Gumption 101 (Summertime for Bassoon Students)

Teachers and performers who really make the world a better place are a rare breed, and Jo Ann Simpson is one of these people.

A fine professional bassoonist, she is an exceptional individual who actively, calmly, and insightfully nurtures the talents of young players and those of the many professionals she invites to her camp. 

Playing Music Is Easy

Tonight was our first concert with Jonathan Cohen, playing Handel, Bach, Mozart & Haydn with Violons du Roy.

It is now late I am too tired to write a lot, but I have to say something about this experience.

It is always a revelation of some kind to play with Violons du Roy.  They are so serious, so loving, so fun.  Since Bernard has been ill and now recovering, there have been many guest conductors and I have met a few when I come as guest principal bassoonist.

I love playing with VdeR, but whenever I return to any orchestra after an extended run of solo playing (just finished a Maritime tour with my chamber group THREE), I always worry about the transition from speaking in a solo voice to singing in the chorus. 

And sometimes, as my friend Valdy, says, playing classical orchestral music makes me feel like I’m being shot at. 

But not this week.

Tonight, as we all left the stage, I was surrounded by musicians talking, laughing, walking with buoyant steps.  More than one musician said they would like to play the concert again, i.e. tonight!  And then our excellent second horn, Louis-Pierre Bergeron, said something like, “ wow, it’s easy to play music!” and we laughed, because, despite the very high standards and the striving, it WAS easy tonight. 

Jonathan Cohen sat at the keyboard, supplying continuo and gesturing fluidly and alertly and transmitting, listening, floating and guiding the musicians in a way that I am at a loss to describe yet which each and every musician recognizes as the real thing, immediate, and absolutely natural.  The kind of natural that is born of an alert mind and exquisite craft, honing of skills and thoughts.

I could say more but I really have to go to sleep as we are going to play the same concert in Montreal tomorrow at the Salle Bourgie (October 16, 2015).  If you can come, you will be very happy that you did.  I know that I am.

Solitary Refinement - Hotel Room Practising

All traveling musicians have to practice in hotel rooms.

Mid-June, 2015, I was just returning from Ottawa where I had premiered my newest concerto commission with 13 Strings & Kevin Mallon (Silver Angel by Constantine Caravassilis) and played Vivaldi G Minor RV 495.  I was between houses, so I booked into the Holiday Inn near the Royal Conservatory and near my son’s school.  On June 16, I said good-bye to my son and then practiced for an hour before driving to Waterloo for another rehearsal.  

I was in the midst of my current chromatic interval routine, my Major Third Chromatic Up-Down Fill-Ins and Up-Down intervals and in the fastest and highest phase of the slurred intervals.

Back to the Blog

I have never stopped thinking, albeit a tiny thread of a thought, about my blog.... my life has been so, well.... life-y!  in the past year... tours with classical and folk musicians, first art show in 5 years, selling house, moving to apartment, waiting for rezoning a church, couch surfing, touring, looking after elderly father and family, teaching, moving into my church, premiering new concerti...

I've been in my new place for 6 weeks and I am happy.  My church is the place I've always wanted... it's like I am living in a concert hall with a really good backstage...and my bed is in the same room as the grand piano.  This must be why I live alone, who else could tolerate such weirdness!?  I am still doing all the things I've ever done, including playing concerts, helping my fantastic, iconic, frail-former-superhero father, touring, recording (today, finishing my THREE disc with Lesllie Newman and Guy Few at Maureen Forrester Recital Hall in Waterloo).  Yet it's better now...I have a studio home smack in the downtown core of a small town, steps from the postoffice, surrounded by kindly neighbours and the wafting fragrances of different types of farms.   I'm on the highway a lot to be in different big cities, which is exactly how I like it.

And between unpacking boxes and practising, I am grabbing some time to learn about the phenomenal tools available to musicians and artists these days, following a 9 week free course by the incredibly experienced and dedicated Ariel Hyatt of Cyper PR and learning something mind-glowingly relevant every day, sometimes twice per day.

So life is still very life-y, but I am enjoying all of it... here is the back of my former church/new studio.

Family Day 2015

I visited my Dad on Family Day.

I left Toronto with a truck full of groceries from the Korean supermarket next to my Toronto apartment and drove north in record cold temperatures (not really that cold) and the blazing sun that slowly morphed into a magenta and golden sunset as I neared Parry Sound.

Who Do You Think You Are? (Programming and Presenting Classical Concerts in Many Settings) - small thoughts

For classical musicians (and everyone else), this is a question that comes up, but never in those exact words.

For example, when someone asks you to present a concert for them, they both want to know the answer to this question and then, either support or challenge your response.

The important thing is to have a response.  And to like your own response at a fundamental level.  If people are then willing to pay you for your response, even better!  But the order of thought is really bloody important.  

Coming Back to Life!

