#I used to be able to read treble when I was learning piano

[pianistbynight]

What are your top study strategies with piano? I'm a self-taught pianist that most started because of my love for your lie in April and how music moved people so I am always trying to improve!!!

hi! first of all, i'm sorry this took a while, i wanted to make sure i had as complete a list as possible without being too overwhelming! also not sure what level you're at, so i'm going to assume you're just starting out and you're looking to play classical music. 🙂 also this is more of a "do as i say, not as i do" bc i really struggle to do some of these consistently 🙈

try to learn some basic music theory as soon as you can. just enough to be able to read sheet music (how to read treble and bass clefs, accidentals, time signatures, basic rhythm, and key signatures) if you haven't already. that's something i regret not doing at the beginning bc the vast majority of music and all of classical music are written in sheet music and you get so much more info from it than you can from the best of synthesia videos. beyond that, knowing music theory -> pattern recognition, so it can help with sight reading and memorization. this is the youtube series i learned the basics from. it's pretty comprehensive although i find he's sometimes hard to hear and goes off on a tangent. at the very least, you can use it as a guide for what to type into the search box to get a more concise explanation as there are lots online!

familiarize yourself with the basic technical exercises (scales, arpeggios, triads, etc.) in every key bc those patterns and fingerings appear all the time in classical music.

practice sight reading. (yes, i know it hurts the brain, it hurts mine too, but it will really really speed up the learning process when learning new repertoire so we can focus on the more fun aspects of music! 😆😅)

practice every day! and not just moving your fingers, your mind needs to be present and your ears need to be listening (e.g. are you playing with the right dynamics? are you moving in a way that will get the right tone? how is your posture?). sometimes it's a lot to be thinking about as you're playing, so it helps to record yourself and listen back. once you feel yourself losing focus or making the same mistakes over and over again, maybe it's time to take a little break bc practice makes permanent and you don't wanna injure yourself 🙂

on that note, playing an instrument is kind of like playing a sport in that you need to make sure you use proper form so you don't injure yourself (using bigger muscle groups like your arm and gravity rather than forcing the sound through blocky fingers)! if you play on a digital, the keys will generally be lighter than on an acoustic (highly recommend trying to play on both to compare!), so making a conscious effort to play the way you would be forced to on an acoustic is all the more important.

i hope this helps! my ask box is always open if you have any more questions or just wanna talk music 🎶💗 i'm really excited for you! expressing yourself through music and sharing it with others is so fulfilling 😊

[daybydayinaquote]

Better Every Day: Day 315

November 11 If you could acquire a talent, what would it be? What is preventing you from acquiring this talent?

I wish that I was able to play the piano. When I was younger I used to take lessons to learn how to play. But I never really put the effort into it. Like it helped me when it came to me being in band and knowing how to read treble clef music. But then, reading bass clef... it has always been a bit difficult for me. But I do wish that I had put more effort into that. I could just play my heart out like all those other pianists. And just make beautiful music...

[bge00]

I did use the same source reading-wise that will be linked at the end of this update, but my first step with learning the bass clef notes was similar to my approach to learning the treble clef. I was able to discover that similar to the treble clef notes, the bass clef also gets its name from how it's shaped on the musical staff, with two dots on the right of a fancy looking F, resulting in the name of the F clef note. I also learned the specific instrument more likely to sound these bass clef notes were the bass guitar, timpani, trombone and double bass, but when it comes to playing the piano, it's usually the left hand that's needed to do the work. Source: MasterClass. (2021, June 7). Treble Clef and Bass Clef Guide: What are Clefs in music? - 2024. MasterClass. https://www.masterclass.com/articles/treble-clef-and-bass-clef-guide

[nvvermore]

Entr’acte

For the second time, Amaryllis drops everything and steps away from their comfort zone when Beatrice needs a teacher, this time with a very different group of students [@juliandev0rak]

words: 2108

cw: none

—

“What do you think about maybe visiting the school? Maybe… teaching some music lessons?”

“You want me to teach your kids?”

“Well, I’m not asking for you to come to teach full time or anything, but,”

“I’m not very good with children.”

“If you managed to teach me, you’ll have no problem with them!”

“Beatrice.”

“I’m joking! They’re really wonderfully behaved children, I promise. Besides, how bad can you really be if you’re friends with Lucio?”

“You’ve made a good point,” Amaryllis laughs. “What exactly would I teach them? I doubt they need professional-level vocal instruction.”

“You know music! You can sing and play the piano, and probably other instruments too-“

“Guitar. And violin, but only a little.”

“See! You could teach them all about notes, how to play nursery rhymes. It’s mostly about giving them something fun to do, like art class or recess.”

“So you do want me to come in on a regular basis?”

“Well, if you’re a good fit I wouldn’t mind it…”

“Alright then. I’ll come teach.”

“Really?” In her excitement, Beatrice throws her arms around Amaryllis’s neck in a crushing hug. “Oh thank you, Amie!” They return it after a moment, arms wrapping around her middle. When they part, there’s the loveliest pink flush to her cheeks, their faces only inches apart. Reluctantly, Amaryllis breaks away from her embrace.

“I am a little busy with the masquerade approaching, but I can make time.”

“Tomorrow?” Beatrice suggests quickly.

“Tomorrow, hm? You don’t already have lesson plans for the day?”

“Ah, well-“

“You knew I’d say yes.”

“I was right.”

- - -

And that was how Amaryllis ended at the old coliseum turned schoolhouse, with carefully crafted lesson plans in hand. They had even gone out of their way to dress in the most modest and brightest dress they had in their wardrobe, along with simple pumps and opaque tights.

Once Amaryllis was standing before the doors, dressed in spring green, the gravity of how fully head-over-heels they had fallen for Beatrice dawned on them. In their right, not lovesick mind, they would never willingly venture out in such a manner. They’d even completely forgone their veil for the afternoon— it was hardly necessary to do so, but Amaryllis was dead set on being a good example.

On the other side of the doors, it seemed Beatrice had been waiting for them. Seated on a nearby bench with her nose in a book, it was the same way she’d often wait for them before their lessons together. There was nothing out of the ordinary or new about the sight of her, but Amaryllis still found themself stopping to take her in. Leaning against the wall, they watched the way her lips moved as she read, how focused she was as her eyes flit across the pages.

Soon enough, the moment passes when Beatrice finally takes note of them.“Amie!” she jumps into her feet, and Amaryllis notices the way her expression drops into surprise for a split-second. Then, she proceeds to unabashedly look them up and down, grin returning to her lips when her eyes meet theirs. “You have perfect timing! The children should be just getting back from recess. Come, I’ll show you around.”

Without warning, Beatrice takes their hand, and Amaryllis has to stop themself from giving into the urge to intertwine their fingers with hers.

Beatrice leads them through the halls, enthusiastically pointing out various classrooms and other school facilities. She tells them all about what she’s already been able to do with the school and her goals for the future. Amaryllis drinks up every word, and the passion she has for her students makes them fall a little bit more in love with her.

They make a mental note to see to it that a little bit more of their salary is directed to the school— discreetly through Nadia, lumped in with what she already uses to fund Vesuvia’s public education.

“And this is my classroom!” Beatrice pulls them into a room with rows of little desks decorated in little messes of papers and books. Amaryllis looks around the modest room, in awe at all the carefully-crafted decor she had put up all over the walls. Posters and signs that must have taken her hours and hours to make.

There was the common alphabet drawn out all the way across the front wall above the chalkboard. Large and colorful drawings acting as helpful reminders of numbers, shapes, days of the week, and months of the year. Not all of it was purely educational; messages of inspiration were all over, encouragement just a glance away for any child who needed it. Even each desk had a carefully handwritten tag spelling out each child's first and last name.

Amaryllis realizes they must have looked around the room a little too long, because when they glance back to Beatrice, she’s fiddling with her the clasp of her cloak. The instinct to assure her overcomes them, and they reach out and place their hands over hers

“Beatrice, this is lovely. I can tell you truly love your work.”

She looks hesitant for a moment, as though she might brush the complement off, but smiles after a moment. “Thank you, Amie. I really do love it.”

Amaryllis quickly squeezes her hands before taking them back. “I hope I can meet your high standards.”

“If I had any doubts, I wouldn’t have asked you,” she opens her mouth like she has more to say, but then tiny voices and giggles sound from the hallway. Something in her composure shifts then, and in a second she goes from their Beatrice to the student’s Beatrice.

Greeting each child with a warm smile as they file into the room, not an ounce of hesitance or nervousness. Amaryllis can’t take their eyes off of her, wants to take in all of her radiance that comes with her moments of total confidence. That beautiful smile of hers is then turned on them, and class is ready to begin.

“Settle in everyone! This afternoon we have a very special guest!” Beatrice addresses the class animatedly. She steps back, gesturing for Amaryllis to step up. It almost feels like they’ve somehow switched places with each other; Beatrice has all of the certainty and Amaryllis is full of worry. But they would do this, and do it well, for her, and for these children.

“Hello, you can call me Amie,” they introduce themself with the nickname instead, as their name could be difficult to pronounce for ones so young. “Together, we’re going to learn all about music!” Amaryllis glances to Beatrice, who watches them with a soft expression, and in turn she gives an encouraging nod. “For today’s lesson, I’m going to show you how to write your very own song!”

- - -

The lesson had run wonderfully, much to Amaryllis’s surprise. The class was a modestly-sized one, and all in attendance were very eager to learn. They’d begun with the very basics of treble clef, explaining the lettering and telling them the silly acronyms to assist in remembering. As the children demonstrated they were catching on to their teachings, Amaryllis shed their hesitance.

In the end, they were able to assist each student in writing out their own little two-measure song. None of them really knew they were writing, but Amaryllis could hear each little song as they went over it with Beatrice’s students. Some of them put the same note down eight times, some of them followed the alphabet, some of them randomly placed notes on the staff. It was sweet, to see each child’s method of creating.

Amaryllis’s plan was for Beatrice to hold on to what they’d written, because next time they would teach them how to sing their songs. Each child was already so proud of what they’d accomplished, and Amaryllis was truly looking forward to showing them how it sounded.

Once their lesson was concluded, it was time to wrap up for the day. Amaryllis stood back once again to let Beatrice take back over, and meanwhile they made themself at home in her desk chair. When the students finally were dismissed, Amaryllis did not expect for several of them to flock around them.

One little girl told them how pretty their hair was; another told them that he thought their scar was so cool. A little boy explained very thoroughly that he’d been taking piano lessons since he was very little. It took a few more minutes of questioning and stories and several promises that they would return next week for everyone to clear out.

Beatrice saw the last little straggler out of the door and closed it behind her. “‘Bad with children’, hm?” She was beaming again, surely pleased to have something to call them on.

“I may have lied,” Amaryllis admits. Beatrice raises a brow in questioning, settling down onto her desk in front of them. “It’s just, I don’t tend to be the best influence.”

“Amie, that’s not true,” she reaches forward to take their hand, “you were just actively being a positive influence for the past two hours.”

“I tried my very best, abeille.” ‘I tried my very best for you’, goes unsaid.

“I think you did wonderful! Even I learned things I didn’t know before.”

“Then I must not be doing enough in our private lessons.”

“That’s not what I meant!”

“I know, I’m simply teasing you.” Amaryllis rests their clasped hands against Beatrice’s knee. She isn’t sitting as ‘lady-like’ as she typically tends to, her legs remain uncrossed and knees apart. Her long skirts cover her all the way down to the ankle, perfectly decent, though Amaryllis’s thoughts about their current positions are anything but. Slipping their hands under said skirts, the feel of her skin under their fingers as they push the fabric up and— now was not the time or place to fantasize about her.

“You know, I meant to say,” she glances away when Amaryllis’s eyes meet hers, cheeks rosy. “You look, different.”

“I know, it’s atrocious, isn’t it?”

“Absolutely not!” Beatrice bites her lip, before continuing. “I think you look just as lovely like this,” she rushes to add, “and it’s nice to see your face. Outside of the rehearsal room. In public. That probably sounds a little odd-“

Amaryllis’s breath falters. “It doesn’t.”

“Oh, good, then.” Beatrice’s free hand picks at the surface of the desk. “Then is there a reason you didn’t wear your veil today? I’ve noticed you don’t usually go anywhere outside the palace without it.”

“It’s part of my effort to not be a poor influence,” they explain. “Little ones are so impressionable, it wouldn’t do to cover up like I’m ashamed.”

“Are you?” she blurts out, looking instantly regretful. Amaryllis doesn’t talk about these things, they never do. But with Beatrice, they feel safe enough to forgo many of their masks.

“Rationally, I know there isn’t anything to be ashamed about. But it’s,” they take a deep breath, “difficult when someone once put in a lot of effort into making you think that way. You never know who else will treat you that same way. So, I prefer to have a shield.”

“You’ve never worn it when it was just us.”

“Because I know you’d never make me feel ashamed.”

“Amie, I—“ Beatrice is cut off by a knock on the door that makes them both jump. She releases their hand, sliding off of the desk to let the interloper in. Simply a concerned parent who’s come to speak with his child’s teacher. Amaryllis takes it as their cue to excuse themself.

“I’m quite busy with preparations, so I’m afraid I might not see you again until the masquerade.”

“It’s only a few days away, and I’ll be sure to practice extra hard in place of our missed lesson.”

“Not too hard. We don’t want a repeat of the last time you strained yourself.” Though truthfully, Amaryllis wouldn’t mind bringing her tea again, or taking care of her, settling on her comfy little couch to snuggle up.

Beatrice throws her hands up dramatically. “I won’t practice that much, I promise!”

“Good girl,” they take her hand, relishing in her flustered face, “until we meet again.” Amaryllis places a kiss on the back of her hand, leaving behind a deep red stain. With a respectful nod to the waiting father, they step back out into the hall.

Normally, Amaryllis loved work. It kept them busy, kept them distracted. But they were already distracted by something other than work, and they had a feeling the next few days would be agonizing without a moment of Beatrice’s company.

[withperfecttempo]

Headcanon - On Learning and Being Taught How to Read Music

***Please do not reblog/steal***

// Lestara most likely played an instrument to be able to give Sona any sort of guidance with learning music. I would imagine that she played a stringed instrument that is the closest to the etwahl like the harp or piano. One reason I narrowed harp and piano is that they seem to have similar layouts in their scores by having treble and bass clef ledger lines. Lestara would use sheet music from her collections for references and to teach what she could as a foundation for Sona’s following experiences. Sona is a fast-learner, has a keen memory, and is able to learn music by ear; all of which she has shown in her childhood years before her adoption. When she was taught how to read music, she is able to pick up quickly and draw connections with what she already knows. With her curiosity, she probably has tried to teach herself at some points as well.

[rugessnome]

I'm going to pretend @overlyelegantstranger tagged me... 1. Nickname: Mouse is my longstanding online nickname, and for a bit less, DT (for Darth Tenebrous, actually, given my URL) ...actually I spelled Adrien the way I did because I've an OC who shortens her (different) name to "Ien", but I haven't found it convenient to introduce, nor convinced myself it refers to me. 2. Zodiac sign: I'm supposedly a Taurus; actually the sun was in Aries at my birth, and while those often suit me in tumblr astrology, I resent the assigned nature of it all so uh... also no. 3. Height: Five four, maybe five foot five if I'm lucky and standing particularly straight 4. Hogwarts house: Mostly Ravenclaw, with some Slytherin sympathies and a newfound appreciation for Hufflepuff. I will actively resent Gryffindor colors unless you tell me they're actually Shuos (even though I would probably be a Nirai, if anything, in the hexarchate. But I love certain of my foxes.) and/or somehow Sith. 5. Last thing I googled: "Nebuchadnezzar poisoning", because @piermanwalter reminded me of an anecdote in The Disappearing Spoon about how the eating grass thing might have been prompted by inadvertent poisoning. I didn't remember which element; turns out it's lead AND antimony. 6. Favourite musicians: Idk; Over the Rhine are up there, and lately The Mountain Goats. I've also seen Belle & Sebastian and Camera Obscura in concert, so I suppose they're up there. Vienna Teng, Regina Spektor... This is an incomplete list. 7. Song stuck in my head: the phrasing of this question keeps putting some song I don't even really know that has "over my head, over my head" in it? But really it's OTR's "And Can It Ever Be?", with which I am a little obsessed anew, because: "This night is so dark/this night is silence, and very little fear/tell me that this welcome peace/isn't dancing with the ghost of future tears" 8. Following now: four hundred ish? I'm going to check and come back and edit. The vast majority of whom are inactive and/or not personal blogs. 9. Followers: I think this is around 500, although I am/may be long overdue for a purge of spam/porn blogs 10. Do I get asks: Mostly only when I ask for them. But occasionally. 11. Amount of sleep: I gravitate towards about 8 hours. I am practically nonfunctional normally on much less than 6, and lately, thanks to um... anxiety, even getting by on 6 is difficult. 12. Lucky number: ...in some ways π, in some ways e 13. What I’m wearing: Star Trek ~lounge pants I made from Enterprise/"Star Trek" print fabric, and an oversized t-shirt I got when I participated in a litter cleanup 14. Dream job: uhhh something involving as many as possible of: sci-comm, math or programming tasks, a result helpful to people, and maybe a bit of domestic travel now and again?? Idk, I seem to change my mind on this frequently and don't really have a good or set idea. 15. Dream trip: I think the idea I'm most into at the moment is one day, hoping the present situation doesn't actually end service for good, is riding the uh "Empire Builder" Amtrak route through the northern US. Aside from that, I recently went to West Virginia and western Pennsylvania and would enjoy going back and also I am (except for quarantine concerns) almost always up for a road trip to Michigan. 16. Favourite food: this is not something I am good at deciding. There are too many good ones. Something, such as I had for dinner, involving potatoes, corn tortillas, and some peppers and tomatoes (or tomatillos in something else) and cheese as seasoning is my idea of great comfort food. I appreciate a good meatloaf but I also really don't mind eating vegetarian meals on a regular basis, given they're something I like. 17. Instruments: um. I can kinda play a few pieces, with idiosyncratic timing, on keyboard/piano and that's about it. I don't fluently read music though I might be able to work through something in treble clef. I recently acquired a cheap ukulele but I am struggling with tuning it, or understanding how it's used in songs or... 18. Languages: rusty, at best I was almost capable of halting conversation, German and Spanish. I have the Duolingo Latin tree but I don't think it's um... that extensive. I have learned a little Russian and beyond that just... too many interests, without much time being devoted to any of them. 19. Favourite song: I'm into "And Can It Ever Be?" anew, as I said above; also more recently "Your Honor" and "Ghost of Corporate Future" off Soviet Kitsch (aand, a bit awkwardly, "Hotel Song"). "You Or Your Memory" "Dance Music" "This Year" and "Up the Wolves" (which is to say that basically the larger part of my album rotation lately is Soviet Kitsch, The Sunset Tree, and Till We Have Faces)... 20. Random fact: I have been watching retro computer repair videos lately (Adrian's Digital Basement esp) and they've made me kinda want to learn to solder. Though I'm not sure whether I'll look into this before we're past current events or not. (Probably I'd start with some of the kits from Evil Mad Scientist Labs) 21. Aesthetic Standing in a broad-shouldered greatcoat surveying a wintry landscape, perhaps feeling powerful, but with a note of melancholy and humility to it. Welcoming a dear friend in, pet in arms, with an array of beautiful if homely chopped vegetables and prepared ingredients inside waiting to be cooked up. A hobbit math professor relaying an algebra theorem or a physics application. Walking near a wetland in a flannel, among the trees and wildlife.

[mischiefandmagic6]

A Favor Only You Can Do

Well, fuck. I was so ready to finish a bunch of days and the motivation machine broke. On another note, my family is almost done with binging GoT. All we have is season 7 left. Now to the fic. As always, it is on AO3 with the rest of the month prompts.

Marinette frantically ran around her room. She had no clue if her design was to fit on a person. All her mannequins were female shaped and not male. If she were to push herself, then she needed to not make only women clothes. An idea formed in her head and she picked her phone up sending a quick text.

Ten minutes later, Adrien burst into her room. “Are you okay?” he asked,  out of breath and searching over her body.

“Yes,” she said, wondering why he looked frantic.

“What’s the emergency?”

“Oh,” It clicked in her mind, “not a literal emergency. I have a favor that only you can do.”

Adrien took a deep breath. “Okay, what do you need?”

“Can you help me model my clothes? I don’t have male mannequins,” she asked him.

“Sure, what do you need me to do?” He asked.

“Just to put this on as I make any adjustments.” She handed him a jacket to try on.

Carefully, Adrien slipped the jacket on. The pins were in securely, but it’s better safe than sorry.

The next hour and a half was spent with Marinette directing Adrien to move certain ways as she adjusted each part of the jacket. It wouldn’t have taken as long if Adrien hadn’t kept making faces or ridiculous poses.

“So who’s the jacket for?” He asked after he took the jacket off for the alterations.

“Right now, it’s for no one,” she said. “I’m just expanding my skills. Instead of making clothes for women, I’m attempting men’s.”

“And as you said, you don’t have a male mannequin,” he finished the statement.

“Correct,” she shook her hand when she poked a finger with the needle. “Thank you for helping me.”

Adrien sat down on her chaise. “It’s no problem. I was lucky that Father hadn’t scheduled anything for me.”

“Did you happen to drop what you were doing and run?”

“Possibly,” he said.

She gave him a look. “What did you drop?”

“Nothing important,” Adrien dismissed. “How are the alterations going?”

“Right now, they’re good. I’ll need you to put it back on after I finish so I can see if I got it correct,” she said as she turned her sewing machine on.

Since Adrien knew she got in the zone when she sewed, he messed around on his phone. She knew that he was watching cat videos.

It took an hour of sewing for her to finish the project. When she had told Adrien that the jacket was for no one, she lied. It was actually for him. He had complained that he didn’t have a jacket that could keep the cold out.

Marinette stood up with the jacket in hand. “Now for the final test: seeing if the jacket fits.”

“I’m sure it does,” Adrien said as he stood to put the jacket on.

The next few minutes were spent tugging and flattening the jacket, much to her embarrassment. There were some parts that needed more fine-tuning, but it worked well considering that she didn’t have his measurements.

“Seems like you did a good job,” he praised. He took the jacket off again, careful of the few pins on it.

“Thanks, I needed a challenge.” She set the jacket down and turned to Adrien. “How was your day before I pulled you here?”

“Eh, boring,” he plopped back down on her chaise. “Being here is way more enjoyable than the piano.”

“I wish I could play the piano,” she said. “Or any instrument really.”

Adrien shifted to face her, his face was lit up. “I could teach you if you want.”

“I don't want to trouble you any more,” Marinette tried to counter.

“Think of it as a favor for me,” he said. “I help you, you help me.”

She tried to figure out how that made sense. “How is you teaching me piano helping you?”

“It would make it more fun,” Adrien flipped on his back. “That's how you would help.”

Marinette hummed. “I guess I can’t argue with that logic.”

“I’m going to pretend that you actually meant that.”

“What should I learn first?” she asked through her giggles.

He sat up, said, “bring a notebook and pencil real quick, please,” and patted the space next to him.

She followed the instructions and turned to an empty page before handing it to him. He took it and drew ten lines spaced apart.

“What I’m going to show you is a scale,” he said as he drew dots and vertical lines. At the beginning of the scale, he drew an open brace and on the top set of lines, he drew what looked like an ‘and’ symbol and on the bottom set, a backwards ‘c’ with a colon next to it.

“This symbol is called a treble clef,” he tapped on the top line, “and this one is a bass clef,” he moved the pencil down to the bottom line.

“Why are there two clefs?” She asked, mentally taking notes.

“With the piano, you use both hands,” Adrien held his hands up. “The left one is for the bass and the right is the treble.”

“That makes sense,” Marinette took the pencil out of his hands to make a few notes on the paper. “So, why the open brace?”

“That makes it a grand staff,” he took the pencil back to write it down. “It joins the two clefs to make one piece of music. It’s also the harder notion to use.”

“I’m kind of getting this,” she said, leaning forward. “And I think I should probably learn the easy stuff first.”

He grinned sheepishly. “That would probably be the best and once you understand it, it does get easier in my experience.”

“Okay, now I know there are notes,” she smiled.

“There are,” he gave her a look. When she looked back at him, he turned back to the paper. There he wrote one set of lines on a new paper with a treble clef at the beginning. “Each note represents a letter. E,F,G,A,B,C,D,E,F.” Each letter was written down next to each note.

“I’m not going to be able to remember that,” she admitted. Sure, it was the alphabet but it all seemed to mesh together.

Adrien laughed. “There’s a saying that helps. Every good boy does fine and face.” He wrote it down on the paper. The first of each word on the first saying was capitalized and the word ‘face’ was in all caps.

“Oh!”

“It definitely helped me when I was beginning,” he said. “This is pretty much all I can teach you without an actual piano. The reading part kind of goes along with playing and the rhythms as well.”

“Good, my head was starting to swim,” Marinette joked.

“Oh, har har.” Adrien set the notebook next to him. “Soon enough it will make sense if you want to keep up.”

“We’ll see about that.”

He opened his mouth to say something when his phone went off. He held a finger up and went to the other side of her room to answer it.

Marinette stood to clean up the mess. She had placed the jacket on her desk when Adrien came back over.

“That was Nathalie,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I have to go home.”

She sighed. “Thank you again for your help.”

“It’s not a problem. It was a favor,” Adrien reminded her.

With a smile, she lead him downstairs. She picked up a few pastries to give to him. “Don’t let Nathalie see this.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Adrien winked and pressed a kiss to her cheek before he left.

Her hand rose to her cheek. She may have to call more favors.

[10000badframes]

Why I Left Music

To understand why I left music, you've got to start with why and how I got into music.

When I was little, I was deaf, and when my hearing was restored, it came back in stages. I would listen, rapt, to a My First Symphony tape as the sections of the orchestra were introduced one by one, and as time went on, each became more intelligible. High pitches were easier to discern, so the flute stood out like a beam of light in the darkness. What's more, I was surrounded by music on a daily basis. My dad is a wildly creative and intuitive musician, proficient on a number of instruments, my mother and brother sang beautifully, and my sister had been singing and playing violin from an early age. We sang as a family at home and at church, and I was in choir and handbell choir from my earliest memories on. I don't remember not being able to read music.   I started with piano, and moved to flute once my arms were long enough for the starter headjoint, in about fourth grade. My first teacher was the principle flute player with the Rochester Philharmonic, and when I moved to Iowa, I learned from the principal of the Des Moines Symphony. Both teachers made the smart move of throwing repertoire at me which was much more advanced than the usual stuff at my level, and because I didn't know it was supposed to be hard, I rocketed forward at a feverish pace. I continued with choir and handbell choir, and as my skill became more evident, I added youth orchestra, honor band, and pit orchestras, and that was just after school. During school I was in marching band, concert band, jazz band, and orchestra. I attended elite months-long summer camps for the nation's best young musicians. I competed regularly, and at one point was considered to be one of the top three musicians in my age bracket in the country. My first tattoo was of a treble clef. As a shy child in a talented family, I was pleased to have found my talent, the thing I didn't have to work very hard at in order to achieve great things. I rested my self-confidence on that talent, and when opportunities came up to show it off, I didn't turn them down. Nobody forced me to do any of the activities above; it came with a built-in social life and plentiful affirmation, so I almost never paused to think about whether or not this was something I actually wanted to do forever. It was simply assumed, as inherent a fact of life as the sunrise.   I probably should have known it wasn't for me when practicing was boring; almost unbearable. I heard about people enjoying practicing, and assumed that they were lying in order to look good. I would avoid it however I could, and did pretty well regardless. I loved ensemble work because I loved music, but listening to myself for hours on end, however good the result was, was miserable. At the worst of times, I assumed that my hatred of practicing meant that I was lazy and undisciplined, inherently a bad artist, and probably a bad person. I heard talk about 'flow state,' and how it made the time fly. Having never achieved it, I assumed that it was a lie. Since I'd specialized to such a high degree, music was the only course to follow in college. The culture surrounding classical music then became much more evident, divorced as it was from my little Midwestern fishbowl. I learned about the way I was expected to present my gender, and was pressured by my teacher to grow out my pixie cut out of concern that I wasn't feminine enough to be a flute player. I learned about the ingrained gender divide, and how child-bearing was considered the knell of doom for female musicians. I learned that I was one of thousands of young musicians all competing for the same handful of jobs, which could wait for perfection to walk through the door as the market was so flooded. I learned that blind auditions don't mask your gender if the judges can hear you inhale. Most depressing of all, I learned that my chances of getting an orchestral job - the only thing which I enjoyed about being a musician - were so small as to be statistically impossible. I would have to join the military, become a teacher, or quit. At first, I quit. Two years into my bachelor's degree at a prestigious school, I quit, leaving my family and community reeling in shock. They had all invested faith, time, and money in my dream of being a musician, and I had thrown it away. To them, it appeared to be an impulsive, flaky, and selfish decision to make, flying in the face of every opportunity I'd been given. To me, I was trying to stand up for myself. I was lost, depressed, occasionally suicidal, and suffering from ulcers. I was still battling the notion that I was lazy and undisciplined, and now everyone I knew saw me in the worst possible light. I leaned into my new failure status, and piled bad choices on top of bad choices, embarrassing myself and my family. Years later, when I had leveled out somewhat and come to terms with the fact that I needed a bachelor's degree in order to be taken seriously on the job market, I wanted to do anything except for music. I enrolled in a community college and took math, science, and art courses, the latter having been a hobby of mine since I was young. I'd been drawing cartoons to put in my boyfriend's lunch for years, and in my drawing and painting classes, I honed the skill. When the time came to transfer my credits to the state college, the majority of my post-high school credits were in art and music. I applied at the state's art school, and was turned down. My financial reality became clear; in order to get a bachelor's degree in under three years, the majority of my transferrable credits were in music, so to music I had to return. I was accepted at the music school, and went back to rehearsals, practicing, and competing. It was much the same as the last time, in ways both good and bad, with the notable difference that this time I was resigned to the impossibility of it all. Whenever people said they'd had a satisfying practice session, I lied through my teeth and said I had, too. I incurred my debt, got my degree, and left with zero intention of pursuing a master's, surfing a new wave of disappointment from teachers and my community alike. The shambling zombie of my career ambitions followed me when I moved to New York City due to my husband's job, and I paid hundreds of dollars for lessons from eminent professionals at Juilliard and the New York Philharmonic. I took masterclasses, invested in new equipment, and auditioned. Nothing substantial ever came from it, as the statistics had foretold. I watched my classmates move into the military and teaching, with a lucky few going on to teach at the collegiate level, and even fewer achieving a performance career. I practiced, and hated every minute. Then, at my breaking point, I watched Monsters University. It's such a weird way to switch gears. People took a number of things away from their experience of MU; mine was the message that you can be amazing at something and still never hope to make a career of it. What you have to do when you've faced up to that truth is to find what you loved about the career you thought you were going to have and apply it somewhere else. Adapt. Something better might be waiting. I thought about how live music is being replaced with synthesized music and orchestras are dying across the nation. I looked at my dusty art portfolio. There were dozens of animators in that credits sequence after MU, I thought. There are two flutes in every orchestra. The next day, I sat down with my husband at lunch, and said, "let's move to California. I want to be a 3D animator." This was surprising coming from me; I'd only ever reluctantly taken to digital media, and barely knew how to use Photoshop. My reasoning was that if I wanted to be at the forefront of a growing industry, and if I re-trained in animation, I would have a better chance of getting work than I had now (there was nowhere to go but up in that respect.) There would be more opportunities for both of us out in California, where his company had a major office, and where several prominent studios were housed. He agreed immediately, and got me The Illusion of Life for my 29th birthday. Maya is a hell of a tough program at the best of times. It has a mind of its own, and even when everything is running smoothly, you have to contend with such gauntlets as the graph editor (a mathematical representation of motion over time.) You know what you want the characters to do, but you have to use this thorny, labyrinthine program to do it, and I've cried many tears of frustration over it. You are responsible for every single movement, every blink, every shrug, every breath. It is dizzyingly easy to mess up, and impossibly, sixteen-dimensionally complicated. And yet. Flow state, that thing I thought was a lie? I found it. It was about six months in, while I was still wrestling with the program. I was grappling with the reality that I'm not naturally good at this, that my talent lies elsewhere, and any progress I make in this quarter will come from elbow grease alone. I was making adjustments to a scene, and realized that four hours had passed unnoticed. I felt energized and satisfied. I craved more. At thirty, I found out that I wasn't lazy and undisciplined, that I didn't hate hard work, that I wasn't a terrible person - I was just very, very good at something I didn't truly want to do. Now, I struggle and weep and sink weeks and months into seconds worth of footage, and I love it. Wild horses couldn't keep me away.

[ftjust]

Piano notea

#PIANO NOTEA HOW TO#

#PIANO NOTEA FULL#

#PIANO NOTEA DOWNLOAD#

We therefor limit the notation system to notes that should be shorter or longer.

#PIANO NOTEA HOW TO#

The best way to learn music theory is to watch a video on YouTube that demonstrates its use and how to read it. This page contains songs that can be played in-game on the Raft Piano. The information that music theory provides is the backbone to all music. Sheet music is a written version of music that can be read and understood by a musician. They resemble tiny hieroglyphics of sorts. Were your online sheet music source for music books, music sheets, songbooks, music scores, choral sheet music and more From piano sheet music to flute sheet. I created this basic flashcard game as a follow up to our popular 'Notes - Learn To Read Music' app. Major Chords To form a major chord you use the root, third and fifth of the major scale. We take a look at major, minor, diminished, major seventh, dominant seventh, minor seventh and minor seventh flat five chords in all keys. Music notes symbols and meanings are typically short lines with dots and lines on them. 'Piano Notes' will help intermediate learners to improve their sight-reading of notes on the bass and treble clef in the keys of C, F, G, Bb, D, Eb, A, Ab and E (0-4 flats, 1-4 sharps). Piano Keyboard Chords There are lots of keyboard chords on this page. Music notes symbols and meanings are typically short lines with dots and lines on them This makes learning sheet music even easier. This means that vast majority of our music notes can be heard and followed bar by bar. The first key(just right before two black keys) is called note C, move to the next key. You are just seconds away from score selection to checkout.Īnd once you complete your purchase you will be presented with a green button which will take you to your ordered digital sheet music page.įrom there you will be able to view your chosen sheet music, if the score is transposable, you will be able to transpose.īut that’s not all: our interactive digital sheet music viewer allows playback funcationality as well. Every piano has white and black keys, well you all know that. The purchase process is as simple as it gets. Now that you know where C is located, it’s easy to find the other notes. These are the notes of the entire musical alphabet. These notes are (obviously) A, B, C, D, E, F and G. Our search bar is really easy to use and will present you with variaty of music notes selection when you start inserting your desired song title. Piano notes are named after the first seven letters of the alphabet.

#PIANO NOTEA FULL#

Finding the right sheet music you need takes only a couple of clicks.Īt MusicNotesRoom you will not only be able to find what you are looking for to improve your musical skills but also get full attention from our team if needed.

#PIANO NOTEA DOWNLOAD#

We have thousands of digital sheet music of various genres.Īnd it’s for you to pick, choose and print (or download as PDF). Weather you are looking for keyboard, easy piano or beginner piano, we have you covered. Have you been searching for piano sheet music and had a hard time finding the right one? Look no further because we at have the right sheet music for you. Learn to play your piano sheet music in minutes

[sodoyouknowbts]

Yoongi x Reader - Guardian (Three)

Part of the ‘Souls’ Series.

Summary: Min Yoongi is a cynical guardian angel assigned to look after you.

Pairing: Yoongi x Reader (ft Hoseok)

Genre: Romance, fantasy, soul mates

Author: Pilot

Chapter Three

You get back to your apartment, unlocking the door and pushing it open. You stand there for a moment, your mind going back to your run in with him. Min Yoongi. Your face reddens at the thought of him saving you, your body pressed against his chest. You throw your keys down onto the dining table and slam the door shut. You kick off your shoes.

You scoff again and throw your bag down onto the couch, the heavy encyclopaedia drags the bag onto the floor. It lands on the floor with a thud.

You head to the kitchen sink, run your hands under the water and then place your cool hands up to your cheeks. Why were you getting flushed thinking about this random guy? A random good looking guy. A random psychotic good looking guy. A random psychotic guy who thinks he’s an angel. You remind yourself. You pat your cheeks again and turn the tap off.

You head to your room, pull out your notebook and take a seat on your bed, getting comfy. Propping your legs up, you pull the notebook open by its yellow ribbon. After pulling the cap of the pen off with your teeth, you begin to write about your day. It was the best way to de-stress for you, to jot down bullet points and random thoughts.

You look over at your calendar hanging from the wall. Your internship at the consulting firm started on Monday. It wasn’t the job you wanted to end up with, but it was one that you needed, to pay your rent and bills.

It was a temporary internship after all and you did plenty of temp jobs. Until you got your marks back, you wouldn’t be able to practice law and even then, not until you took the bar exam. You had decided to settle on journalism in the mean time, uncertain if you could bear the thought of further study. Besides, you enjoyed law reform and access to justice and you knew that law wasn’t the only avenue to pursue it. It was something your mother was always passionate about and in turn, you were too. You had a soft spot for the hard-working underdogs who had everything against them.

You cast your notebook aside and flop down onto the bed. Glad your exams were over, you could finally relax and just focus on work.

//

“No, it’s more like this.” Yoongi circles the treble cleft and draws a little arrow on the music sheet.

Won Young nods and tries again, his foot pressing down on the peddle of the piano as his touches the keys.

Yoongi closes his eyes and nods. The melody echoes throughout the music room.

Won Young makes another mistake and in frustration, slams his hands on the keys.

“What did I say about disrespecting your instruments?!” Yoongi says. “Here. Feel the music, let it flow.”

Won Young sneers. “Feel the music?”

Yoongi shoots him a look. “Shuffle over.”

Won young obliges, moving to the edge of the seat. Yoongi sits in the centre, flexes his hands and closes his eyes. He begins to play. Won Young watches quietly, eyes wide. Yoongi was a pro, his hands moving across the keys in fluid motions, his slender fingers extending to hit the furthest keys with ease. He presses the pedals down lightly, increasing and decreasing the sound. The melody flows, somewhat melancholic. He finishes the first verse, lifts his hands up and leans back on the piano stool, nodding proudly and jutting out his chin.

Won Young claps, teasing a little and laughs. He pauses. Yoongi watches his expression change and his face grow pensive.

“You know what I’ve noticed, Wonnie?” Yoongi says, sliding the piano lid down and covering the keys. “You’ve been trying really hard of late to devoid yourself of feeling things.” He turns to look at him. “Piano is hard, things are hard. It’s okay to feel angry and annoyed about it.”

Won Young blinks, his face stern.

“You think that if you block your emotions, things get easier. Trust me. They don’t. It’s okay to feel depressed and it’s okay to feel happy. Even if you think you have no right to feel happy.” Yoongi scratches the back of his head.

“You just need to learn how to embrace your emotions. Not try to switch them off or to control them, but just to embrace them. Music helps, too.”

//

After music practice, they head to the supermarket.

“What do you want? I’ve got this. Help yourself.” Yoongi says.

Won Young heads to the back of the convenience store and comes back with a cola. Yoongi grabs some cup ramyun noodles, pays and then goes to make them.

“I’ve saved us two seats at the front.” Won Young calls out.

Yoongi grunts back in return, grabbing some serviettes as he rushes to the front with the steaming hot cups in his hands. He places them down and a little soup splashes onto the table.

“Ah, sorry.” He wipes it up. They begin to eat.

Yoongi’s mind goes back to you, earlier that day. Is my job really done? Was that all I had to do? He couldn’t help but feel there was more to you.

“Won Young” Yoongi says suddenly, “When I met you, what made you believe I was your guardian?”

“What do you mean?”

Yoongi turns his body to face him. “When did you believe I was telling you the truth.”

“Uh… I think maybe after you showed me your powers? It was pretty unbelievable to be honest.”

Yoongi nods, slurping up noodles.

Yoongi finishes eating first and licks his lips, wiping up any excess chili soup from his mouth. He cracks open the bottle of water he bought. He’s staring mindlessly out of the convenience store window when he sees you again. Yoongi watches as a semi-drunk man stumbles down the street, heading in your direction.

You hike your bag up on your shoulder again. The damn straps kept slipping down. If you didn't have an interview this afternoon you would have brought your tote bag along. Now what did I have to buy? Orange juice, pads… You squint at the stumbling man in front of you. He was walking way too close to you.

Yoongi semi-gets up from his seat, bottle in hand. Won Young looks at him, noodles hanging from his mouth. Was this guy about to start trouble?

You dodge him but he makes every effort to bump into you. He fondles your body as he does. You immediately let out a yell and push him. He staggers backwards and you swiftly take off your shoe, pointing the heel at him.

“Pervert!” you yell out. “I will hit you. I know judo.” You hoped your words were serious enough. You didn’t really know judo. One time you had accidentally walked into a judo class instead of your Pilates class but were too intimidated to leave. You had about an hour’s worth of basic judo knowledge up your sleeve and a self-defence Youtube video that you had come across accidentally.

Thankfully, the man moves on and leaves you alone after you threaten him. You sigh, hopping over to one of the tables outside the convenience store and sit down to pull your shoe back on. Yoongi watches from the convenience store window, amused.

You lean on the table, one arm drooping off the side. Were you suddenly now just attracting weird people?

Yoongi looks down at Won Young who has just finished his noodles. He pats him on the shoulder.

“Let’s go.”

Yoongi pushes open the glass door and it squeaks. He walks down the stairs, out into the cold night, Won Young hot on his tail. He walks up behind you.

“Fancy meeting you here.” He says nonchalantly, unscrewing the cap of his water bottle.

You turn around and pull your shoe off again, holding it up. You sigh, realising who it is. It’s the self-proclaimed angel.

Yoongi brings the water bottle to his lips and takes a sip, caring little about you and your shoe.

I can’t believe he’s followed me here. You note Yoongi’s unphased expression. You bring your arm down and begrudgingly put your shoe back on. You decide to go back to what you knew best. Law.

“I will sue you, Min Yoongi!” You declare.

“Sue me?” He laughs out loud. “For what? Drinking water?”

“For harassment.”

His face sours. “Harassment? I haven’t harassed you. In fact, I saved your life the other day.”

“Right, my guardian huh?” You mutter under your breath. “That doesn’t make following me around okay!”

“I am not following you around because I want to!” Yoongi exclaims.

Won Young clears his throat behind Yoongi. You crane your neck and spot a young boy by Yoongi’s side. What was he doing hanging out with a high schooler?

“Is this her?” Won Young asks, looking between you and Yoongi with a funny smile on his face. Yoongi shoots Won Young a look and steps aside, gesturing at Won Young.

“Won Young, my new assignment, new assignment, Won Young.”

Won Young bows to you and you wave.

“It’s Y/N, not assignment.” You say, shooting Yoongi a look. You peer at the boy. He seemed normal enough, with scruffy hair, his uniform too big for him.

“That’s okay. I’m an assignment too.”

You frown. Assignment? What is he, some sort of spy with assignments?

“Anyway, I have to go. Thanks for the ramyun, Yoongi.” Won Young says. He bids farewell to you. “Nice meeting you, Y/N.” He turns to leave, a mischievous smile on his face.

Yoongi rolls his eyes and waves him off. You peer at Won Young as he disappears down the street. Was this guardian thing real? Surely not. Your friend literally joked about this the day before and all of a sudden people were insisting guardian angels existed?

Yoongi kicks the seat away from the table and sits down on it. You watch as he finishes his water and scrunches the bottle. He did have a way of drinking water sexily. You blink and shake your head to get rid of your thoughts.

“Are you okay?” Yoongi asks.

“W- what do you mean?” You stammer, wondering if he could read your mind.

“Earlier, that drunkard bumped into you.”

“Oh, yes. I’m fine.” You let out a sigh, relieved. “I’m a strong independent woman who don’t need no man.” You joke, then quickly pull yourself together. “I’m used to this sort of stuff, looking out for myself.”

You had been living on your own for a while. You stayed with a few family friends in the when you first started at university, but for the most part you had been on your own. Your father would never come to the city, preferring to stay in his townhouse by the sea.

“Why are you asking, is this some guardian thing again?” You tease, deciding to change the subject, you almost let the rest of your history slip to this complete stranger.

“No. It was genuine concern -” Yoongi replies simply. You pause, he was actually being kind of nice...

“- concern for mankind.” He adds.

There it is. You think. You pull a face. “As much as I’d like to discuss your concern for mankind with you, please stop following me.”

“For the last time. I was not following you. Won Young’s school is around here. I come here all the time.” He slouches in his chair and flicks his wrist at the convenience store. “Besides. I saved you. I don’t believe I will have anything else to do with you from here on out.” Yoongi pulls himself up from the chair. “My duties with you are done.”

“Great. Thanks for all you have done.” You reply, also standing.

It’s then you realise how tall he is. He was wearing black skinny jeans, torn at the knees and a black hoodie. Yoongi clicks his tongue, shrugs and walks off.

You scorn at the rudeness. Not even a goodbye. You push the chairs back in, under the plastic table and step up into the convenience store.

Yoongi looks back to see you pushing open the door. He sees the top of your head bopping through the aisles. He turns back around and begins to head home.

He passes a few more drunken people. It’s a Saturday night. He sighs. He’d keep tabs on you tonight. Just in case.

