Monday, April 14, 2014

Bangor Symphony, why must you be so awesome?!

This will be my final post as a college or university student: the next time I write, I will be home cuddling cats, hanging out with my parents and healing from a brutal final year. This blog will continue, though I have yet to figure out what sort of form it will take.

Also, I can never pass up an opportunity to gush about the Bangor Symphony Orchestra. Brace yourself.

Monday: This was one of those field-trip classes: we met at the Dalhousie Art Gallery to view that part of Beat Nation, which is a show that has been toured around, having originated in Vancouver. It's so big that it's normal for the show to be split between two galleries--in this case, the Dal Art Gallery and the Saint Mary's University Art Gallery. The show is about First Nations peoples and hip-hop, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

That day was so warm that I took my coat off on the walk back to NSCAD--and treated myself to a gelato at Humani-T Café (they have some of the best gelato that I've had outside of Italy).

Tuesday: Exam Day for Twentieth Century Art. To quote an email to Lynn, "I wrote more than last time (not writing enough was one of the things that led to me getting a D on the midterm), I tried to make my definitions as thorough as possible (another thing that set me back last time), and overall I'm happy. I've done my best. Since my appointment with Joan, I haven't done much that would qualify as work [...]--and nothing that would qualify as schoolwork (I plan to do some work on my independent project this evening, as it needs attention and most of the time I enjoy editing photos), which feels weird. Though both Kathryn--a family friend who lives in England--and Mom said in comments on Facebook to take a break."

Wednesday: I took that day slowly as well, but managed to do some work on my independent project.

Thursday: Being able to sleep in that morning felt weird (I can sleep in? Great! But are you sure about that? Positive?). During the afternoon class I found out that that was my penultimate university class: with the exception of the last Contemporary Indigenous Arts class, there's nothing this coming week--all we have to do for Topics in Modern Canadian Art is drop off our finals to Ken Rice's office, which is a minute or less from the Photo Dept.

Friday: I spent the day working on my final for Contemporary Indigenous Arts and checked out Reel Injun from the Visual Resources Collection, as I'm doing one of my final papers for that class on the film that had the deepest impact on me, and that one was the first that came to mind.



Saturday: I got a very late start to the day--and I wasn't thrilled about that, as I had finals to write for Monday. However, I did get a fair amount of stuff done, including finishing the gallery review and starting work on the paper about Reel Injun. Bonus: I got to watch the movie while I wrote (I had to pause it every now and then to write things down as they occurred to me)!

I didn't realize that the BSO had a concert coming up on Sunday until I saw this photo. Go violins! Even better: the orchestra would be playing to a full house--exactly what the BSO deserves, especially when performing Carmina Burana, which is a very powerful, knock-your-socks-off piece. Mozart's thirty-fifth symphony (the Haffner) was also on the program (it was the first half of said concert), a fact that I'd completely forgotten. But is it any wonder, given how much of a show-stopper Carmina is?





I love how the audience erupts in applause at the end. And who can blame them? They've been holding it in for just over an hour!

Sunday: Carmina Burana Day. I listened to part of it as I walked to school, and, for the first time ever, zeroed in on the violin part. Usually I take the orchestration for that work as a whole, not focusing on a specific instrument--but because I knew a couple of people (Lynn and Trond) who would be playing it about two hours after said walk to school, I focused on what they would be playing. Verdict: the violin part alone is impressive. July sixteenth, when that concert will be broadcast on MPBN radio, can't come soon enough. After finishing Reel Injun, I listened to the Mozart, which, at about twenty minutes, is incredibly short for a symphony. It's the exact opposite of the Orff in that it's very tame. As I wrote in a Facebook status update, the Haffner "[allows] the Bangor Symphony Orchestra to give it their all in knocking the audience's socks off with the Orff. Brilliant. To whoever chose the music for today's concert, well done!" How I wish I could've gone to the concert--if I were going to school in the Bangor/Orono area, I definitely would've gone, especially if I were a student at the University of Maine (the orchestra's home, the Collins Center for the Arts, is on the UMaine campus). Blow off studying for finals for two hours and get my socks knocked off by the BSO in the process--wonderful (double that when you add in the strong violin part in the Orff and the BSO's violin section's habit of taking an awesome violin part up a few notches). Bonus: student tickets (you have to be a full-time student) are USD$13, including the $3 processing fee that's applied to all tickets--and, unlike regular-priced tickets, student tickets are the same price no matter where you sit. Wonderful! I'm so jealous of students in the Bangor/Orono area right now. How I wish I could've gone. Bangor Symphony, why must you do this to me? Why?!

Okay, I think that's enough gushing about the BSO. **scoffs jokingly** Typical favourite orchestras and violinists. Bangor Symphony Orchestra, I love you--and I can't wait to hear today's concert on MPBN on July sixteenth (START THE COUNTDOWN!). Go violins!

In the midst of all this BSO-induced excitement (which is all in a day's work for me), I wrote my final essays for Contemporary Indigenous Arts.

No comments:

Post a Comment