A quick hello and heads up from r-, who is leaving for Berlin tomorrow for the duration of the month. It is almost a relief to be leaving for Berlin, where I can be further stripped of those pesky bureaucratic responsibilities and simply write, type, have carpal tunnel, type more, look for distractions, and, as I generally do in Germany, feel physically small and inadequate around all those Teutonic hunks. I have been graciously offered floor space in Berlin, and soon I'll have a report on whether buses are, in fact, the same all over the world except for the type of rock video(9 hour Simpsons marathon?) and the strength of the air-con. And do buses drive 150 mph on the Autobahn? Please, someone get me my acupressure anti-puke bracelet, fast.

We have fully settled into a sort of limbo, a rhythmic but slightly uneasy pattern, waiting for the apartment to be vacated on Oct 1. L and I have been working, sitting at cafes(it's still in the 70's here, and warm, and everyone is sipping their white beers on the canals, it's too post-card-esque.) Laura is preparing for Gaudeamus competition(I'll let her speak to that), and, shall we say, writing is continuing; I expect the rough draft(that is, everything I hadn't previously written that still needed to be written) to be done in 2 weeks, and the entire final section should be done by the end of October. Then, it's drudgery and poetry, edits and more carpal tunnel. But it's good, and the beer's good, and the coffee's good, and the only thing that isn't good is the softporn that comes on the dutch tv at about 10 every night. it's bad.

funnily, i had an interview with the international IT director of Greenpeace the other day, and know more than i ever wanted to about greenpeace, including the longstanding internal debate about whether hacking sites should be part of the greenpeace mission statement.

one thing we love here that you don't see in the us are pocket dogs. pocket dogs are little eensy tiny dogs that generally, when they're not walking, are stuffed into a 50 yr old woman's purse, and stick their little furry heads out. Many times the purse is on the front of a bicycle, and the pocket dogs bark at all other bikes, and especially bikes with other pocket dogs, that pass by.

L here- hi everyone. Yes, I am actually practicing full steam ahead, except for tonight when i got sucked into a tv night with R Steve and Keesje. Sometimes it's just very good to stay home. But generally speaking, I've been putting in a solid four to six hours a day practicing, the hours fly- usually, and it seems to be noticable in terms of results. I haven't done this kind of focused work in, uh, ever? Awhile, anyway. Even though it's suddenly weird not to have a million things to do, students to teach (money to earn), rehearsals to go to, phone calls to return, I guess this IS why I came. Of course it's only been a couple of weeks, so we'll see how I hold up. Gaudeamus competition starts Oct 17th, so it will be focus for that until then (this is an international competition for interpreters of new music, any instrument can enter). My program is probably a bunch of music you've never heard of before, all for solo clarinet; composers are Stravinsky (the old piece), Chen Yi, Jorge Liderman, Luciano Berio, Joan Tower, and two pieces by Dutch composers Leo Samama and Tristan Keuris.

Sparnaay is great. He is very energetic, funny, and he knows a lot: multi-phonic fingerings off the top of his head, how to count a measure of 7/20 accurately, great ideas for phrasing and character, how to fake a convincing performance...We have tea in the school "canteen" after lessons and talk about moving and living out of boxes (he is moving, buying a new house), our piles of composers' bad pieces on the top shelf of the closet (he says he wants to put them in a box without his new address on it and hope they get lost in the move so he doesn't have to feel guilty, I tell him he should just move to a new country).

I'm also taking a class in contemporary music techniques, which is based on South Indian classical music, because this music is filled with complex polyrhythms and microtones, like some contemporary music. First class was today. I think it's an interesting pedagogical concept, to teach western techniques borrowing an Indian system (sort of anyway, this is not exactly an accurate description). Anyway, I get to practice doing things like playing 21 against 20, and learn to play scales with quarter tones in them. Improvisation fits into this later, and a composer will be working with the class and writing a piece for us to play later.

Looks like I'm going to end up doing a lot of new music here too, unless I really make the effort to play some old stuff. Perhaps it is my destiny....

Recorders and early period instruments are BIG here. You walk around and see people playing funky instruments like bass recorder, lute and panpipes- things you would usually only see in museums in the US. Here they have big concerts and actually play this stuff, and commission composers to write new piece for them.

My goal for next week is to plan my tai chi classes- to find a place to teach, make fliers, and start Oct 1st. I'm also hoping to convince the director of the Conservatory to let me teach a class there for musicians- sort of a class that could function as a good warm up before practicing, with some things from Alexander Technique combined with tai chi. Something like I'd like to do for myself, that I'll actually do if I'm teaching a class.

Robert is busy trying to learn all the European soccer teams, and we are both hoping that after we get settled we'll have energy to learn some more Dutch. But for the most part, this is a friendly place to be a foreigner, at least compared to many places, I'm sure. It's still a pain in the rear, but I think we've adjusted out expectation meter enough to handle it now.

OK signing off for now-- Laura

nota non bene: although i am writing this with the rdglick@ccnet.com address, this address will cease to exist on oct 1, so, right now, this minute, put my new address in your little hello kitty address book: rdglick@netscape.net, or laura: lcarm@aol.com. If you don't, you'll get a horrible mailer-daemon message, and there'll be hell to pay. xoxox r-