed to my past trips to art museums when I had a very confused idea of what Impressionistic art was about. It really helped me as a musician too, because now I have a clearer understanding of what a musician means when they talk about the "Impressionistic Music" of Debussy.

I think that is about it. I am busy catching up on work now that I am home, still getting over my cold, and really on fire to get back to practicing. I believe a month away from practice and the convention trip were just what I needed to get back into the swing of things. In fact, at my church choir rehearsal last night, my choir members said there was a noticeable difference in my conducting! This was very encouraging to me for two reasons. 1) I have not been working on my conducting since the last time we met and I chose the piece we were singing just before rehearsal. 2) I felt a big difference as I was conducting in my awareness of all the details of the music, and in the ease of expressing them to the choir. It was nice to have it reaffirmed that I am in fact improving and that time away from practicing can open us up to be better performers.

I'll let you all go now. I hope in a few weeks to have the pictures from the Lang Lang concert developed, and will try to post them on here.

God Bless!!