Dona Nobis Pacem

Friday morning, I picked out a cute outfit and fixed my hair, hoping to take a picture with SD in front of this tree in Eastman's Main Hall at the annual Holiday Sing.  It's my favorite Eastman tradition and SD and I have been looking forward to it ever since we knew we'd be moving back here this year.  I cleaned off my desk and admired our little Christmas tree.  I printed a few handouts for my class presentation later in the day.  I thought about giving myself a manicure over the weekend.

And then, I heard SD exclaim from the other room - "What?!"  I rushed in to see what was wrong.

"There was a shooting at my elementary school," he said.

We watched in horror as the news reports rolled in and pictures of 1st graders being led to the nearby fire station flashed across the homepage of CNN, just one mile away from Steve's parents' house.  "We were just there at Thanksgiving," I thought to myself.  We were numb.

The closing song of the Holiday Sing, "Dona Nobis Pacem," sung in a 3-part round by all who are in attendance is normally our favorite part of the event.  Now, standing in front of this beautiful tree, surrounded by the hundreds of people that had gathered in the Main Hall that morning, we contemplated the entirely new meaning of this text in the midst of such tragedy and heartache.  I fought back tears as we sang:

Dona nobis pacem.  Grant us peace.

Later in the day, we found out that most of the victims were children - twenty 6- and 7-year-olds - and my heart broke into a million pieces.  Those families, those teachers, that community.  Sandy Hook is an idyllic New England town and it's become somewhat of a home to me in the 4 1/2 years since SD and I started dating.  That fire station they keep showing on the news?  They have a lobsterfest in the summer and they sell Christmas trees and wreaths between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  We pass it every time we come into town.  Treadwell Park is where SD and I had a picnic lunch on my first visit to CT.  That elementary school is where SD was assigned Georgia in the "parade of states" (it's the reason we danced to "Georgia On My Mind" at our wedding).  He made a giant peach and wheeled it around in a little red wagon.  It's where he first learned to play the saxophone.  That auditorium where the vigil was held and where the President spoke?  That's the stage where SD performed, soloed, and graduated.  This is home.

There is no explanation for the events of last week.  There are no answers.  What can we do?  We can pray, we can grieve with the rest of the nation, we can hold on to those close to us.  We can live grateful lives.  We can give to those in need (see here, here, here, and here for a place to start).  Life is not the same.

How do we move on from such a tragedy?  Leonard Bernstein once said, "This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before."  Yes.  As musicians, making music and sharing it with the community is a way that we can give back, a way to contribute meaning.  This is the time of year that we sing hymns of faith and hope and peace; we sing of Joy coming into the world and we prepare our hearts anew for the coming of the Prince of Peace.  So sing with passion, play with your whole heart, and lead with conviction.  Focus on what matters.  And in the midst of this overwhelming tragedy, may God grant us all peace.

Image Credit: personal

On Teaching

Last week, I found out that one of my former students in Massachusetts passed away suddenly.  Ironically (or perhaps not), I thought about Ed Sunday night and told Steve, "I should write him a note this week and see how he's doing."  Later, I found out that he died the next day.  Life is short, friends; too short to leave things unsaid, to worry about what others will think, to value things that don't matter.  Act now.  Love now.  Give now.  Focus on what matters. Ed was 73 years old when he began taking piano lessons from me in the summer of 2010.  I'll never forget that first week - he came in with a stack of big note, EZ-read piano books, a mini audio recorder, and an enormous amount of self determination.  We started at the beginning: landmark notes (Frances Clark method), folk songs, rote songs, and technic exercises.  Within the first year, he was sightreading simple songs, harmonizing folk melodies, and playing teacher-student duets in the studio's spring recital.  He was dedicated.

In our second year of study, he began learning key signatures and counting in unusual meters.  He performed solo in the studio recital earlier this year.  Our last lesson before I moved was at the end of July.  In those final weeks, Ed began asking questions about chords, harmonic progressions, and inversions.  He was curious and he truly loved learning.

Every week when he came into his lesson I would ask, "How are you doing today?"  His response always caught me off guard: "Oh, I'm much better, thank you."  "What do you mean 'much better'?"  I'd say.  "Were you sick?"  "No, I'm fine.  It's just that people always pay attention when you say 'I'm doing much better,'" he'd say with a grin.  I smile when I think of him looking down now, saying, "I'm doing much better, thank you."

What a privilege we have in teaching.

Teaching to me is not just about music or experiences.  It's about people - people like Ed who want to build on a lifelong love of music, people like Bobby who love to create, and people like Matthew who love to explore and build with musical patterns.  What an opportunity we have as teachers to engage with others, interact, and share musical experiences.  I am so grateful.

Happy birthday, darling

Happy birthday to this handsome fella today!  I so admire your patient and kind heart.  I am more and more grateful for you every day!  Thank you for being my husband and my best friend.  I love you!

Love, Speak, Give

The phrase, "Love, speak, give with intention" appears on my lock screen as a constant reminder to be more intentional about life.  It reminds me to do small deeds with great love, choose words carefully and intentionally, and give with joy.  This month, I've been intentional about gratitude and really acknowledging the good gifts we have been given.  As we celebrate Thanksgiving and families and football and turkey and cranberry sauce this weekend, I hope you sit a little longer, hug a little tighter, speak with intention, and give to others as much as you are able.  "Now thank we all our God with hearts and hands and voices..."

Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!

Do What Matters

Do what matters.

This is my new motto.

When you really stop to think about what matters in life, the world seems to stop spinning quite so fast.  There are so many things in life that vie for my attention every day - emails, bills, people asking me to do more, my iPhone in general, you get the idea.  But do they really matter in the bigger picture?  Not so much.

Sometimes things happen that put things back in perspective.  You make choices about what you are going to do and what you are going to leave undone. 

Sound familiar? 

This happened to me last week.  The decision seems easy at the time but it makes you stop and think.  How often would I make this same choice on a normal day?  How often do I scroll through Instagram during our after dinner conversations?  As recently as last night, I'm embarrassed to say.  How often do I fret about meeting the expectations of others or getting everything done in a day?

This is a reminder to myself: Do what matters. (Forget the rest.)

Happy anniversary, darling

Happy anniversary, darling.

What an exciting year we've had!  We moved to a new state, visited eight states together + two more on our own, and hit 100,000 miles in the car.  We started (and stopped and started) jogging and started eating healthier.  I became a coffee drinker, you became a Bachelor Pad fan (I take full responsibility).  You had four commissions(!), I started a new degree program, and between us, we had two failed publishing attempts (there's always next year!).  We tried too many new recipes to count, saw Vermont in the fall, made our first trip to the ER, played concerts for audiences ages 2-80+, found our new everyday wine, and became Apple converts.

Our first year as husband and wife was not without its challenges but we had many laughs along the way.  I'm so grateful for your kind heart, your patient spirit, and your unwavering support.  My heart is full of so many sweet memories!  Remember splashing in the puddles on Main Street on our way to the Post Office?  And rearranging the tulips on Easter Sunday morning?  How about that time I opened a fortune cookie that had nothing inside and you opened yours to find two?  I learned just how handsome you look in a bow tie and you learned that my southern charm has a fiery side (or maybe you already had that one figured out).

I'm so grateful for the life we share together.  I love you!

P.S.  See more of our wedding pictures here and here.

Life is Good

Oh my goodness, what happened to September?!  Suddenly, it's cold enough to need scarves and sweaters (and salted caramel mochas) and it's dark by the time we sit down to dinner in the evenings.  Yes, the weeks are flying by but every day is so fulfilling.  I absolutely love the work I am doing!  Life is full, life is busy, and life is very rewarding.

Life is good, y'all.

I used to be afraid of change.  In some ways, I still am - it's different, uncomfortable, and unfamiliar.  But you know what I'm learning?  Despite all this, change can be a good thing.  Really good.  The past few months have been full of change for us but it's good change.  It's a growing kind of change.  I jumped back into the life of a full-time student (which I love), Steve recreated his daily routine, we've been humbled by God's goodness to us (more than we could have asked for), we found a new church home (and joined the choir!), we defined our new "normal."  There have been a few challenging moments for sure but when I consider the number of wonderful, new opportunities we've both had of late, I find I can be nothing but grateful for all this change.

Every day is a chance to make things happen, learn something new, or teach something.  I came across an awesome quote in my reading this week: "Doing creates knowing" (Patricia Miller).  This holds so much truth in so many areas of my life right now.  Go and do this week.  Don't just think about it or talk about it or wish about it.  Go and love.  Go and teach.  Go and give back.  Go and live life to its fullest.  Go and make it happen!

xo, Ashley

P.S. Next month, we'll be celebrating our first anniversary!  Can you believe it?  What an adventure this year has been!  So grateful.

