Overbooked and Underpaid: Notes from a Yes-aholic

Act Of Creation - Self Quarantine Composition #2 "One Harpist, Two Harps"

 

To keep myself busy while I (and everyone else on the planet) sit at home I've begun sharing some of my harp music here on the blog.

If you see "Act Of Creation" in the title it means I'm doing an improv - it could be a new piece I'm working on or it might be a new version of something I recorded on a previous album.

Sometimes I like to play two different harps at the same time - it gives a completely different character to the sound. This is one of those pieces.

If you like my music I have two albums available for download - click the store tab up in the menu bar.

The music is available via downloads of the whole album or individual tracks. When you click on any individual track you can hear a sample for free - downloads are .99 each or $10 for the whole album.

Note: The store button takes you to my other website - the most direct way to get back to this site from the store is to use your "back" button.

Thanks for listening!

 

YouTube Videos - #1 Vinnie Goes To Washington

To keep myself busy while I (and everyone else on the planet) sit at home for the next two weeks I've begun sharing some of my harp music here on the blog.

The other day I posted a short new composition as part of the category "Act Of Creation", and after that I posted I video from home as part of the category "Concerts From Quarantine".

Today I'm adding a video from my performance as a headliner for the "Jean's Jazz" concert series.

This one is an original composition titled "Vinnie Goes To Washington" - it's sort of my homage to Harpo Marx :-)

If you like my music and want to hear more I have two albums available for download in my store - just click the store tab in the menu at the top of the page.

The music is available via downloads of the whole album or individual tracks. When you click on any individual track you can hear a sample for free - downloads are .99 each or $10 for the whole album.

Note: The store button takes you to my other website - the most direct way to get back to this site from the store is to use your "back" button.

Thanks for listening!

 

 

You Can't Go Back Again..... Or Can You? An Essay On Memories and Interlochen

 

Interlochen National Music Camp Main Campus

 

 

We all have one. A place.

A special place that was meaningful in some way.

A place where we spent time with other people and built memories.

What happens when you return to such a place? 

Are you transported back in time? Do you relive those old memories? Are they bitter or sweet or a little of both?

I took such a trip last week and it was, indeed, bittersweet. 

Some background....

In the summer of 1978 I was a lonely, artistic kid graduating from a junior high school vaguely akin to those schools in The Blackboard Jungle. A lot of gangs, a lot of drugs, several pregnant girls, and about  80%  of my class was not planning to go to college. 

As someone who wasn't any of those things,  I had a pretty small circle of friends.

My father had spent a couple summers at the Interlochen National Music Camp and felt strongly that I would benefit from a summer there.

So my parents scraped up the required tuition, which was a significant amount, and shipped me off to the woods of northern Michigan for eight weeks.

EIGHT WEEKS!

I was pretty nervous, I can tell you. My previous record for time away from home was two weeks at Girl Scout Camp. 

I could not fathom what it was going to be like to spend two whole months away from family

Not to mention my nervousness about meeting a whole new set of people. And not just any old people. TALENTED people. In many cases VASTLY TALENTED people. (The official term, then, in all the Interlochen publicity materials was "gifted youth" - we all got a lot of laughs throwing that term around)

I needn't have worried. Within one week of my arrival, I knew I had found my people. My tribe. The set of peers that could keep me sane. 

When you are feeling alone and unique in the world, there  is no better remedy than suddenly meeting a whole flock of folks who share your interests and have a similar world outlook. Knowing that there are others like you  - even if they are miles away the rest of your life - can help you through the tough times. Especially the teen age tough times.

I would spend a total of five summers at Interlochen. Three as a high school camper and two as the Harp Faculty Assistant/Practice Supervisor.

Last week I took my son up there to work (he has a job for the summer as a member of the lighting crew).

I had booked a room in the Stone Hotel so that I could split up the driving and also take time to get him settled. Which meant that I had two days to wander the campus and really drink it in. At times my son accompanied me around the place and at other times I explored alone. It was pretty deserted, as camp was not due to start for another full week.

