Today’s a cold and rainy day. The rain here is fine, not like in Singapore with huge raindrops pattering down on you. But it’s awfully cold!
I’m blogging much earlier today because I’m attending a Wind Orchestra concert tonight, conducted by Tim Reynish. It starts at 7.30, it’ll probably end late. Today was rather eventful. I attended the 2nd last Music Therapy lecture of the term this morning from 9 to 11. Today’s topic was Autism, but everything was covered in greater detail in last year’s Introduction to MT lectures at NAFA. The second part of the lecture was interesting though. We did about 45 minutes of spontaneous music making, just like what happens in group therapy sessions. Percussion instruments (cymbal, chimes, xylophones, drums) were out of the cupboard and laid on the floor in the middle. Each of us grabbed an instrument and just started playing whatever on it. The lecturer sat at the piano and plonked away. It took quite some time and it was messy at first, but it settled into patterns of fast and slow, loud and soft. The two hours went by fast!
After that it was off to a practice room for more work on the Mozart. Managed to play through the second movement and do a bit of work on the first. I still don’t dare to touch the third, not when the first isn’t perfect. Sandy says that within the first three lines people can tell whether you’re worth listening to or not, so he asked me to just do lots of work in the first three lines.
Practice was short because there was a baroque violin recital going on in the Corus room at 1.05. My first Baroque concert ever! There was a harpsichord/organ player, a viola da gamba player, and two baroque violinists. I was practically in heaven for that hour. Nice instruments, and fantastic music. The harpsichord could practically swallow NAFA’s one up. The organ was also a pipe organ, not an electric one like NAFA’s. The programme for the concert was German baroque, contrasting the early works of Biber and Boeddecker with that of Bach’s. The last piece was interesting, it was called Delices des cremiers, supposedly named after delicious cheese that the two violin soloists bought for dinner on Saturday, and it was sure cheesy! It was composed by the harpsichord/organ player, and the harmonies were like that of Poulenc but the piece had baroque elements like suspensions.
I walked into town to do a bit of shopping for much-needed shoes and gloves. My orange sneakers were wearing out, and the soles were flat. Water also got in very easily. With today’s bad weather, my socks were practically soaked and my feet were freezing. I’ve heard about the budget shop Shoezone and how good and cheap the shoes were from friends. Managed to find a shop here, and…
my new boots!
Pretty? They cost 12.99 pounds. Seems like a small number, but when converted back into our currency… that should be about $30. Not bad, I reckon. Quality seems quite good too, but I’ll never know unless I test them. SO, while my orange sneakers are wet, these boots are going a-walkin’ with me to tonight’s concert (:
I dropped a glove on my way to school two days ago, and I didn’t realize it until I couldn’t find it. I saw it on the pavement yesterday though, trodden on and filthy, and decided not to pick it up. Walked around the shops trying to find a cheap pair of gloves, and was about to settle for a brown 10pound pair in Animal when I saw this in a sports shop:
NICE RIGHT!!!!! The kiasu singaporean in me emerges at the sight of 70% off, and better still, it cost 3 pounds. With a nice United crest on it too!
I found St David’s Hall in town and went there to purchase a ticket for tomorrow night’s concert. It’s the Orchestra Europa on tour, I think. Ticket cost 1 pound for students of RWCMD (: Repertoire’s quite nice too, I hope the concert will be good.
Had a Quarter Pounder at Mac’s for lunch and then headed back. The rain was getting so heavy that I had to stuff my oboe case in my winter jacket, zip it up and then carry my backpack over it. Can’t be bothered to use an umbrella, because that would mean more things to hold. With the strong wind blowing as well, I don’t think my super cheap SGD$5 would stand a chance against it!
I’ll need to wash my hair because of the rain 🙁 Showers here are terrible. Sometimes you get nice hot water from the shower, and then when someone in another room starts to shower, suddenly there’s no more hot water anymore and the water becomes freeeeezing! Such unpredictable showers..
Yesterday wasn’t as interesting as today. I had no classes, so I took the opportunity to go walking. I went to College, watched Mike’s octet rehearsal, then walked Sarah to the train station which was in town. Wandered around town, looked around the museum, then walked back to College. I tried to find the Church of St. Teilo’s, where today’s concert is going to be held. Got lost, walked more, met a couple of english Jehovah witness’ ladies who tried to speak chinese to me (which I didn’t understand because of the funny slang) and ask me along for bible study classes at the JW centre on monday nights. These bible study sessions were specially for chinese, and were conducted in chinese. They just had to stop me when it was getting dark, talked for so long that it got dark already, leaving me to find the rest of my journey to St Teilo’s in the dark. I finally found it, but the door was locked, so I walked home.
Cooked instant noodles (yet again, yes) for dinner. The common area was sure rowdy yesterday! It was like a shouting match, everyone complaining that everyone didnt do dishes, and they were blaming each other. It was good-natured though, fun, but LOUD. Aidan had to go to St Teilo’s for the Concertango rehearsal, so I tagged along. It was the shortest rehearsal ever! It started at 7 and by 7.15 everything was over and all were packing up!
It’s now 5.30 here, I’ve got to take my chance with the shower ( i hope there’s hot water!!!), cook dinner and then leave for the concert at St Teilo’s. Till next time! (: