violinist & educator

Since this was my very first tour and I have nothing else to compare it to, I have to say that this was one of the best musical experiences of my life.  Sure there were challenges and some of them were extremely hard to take (I won’t mention any specifics here), but overall everything went as smoothly as it could go.

Our first and only rehearsal on Thursday night was productive.  We all got to meet our new drummer (and “tour saver”) Andrew Atkinson from NYC.  He came to us through Zaccai, who had met him a couple days before.  Get this: the only way Andrew could do the tour was only if Zaccai would help him move out of his apartment (long story…)!  We managed to get through most of the album’s tunes, especially L’ours (or, “lauw-ers”), we all soon realized that Andrew was a spectacular Latin jazz drummer and blended in with the rest of us like smooth butter.  We’re so glad he joined!

The next day, after scrambling to find percussion instruments for the tour (some people can be flaky!), we finally got on the road around noon.  Our first show was to be at OHANA “Luau at the Lake”, a tiki festival held at Lake George, NY.  The drive was a good 4 hours from Boston, but with conversations about art, music, languages, and film production with Jochen, the trip flew by quickly.  Jochen is a longtime Waitiki fan who flew in from Munich.  He wanted to be in touch with the tiki culture in the U.S. and also take this opportunity during our tour to film footage for his upcoming documentary “DVD of Tiki.”  We’re really excited to be a part of that project.  The show went as well as it usually does but we had to deal with the unbearable near-freezing temperatures that night.  Yikes!

Our next stop was to play for a pre-recorded air show for Jersey City’s WFMU radio station (wfmu.org) that was hosted by Gaylord Fields and Glenn Luttman.  Thanks to them for making our live broadcast performance possible.  A BIG challenge occurred right before we got to the studio: Jersey City traffic.  OMG, I will never ever set foot or wheel into that state again.  We sat in our cars for 2 hours for the last 0.3 miles we had left to travel to our destination.  It was ridiculous!

Thanks to our good friend Gina, she let us stay at her house that night and boy, did we need a good night’s rest.  In the morning, we had Tim’s delicious Portuguese coffee and some tasty bagels.  With our full tummies, we soon got on the road towards Washington DC.

(Haha… see that parking ticket there?  Apparently in NJ suburbs, one gets a ticket for parking too close to the crosswalks… Poor Tim and Randy)

CONTINUE TO PART DEUX

One thing I love and hate about living in Boston is the constant change of weather.  I love the seasons, particularly the transitional and fleeting months of spring and autumn, but I despise the phases of the stifling humidity and downpours of rain (which I fortunately avoided this year).  But along with those changes come the various music gigs and opportunities.  After three months of “vacationing” in Hawaii with perfect blissful weather and with “nothingness” to do, I return to Boston with open arms as we enter into September because the wealth of gigs are just pouring out of nowhere.  Although it’s never enough to make up for the lack of income over the summer, the influx is definitely a glimpse of hope into the future.

One thing that is on hold for now is my duo.  Even though we were long distance before, but now we are even more so!  Lee-wen has temporarily relocated to Taiwan for personal reasons, but hopefully (crossing my fingers) she’ll be able to return to the US in a month or so.  Now, as I look back to those crazy times in March and April when I was driving to NYC every weekend, it’s hard for me to believe that happened, but honestly, I miss those times because I was happily busy.  We were playing good music for a good reason, and that’s why I’m still pursuing this profession called music.

Being part of a musician means being an educator.  My faculty job at the Bradford School of Music is blossoming and business is good, despite the economy.  I have visions of starting up a beginning String Ensemble there and incorporating informal workshops throughout the year, but we’ll see.  If you have any topics you think would be interesting and would like me to touch upon, let me know.  Of course there will be fall faculty recital where I might rehash my ancient piano playing skills. Haha!