Yoongi pulls his mobile from his pocket and rings Hoseok.

“Are you still at work?”

“Mmm no, I’m home. Why?”

“Ah, I wanted to see if you could print something from the database for me. Is the system still down at home?”

Yoongi can hear Hoseok’s muffled movements around the house.

“No, it’s up now actually.”

“Okay, thanks.”

“Mmm.” Hoseok hangs up.

Yoongi taps his mobile in his hand, looking out for you from under a nearby tree. He decides to make himself invisible, just to make it easier. It was one of the many perks he had, along with an assortment of powers, as a guardian. He walks a few steps behind you.

Yoongi watches as you haul your shopping back to the apartment, your headphones in. You bop your head along to some music. I wonder what she’s listening to Yoongi thinks. Curious, he tries to take a peek at your phone. You pop it back into your pocket. Unbeknownst to you, he walks you home safely.

Yoongi rolls over in bed. He’d been reading up on you all night. He stares at the ceiling. A report didn’t generate for him to be able to complete and submit. It seemed like his work wasn’t over.

//

You stare blankly at the poster in front of you. It was the third week of the five of your internship. You rub your eyes and let out a yawn. You had thought you’d be doing a lot more hands on consulting than what you had been doing the past fifteen days. All you had really done was administrative paperwork and filing. Sure, you got paid for this internship but you wanted more experience than what you were getting. You had put aside another job to do this one full time.

The printer churns the paper out and pulls it back in, printing the documents double sided. Suddenly it halts. You look down at the printer. It’s jammed itself, again.

Seven times. It had jammed seven times today. You give it a kick out of frustration and quickly straighten yourself up, hoping no one’s seen you. You sigh, bending over to open the paper tray. You pull a ream out, jiggle some things around and close the tray with a bang.

Your supervisor comes past you, sliding his body closely to yours.

“Just getting past.” He says.

You quickly stand up and flatten yourself up against the printer as much as possible to avoid him. It made you feel uncomfortable. This was just one of the many subtle ways he got in your personal space. It was harassment.

You grimace and smile politely, quickly moving away and heading back to your desk. You write another file note and save it to your desktop. It joins another five you had already saved. You had already lodged a number of complaints to Human Resources, but they didn’t seem concerned, which you found odd about a HR department.

You look at the shared drive. There were a number of files there that had been locked down. You examine the file name. You’re certain it’s the same file you saw one of the staff in accounts accessing. He had gotten quite evasive once you asked him innocently about what he was doing. You couldn’t help but be suspicious of it. There was something off about this consulting firm.

After three weeks you had also learnt that a number of other women had been harassed and their pay docked. Something didn’t add up. Determined, you had decided to bide your time to collect more evidence against them. It wasn’t right.

You look over to the desk next to you. Your fellow graduate hadn’t been in today. She went home in tears the night before, but wouldn’t talk about it. Your look at the time. Crap, it’s already 6pm.

You finish compiling the documents. Your mind drifted to Yoongi. You hadn’t seen your so-called guardian angel for a few weeks now, not after the second convenience store run in.

In that time you had also done your research. It appeared that guardians seemingly manifested in a variety of ways, according to multiple cultures and folk lore. You used to believe in this sort of stuff, before your mum passed away. Her passing took away any belief you may have had as a child. Nothing prevented her death.

You had stayed up all night last night, reading one particular entry. You didn’t remember researching something with so much passion in so long. You yawned again. The internet was a strange place.

You got up, straightened your blouse and picked the binded files up from the table. You took a breath and headed to your supervisor’s door. He’s on the phone and you hope you can sneak in and out and leave. Everyone else had already gone home. You knock on your supervisor’s door, eyes reading the plaque on the wall. What luck, that your supervisor was also the Managing Director.

He waves you in and holds up a finger to you to, gesturing you to wait. You scrunch your face and sigh. Not what you wanted. The last thing you wanted was to be alone with him. You edge toward the door.

He gets off the phone and waves you over. Reluctant to get any closer, you gesture at the files on the desk.

“Everything is there. Let me know tomorrow if you require anything else.” You turn to leave.

“Y/N.” he says, his voice gruff. “Let’s chat.”

You pause and turn around. “Sorry, sir. Really. I have an appointment I have to get to and I didn’t realise the time.” You say with a smile.

He sees through it. “Come on, I have yet to do your midway performance review. Take a seat.” He insists, pointing at the couch.

You sigh and reluctantly sit down in the cold and uncomfortable leather couch.

//

Yoongi sits up abruptly. His internal alarm is going off. He had been napping on the couch just before he felt it. He places a hand on his chest. This is a different feeling to what he had experienced before. Yoongi closes his eyes. He could see you, sitting in an office, as a somewhat plump middle aged man moves in closer to you. He can see the look on your face, the placid smile.

Yoongi pulls on his shoes, grabs a jacket and clicks his fingers. He appears just outside the office. The whole floor is dimly lit and half of the lights have already been turned off.

“So how are you finding the internship?” The manager asks you, sitting himself down on the desk in front of you, folding his hands into his lap.

“It’s good. I’m learning a lot.” You feign.

Yoongi’s eyes scan the floor. Not another soul was in sight. He read the plaque on the wall. Managing Director? Yoongi sneers. He stares at the man. He recognised him from a news article he had come across the other day. He had been acquitted of other sexual harassment charges. He remembered reading something about embezzlement too. Yoongi examines the body language in the room. It was clear what the manager was intending to do. But what could Yoongi do to help?

Yoongi pauses. His research indicated that you took a number of odd jobs to get by. Huh, the similarities. You were getting paid for the internship. If you attacked the managing director, you’d lose in a law suit. Yoongi looks up. Fire sprinkers. Flood the building, immobilise the company for a while, have everyone continued to be paid as it’s covered by insurance… Yoongi smirks to himself. 

Yoongi looks around and spots a nearby computer. The monitors are still on. I guess it’s about time I put my business degree to use. He thinks to himself bitterly. He had taken a security systems unit for fun in uni. Who knew it would come in handy? Yoongi rifles through a nearby set of drawers and finds a USB stick. He plugs it into the computer and searches for hidden and locked files, tapping away at the keyboard.

He starts the file transfer. Two minutes remaining. He sighs. One thing he didn’t always have control of as a guardian, was technology. Yoongi gets up and begins to flick through a cupboard, keeping his ears peeled.

“Good. We want you to get the most out of this placement.” He says, clasping his hands together. He jumps off the desk and moves over to you on the couch. You edge away but he’s pushed you up against the arm rest.

“Now, I hear you’ve been submitting a number of sexual harassment complaints to HR.” the manager says, leering at you.

“You really shouldn’t have done that.” he says, grazing your cheek with his finger. You turn your head and go to stand up. He pushes you down easily by the shoulder and you let out a gasp.

At the sound, Yoongi tilts his head toward you, a bunch of papers in his hand.

“I guess I just need to follow this up with disciplinary action.” The manager seethes.

Yoongi glances at the desktop computer. File transfer complete. He pulls the USB out from the computer and walks through to the office. He spots a lighter sitting on the desk by the director’s cigars. Yoongi takes away a layer of his invisibility so that only you can see him.

Your eyes widen as you see Yoongi appear out of thin air. You look back at the manager and back at Yoongi. The manager hasn’t noticed a thing. He’s rabbiting on about something but at that point you've stopped listening.

“Y-”

Yoongi brings a finger to his lips to hush you. He’s holding a bundle of papers in one hand and a lighter in the other. He stuffs the papers under his jacket and flicks the lighter, holding the flame up under the smoke detector.

A few seconds pass, the manager’s hand is on your thigh and you’re trying your best to keep calm. How did he get in here? Then it happens. The fire alarm sounds, the noise is shrill and the beeping is intermittent. The sprinklers go off.

“What the – fire?!” The manager stands up quickly, forgetting you and rushes out of the room in a panic. He scoots down the floor, covering his head with his hands. He presses the elevator buttons but of course, none are working. He pushes the fire escape door and flees.

You’re sitting on the couch, astonished, shocked and getting increasingly drenched.

“Are you okay?” Yoongi asks. He doesn’t appear to be getting wet.

“How? What did you do?” You begin to ask.

“Not now. Let’s go.” Yoongi pulls you up by the arm. “Where’s your desk?”

You point outside of the office to a desk at the corner and he spots a bag. Yoongi walks over to it and you follow him. He gestures at it. “Yours?” You nod. He brings it over to you, grabs your wet coat from the back of your computer chair and leads you out of the building.

You step outside, shivering. Your body is soaked through. It’s freezing outside. Yoongi looks at you.

“Come on. Let’s get you home.” Yoongi looks at you, concerned.

You quiver. “H-How, taxi?”

“Something better and faster.” He places a hand on your shoulder and you blink. You open your eyes and find yourself standing in the middle of your lounge room. Yoongi moves over to turn on the light.

You sink into your carpet, wrapping your arms around you. This was too weird. How did he manage to show up, how did he manage to transport me to my apartment?

Yoongi walks over to you and pulls you up. “Go have a hot shower. You’ll get sick otherwise.” He pulls the papers out from his jacket and places them on the table, along with the USB.

You slowly head to your bedroom, pull out some fleecy pyjamas and walk to the bathroom. He follows you, turns the taps on and checks the temperature of the shower. He exits and leaves you there, stunned.

You shut the door, strip and get inside the shower. The water runs over your body and you close your eyes. From all the research you had done, it could be enough to make anyone believe. And yet today, he just magically appeared and magically made the two of you disappear. He was telling the truth the whole time. He had powers. He wasn’t a weird stalker. He really was your guardian angel.

Meanwhile, Yoongi’s sitting on the couch in your lounge room, twiddling his thumbs. He leans back, casting his eyes around the apartment. He spots a photo frame of your and your mother on the wall when you were younger. He smiles to himself. He stands up and goes to look at it closely. Something about this image seemed familiar. Was it your mother, had he met her before?

He hears the door to the bathroom click and he straightens up, the photograph forgotten. You come out, engulfed by hot steam, wearing a towel turban and navy blue and white polkadot fleece pyjamas.

“So…” you say.

“So.”

You stare at him. He’s dry as ever.

“Not to be the one to say, I told you so but. I told you so.” Yoongi quips.

You stare at him. “Are guardian angels always this humourous?”

“I’m a funny guy what can I say?”

You sigh and go to the kitchen to get yourself a cup of tea. You’re quiet as the kettle boils and Yoongi sits himself down at the dining table. He flips through the papers he’s collected.

“Thanks.” You mumble from the kitchen. Yoongi looks up at you.

“Hm?”

“Thanks for before.” You begin to say, “Although, I could have handled it.” You couldn’t swallow your pride.

“I don’t think that was the case.” Yoongi sighs.

You refuse to say anything else. Deep down you were grateful for his help. If he didn’t get there when he did… you think back to exactly how he got there. So many questions begin to race through your mind.

“Here.” He says. “Do something with these.” He points at the papers on the table.

“What are they?”

“Files and information you may find useful.” He says and shrugs. He stops and looks at you, towel turban sliding off your head, wisps of wet hair on your cheeks. She’s pretty cute.

“I’ll be heading off now, if you’re okay?”

You blink and look at him. Yoongi tries to mask his concern. He clears his throat. You bite back on a line of questioning that’s formed in your mind. There really wasn’t any use, trying to get into it tonight. You resign yourself to the fact that he really was some sort of supernatural being that had a tendency to be indignant.

“Thank you. I mean it.” You manage to croak.

Yoongi’s expression softens. He nods. “Stay warm.” Then he disappears, leaving you alone in your apartment with a pile of papers and a USB.

To be continued.

[irarelypostanything]

Piano

I went to a public(ish) piano, and one of the first things I did afterward was pull out my phone and Google, “is it *****ey to play piano in front of other people?”  The first result was a Reddit post.  Some guy played a public piano, then a condescending stranger asked him if he knew how to play Rachmaninoff.  When he said no, the stranger proceeded to knock him off the piano and show off some advanced music.

The top response was that this was a use case for time travel.  He could have spent the next ten years mastering Rachmaninoff, gone to the past, knocked himself out, and then gotten that exact question and said, “f*** yeah I can, you prick.”  Then he could have crushed that man’s hopes and dreams.

I find that when I play in a public(ish) place, one of three things happens: People are impressed, someone plays after me and plays a lot better, or absolutely no one cares.  The scenario I haven’t encountered yet is that I play something, someone knocks me off and humiliates me and then gives me a wedgie, and then we both enter the same piano competition.  I spend an entire season learning different piano styles from a colorful cast of characters, each with a distinctive style like jazz and classical, I learn a lot, I lose anyway, but then I realize that the real piano competition award was the friends I made along the way.

Reminds me of when I was trying to impress someone, years ago, by playing “Love Story” and then she went on to play some crazy symphony level next level song.  That’s a bit more realistic of a story.

I also recall that Circle K conference.  I played Moonlight Sonata, then someone asked me if I knew the other parts.  When I didn’t, they showed me.  They showed everyone.

******

Piano is kind of apples and oranges to instruments like the guitar, or the violin.  Some music teachers study piano just because they have to complete the set.  You have to read Treble clef AND bass clef - one might characterize violin music as half of piano music.  There are three pedals, but most keyboards just come with one, and that’s called the damper...it can be fun, and even though sheet music sometimes explicitly says where the damper can be, sometimes I would just lift up at every measure.   

Is it hard?  Depends on who you ask.  If you hit a note, you just hit it...you don’t have to worry about screeching, or buzzing, or showing off how you know exactly where to position your finger because you don’t have to use those little tapes or painted-on dots anymore.  If you don’t play but are ever bored, just find a piano and randomly play black keys.  You will be mind blown.

I don’t think they have truly public pianos at Davis anymore.  They’re basically 88-key fomites, really.

*****

The nice thing about a musical instrument is that if you’re able and disciplined enough to practice the same things a bunch of times, you’ll get better at it.  No one really debates that.  What’s interesting is that some people have the talent to improve tremendously in a very short amount of time, and some people are slower.  You could say that this applies to anything, but I would disagree.  There are a lot of things that you can practice a million times, and still fail at.  But you can’t really fail with an instrument.  If nothing else, you can just invent a new trend.

A musical instrument is like an invention custom made to show off the “superpowers” of humans.  Corgis have tiny hoops they can jump through.  Cats have piles of mouse corpses.  Humans have this thing that they can just play, seemingly with no effort (after a lot of practice), and then suddenly their hands are flying and music is streaming.  I feel the same way when I encounter someone who can sing - really sing.  Out of the blue, everyone is under a spell.

[asian-y-stuff]

14 Cartoons About best keyboard for beginners

I haven't heard anybody express aid that they didn't learn the way to play piano, but I have listened to Many individuals say they regret they failed to take advantage of of their childhood lessons. Several individuals with Those people regrets have problems with the "round-to-it" dilemma--they'd like to relearn piano the moment they've got the perfect time to get "round-to-it." Not to mention not a soul hopes to sit in outdated-model classes which has a silver haired grandma who could not explain to rock n' roll from the rock. Together with that, their fast paced schedules would only prevent them from attending the piano lessons on a regular basis.

So what's the respond to?

There are two connected things that produce an unparalleled option for these variety of Older people.

Firstly, the world wide web has opened up options and data for everyone. Up until eventually this 10 years folks were being mostly limited to a piano teacher which was of their region. But it isn't really legitimate any more. Plenty of piano instructors currently have branched out into the web world by presenting lessons on-line. Some teachers will provide many media to help discover how to Participate in whether you are a rookie or a sophisticated improvisational participant. And they are simple to locate as well. Typing phrases about piano taking part in into Google or other search engines like yahoo will return a wide variety of fascinating benefits. (Attempt it, and see the outcomes!)

The next thing is one that was presently there, nevertheless till lately has not been exhibited effectively plenty of for any layperson to digest. Fundamentally, you can find three approaches for Mastering to play piano, and combining elements from the different techniques can generate far better final results than depending on just one technique.

Individuals three approaches are:

(one) Playing from the duplicate of your printed songs. In excess of ninety five% of piano lessons are depending on a chance to read through sheet music and to create your fingers do what your Mind needs them to. This is certainly the standard approach to piano classes; that includes repetition of scales, drills, finger exercises and constantly practicing pieces within the most elementary to Innovative compositions.

(2) Playing without the will need for sheet new music. Some scarce persons can actually Engage in tracks "by ear" and they do not will need any instruction due to the fact they can Enjoy any music they want very easily. You are able to learn some approaches to Perform by ear, but Will not idiot yourself into pondering you'll be actively playing similar to a Professional very quickly. However, most of the people will find that they can be taught the strategy to play a music by ear, Consequently, Understanding the way to play well enough to entertain for enterprise.

(three) Using chord symbols permits you to Perform the piano. A lot of pro pianists - notably people who Enjoy jazz - use guide sheets. Fake publications are musical textbooks that consist of their tunes in a very "guide sheet", which incorporates just the musical melody plus the concurrent chords for the track. This kind of piano enjoying involves you to find out no less than some chords and you will have to know how to browse audio from the treble clef, that is much simpler to master than equally bass and treble.

This kind of piano actively playing does exist and it is obtainable to all, even though most perspective it like a design and style limited to experts. This is not so. It really is a simple technique that could train you an appreciable sum relatively rapidly. In only a few months' time, it is possible to play the piano perfectly adequate that you're going to be happy with your playing and want to Participate in for your friends.

These approaches are all feasible and can be learned employing piano academics on the web. The most effective factor to do is to combine all 3 - Studying to study music, establishing an "ear", and Studying the chords and the way to make use of them to build songs.

It won't matter which system you choose - just choose one and begin. It can boost your self self confidence and entertain you concurrently.

Have you been attempting to master guitar on the web and ended up much more baffled than after you started? There may be an avalanche of on line guitar classes providing information about how to Participate in like your preferred group.

The dilemma For each guitarist is how you can select the best on the net guitar lesson, the lesson that should enable the guitarist to re-produce the guitar sounds they hear on the first recordings.

Amongst the most popular teams of all time is unquestionably the Rolling Stones. Along with the Beatles, Creedence and Led Zeppelin the Rolling Stones have stood the check of time. Annually new audiences discover and therefore are enthralled by their new music.

Guitarist Keith Richards is usually a grasp of creating special guitar sections that promptly discover each tune. The "art of all art"is recognizing when to stop, Keith is familiar with how to generate effective use of musical Place or silence. Though most guitarist's are chaotic filling up each and every musical hole at each option Keith invitations the listener into his globe, consequently the viewers under no circumstances tire of hearing these songs.

That will help you start out enjoying authentic variations of the Rolling Stones tunes here's 3 guidelines.

1. Learn to Engage in 3 note chords in the next, 3rd and forth strings on the guitar. These three chords are referred to as triads and so are a large Portion of the Rolling Stones trademark guitar audio.

Hear the opening chords of "Commence Me Up" or " Brown Sugar" for examples of this kind of chord enjoying.

For "Start out Me Up", Enjoy a "C" significant triad as follows:

Participate in the Be aware "G" around the fifth fret, forth string, Participate in the Notice "C" about the fifth fret 3rd string, play the Observe "E" about the fifth fret 2nd string. Because each one of these notes are around the fifth fret you could possibly very easily Enjoy the many notes by generating a barre chord along with your very first finger.

Incidentally this certain version of a "C" chord has a complex title. Musicians connect with this chord the 2nd inversion of the C key triad. It's handy to learn the theoretical terminology to communicate with musicians who Perform other instruments e.g., piano, bass, trumpet etcetera.

two. Use typical guitar tuning. Despite the fact that Keith Richard's works by using a number of 'open' tunings e.g., open "G" tuning consisting of: sixth string = D, fifth string = G, forth sting = D, third string = G, second string = B, initially string = D. It is possible to generate precisely the same sounds without re-tuning your guitar.

The massive edge with leaving your guitar in typical tuning is that you're going to In a natural way build a far better 'ear'. This is because your ear will get to find out wherever a selected sound arises from on

the guitar. If you retain re-tuning your guitar it's going to confuse your ear.

3. Engage in two Take note electricity chords about the third and forth strings. Hear the opening chords of the original Model "Honky Tonk Women" and you will hear a typical example of the kind of sound I'm referring to.

Check out participating in the 3rd and forth stings open, strum each of such strings and you'll be playing the primary chords of "Honky Tonk Women", this chord is called "G".

Bear in mind, Simply because it's basic doesn't suggest that it isn't proper. Simple will work!

The trick is usually to concentrate to how Keith Richard "Areas" the chords, Put simply hear his rhythm.

With a lot of on the internet guitar lessons it is important to obtain off to the appropriate begin, it's so Significantly tougher to re-study some thing at the time It is really ingrained in the Mind.

In order to learning Rolling Stones tunes have a look at on line guitar lessons that present their tracks in conventional tuning, you can be happy you did!

[akaristudies]

Hi! ^-^ I'm new in the musicblr community and I'm just starting to learn piano, but to be able to play any sheet music I have to be able to read it; I know how to read sheet music but it takes me absolutely forever to be able to play the note. Any tips on how to read sheet music more "fluently"? ♡

hello!

hmm i’m not quite sure how to give advice because reading sheet music was never tough for me, although i’ll offer one of the best tips that might help you.

a lot of vocal majors i know only started learning how to read sheet music in the beginning of freshman year of high school and they had no experience in reading notes AT ALL. however, by the end of the year, everyone knew everything so well by the end of the semester, which was four months and everyone has mastered it when school ended. the best way i think someone could read notes ‘fluently’ as you describe is learn all the notes on each staff, treble and bass clef and use practice sheets (even when piano majors all know this stuff, the teachers still gave us sheets to work on cuz this is helpful). idk if you can find some worksheets online for theory but maybe google basic theory practice/work sheets and you’ll probably find some. if you can’t, maybe you can analyze sheet music online and label each note, which helps too. music is slightly crossed with math because the best way to master it is practice. :)

if there are any musicblrs or music majors that would like to add more tips, please reblog!!

[lindentreeisle]

Just played my violin for the first time in 9 months

I began to take lessons in 2011.  I had never studied a stringed instrument, but I played piano for about six years, and trombone for eight, so I knew how to read music and some of the most basic basics of music theory.  I had always wanted to learn, but (embarrassingly) getting deeply into Sherlock fandom and reading any number of violin fics gave me the push to rent an instrument and find a teacher.  By 2015 I was learning how to play in second and fourth position and studying a more advanced technique book.  My teacher said, let’s do some intensive work on a sonata, and suggested some composers who had appropriate work for solo violin.  I picked Vivaldi, because baroque music is the reason I wanted to learn violin in the first place.