New Student Orientation

Last week was New Student Orientation at Eastman.  It feels a little surreal - I am so, so grateful to be back.

Orientation Week generally includes advising sessions, placement exams, meet-and-greet events, tours, and a few special events for all the new students.  For me, the week looked like this:

• Day 1: a meeting with my advisor to discuss course options, an appointment to get my new ID card, and an info fair on local organizations
• Day 2: breakfast with the deans and a TA meeting
• Days 3 and 4: placement exams (and three more meetings)
• Day 5: registration day

Amidst the flurry of excitement, there were a few stressful moments.  First, those dreaded placement exams. 

A little back story: I've been studying Renaissance music history (in great detail) and counterpoint (Renaissance through Early Classical) for a month now.  (You see, when I started my masters at Eastman a few years ago, I passed both the music history and the theory placement exams.  Now, as a returning student, I was only required to take certain portions of each test.)  I was ready for the tests but it's still a lot of pressure.  If you don't pass these tests, you're required to take extra (remedial) courses before graduating.  Not only does that add hours to your schedule but it also costs more than a pretty penny. 

Anyway, I walked into the history exam on Wednesday and got a copy of the test.  Because I had taken it before, they included a copy of my previous scores in the packet but I realized right away I was looking at someone else's scores.  Come to find out (after taking the test anyway), I passed everything the first time and didn't need to take this test at all.  They had the wrong placement exam on file the whole time.  Seriously.

Naturally, I treated myself to a lemon cookie from my favorite bakery on the way home.

The second most stressful part of the week - course scheduling.  I walked into my first advising meeting of the week bright-eyed and bushy-tailed with a 3-page list of courses I wanted to take with credits, days/times, and teachers already written out.  Yes, I'm that girl.  The problem was not my level of preparedness; the problem was that most of the courses on my list were already full.

I won't tell you how many times I rewrote my schedule in five days.

By Thursday, I finally had four classes that were still open and did not conflict with my TA schedule and I had approval from the dean to add an additional credit to this semester.  Then, I went to register.  One of the courses I had chosen was only open to theory majors and another course had waaaay too many projects and assignments.

After a small meltdown, Steve and I looked through the list one more time and found a course that was still open.  Thank goodness.  In the end, it's an eclectic mix: theories of human development, sacred music, studio teaching, and 19th century music history.  It's a perfect sampler of everything I am hoping to incorporate into my program of study.

Year 1 starts today!

Child's Play

It was gorgeous here on Saturday.  Too gorgeous to sit inside all day.  So, I took my notes, my current summer reading material, and my new pair of sunglasses and packed up for an afternoon of studying in the park.

A few people passed by on their way to the bus stop, the coffee shop, or the parking garage and didn't take much notice of me on my bench.  A middle-aged woman and two young children crossed the street and sat on the bench to wait for the bus.  The children - two girls, the oldest was maybe seven and her sister either four or five - immediately began exploring the park.

Instantly, they were in play.

"Hi!" the oldest said to me as she rounded the curve where I was sitting.  "Hi!" I said back, smiling.  She continued on her way, with her sister following close behind, imitating her every step.  "This is the path to the princess," the older one said.  I pretended to read my notes as I watched them play.  They were skipping around the same section of the park - an oblong circle - but every time they rounded the corner, it was as if it was brand new territory to explore.

"Y'all get down from there!" a voice said from behind me.  "You're going to fall!"

The girls returned quickly to where their "Nana" was waiting but within a minute or two, they were back on their quest for the missing princess.  "For real, for real, this is the way to the princess," the older one said as they made their way around the circle again.  "Princess!" the younger one called out.  Within minutes, they went from searching for the princess to chasing the princess through the magical forest.  They changed direction and circled round the same section of the park as if it were brand new.

"Y'all stop that!  Come over and sit on this bench.  You're going to miss the bus!" the voice said again.

