Tuesday, March 4, 2008

marching ahead...

I'm still pluggin' along, now with a more positive attitude which, incidentally, is easier to maintain with three of my five mid-terms finished. I had a Baroque music history listening mid-term yesterday consisting of ten snippets of music, all around one minute long, which I had to identify by ear and give title, composer, decade of composition, and five "points of interest." Our professor handed out sheets of loose leaf notebook paper at the beginning of the exam. I had been incredibly worried about that exam all weekend and it was (of course) not quite as bad as I thought it would be, but nearly so! I'm glad that I studied!

Today I had two mid-term exams for the same class. Actually, the Baroque mid-term that I just described was only one of two that I will have for that class as well. Anyway, the mid-terms were for Aural Skills, which is one of my least favorite classes. I love my professor--he is seriously one of the sweetest men I know and so honest it hurts (he'll fail you and actually be sorry about it and want to help you be better...for REAL). However, a good professor does not always redeem a tedious class, and I believe that no matter how fantastic the professor is, Aural Skills is just not meant to be enjoyable. So anyway, we had our "written" final today in which he played two melodies for us to dictate, four harmonic progressions, ten harmonic intervals (ACH!), and five chord quality identifications (double ACH!). That wasn't as bad as I thought it would be either, but it's in my nature to worry too much. I really think that it's just how I am and I either need to embrace it or ignore it or something because it's driving me insane.

Anywho, my remaining mid-terms are: Baroque multiple-choice (yay!) and Lyric Diction II German IPA transcriptions with open reference sheet (piece of cake) and performed diction exam based on our chosen art song/aria. No big deal!

What is a big deal is my Departmental Degree Approval Jury this Thursday. It's at 2:30pm and my mom is coming!! I'm so excited to see her and to have her there--it just makes everything so rosy to know that I have someone in the audience who will love me no matter what happens. I expect to do well, but having her there makes all the difference. And I know some of my friends are coming, which is also incredibly helpful. I'm actually looking forward to this!

Peace y'all

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