In the thirty-four (yes THIRTY FOUR) years since I first set foot on the Interlochen campus, a LOT has changed. Many buildings have been torn down or renovated beyond recognition and several new buildings have been added.

And while I am happy for the institution itself - I know that all these changes mean the place is doing well - the powers that be are slowly erasing the camp that meant so much to so many of us. 

A particularly bitter loss is that of graffiti. Yes, you heard me, graffiti. The living and practice spaces of Interlochen are literally plastered with the names, dates and pithy sayings of thousands of folks who have spent time there in the camp's alomost almost eighty five year history.

And some of those names are big. I mean BIG. 

There is an amazing feeling you get when you are putting in your hours of practice in a room covered with the names of giants of your instrument and knowing that they sat in this very room - THIS VERY ROOM - thirty years before you.

If you played a something large like harp or tuba or timpani, you didn't practice in the regular practice cabins. Instead your instruments were housed in "huts" behind the open air stage known as "the Bowl". 

Sometime in the 1990s the decision was made to tear all those huts down and move the instruments to "nicer" quarters.  When I saw that those cabins had been removed, I actually teared up a little. My name, and all the names of my fellow harpists for over 60 years were just gone. Erased. As if we never existed. 

I was able to show my son the first cabin I lived in - thankfully still housing the graffiti of myself and fellow 1978 cabin mates. (Liz "spiffy" Spier, if you are reading this, your name is still there! And Alison Cohen 1974 - your approach of plastering your name across every square inch of your living space has paid off. You are still everywhere!)

I said earlier that the experience was bittersweet

 While walking around, I found myself having an odd reaction to the new buildings and renovated grounds. They are truly spectacular spaces and a vast improvement to the camp. Instead of crooked, worn wooden benches that could give you a splinter, there are shiny, stable seats mounted on secure railings. Everywhere you look there are state of the art facilities.

Why was I so nostalgic for the army surplus crappy jeeps and metal cafeteria trays? And cabins full of spiders? 

The only answer I can come up with is that, to truly relive a memory, you need the place of the memory to be as close to its original state as possible. You cannot completely immerse yourself if too much has changed. 

Also, memories made in the company of other people are sweetest when they are relived in the company of folks who were originally  there with you. Without them, the memory cannot fully come to life. The true  power of it remains tantalizingly out of reach. 

Worse is attempting to explain those memories to the  new friends or family who have accompanied you to your nostalgic spot. Try as they might to share your enthusiasm for this special place, they can really only politely humor you.

Still, I'm glad I returned. Bittersweet or not, Interlochen is still truly special place and I will carry my summers there with me always. 

(End Note: - I will be visiting the campus again the last weekend in July. If you were there with me in 1978, 79, 80, 81 or 82 - and you are planning on visiting at the same time - let me know!)

Here is a scrapbook of sorts for fellow alums to enjoy - I have not taken pictures of the new buildings, only my old haunts:

Main Camp looking down the avenue of dorms. HU 4 is now officially Picasso House.

 

 

They still have a few of the old benches scattered about the place...

 

Main Camp looking towards Kresge - the new, "safe" benches are everywhere. I have to admit they are an improvement :-)

 

 

The Melody Freeze still looks the same, complete with payphones. I wonder if any of today's campers have seen payphones before? Or use them?

 

 

"The Bowl" with its new improved, non crooked, seating and a lovely brick "patio" in front of the bushes.

 

 

The roof of the bowl shot from inside, on the stage. They have obviously rebuilt the roof and reinforced it with steel but it still looks much as I remember it.

 

 

THIS is more like I remember the place, old, dirty and full of charm. Those doors at the back of the risers open up during Les Preludes and several musicians sit back there and play. Especially the timpani.

 

 

View of the improved Bowl seating from the stage as if you were principal flute. It's an amazing thing when you are playing and that place is full.....

 

 

I know I'm spending too much time on this but I cannot overstate the improvement in the seating at the bowl. It used to be quite tricky to walk up and down on a muddy day.

