Time flies...

Since coming home from Germany for Thanksgiving, I have mostly stayed in the Bay Area, with the occasional triplet here and there for auditioning, etc. I've been super busy with singing, writing, translating, family, family visits, home repairs, and so forth.

So the time...it has flown and every resolution I've made to blog more regularly...I have blown...

So often I go to a concert or hear a piece of music, or even read a great book, and want to blog about it, but by time I have time, my inclination and inspiration have long grown cold, and I have, sad to say, been there, done that, and moved on.

Sigh.

However, today I started and finished a wonderful book that I had to blog about, even if only briefly: Australian David Malouf's Ransom. A dense, but not difficult read, Ransom is a beautifully poetic look at a specific slice-in-time from the Trojan War that focuses on love, fate, chance, and loss. Stories from Homer are often absorbing; tales from ancient Greece continue to fascinate. This one is terrific. It's a moving, learned, and revealing look at a portion of one of the classic tales of Western lit.

I couldn't put it down.

What I'm reading (see above)

What I'm listening to: Mozart Clarinet Concerto (more on this next time I post). The slow movement is, for me, a sublime, Ur-Werk, one of my favorites.

What I'm working on: The Vinaccesi Ensemble, of which I am a part, has a Berkeley Fringe Fest concert on June 7. We are performing some great 17th century Venetian music by Monteverdi, Cavalli, Caldara, Strozzi, and Vinaccesi--and I'm feverishly engaged with those pieces. It's a great program, with music by well-known masters as well as lesser-known gems. I'm also currently in rehearsal for some interesting new music by Daniel Felsenfeld and Mark Alburger, but since those performances are in mid-June, I'll write about those later!