Last summer I was practicing etudes out of Wohlfahrt, and studying Handel’s Sonata 3 in F Major.  I never practiced enough, I have motivation problems at home, but I took myself across town to my teacher’s house once a week, because while I wasn’t any great talent, when I was playing well I was a part of this great music and it was amazing.  On August 1st, eh day after I moved, for some reason my carpal tunnel suddenly was unbearable.  I’d had problems in both hands for years, my hands going numb and tingling when I twisted my wrists to do fine handwork like knitting or violin.  When I had bad spells I wore braces at night and they usually passed.  I had become used to having bad days at violin, where I had to stop repeatedly to curse and shake out my hands until the numbness faded.  This time it didn’t fade and it wasn’t triggered by anything: I couldn’t hold my cell phone or pick something up without losing feeling.  On the day before my next lesson, I cried when I texted my teacher to tell her I had to cancel because I couldn’t hold anything well enough to play.

I had my second carpal tunnel surgery in March and my incision is now a healing, angry red scar that only hurts when I put sudden or heavy pressure on my palm.  The carpal tunnel is gone.  I’ve been putting off picking the violin up again, I’m not sure why.  As early as February I was saying, I need to get in touch with my teacher and see if she has room to take me back, I should be able to play again by April.  When the Vivaldi concerto I’d spent more than a year on came on my ipod, I surprised myself by crying: losing the violin (temporarily) had obviously upset me more than I thought.  But I’ve still been putting it off. 

I’ve been struggling with depression for months.  In the worst parts I had no desire to do anything at all, and I deliberately avoided thoughts of things that I had used to enjoy (like the violin) because they led to a spiral of worthlessness and self-loathing.  Even on my good days this past month, when I’ve thought about the things I used to enjoy and the plans I had made for the house, I was afraid to take out the violin.  I’m really not sure why.  Subconsciously I sort of feared that I would open the case and it would be broken, or ruined somehow because I hadn’t touched it in so long.  On Saturday I took the violin case out of the corner of the living room where it’s been hidden since I moved in, and put it at the foot of the stairs.  Yesterday I carried it up to the back bedroom, where the light is good and I’d stored my music stand when I unpacked.  Today I opened it.

Of course she wasn’t broken.  I fretted that I had left the bow too tight, that the strings might be horrifically out of tune, but she tuned easily and quickly, as she always has: seemingly immune to the constant temperature and humidity changes here.  I felt unaccountably affectionate as I stroked the shoulder rest and wiped rosin dust off the fingerboard.  The first notes, tuning, and then scales, sounded scratchy and thin.  The sound burred: I was drawing the bow crooked, too high on the neck, and I’d lost the knack of balancing bow speed and pressure to produce good sound.  I flipped open the Wohlfahrt to the first etude, simple enough (they’re all simple really, the point is to focus on technique, not musical complexity).  I was afraid, because I know how abysmally bad my head for theory is: every piece of it my teacher explains is gone almost instantly, and I spent so many years reading and thinking only in bass clef that treble is still a foreign language to me.  I can read the music because I know how the written note should be played, but if you ask me to name the note I have to count F-A-C-E on the staff like a grade schooler, and god help me when my teacher asks me to name the key based on the number of sharps or flats.  I was afraid, because I knew I had doubtless forgotten a lot of technique, and my body had learned what to do but the body forgets without practice.

Then I looked at the page, at the C note, 3rd space up on the staff, and I couldn’t name it without some thought but my brain instantly thought third string, first position, second finger and my mind and my body both remembered how to play it...because most of the time playing a note isn’t an “if then” proposition that you work out in your head in words, it’s sense memory, the feeling of how playing that note should make your body feel, your wrist like this and your finger just there, the way the string feels under the exact part of your finger you’ll use.  When you hit the note wrong, you can hear it, but you can also feel it, because your hand is ever so slightly off position, and you fix it and you feel it like the indicator on a prize wheel clicking to a stop in the exact place you thought it would.

It wasn’t good.  The notes weren’t especially clear or clean, and when I moved to the Handel a lot of the passages didn’t make sense to me until I listened to the recording to remind myself how it should sound; I missed slurs and ties so I ended up bowing in the wrong direction, and the things I had struggled with before (like shifting in and out of fourth position at the right moments, and those damned, damned harmonics that take me twenty tries to get right) were virtually impossible.  But I was playing the right notes (except the harmonics) and getting the note values right, and I could see that it was achievable, that with work I could get back where I was before.

After I bought the violin I was renting, around six months after I started playing, I gave her a name in my head.  No one ever asked me, there’s no reason or opportunity to ever say it, I don’t know if it’s even a thing people do (I’ve only heard of antique violins being named, and usually something like “the [X] [name of luthier” rather than a given name), my trombone never had a name, but it felt right to me that this thing that I used so often but was more than a tool, that felt like both an extension of myself and a creature with moods and personality of its own, should have a name.

Her name is Steadfast, and it seems more apt now than ever before.

[wontonkatsu-blog]

Blog #13: POP! Reflection // Jessica Rahel

May 11, 2017 

On Tuesday, May 9th, we did our POP show with the other AAS 218 class. POP stands for Producing Our Power, which I think really fits what the performances in the show are about. I think it is about producing and earning the power that was not handed to us in the first place. Whether it be our age, the color of our skin, the languages we speak, our gender, or the way we present ourselves, there are people who look down on us. There are people who do not see us the way we see each ourselves and each other. Each and every one of us know our own strengths and weaknesses. POP was a way to express ourselves and to step outside our comfort zone.

Before POP, I was really clueless as to what I wanted to do. Because it is my last semester of college, I really wanted to take it easy for POP and do something that I’m comfortable with, like play the piano as background music or be an extra in a video. On the other hand, I was also very inspired by everyone in class to go all out for POP. It’s my last semester after all. If not now, then when? I felt conflicted.

I ended up going all out.

I ended up doing something that I’ve always wanted to do since I was younger. To star in a music video and record a cover of a song.

Our POP group, DNA, made a complete remake of the song and music video of the song “Awake” by Jin of BTS. I wrote a really long blog post about how I came up with the idea to remake this song, which you can read about here. I’ll write a shorter version of the story here anyway. I listened to the song for the first time at 4am in the morning on a Thursday (April 6), came up with the idea at 1pm, and pitched the idea to my group in class at 4pm. It was a really impulsive decision since everything happened within the span of less than 12 hours. I could not even keep up with myself that day. My excitement level drained my energy so much that I asked myself that night, “What the hell did I get myself into?” Here’s what I got myself into:

1. After forming our groups, I had to switch mindsets. I had to go from “I just want to take it easy” to “LET’S DO SOMETHING NEW!”

2. I re-learned how to breathe properly in order to sing properly with my old choir teacher, Rosa Ng.

3. I learned how to use a software that composes music. I’ve never done that before. I’ve always composed music on paper. Composing music on a computer felt so professional to me.

4. I learned that viola players read music in what is called an “alto clef”. I didn’t know what an alto clef was until this project happened. I didn’t know that such thing exists aside from treble and bass clefs. Thanks, KC, my friend who is an orchestra director, for telling me about the alto clef BEFORE I composed the viola part to the treble clef!

5. I experienced that feeling of being stuck in a recording studio for 5 hours, fueled by boba, water, and fries.

6. I started paying attention to how K-Pop males have their makeup done (I just wanted to look like Jin ok…)

7. I learned how to wear white. That’s considered a miracle, to those who personally know me.

8. I learned more ways on how one can move the camera to create beautiful shots. Thanks, Floris.

9. I experienced a wave of disappointment after realizing that we won’t be able to use any of the viola parts that we recorded. I worked so hard to compose it and even learned a new clef.

10. I got back on my feet after that disappointment and took it as a learning experience. I got to compose music for the viola! If I need to compose for a viola part in the future, I now know what to do.

11. I learned how to accept the things that I can’t change and change the things that I can.

12. I learned to let go and hand over big responsibilities. In the past semesters, I’ve always taken the big responsibilities so that I don’t have to worry about other people messing up. This semester, I had to leave it to the more experienced people and let it go. It was hard at first, but I finally convinced myself to just let go and focus on doing my part, which was to compose the music and look pretty for the music video.

13. I learned that I would rather die than have my group members skip a meal.

14. I am still learning that not everything has to be perfect.

15. I got some basic Mandarin lessons (IN COLLEGE) from “Professors” Hu (Chao) and Cheng (Peter).

16. I got to sing in Korean and Mandarin!

The end result:

Originally, I chose this song because I felt the lyrics when I listened to it at 4am that one morning. The chorus, “Maybe I, I could never fly… but I will still struggle and fight” really stood out to me. I always feel this way. I don’t think I’ll ever reach the “level” of where some of my friends are, but at least I can try to. My friends are earning higher degrees in college while I’m here graduating with a bachelor’s degree. I’m average in playing piano. I’m average at a lot of things. This could be due to how I’ve been spreading myself too thin throughout college. I did a lot of things, but I was average. I learned a lot of things, but I’m still average. I don’t stand out from the crowd, because I’m average.

To relate this to the concepts we learned in class, we decided to make this song about Asian-American success. What defines success? Is it becoming an accountant? Lawyer? Doctor? What about becoming a teacher and inspire children to be the best? A professional musician? A YouTuber? As Asian-Americans, we feel like we have to follow the crowd of other Asian-Americans. Our parents and society expect us to achieve a higher education. They expect us to become nurses, doctors, lawyers, or working in business. In the music video, I had 4 occupations: doctor, marketer, pianist, and a photographer. Other people expect us to become doctors or work in business. However, becoming and musician or a photographer is a big risk because it’s very hard for us Asian-Americans to succeed in those areas.

What about our own dreams? This song talks about how even if we don’t feel like we’re enough and that we feel lost in life, we can still struggle and fight for our own sake. It’s not too late. The word “awake” in this song, in my opinion, means that we are aware of who we are: not good enough. But we still keep going and run a bit more. It’s okay to not be what our parents or society expects us to be. Their meaning of “success” can mean “failure” to us. If we are rich and successful in someone else’s eyes yet we are unhappy, our success means nothing. If we are still seen as a failure in their eyes but successful and happy in our own eyes, then we have succeeded nonetheless.

This project is a literal example of how I relate to this song. I don’t know how to sing, but I’m going to try. I don’t really know how to compose music, but I’m going to try. I’m not that pretty, but I’m going to try to look pretty. None of us are professionals, but we did it. And we succeeded.

I love how everyone brought something to the plate. At first, I was concerned that not everyone will contribute because of the limited roles that I had written down. I wanted to be the only singer at first, but that wouldn’t include everyone else. Eventually, we added more singers- Lucy, Seoyoung, Haruka, and even Chao! I think Lucy’s voice stood out the most. She has no problem reaching those high notes that everyone usually struggles with. Seoyoung and Haruka are also really good, even though they said they can’t reach the higher notes. They have such beautiful and distinct voices. Chao honestly wasn’t that bad when he is serious about singing. When I heard him sing prior to recording, he wasn’t serious about it so he didn’t sound very good to my ears. I thought that was how he really sings, which was why I hesitated to put him on the track. However, putting him on the track gave the song a bit of humor because he’s the only male singer and the fact that a male suddenly sings at the end of the song. Peter and Chao helped greatly with translating part of the song to Mandarin and also starred in the music video. Eric helped Floris direct, and Floris put everything together. We all worked hard together and I’m so proud of everyone. Floris and I listened to the finished song in an Uber on the way back from a shoot. I was tearing up because it was so beautiful. Floris made everyone sound like little Sam Smiths (not really but close enough). I love the song and I love how we got to sing it for this class.

