The perils of the chronic over-achiever

I think I'm going to cry. :-(

Since last night, I've been incorporating all of my Handel research into my outline so I can see what holes need to be filled. Fortunately or unfortunately, I have discovered I have considerably more information than I need. That is, the length limit on the paper is 20 pages, and my outline is already 8 pages long, and I haven't incorporated even half of my notes into it yet, never mind the score analyses that I've only barely started and which I expect to be the focus of the paper since that will consist of original conclusions from original research.

This sounds like a fabulous problem to have, but it's depressing me to think of how much time I have spent painstakingly collecting information that I can't use. I mean, I could write a book with the information I've collected so far, and yet there is so much yet to do because I've only barely started the score analyses.

It sounds really stupid, but this is really really upsetting me.

How some things never change!

In my Baroque seminar, I am writing my research paper on ornamentation in Handel's vocal works. The research has been immensely interesting so far. I have located three aria scores into which Handel himself notated the ornamentation. The famous Italian singers who usually sang his works never needed such guidance, so he didn't notate such things, but in 1727, when there was to be a revival of his opera Ottone, both of his leading ladies (Cuzzoni and Bordoni) were ill, so the role of Teofane had to be sung by a less experienced English singer. For this reason, he wrote out ornamentation for her to use. Now, by less experienced, I only mean in the art of improvising. The ornaments themselves are wickedly difficult. I have decided to study these arias and learn to sing them with Handel's own ornaments, and they are really challenging me. Furthermore, I think if I were to perform them in an operatic competition, the judges would mark me down for over-embellishing. You just don't hear Baroque arias ornamented to this degree today, and this is probably due to nothing more or less than a poor understanding of the period on the part of singers and their teachers, coaches and directors. (Yes, it takes a nerd to figure out stuff like this. Who else spends their days with their noses pressed into 275-year-old treatises?)

So, speaking of 275-year-old treatises, I have been reading one by Pietro Francesco Tosi, an Italian voice teacher in the 18th century who traveled a lot in Europe. Though performance practices have changed some in the last 300 years, some things just never do. I quote from a translation:

[The singer who has good judgment will never, without just cause, utter the words that are so often used and are so repugnant to everyone: "Today I cannot sing because I have caught my death of cold," and as he is saying, "I beg to be excused," coughs a little. I can attest to the fact that in all the days of my long life, I have never heard a single singer pronounce this happy truth: "Today I feel well;" although honesty would require this admission. They save this unusual candor for the following day, when they have no trouble whatsoever in saying, "In all the days of my life, I have never been in such good voice as yesterday."]

He says a number of other humorous things about singers and voice teachers, and it often surprises me to remember how old this document is because one hears so many of the same comments today! On the other hand, I don't think Tosi was trying to be funny...

CAUTION: Cerebral Overload!

Wow... this is frustrating... It's only 9:30, but I think it's time to call it a night.

Ever try to read something, and you get through a few paragraphs and realize that you haven't absorbed a word? So you start all over again, get to the same darn spot, and realize you still haven't absorbed a word? You go back once again and try it one sentence at a time... you understand what all the words mean, and you are vaguely aware that at any other moment this sentence would make perfect sense, but for some reason you can't put those words together to construct that one simple idea the author is trying to communicate? And suddenly you realize you're wasting your time. It's very noble to be studious, to buckle down and try do your work when you're sick, tired and otherwise distracted, but sometimes you would be just as productive staring at the wall.

My brain is full. I'm going to bed.

Not from 'round here?

This afternoon I was observing a choral rehearsal conducted by my conducting professor. The basses were displaying a certain degree of rhythmic incompetence, prompting the exasperated professor to state, "I don't know how it is where you come from, but in Colorado those white notes get 2 beats." It was said in good humor, and I found it amusing.

School is going well. I seem to be ahead of the curve right now in terms of workload, but I am not letting it fool me into slowing down. There's a long way to go and a lot of term paper research that needs to be spread out over the next several weeks. Beyond that, however, I have nothing noteworthy to report.