 

 

THIS is the asphalt I remember! This used to be in front of the bushes and when I was a dancer during Les Prludes, I had to kneel on this. Excruciating!

 

 

Thought I'd throw in this 1956 picture of Les Preludes. You can see the dancers all taking their poses - including on the roof - and the 12 harps stretched across the front of the stage. I danced once and harped twice. The roof was too fragile in 1978 to put dancers up there.

 

 

A more modern Les Preludes after they rebuilt the roof and it could support dancers again. I still get chills every time I hear this piece....

 

 

The gaping hole behind the bowl where the harp and tuba huts used to be. One year we had a party there for the stage crew for carrying our harps all over campus. We bought them donuts...... We also made halos and wings out of coat hangers and aluminum foil and wore them during Les Preludes rehearsal. We stored them in a hole in the ceiling sort of like a time capsule. They surely wound up in a landfill :-(

 

 

 

The front of the dance building. It has changed very little in 34 years.

 

 

The back of the dance building - again, almost untouched by time. I spent hours and hours in this building my first summer.

 

 

The main dance rehearsal room. I'm so happy they still use live piano instead of recorded music for class.

 

 

Stairway to the lower rehearsal rooms and dressing rooms. I include it as an example of what most of the buildings used to look like. Unlike the spiffy spaces they have today. I suspect this building will also be "updated and improved" before long so I was happy to get back inside it one more time.

 

 

Kresge Auditorium as viewed from the stage. One of the more modern buildings when I was there, It also is virtually unchanged. This is where I saw Count Basie and Maynard Ferguson and so many other huge acts. This summer it will host Steve Martin, Styx and Bill Cosby.

 

 

The concrete stage in Kresge - we also performed dance concerts here in 1978. This floor gave me shin splints :-(

 

 

A view of Kresge stage from the side. It is an auditorium that feels open and closed at the same time due to the open air design at the sides.

 

 

The catwalks where my son is surely hanging lights for all the shows

 

 

The stage windows overlooking Green Lake

 

 

The back of Kresge with those same windows. This is where all the sailboats are kept for Stone Beach

 

 

In my day the sail room was run by a guy named Dana. I can't remember the rest of his name - he was just Dana. One day the stage crew picked up his cute little yellow convertible and wedged it between these two trees. He was not pleased.

 

 

Stone Hotel Beach. Again, unchanged

I took many more photos but that's probably enough :-) I'll put together a facebook album eventually.......

 

You Did What?!!!!!

Wednesday began much like any other day with one exception.

My husband was out of town.

In a universe that loves to screw with people, that was all it would take to set in motion a chain of comedic (and painful events).

My mornings typically begin like a lot of people's mornings. There is the usual routine of making sure my daughter is up, getting ready for school and making a lunch.

There is the driving of the morning leg of the carpool to the aforementioned school. 

On this particular Wednesday, I have everything under control and am heading to the car.

Because we have a young male dog that wants to run all over the neighborhood "socializing", we have rigged up a sort of gate contraption at the top of our driveway. (Which is actually almost useless since our very agile Sheltie can just hop right over it at the low spot. But it does slow him down.)

If I had any sense, I would have opened that gate as I do most mornings.

But of course, I didn't.

Instead, I decided to step over it.

Which is not normally such a stupid thing to do. It's only two feet high.

But on this day, a day when my husband was 4 hours away, and my teenage son spent the night at a friends house, and the only family member in close proximity was a 12 year old girl who cannot drive, on THIS day, my first foot went over the gate just fine. But my SECOND foot got caught in the top of the mesh.

Sending me spiraling down in what the ER nurse would later characterize as a "cartoon fall".

The next 5 minutes are kind of a blur. There was a spilled can of soda (my morning non-coffee caffeine ritual), an explosion of articles out of my purse, and a fair amount of swearing.

And possibly some whimpering.

What do you think I did next?

Do you think I had my daughter run in the house to call the girls in the carpool and tell them they couldn't go to school today?

And did I then have her call a friend to drive me to the hospital?

Or maybe an ambulance even?

No. Of course not.