Shoutout to Cornerstone for letting us use their recording studio! :D

I also enjoy the music video. We were inspired by the original music video and re-created some of the scenes, such as in the beginning when I took off the earphones, the hallway scenes, and the Polaroids. Ever since I discovered Fort Point with my friend last year, I started bringing my other friends there. It was like a secret place to me. Fort Point is a beautiful place with dark hallways and has a great view from the rooftop. It’s free admission, too! When I found out that Floris wanted to shoot there, I was THRILLED. That place means a lot to me and I’m glad that we got to shoot there. I also love the shots that she took of me. She made me look like Adele (again, not really since Adele is bae and I’m lame). I learned a lot from her and Eric, and hope to make my own content in the future one day.

There are also some things that we could have improved on. For example, we could have found a better person to sing the first and second verse. Even though I can reach those low notes doesn’t mean that I should. The recording doesn’t sound as good as me singing it out loud, but what’s done is done. I also didn’t compose the entire thing from scratch. The music at the beginning of the music video was taken from the original music video all the way until the first verse starts. So, the piano at the beginning wasn’t me, and the violin part also came straight from the original. Also, throughout the song, the violin part was taken from a Youtuber named Jun Sung Ahn since we couldn’t use Allayne’s viola recordings (it did not fit well with the song).  If I had known that we couldn’t use Allayne’s recordings, we could have found a violin player who can play for us. This was a learning experience where I had to tell myself to let it go. So what, those parts are not from scratch? We still did our best. The deadline was coming up soon. There was nothing much else that we can do. In terms of the music video, I honestly could have looked better. The loose hair strand in the beginning of the music video bothers me more than I should, even though no one cares other than me. We did a great job overall. That’s what really matters.

Special thanks (This is going to get real cheesy)

Thank you, Professor Irene Duller, for this opportunity for me to live my dream and express myself in a way that I never thought I would ever get to do in my college years.

Thank you, Kevin, Mav, and Khanh, for believing in us, encouraging us, and helping us keep up the progress throughout this project.  

Thank you, Allayne, for learning the song and coming to the recording session.

Thank you, Uncle Harry, for taking the time off your workday to help us with the drums.

Thank you, KC, for teaching me more about orchestral music and helping me compose.

Thank you, Rosa, for being patient and teaching me how to sing again.

Thank you, my friends from outside this class, for your excitement, encouragement, and prayers.

Thank you, Troy (the only Wontonkatsu member who isn’t in our group) for your support for us and believing in us.

Thank you, DNA for all your hard work in making a dream of mine come to life.

POP Highlight

I loved every single moment of the show. I was really hungry and asked someone from the group chat to bring us food, and thankfully Chao saved the day with some bread and boba. First, I enjoyed Dreamer’s skit because Troy is in it, and seeing one of our own group members on stage gave me a proud big sister moment. In this skit, Troy was the main character’s friend and the supporting character. I think they did a really good job in touching upon a really touchy subject, which is depression, without overly exaggerating or offensive. I also enjoyed the fashion show. I could tell that they put in a lot of work putting together all the outfits. My favorite is Linh’s dress. I think it’s really pretty and feminine, and it looks like you can wear it to any kind of party without being overdressed or underdressed. And Dangerous Divas… I love how they stayed together as a group and kept their name. It just shows how powerful they are and what they can accomplish together. I recorded their entire performance because I love their dances so much. They did a really good job in showcasing what it means for women to be empowered. Shaolin Showdown was amazing. The spoken word guys were very powerful and their words really touched me. Allayne did a great job playing the viola in an intense fashion. The very last group ended the show with a brilliant dance performance that left everyone shook. We took photos afterward. It was an amazing night filled with lots of talent and fun.

- Jessica Rahel

[thefederalistfreestyle]

Interview: Alex Lacamoire (Keyboard Magazine):

Hamilton has won 11 Tony Awards, a Grammy, and a Pulitzer Prize. Its soundtrack went to Number One on the Billboard Rap chart, and the newly released collection of covers and remixes of the show’s songs just debuted at Number One on the Billboard 200 chart. Hamilton is a phenomenon, and Alex Lacamoire is its musical director and orchestrator.

But before his name became synonymous with that “ten-dollar Founding Father without a father,” Lacamoire had already built a reputation as a musical wunderkind, with an ESP-like ability to accompany, arrange, and wrestle a musical idea into shape. From his humble beginnings as the rehearsal pianist for The Lion King to storied successes with shows like Wicked and In the Heights, Lacamoire continues to be one of the most sought after musicians on the planet.

Backstage before yet another sold-out performance of Hamilton, Lacamoire talked to me about his unquenchable quest for musical excellence.

[. . .]

I read a quote by you about your work with Lin-Manuel Miranda in the show In the Heights where you said, “We had a Latin-American artist writing Latin-American music, as opposed to someone else trying to write in that style and pay homage to it…” As someone who grew-up in Latin family, did working on the music for that show feel familiar, or did it feel strangely foreign to you?

It was both. It felt natural in the sense that I recognized the music. I felt it in my bones from having grown-up listening to Salsa music. It wasn’t something that I ever put-on - I just listened to it because I was exposed to it. When I was in a car, my parents would be listening to it. Or when I was at a Christmas party, somebody would be blasting music to dance to for four hours. So you can’t help but just hear that hypnotic, trance-like tumbao. That became part of my DNA.

But in terms of the mechanics of writing it down and trying to notate it? I absolutely studied books. I read Rebeca Mauleón’s book [The Salsa Guidebook] about writing for Latin music—what it looks like and the terminology, like “Oh, this is what the bongos do,” and, “This is called the martillo,” etc. So I absolutely had to explore and listen, and it was very foreign to me, in terms of expressing to someone how to do it. Because that’s my job as an orchestrator: to notate it. It’s precision work, being specific about what something needs to be so that it can be consistent from night to night, and that it delivers what the story needs to deliver for the people on the stage and for the audience watching. You don’t leave a lot up to chance.

That brings us to the phenomenon of Hamilton. There’s a great video online of you delving into the title song, showing how you dance around a melody and lyric. How do you develop and prod it without ever stepping on it?

Well, in theater, what the actor is singing and speaking about is king. That’s where the focus needs to be, so you can’t step on that. I’m in a service industry; you know what I mean? I’m writing charts for a producer who needs me to write them, and I’m doing arrangements for a composer who needs me to do them for him. I’m doing something for somebody else, so it’s not really about me saying, “Look at me!” My job is really to help a story be told. Leave a hole, get out of the way of the melody, make sure the lyrics are being heard—that’s why I do what I do.

It seems like the collaboration must be a thrill for you.

Yes, because I feel like you make better music when you have someone giving you encouragement, or a critique to make something better for whatever reason. I think you come up with better things that way. I don’t think it’s as fun to be in a vacuum. I think that’s why the theater aspect of music felt so fun to me. The solitary aspect of being in a practice room and practicing your scales and modes gets to be very lonely! I’d much rather be with people, and also, I know what I’m good at, and that’s enhancing something. I’m much better at working with something than creating something out of nothing.

Can you talk a little about the way you and Lin collaborated on Hamilton?

Lin leaves that space for me because he doesn’t get bogged-down in the details so much of the actual writing down of the music or the sounds. He’s more like a “big picture” guy, as in, “Here’s the melody, here’s the lyrics, here’s the chords, here’s the structure. He does that in a demo, and then he hands it off to me.

Are his demos on piano?

He uses a keyboard and he works in [Apple] Logic. He finds the sounds, he finds the drum loops, he plays the bass lines, he plays the hooks. But then it’s up to me to actually have other people do that for us. Lin knows that he can give me the keys to the car. He would send me his Logic demos so I could then go in and solo all of the different parts and see exactly what sounds he used. In terms of gear, I use an 88-key, weighted Yamaha keyboard along with Logic. I also use [Apple] Mainstage and I like sounds from Massive and Kontakt. I’ve also dabbled with sounds from EastWest. I orchestrate in Finale, and I can poke around in Pro Tools, but Logic is my main software.

Why do you use Logic over Pro Tools?

Well, I think Logic is more for songwriting. I think Pro Tools is great for recording, but I don’t think their MIDI capability is nearly as expansive and intuitive as Logic. In Logic, I’m able to find a bunch of loops easily. I don’t know how to do that easily in Pro Tools. I find it’s a pain in the butt just to call up a piano sound. You have to open-up two different windows in Pro Tools! I just like the palette in Logic, and I find it to be user-friendly.

Does Lin give you a finished enough demo that you know what’s going on?

Absolutely. And his demos are so clear that you know what things are supposed to sound like. Even if there aren’t complete vocal harmonies, I’ll be like, “Oh, that’s where harmonies can go.” And even if it’s a very spare demo with just a bass line and a piano playing one note, I can tell what the chords in-between need to be so I can discern what the guitar should be playing, or what strings should be playing in that middle register. So if he’s done the extremes of the bass and the treble, I can do the midrange.

We don’t always do a lot of “side by side” work. He lets me do my thing, and then he hears it when it’s pretty much done, like when the band is finished rehearsing it, or after I’ve taught the vocals to the ensemble or the cast. Then he’ll hear it and either give his approval, or he’ll say, “I liked this but I didn’t like that,” or, “That was great, but let’s try this instead.” It’s a collaborative process.

Hip-hop has found its way into just about every conceivable musical scenario, including Hamilton, where you marry programmed beats with live performance. Is that the happy medium for you—the intermingling of both disciplines?

It’s interesting because I think that’s where music is heading. I like the human element; I’m old-school in that respect: I still like that human connection that you get from playing. But obviously, the world is moving in a digital direction, so finding ways to harness that [musically] is fantastic, because it sounds modern. It sounds hip and it sounds current.

Do you play other instruments besides keyboards?

Yes. You’re not going to hire me to play a gig on guitar, although at one point, I did have enough guitar chops to sub on the show Rent. On that show, the way it’s orchestrated is that the second keyboard player has to play keyboards, acoustic guitar, and electric guitar. So I can get around enough on guitar to be able to write out specific voicings, and play things out and have them be guitar-istic. I can do the same thing on bass and drums too. I can figure out what it is that I’m looking for because I’m always listening.

It seems like all of the musical investigation you have done, even early on, prepared you for what you do now.

Yes. One thousand percent, because what I do isn’t just about playing piano – it’s about theory and harmony, and colors, and listening and playing – the totality of everything that I’ve learned. All of that trial and error led me to where I am. Being a music director is so much more than just sitting down at a piano.

I think the best way to describe it for me is that I know when something feels right. Someone may listen to a chart that I consider half-done and think, “Oh, that’s done!” But there’s something in me that is uneasy and won’t rest until it’s right. It’s about asking myself, “What can I do to make this better or sound fuller?” I feel like a musician knows when they’re done and when a piece feels complete.

HAMILTON CREATOR LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA ON ALEX LACAMOIRE

“If Alex Lacamoire didn’t exist, I’d have to invent him. He came along in my life at a time when I was looking for a musical director as conversant in Latin styles as hip-hop, R&B, and the musical theater of my youth. And in walks Lacamoire, spoon-raised on Miami-Cuban rhythms, with his heart in the far out prog rock of Steely Dan and Rush. We just sort of started working together and never stopped.

“Musical sensibilities aside, Alex’s meticulousness both as an arranger and orchestrator is always invaluable. He has the same patience when staffing musicians as he does filling out a four-part vocal harmony in a chord. He is beloved by actors and musicians alike because he loves them, and brings out their best. “What else? He’s just the f—king best there is. And I’m so lucky to be on his team.” – Lin-Manuel Miranda

read the rest of the interview to learn how he got his start in the industry!