06 IX 2001 - 22:21 - ira1

Although I suppose this is technically the same day as it was when I wrote my last entry, it sure doesn't feel that way: I've had sleep in between (so it was four hours - sleep is sleep.) So it's not like my other many-in-one-day entries in that I have something new, if not interesting to report.

If you're looking for happiness and roses, I suggest you leave. Now.

Because today, my "something new" will be an explosion of some of my pent-up rage. I was reading a very interesting article about how cathartic moments may actually hurt more than they help, because rather than relieving (god forbid!) any of that pressure/anger-type stuff, it just makes you more eager to release more of that "pent-up" anger that wasn't necessarily there (because hey - it feels good to hit something, to explode. This I know, and it scares me half to death.)

But I can just imagine how nice it would be to take a-co and take a potato peeler to him until he... until he... oh, I don't know, I was never any good at making threats. I've had it up to here with him. I don't have the patience to teach him... well, actually, I do, because I've taught other people before, but I don't have the patience to teach someone who doesn't want to learn. Last year, I joined the orchestra for their concert because they needed a cellist capable of playing an oboe-cello duet and staying in time; according to very reliable sources, a-co griped the whole time, saying something to the effect of "i'm sure i could sound just as good as he does." Actually, I'm sure of it, too: I just say he needs fifteen more years to get there, and he says three weeks would be enough. He plays badly, so he gets bass parts in orchestra, which he claims are too easy for him although he proves unable to take it down an octave (one of the simplest transpositions), and so because he says they're too easy and he can already play his part, he doesn't practice, which means that he sounds worse, which means that he gets bass parts... yeah. You see the cycle. I already mentioned his abuse of his instrument - now, I'll talk about his complete lack of rehearsal manners. He talks over the conductor. He holds conversations with the slacker oboist next to him and they both wonder where they're supposed to be when everyone starts to play. He plays, practicing his own part while other people are playing - when the conductor wants to hear only the violins, I heard him rehearsing a run at full volume! - and I had to remind him several times that it was rude to practice your part while other people were trying to work on something with the conductor, or while the conductor was trying to say something to everyone. What cliniched it for me and put thoughts of torture with Inquisition-inspired devices (better than even the potato peeler) in my mind was the period when I looked over during the last section of the overture we're rehearsing (for borogoves and anyone else who cares - Rossini, Barber of Seville - yes, it's above our heads), which he of all people needs to be playing if he's not practicing at home, just so he can get the bloody notes under his fingers - and his cello is on the floor, his bow on the stand, his music in his lap, and he's writing accidentals in his music.

He's taking a little personal time-out to write every sharp that's in the key signature in his music.

I don't say anything, of course; we're only on the first repetition and he might yet pick up his instrument, and hey, if he has to write his accidentals into the music, maybe I'm glad he's not playing. Maybe if he has to ask me sotto voce if I have a good finger for a simple 1-2-4-2 pattern, I'm glad he's not playing. But when he doesn't pick up his instrument for three run-throughs and then doesn't play for the remainder of the time because I'm confusing him with my cello part - which he is for the most part in octaves -excuse me, for him, that's unison- with, that's inexcusable. And for what? So he can write accidentals into his part? That's what home is for: you mess up during rehearsal, you write one sharp in your part. You do the pre-emptive stuff at home. You can take your part home and spend the five minutes that you SHOULD be in REHEARSAL writing down the accidentals that you instead choose to from class.

And then: the freshman violinist knocked my bow off the stand. The damage might not appear for a year. I don't even know it was damaged, but likely the wood was hurt by the force of the blow. My bow was still wound, for Chrissakes. And I should have been more careful - but here's the thing: my bow wasn't sticking out on that side of the stand. I don't know how he managed it, and besides, you are always careful around other people's instruments. Always. Cardinal rule of being around other musicians. So he apologized, and he offered to buy me a new bow - I don't think so. That bow is as much a part of me as my arm is, and it gets wounded, I get wounded.

I'm peeved, and homework calls. Perhaps there will be another entry tonight, when slogging through homework has cooled me down a bit. Perhaps not.

J

celo, celare, celavi, celatum (1) to cover, to conceal