I try and fail to write everything.

What is best to write about? There are several options I'm considering:

- small, personal flirtations, mostly with foreign men,
- scenery,
- music.

Right, so music.

Unbelievably, I've already given an entire concert and will soon embark on another concert program. Our first concert, of Shostakovich 7 and the premiere of the cello concerto, was good. It was completely sold out. It was also extremely long, and at times physically painful. The Symphony is ninety minutes long, and not only did we play it at our 4pm Sunday concert, but we also played it through entirely at the 9am open dress rehearsal. Open dress rehearsals, for the record, are a totally crazy idea. Especially when Yo-Yo Ma is the soloist. There are hundreds of people present; how can you possibly rehearse? They expect a concert, and also treat the ushers terribly, from what I hear. And they gave a standing ovation at the end of Yo-Yo's performance, when actually, we didn't really have time for a standing ovation. Because it was a REHEARSAL ...

The audiences here are surprisingly rude. I mean, many of these people are very cultured and wonderful, but many aren't. Lots of people leave early. They all have cocktail hours and tee times to get to. Okay, that's enough negative energy about Aspen. But the average home here costs three million dollars, I was told the other day during a dinner at an Episcopal church. Isn't this sort of a Christian dilemma? I also have a problem with the fact that only rich people can afford to live in Aspen, or maybe even to see our concerts. We are like their personal entertainment for the summer. And it's sort of weird.

I am feeling good about being here, despite bitching that could suggest otherwise. I have seen some absolutely incredible concerts. The best so far was a recital by the Jupiter String Quartet, who just won the Fischoff Grand Prize recently and are all NEC alumni. Their Mozart (Prussian #2) was the most fascinating Mozart I've ever heard. I was literally on the edge of my seat the entire time, smiling, occasionally laughing. So, that was incredible.

And I just had a great lesson. Ms. Heard seems pleased with the way the Saint-Saens is going, and offers a lot of brilliant ideas for practicing the Bach. I love her, and I'm glad she's here. I'm glad I'm here with her.

Our next concert will include a Ciaccona by Mark-Andre Dalbavie (modern), a Prokofiev Piano Concerto, and Brahms Symphony no. 1. And that will be on the rehearsal menu, starting Thursday.

And I miss my parents.

I discuss Festival Orchestra's first concert.

A quick blog post from the Aspen Music Festival and School: after a round of auditions when we all first arrived at school, I was placed in the back of the first violins of the Aspen Festival Orchestra. This was sort of shocking to me, as the audition felt pretty bad, and the competition to be in that orchestra is pretty tough. I was also so, so excited: this orchestra gives pretty high-profile concerts, with famous soloists, and plays great repertoire. I'm fairly sure that this will be the best orchestra I have ever played with.

This concert, we're playing Symphony no. 7 by Shostakovich, plus a world premiere of a cello concerto, "Vision," by Kevin Puts. Yo-Yo Ma is the soloist. (!!!!) Luckily, I hardly play during this piece, so I hope to just sit back and watch this amazing artist from up close. (Well, sort of close.) The piece is beautiful, largely tonal, with lots of lovely chord progressions and textures on which the cello sound can just float. I think it will be beautiful. Yo-Yo, as David Zinman calls him, will rehearse with us today. This will probably guarantee us something of an audience during rehearsal. The concert, we hear, is selling out and should be a huge event.

I'm here in Aspen in order to gauge just how much I need and want to be a classical musician. How do the rehearsals make me feel? How much can I really practice? How do other musicians make me feel; is this the life I want? So, yesterday's rehearsal was my first real experience as a musician of the festival. It was frankly pretty grueling; the Shostakovich is an enormous, difficult piece, so I wasn't exactly ecstatic for every single moment. But I truly loved looking across the orchestra - which is enormous - and watching my fellow musicians. The concert master, Herbie Greenberg, is a fantastic man who keeps turning around and addressing the violins: "Gang, it's a little messy ... Gang, we're going to be in TWO halves, right? ... Bravo, gang." David Zinman, our conductor, has a good sense of humor, and is expressive and easy to follow. There's a bit of Zinman-worship at the festival; it's probably deserved, so I'm really looking forward to finding out what he's like to work with. We will play several concerts under him.

I was just kicked out of the practice room by one of the 200 or so pianists studying at Aspen. I'm off to find another place to work.

I tell you about Louise Gluck.

I recently bought a book of Louise Gluck's poetry. It's entitled 'The First Four Books of Poetry,' and that's what it is: her first four volumes, assembled into one. Upon reading just the first few poems, I was thrilled that I'd finally decided to buy some of her work. She is elegant but she is modern, she is sexy but she is restrained.

On an Academy of American Poets DVD that profiled her -- and three other Pulitzer Prize-winning poets, who were men -- she was fascinating to watch. She openly told her interviewer that she loathed public poetry readings; she described the way someone reading a poem aloud interferes with her experience of the poem on the page. I was struck by this: no lip service to the fact that poetry was, for a long time, an oral tradition. In a way, I know what she means: her thin body, her New York accent, and her slow, painstaking delivery haunt my own silent readings of her poetry. But it doesn't bother me one bit. Somehow, despite knowing how she hates to read her own work aloud, I find her an arresting performer.

She says her favorite book of her own poetry is "Descending Figure." That's not the one that won the Pulitzer - who cares? I am in love with her.

I may add to this later.

I explain the blog.

In this blog, I'm thinking of doing a bunch of things. In one vein, I'd really like to just talk about whatever art I'm absorbing at the moment: book reviews, music and performance reviews. In another, I want to post my own creative writing: poetry, fiction, fragments. In a third vein, I want to chronicle what I think will be a really important year in the Vanderbilt living wage campaign, and share my experience (and perhaps other's, as well) with direct actions. (This probably deserves its own blog!)

In another vein, I'd like to chronicle my time at the Aspen Music Festival and School. I'd love to make that a good resource for people who want to know about Aspen -- I had a hard time finding personal accounts of the festival experience. The first chunk of the blog will probably deal with this extensively, since I'm headed to Aspen in about twelve hours.

I hope this blog will be different from a couple of others I've had: I'd like to stay away from the personal stuff, as much as I can. Of course, the personal will filter in through all of these things. But I hope friends will read, learn, and be inspired to throw their own two cents into the internet fountain.

I titled the blog "And We Will Form A Family Band." I think it embraces several things that I love: community, music, jamming, and Anchorman.

All good things,
Ellen.