Because I am a fully indoctrinated, Scots/German raised "suck it up, walk it off, and get on with it" stoic.

So I did what any stoic with a rescue complex would do. I had my daughter throw all my stuff into the car (except the soda - I never did find out what happened to it), I gritted my teeth, drove over to pick up the girls, and drove the 9.8 miles (each way) to school. (Thank you google maps - I've been making that drive for 14 years and only just now found out how far it is.)

I knew I had done something significant to my left ankle - maybe a bad sprain - but I also knew all my friends were at work and the parents of the girls I was driving were already at work. I didn't even know how to get a hold of them because - in all the years that I have been driving those kids to school, I've never bothered to get the parents work phone numbers. (Which is pretty stupid.)

The girls were terrified because I literally huffed and puffed the whole way, grimacing and letting out audible gasps every time I had to use my bad leg to depress the clutch.

Oh, yeah - did I mention the only car I had available that day was a stickshift?

On the return journey, I called my son on his cell and told him to get ready, I was going to swing by and pick him up from his friend's so he could help me get out of the car and into the house. 

I have to pause here to say - all that stuff about how hard it is to raise teenagers, all the conflict that gives parents migraines, that's all true. But my 17 year old son was a gem that day. Once we got home he waited on me hand and foot and only went to school when he was sure I would be OK without him. 

Since I have health insurance that could charitably be described as "catastrophic coverage only", I did what all economically challenged stoics do. I took some Ibuprofen, climbed into my bed, elevated my leg, wrapped my ankle in a nice Ace bandage, put ice on it and settled in to let it get better.

I didn't cancel my students for that evening because A) I don't need to stand on my ankle to teach  B) the students for the day were all coming to my house rather than the University C)  I foolishly thought my ankle might be better by then and D) self employed people who don't work don't earn money.

I did call my husband and tell him what had happened and he, of course, dropped what he was doing and headed straight home so I knew I would be in much better shape once he got back.

With 4 - 5 hours to kill before John made it back to town, and before kids would come home from school, I discovered the flaw in my "I'll be OK here by myself" plan. 

The dog needed to be let out to pee.

My ankle was so bad I could not put any weight on it at all so I tried hopping about on my good leg.

On one particular hop, I felt a small twinge in my good ankle.

Great. All I needed was to screw up the other ankle.

So I resorted to crawling around my house on my hands and knees.

During one such excursion, I had to figure out a way to carry the phone around with me.  I had several playing engagements coming on the docket that now had to be farmed out to other harpists.

Since my phone doesn't have one of those clip on things, I had to resort to stashing it in my bra. (Note to my male readers - women are always doing stuff like this, they just don't tell you,)

Let me tell you, spending several hours crawling around your house gives you a whole new perspective. For one thing, you find out how truly filthy your floors are.

I spent all that day and the ensuing night wrestling with whether or not to go to the ER. With a deductible like ours ($7,000) you don't make such trips for things you can fix yourself. But my final student for the night pointed out that if there really was something seriously wrong and I didn't address it, I would probably limp for the rest of my life.

And I realized that I wasn't only being a stoic, I was being a stone cold idiot.

Bright and early Thursday morning my husband drove me to the ER.

The x-rays showed that I had not sprained my ankle. 

Yay!

Not.

I had, in fact, broken my leg in two places. 

To be precise, I had broken my fibula. The big break is down by the ankle. The second break is a tiny one up by the knee.

I don't yet know the full prognosis. I meet with the orthopedic surgeon on Monday to find out if there is any way I get out of this without surgery to put a plate in my ankle.

The kicker is that I have one of my busiest playing seasons in years with a musical and two concertos on which I am the featured soloist playing the Handel Concerto and the Debussy Danses.

All of which are now on hold.

But thank goodness I got some sense and got treatment. As I go through this process, I will be blogging a lot because I'll have nothing better to do

A couple of photos:

The offending gate

 
My thigh high splint and my new digs for the duration.

 

In an ironic twist of fate, this is today's Edison which is also Mike Peterson's Comic Strip of The Day. Please go read Mike's take on health care in America.