That It Should Come To This!

 Well it seems as though the semester is finally reaching its end. I have not been very good about getting my blog done in the last few weeks, but either way it's time for me to do a final update as in pertinence to my voice lessons. If I had to use one word to describe this semester as a whole I would have to go with "trusting". Whether it is a matter of me trusting God or trusting in my abilities to get things done/memorized/learned. It has been awesome, while I have not necessarily done amazing or been extremely productive it has tought me to how to have patience and confidence in how things will turn out. This has led to this being the most calm finals week I have ever had. 


I feel like I have grown a lot this semester not just as a musician but as a person. There were times where due to a lack of comments from other students I was feeling like I wasn't doing very well or that no one really cared about me as a singer. But not too long after that God showed me that I am indeed blessed with people around me who do appreciate me and I don't think they realize how much it helped me get through harder times when like when I was getting frustrated by progress vocally, basically shunned by other students for trying to be nice to someone, and especially when my grandmother passed away since not a whole lot of people new that had even happened this semester. I would like to really thank you Dr. Hepworth, you have been one of the people at the front of those helping me through all of this, and I really look forward to working on my recital music next semester with you, and just more of our ridiculous lessens overall.


I look forward to trying to put together not just a recital, but a semester of work that will give others the courage to achieve at a level higher than they knew they were capable of. 

I Bear a Musical Life

Well It seems as thought one more week has managed to just fly by...... At this point I don't feel stressed about any of my classes, but I don't necessarily feel extremely prepared either, It's some sort of relaxed in between stage.

To start lets look at my performance on recital. At first I was just relieved when I discovered I didn't have to memorize Hostias, It's not that I couldn't eventually do it, it just gives me a little less to do and no instead of trying to cram memorization on it I can just focus on the musicality of it and Non e ver since I have that one memorized. While my two Charles songs are not quite memorized I feel like with the focus the should come pretty easily. And this leads me to the decision that I really need to buckle down on my foreign pieces. the two German ones are coming along at a good speed, but my French piece still need some work, at this point it still feels sloppy and I am still working on trying to grasp myself around the text.

Overall I just look forward to this next week and the practicing that occurs, and I should finnally be able to start sending out my support letters! Hip hip hurray!

This Above All: To Thine Music Be True

Well the end of the semester is approaching very quickly. And with still a lot of stuff to come this is definitely not the time to get lazy. There are occasions where I start to get a little frustrated that I don't have as much music memorized as I would like, but then I snap out of it because the more I sit worrying about it, the more I waste time I could be practicing.

As for this week in particular I feel like it went really good. While I know I still have some work to do before I am sure I have Hostias memorized for Tuesday, so if I can't pull it together I might have to think about doing Non e ver again. But for right now I am just going to focus on it and when the time comes I will make my decision then. As for the rest of my pieces I feel like none of the melodies are extremely difficult, but I definitely need to do some consistent work on the diction of them, especially the foreign languages.

I can't be entirely sure whats God has in store for me next week, but I will just have to take it and run with it instead of wasting my time trying to over think things.

Alas, Poor Spring Break, I Knew Thee Well!

Well it seems like the semester has gotten back into motion in no time flat after break. Personally my break did not contain as much practice as I originally desired. I can't completely blame it but I think a moderate amount of it could have to do with a kind of dreariness hanging over my hose after the passing of my Grandma the Wednesday night before Spring Break. I felt really honored when a lot of my family members asked me to sing at the funeral service, so I worked with a few of them and we picked out a hymn for me and I worked on it here and there throughout the week. My mom made sure that practiced a least a little every day, now I just have to see if she can use this motivation of me for the rest of the things I have to practice. Anyways, as for this week it definitely took me a bit to get back into the swing of things when it comes to practicing and things like that, and it was really hard to stay inside with such an amazing week of weather. I think its time we get a piano that we can use outside to practice with (yes I realize the problems that would occur with this idea, but it doesn't mean I want it to happen any less :P). Now that things are finally on the move again and I can get on a moving with everything, I really do want to finish this semester strong and I know that I can with such amazing faculty and a God that is above everything. So its time to take hold of the present and set everything in my path ablaze.

To Sleep, Perchance to Finally Rest the Voice.

Well I managed to be a few days late again, but in comparison its still tons better than I did last semester. Anyways this week felt kind of crazy with the first day of tour and all. When it came to practice time I thought things went pretty well, it was all mostly on my own since Phil asked for for rehearsal time to practice with someone else, and because of tour I missed my voice lesson. A lot of my practice time has been spent making sure I have Non e ver memorized for next Tuesday on recital. Speaking of Tuesday, next week is going to be crazy! Monday I have Chorale then the Choir concert, then Tuesday I am singing on recital and I will have our band concert, to follow that on Wednesday we have our second day of tour, and then Thursday I have my voice lesson. Wow I am really looking forward to having spring break next week just so I can at least rest my voice and try and get some more memorization done. But I can do this all as long as I am doing it all in the name of Jesus Christ!

Beware the Deadlines of March.

Well In a moment of retrospect I came to realize that I had not actually done a blog for last week, but oh well, I will just do my best to sum up the last two weeks in this one. When it comes to practice I wasn't extremely satisfied with how my practice went, but I was glad that I was able to get some translations/ IPA written in some of my music. I had hoped to to get some good practice in this last Sunday but I ended up feeling really sick all day and just lying around sleeping all day, talk about frustrating. Anyways, I digress, on the broader scheme of things I really do feel like I am a lot more prepared this semester than I have been In the past, as I look towards the spring break coming up and the goal to have some pieces memorized I feel like this could be the closet I come to having that goal reached at that time. I just need to buckle down this next week and really focus on getting some good time in practicing and focusing on my diction in my pieces and I think things will slowly work to where they need to be.

To God be the glory!

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to sing for God, not for mankind.

Its seems as though another week has come and past, these weeks seem to fly by faster and faster every semester. I thought this week went really good, I had some good practice, I thought singing in studio went really good, and I felt like we made some good ground in my lesson to improve my understanding of head/jaw position. I feel like Non e ver is going well and I can really spend time working on the character of the piece and in time I know memorization will be easy with more practice. I have also spent some time on my two Charles pieces. My Lady Walks in Loveliness along with And So,Goodbye just need some practice of singing through the notes to the point where I can hear the melody without second guessing myself and also just focus especially on diphthongs in those pieces. Other than that I am begging to work on Hostias and making sure I use a lot of wide open vowels and focus on consonants. And on the side of those I will begin looking at my French piece Le Charme and getting down the diction (the usefulness of taking diction is already showing). In sense of all things I really feel good about this semester, and its not because I am working a whole lot harder than I have before, its because I can use my time as great worship and offer my music up to God.