End of the Year

Well it's not quite the end of the year yet, but it's definitely the end of the school year. Today is Friday of finals week. Normally it's fairly peaceful at the School of Music by this time of year, but today there is a lot of hubbub around the building. Partly because there's a faculty retreat today, which is the first time we've had an end of semester retreat. But also there's a lot of students still hovering around, likely because everyone got thrown behind schedule when the school closed for two weeks in November.

Oh year, the school closed for two weeks in November. Due to the now notorious Camp Fire, about 90 miles north of us in Butte County, air quality from the smoke severely impacted our region. In Sacramento it looked like we had very foggy conditions all day long. But it wasn't fog. The AQI was going into the 400s in several areas. So many colleges closed for the week before Thanksgiving, and the week of Thanksgiving. K-12 schools stayed open but without any outdoor activities, finally closing on the Friday before Thanksgiving. The fire was the worst in California history, both in destruction and in loss of life. It was unlike anything I've ever seen around here.

Anyways, due to the closure and missing two weeks of school and ensemble rehearsals, we had about a dozen concerts that were cancelled and/or rescheduled. So my work life was quite busy when we all returned to campus after Thanksgiving. Now, several weeks later, I've finally got my head above water. And now it's almost time for a nice winter break.

On the music side of things, I have not been too active this semester. I did re-arrange Gordo's Revenge for the marching band's pre-show music, and I wrote them a new arrangement of the Star Bangled Banner. But other than that I've been quietly hiding in the shadows of the music world. The last show I played in was the LOTS production of The Gondoliers in August. I haven't even updated my website since then. And I won't even get started on the last time I wrote any original music. I guess it's been hard for me to find inspiration. Not sure that will change anytime soon; I imagine I'll just idle my way through the holidays into 2019. Maybe the new year will see some new sparks of life from me...