I haven't blogged in a while because let's just say it has been a rough past couple of weeks.  Upon being sick and a death in the family, it is safe to say that I didn't get much practice in.  That is not to say that going into my jury will not have a positive attitude. My journey this year has been interesting to say the least.  I have never in my entire life ever had a voice lesson.  I have taught myself anything I knew about singing, and it isn't much as I came to find out this semester.  This year I prided myself on a tough work ethic and a good attitude. I tried to take in as much information as I could this year about the vocal process, and I learned a lot.  If I do join the army come May 29 then I will not be back so soon, but when I come back I'm sure my work ethic and other habits will be top notch and ready to continue!

I believe I missed last weeks blog.  The end March and beginning of April have been a very busy time, and things will only get more hectic.  With time getting more scarce, I find myself returning to old practice habits of spending more time all at once practicing.  Not to be misunderstood, I haven't been fatiguing myself in a practice room, but I have been spending more time in them.  During my vocal lessons, I am never quite sure as to which song I will be singing, so the previous weeks I worked on all of my repertoire.  This week, however, I have been focusing more upon "O del mio amato ben" and my German piece "Sehnsucht" and the difficulties they entail.  For the Italian piece I can be more "nit-picky" because it has more hours of practice put into it.  Diphthongs prove to be less and less as I keep practicing, and now I am really starting to get emotionally into the piece as my performance during studio hopefully showed.  "Sehnsucht" has been more technical work of getting my mouth around the many consonants, diphthongs, and subtle lip rounding that the language entails.  All in all I can just say that I've been working hard as I always try to do, and it helps me stay confident in my performances.

Throughout this week I have been swamped with work.  I thought with everyone being gone to San Antonio, I would be able to get some observation hours in and get some much needed practice.  On the contrary, I find my self working on tests and projects.  Don't get me wrong, I am still getting in my normal practice hours, but this week I have felt over worked.  For my vocal journey I have mainly been doing IPA.  I have a project for diction, and a new German song in my vocal repertoire that I am looking at.  The week has been full of phonetics and deciphering what they mean as best as I can along with getting into practice rooms and doing what I do best--practicing.

Vocal Journey part 2

The past few weeks that have gone by have been hectic to say the least.  I have come to find the stresses of having two main instruments.  Those being my voice and the saxophone.  On top of countless hours of practice and study for the saxophone, I have noticed that I am spending almost the same amount of time singing or working on my vocal progress.  Each time I practice for my vocal studio assignments, however, I do it differently.  I may sing in the shower to help with memorization, or in front of the mirror to view my jaw space.  All in all I have noticed slight differences to how I practice compared to the saxophone.  I find myself working in smaller doses, but larger amounts.  Slowly but surely I continuously add up time minute by minute at the end of the week.  Fifteen minutes here, or a half an hour there of practice several times a day adds up in a hurry, and I hope that my work in class has shown this.  Sometimes I feel unprepared or far from perfect, but then I take a step back and think about the hard work that I put in.  I realize that I'm not as good as many others, but I'll be damned if I'll be outworked by everyone else.  Not only do I sing and practice constantly, but I listen whenever I am near a computer to my music.  Right now I am listening to "When I Think Upon the Maidens."  Next up will be "Weep You No More" and I'm sure the rest will follow after. So now I will have enough with the blogging and get on with more vocal practice.

My vocal beginning

My week has been filled with more practicing than listening this time.  I still get onto youtube and the NAXOS music library and listen to my pieces, but now that I have more of the text down, I have begun to sing.  I try and keep myself loose in the neck and jaw area by doing many exercises.  A couple of which include double tonguing and moving my head side to side as I sing scale vocalises.  The pas week has felt productive because I was able to have two lessons with my instructor, so I feel all the more confident.