Three month recap

Here's a recap of last three months of my experimental semester:

January 22 - mid-February: 3 short choral pieces written (Wild Swans, Sea Violet, so comes love). Explosion of creativity. Great momentum.

Mid-February - mid March: Organized conference efforts for Kauffman. One in St. Louis and the other in Austin. Work demands more time and energy. Pulls me away from composing. Very frustrated.

Composed "whatever a moon" for a church choir. Denied a performance. Disappointment. The emotion and musical ideas will show up in another place, but for now, "whatever a moon" is safely hidden away.


Late March: Spring Break trip to Ghost Ranch!! Time to reconnect to myself and others. Relaxing and embracing my humanity ("Your humanity is your pathway to your artistry." No ice queens need apply).

Early April: I decide to throw myself into a wind ensemble piece for the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra competition. More like throwing myself into a brick wall. Total struggle. Played with some ideas but nothing really materialized. Decided to abandon the piece when I knew it wouldn't make the deadline to refocus on my bread and butter - choral music. I feel lighter already.

Looking at it from this perspective, I have had a successful quarter. I definitely can crank things up a notch though. We'll see what happens in the second quarter of my grand experiment...:)

Cheers!
Megan