Announcing!

Little dearie Hannah Ruth has a blog!

http://bannahhraun.blogspot.com

In other news:

My life has been chugging along here now for three weeks at BU and Boston in general. I'm enjoying school - great Sheveloff class, and orchestra isn't too bad. We're doing some Debussy piano pieces that were orchestrated by Ravel, a new trumpet concerto by Richard Cornell (Terry Everson sounds GREAT!), and Brahms 2. I'm concertmaster. Again. Fortunately (or, I should say, hopefully) this means I'll be somewhat off the pressure hook for the rest of the semester. Hopefully. Last year I was concertmaster twice in a row in the second semester - I really don't want to deal with that again.

This past Thursday night was the opening concert at Emmanuel. We did all 6 Brandenburg Concerti. It was, to put it plainly, an incredible experience and I enjoyed myself immensely. I played the solo violin part to number 2, which used a solo horn instead of trumpet (apparently thats how Craig Smith did it the last time they did Brandenburg, in 1996). It was beautiful to have a horn instead of a high, screeching piccolo trumpet. Ahem.

I got to hear a lot of the rehearsals for the ones I didn't participate in (3, 4, and obviously 6). My conclusion is that number 6 is my all-time favorite, especially the first two movements. Simply glorious. The grand plan of my lifetime is to have a kid who plays viola and then I'll learn the 2nd viola part somehow badly but since its my kid they'll HAVE to play it with me! Ha! You're all invited to that concert about thirty years from now. :-)

Finnis and the rest of the Braunhills are doing well. Last weekend he had a brief return stint to the hospital to treat jaundice. It was scary, but according to Hannah (Miss PA School Smarty-Pants!) its very common in newborns. He was three weeks early, which could have caused some stuff to not quite work right yet. However, I got to see him and Heidi Wednesday evening at the Bran. dress rehearsal, and his coloring is back to quite normal and he is cute as a button. Thank goodness.

Here is a picture of the incredible flowers my parents sent to me for Brandenburg:


For more Brandenburg pictures, click HERE.