But first, you may note that this blog is no longer titled "Steve's Shanghai Journal". If you came here looking for the account of my time in Shanghai — September through December last year — well, you're not exactly out of luck, but you will have to go back into the archives. Hint: All of the 2009 posts belong to that old Shanghai incarnation of this blog; the 2010 posts all fit the new title.
So this blog is now going to be an extended account of my adventures while pursuing my long-deferred dream of taking a Master's degree in Piano Performance at SDSU. By long-deferred, I basically mean this is something I could have (perhaps, should have) done 33 years ago. A couple of other convenient reference points: Assuming that I finish my degree in the expected 2 years, I will receive my master's degree precisely 30 years after I got my PhD. And, if I wish, I can, the same day, apply for full membership in AARP.
School started for me a little over a month ago, with a battery of placement exams (music theory, aural skills, music history) during the orientation week just before the start of classes. These exams were the cause of months of trepidation. Doing well (or well enough) on them would mean getting to take classes that count toward the degree right from the start. Doing otherwise would mean some amount of remedial classes taken for credits that cost but don't count. Since I never took a Bachelor's degree in music, I decided to get some books and study up during the summer. I even dragged those books with me to my chamber music festival in Austria — which took place during the two weeks immediately preceding the exams — and managed to peruse them a bit while there, but more urgently during the long plane rides home. Some of it definitely paid off. I aced the aural skills exam, did well enough on the music theory exam to avoid having to take the remedial theory course, and even did ok on the music history, though I did end up with a set of short essay questions to answer on the periods I was weakest on.
With the first day of classes, my first semester program had already taken shape as follows:
- Music 690 — Seminar on Research Methods in Music
- Music 651 — Private Lessons
- Music 570 — Section: Piano Ensemble
- Music 570 — Section: Mixed Ensemble
- Music 554 — Music Literature Survey: Chamber Music
Music 554 has a mix of graduates and undergraduates taking it and operates as a seminar, with each student taking responsibility for presenting one or more of the works on the syllabus. I've signed up to do a combined presentation on the Brahms and Fauré Piano Quartets in C minor. I've always loved them, and they fit together nicely as they were written (or rewritten) only a few years apart, and both arose in part because the composer had a really bad bout with unrequited love.
Piano Ensemble is an interesting class. Half of it is devoted to developing orchestral score reading skills. This happens in weekly "lab sessions" on Mondays. Each student takes a turn playing the solo part to a movement of a Mozart or Bach concerto with the rest of the class forming an "orchestra", each person playing one or more orchestra parts. Everybody plays on electronic keyboards with registrations that can sound like the instrument they are playing, oboe, clarinet, whatever. It's good training. Some instruments (clarinet, horn) require transposition on sight, others require reading clefs unfamilar to pianists (viola, cello). Yours truly got the honor of being the first to go solo, so had to learn the first movement of the Mozart Concerto in C minor, K. 491 in just a couple of weeks. I'm still writing my cadenza. More on this later after my last session on K. 491 happens next Monday. The other half of this class pairs up the students to rehearse, be coached on, and perform piano duets. I'm working with an Artist Diploma candidate on the Rachmaninoff Second Suite for Two Pianos. This is her diploma recital semester and she intends to program this duet on her program, so we'll be performing it both as part of the Piano Ensemble's noon-time concert and at her evening recital.
I can't really give a full account of the Mixed Ensemble class yet. I do know this much: I'll be playing some piano quintet with the Hausmann Quartet, one of the two string quartets currently in residence at SDSU. I have heard them, and met them, and they are really good, but due to their schedule and mine we haven't found time to get together yet. When we do, we will probably evaluate several options, including the Dvořák A major and the Schumann E-flat major. I'm game for either, but would definitely like to have another go at the Schumann after just having tackled it at Alpen Kammer Musik this past August. Whichever piece we choose to work on will be performed at one or two evening concerts late in the term.
Last but not least, Private Lessons. I really like my new teacher. We are still getting used to each other, but I can already tell this is going to be very good for me — just the kind of discipline I've been missing all these past years without a regular teacher. I think most people have a good idea of what private lessons are like, but there is one novel element for lessons at this level. Each semester you have to play for a jury at the end of the term, about 25 or 30 minutes of music played from memory. I'll definitely need a couple of semesters to build up my confidence in my memorization abilities. Until then, I'm going to choose pieces for jury that won't be too hard to memorize. So far this semester I'm working a pretty balanced diet of pieces: the Bach English Suite in G minor, a late Haydn Sonata (the last in C major), a one-movement sonata by Medtner (Sonata-Elegie) and a selection of préludes by Kabalevsky. At the end of this term there is a chance to enter a concerto contest at SDSU, with the winner playing their concerto with the SDSU symphony next semester. I haven't decided whether to enter, or what concerto to play, but that has to get settled pretty soon.
So far everything to do with school seems to be going fairly well. For about the same time as I've been in school, I've also had an off-campus project that I thought was going to be a very good experience. That was until last Friday. The project was the premiere of a new chamber opera for 6 voices and piano trio. I got involved because I happen to know the violinist who was already engaged to play in the trio. Somewhat at cross purposes, in order to get the gig, I had to sign on to be the Music Director for the production, which was a lot more work than I expected. Then after several weeks of intense rehearsals, the composer decided that he would play the performances himself, so as of last Friday I was no longer connected with the production. That was a huge disappointment but, I suppose I'll get over it.
I'm also continuing to work in my consulting business while in school. I'm keeping it to about half time. So far that's going smoothly, but only time will tell whether this will remain feasible when things really get going.
So that should get you up to the latest. I'll sign off now and get back to my cadenza to K. 491!
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