I need just a few more hours in the day!  I am coming back to writing about my life.
Right now, I am having time to process some of the ground-shifting experiences I have had this year... 50 solo concerts across the continent, from the deep south to the far north and to the coast and throughout the Prairies... recitals with Guy, concerti with different orchestras and my first life-changing concerts with the beautiful Valdy and Karel.  I have been a deer-in-the-headlights but so happy.  Other big changes are on the way, having sold my beautiful Toronto house but with time for one more art show before I move.

Lots to tell in the days to come...

Meanwhile, here are some images... I met so many inspiring musicians this summer... here is the inimitable Jane Siberry... she asked me to sit in her band at the first Kingsville Folk Festival and I almost fainted... bumped into her later in the summer at my favourite Toronto gym! I was actually wearing the T shirt that had her name on the back (I didn't tell her).   So much more to tell you about my first folk festivals (Kingsville and Summerfolk)...

With Valdy and Karel before our first show at Kingsville Folk Festival... first time out for my pink pants too!  Anyway, best summer ever, playing with these crazily musical men and meeting so many passionate musicians.

Met the songwriter, mad genius Graham Shaw... Valdy and Karel and I had dinner at his lakeside home and Graham insisted on giving me his fabulous paper hat after we had all jumped in the lake...

Had my first art show in 4 years on Sept 13/14... called it "ZOOM - near + far" and sold about a dozen of the 40 new works... including this one, the newest oil painting, called "Sunfall"

Touring with Valdy and Karel was a dream come true... here we are standing in front of Blueberry, his Merc touring van with our wonderful new friends from Burns Lake, B. C.,

Karen Cyr and Sandra Barth... so much more to tell about this tour!

Our really fancy tour T-shirts did not sell well in northern B. C.  (our CDs did, thank goodness)... we now have work-out gear for the rest of our lives (not really)

please write to me if you want one... they are fantastic quality, really.

We each got commemorative paddles from the

Chief Louie Paddle Company in Burns Lake and I clutched mine for the rest of the tour and it is on my dresser in my bedroom and makes me happy whenever I look at it

This is me after the Summerfolk Festival in Owen Sound, teaching two days later at the Brooke Valley Bassoon Days... this was a helluva summer for me... 

Then on to the deep south, here at the University of Southern Mississippi with Dr Kim Wooly and her lovely student before our recital on August 27... I took Graham Shaw's hat to the deep south with me... it survived and I did too

Two of my favourite musicians of my life... Guy + Valdy, both wearing almost the same shirt!

And so impressed with Lecolion Washington, bassoon professor at University of Memphis, here getting ready for Bassoon-a-Palooza with 23 young players

Rehearsing with Lecolion Washington before our recital on August 30 at the Univ of Memphis

 Guy and I flew to Eugene, Oregon on October 15 to attend Arts Northwest Showcase with one of our managers, Allison Bent.

Fun and crazy... met amazing musicians, might get a U.S. tour out of this for 2016

Anyway, we were pretending that our tour bus was parked outside the Hilton.

My Valdy tour took me straight back to my home territory for the first time ion my whole career... and while I was gone, they made the whole area into one territory!  Saw Nadina Mountain (my namesake) (it means "mountain that stands alone" because it does) from 50 miles away... gotta go back soon

Wild drive down the Fraser Canyon with Valdy whipping that pony through the mountains from Quesnel to the coast to catch the last ferry to Pender Island for our last concert on the B. C. leg of tour... 

So much more to tell.

But for now,

it has been a great year.

The future is open.

ZOOM! near + far

On Saturday, September 13, 2014, I will be hosting an exhibition of my new art in a show called ZOOM.  There are over 40 works, many of them brand new, some of them from recent years.  This will be mostly my arty art, with some playful creatures.  I will save my illustrative art for the next show.

The opening is by invitation so please write to me if you want to come.  I have included the announcement below and also the catalogue of the paintings.

As always, the proceeds of the sale go to my recording projects e.g. the ROMANZA project) and also to my charitable status group, the Council of Canadian Bassoonists.  It's all art.

Excess Baggage

Today, I emptied my bassoon case cover... I had noticed earlier that while my bassoon in it's little Gewa case is light, it becomes heavy when I zip it into the black padded backpack cover.

All became clear when I emptied the pockets and corners.  I discovered many tokens from the people I've loved most in my life... notes from my son, small gifts and notes from colleagues, photos of treasured students & recording sessions with beloved colleagues, a loving note from Sol Schoenbach from when I sent him a recording of one of my first professional solo concerts.

Some of these things still bring a smile and forward-feeling hope, a blessing for a lifetime.

Others twist me with a small, still sadness that comes from awareness of misplaced hope and trust, a momento mori.

Then I remembered that the choice is always mine.  I gently removed the things that hurt and weigh on my mind.  I left the things that are alive and lift me on my path.

In this case, it's just that simple.

Love to all,
Nadina