The girls again paused their game of play and sat for a moment but just as before, they were quickly on their feet again.  Now, the game was Hide and Seek.  The older one ran across the little park to a new section (yet to be explored) and the younger one soon followed.  As they chased each other around the flower bed in the middle of the park, they saw a bright orange butterfly.  They both froze in an instant, mesmerized.  The older one quickly gave instructions to her sister - "Wait here, I'll get it," she said as she tiptoed closer and closer.  As she reached her hand out slowly, the butterfly flew up into the air suddenly, causing both little girls to jump back and squeal.  Now, the game was "chase the butterfly."  A man blowing leaves off the park benches jumped into the game for a minute when he reached his hands up as the butterfly flew overhead.  The girls giggled.

Within the span of twenty minutes or so, these girls moved seamlessly from one idea to another without discussion (i.e. "now what should we do" or "how about we play this?") and without explanation (i.e. "so, there's this princess in a magical forest and we're going to go find her").  They were in almost constant play the entire time (except for those intervening moments where an adult told them to STOP playing and wait for the bus).  I was struck by their uninhibited creativity, their level of imagination, and the quick change of pace.

This is play.

Do we remember what it feels like?  How did we forget?  Do we encourage it when we see it or do we tell children to stop playing so they can do something boring and adult like sit on a bench waiting for the bus?

Maybe play is more important than sitting and waiting.  Maybe play is more important than watching TV all afternoon.  Maybe real play is more important than playing games on a handheld device.  Play is how we learn, how we grow, and how we develop creativity.  Play is how we learn to interact with others.  Play is how we learn to dream, discover, and explore.  Have you searched for the lost princess lately?  For real, for real, this is the way.

Image Credit: my iPhone

Hymn Sing

There's something truly inspiring about community singing.  The act of bringing people of all ages and all professions together and singing something - in unison or in harmony - is a tradition rich in history and meaning.  Picture this scene from the early 20th century:

April 5, 1919

“At the first session of Farmers’ Week Mrs. Steele faced a packed house. 

There were the reserved farmer and his family, the classic self-conscious professor, the shy freshman, the all-wise sophomore and the learned upper-classman.  In addition, townspeople of all ages and professions were present. . . .With breathless suspense we waited to see what Mrs. Steele would do with this unusual gathering.  Was it possible to make this audience sing?  If Mrs. Steele had any trepidation or misgivings she did not betray them but stepped forward in her inimitable manner and said:

“First, I want everyone in this audience to know that he can sing.  Why, everyone can and everyone wants to sing.  It’s the simplest thing in the world.  All you have to do is to forget about yourself; it’s self-consciousness that prevents most persons from trying.  Can you sing?  Of course you can.  I know it.  We are going to sing the first verse of The Star-Spangled Banner.  Stand erect, hands straight down at your sides.  Now open your mouths and sing.” 

And with one movement of her baton the entire audience, led by the university band, the university glee club and the trained chorus of county agents, burst forth. . . .

"Don’t you see that you can all sing?” said Mrs. Steele. 

“People get confidence in themselves when they hear others who have no more training than they have singing along with them.  Now you know what Community Singing is. . . .It is the expression of the mass soul in song.  A singing of the people, for the people, by the people.”

Trosper, B.B. (1919). “Community Sings,” excerpt. The Country Gentleman, Vol. 84. Luther Tucker & Son (63-64).

---

Isn't that great?!  I especially love that last part: "Community singing. . . .is the expression of mass soul in song. . . .of the people, for the people, by the people."

Last Sunday, Steve and I walked to church for "Tent Sunday" - the one Sunday a year where choir members, pastors, and lay readers move outside the walls of the Sanctuary; where the organist plays a Casio keyboard; where the pages of the Bible on the altar flip back and forth in the wind; where the congregation sits in folding chairs and bulletins are used as fans. 

The service began with a good, old-fashioned hymn sing. 

For those of you who might not be familiar with the tradition, a hymn sing is a time when hymn favorites are called out by members of the choir and the congregation for all to sing.  Together, everyone turns to "#77," for instance and sings 1-2 verses.  Folks generally have their favorites ready to shout out at the conclusion of each hymn.  Hands go up, numbers are called out, and murmurs of, "Oh yes, I love that one," are heard above the fluttering of hymnal pages.  With a brief introduction, the crowd joins together with fullest voices, truly singing their hearts out.

Isn't this what it's all about?

Music is often considered an outward expression of the soul.  Creating music together - with children and babies and grandmas and youth; with those who read music and those who know the words by heart and those who are experiencing it for the first time  - that is the expression of all of our souls combined.  How great is that?! 

"Of the people, for the people, by the people" and how sweet it is.