Funny Little Boy

Dexter followed me out of the house last night, I was going to put some things in the recycle bin. I knew he was there. All of a sudden, he said, "Whoa, that scared me."
I said, "What scared you?"
He said, "That scared Dexter."
I said, "What scared Dexter?"
He said, "That scared the little boy."
By, then I was laughing, because I knew I would never find out WHAT it was, but I sure have a funny little boy.

Two year olds that can speak clearly say some crazy things. Some things are so illogical that my brain rejects them, no matter how funny, because it does not compute, so I can't remember long enough to write it down.

One Sunday, we were leaving the baptismal room, heading toward the refreshment room and he said, "Mom, you're making me nervous." I tried to get him to explain what I was doing that was making him nervous, but he only repeated himself.

A few days ago we were driving through some winding mountain roads, on the way to the beach, and he said, "Oh no, dangerous curves." I think he got that from Thomas the Tank Engine.

He turns three years old next week and he already recognizes pretty much all the alphabet letters, thanks to this wonderful website: www.starfall.com
The top link on that page with the ABC's is great. I would never try to teach letters to a 2 year old, but he learned them, nonetheless. He doesn't know the alphabet in order, yet, and he may forget the letters if we don't keep them fresh. He loves to be read to and has at least 3 or 4 short books memorized.
O.K. enough bragging for now.

A Milestone

This school year is a momentous one:
We have a daughter starting high school and a daughter starting Kindergarten.
'Course it's a little anti-climatic because the high schooler goes to the same school as last year, since it is an all ages private school, and we are homeschooing the kindergartener.
Nevertheless, it is a milestone.

Note: this event will repeat in two years with our sons.

Ode to TJed

In Core Phase we learn good and bad, right and wrong
Our play is our work and our work is our play
Building a foundation so strong,
it will last our whole life long.

We love to learn
We're learning to lead.

In Love of Learning Phase we discuss, read and write
Following our interests wherever we might,
To marvel at the wonders of the world all around,
And find the hidden treasures of knowledge to be found.

We love to learn
We're learning to lead.

Then, we will be ready for Scholar Phase
Studying for hours in classics of every kind,
Learning to analyze, question and decide
Reading, thinking, laughing and crying
Struggling to exercise both body and mind-
Feeling, changing, becoming better than before
And then we'll go out and serve and change the world.

We love to learn
We're learning to lead.

We the rising Hero Generation.
We must work hard to earn our education
to become men and women of conviction
who will stand strong in the face of tribulation.

We love to learn
We're learning to lead.

New look

So, thanks Pyzam for making it easy to change the look of the blog.

But, the text color they had was a lighter turquoise than the background color and I thought it was unreadable.
So I figured out how to change the text color, all by myself!
Yay!

Thanks to Little Einsteins...

...my two-year old:

1. knows what an outrigger canoe is.

2. has heard of Machu Pichu.

3. thinks that hula dancing is for cooling volcanoes.

4. refers to speeds in musical terms. (my little backseat driver, "Mom, you have to go allegro!")

5. knows some silly words to some great classical songs.

6. thinks little pigs can fly airplanes.


I might add more to this list as I discover what else he knows.

What it takes...

So I'm sure someone is wondering what it takes to audition for the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, unless you've already googled it and know all about it.

The first three requirements are pretty easy:

~Be between 25 and 55 years of age (a minimum of 5 years of service is expected and a lifetime maximum of 20 years)
~Live within a 100 mile radius of Temple Square
~Be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in good standing

After that it gets tricky:
~Fill out an application (in July) including a recording of yourself singing a hymn and other vocal exercises
If they like your tape, then:
~pass a written theory test & listening test
If you pass those, then:
~live, in person, audition; part of which is performing a difficult piece they send you and another part is sight reading your part (alone) in a quartet

That all takes about 6 months.
If you make it through all that, you're in!
Except that you have to first spend three months in the Temple Square Chorale while taking a music theory class.
After that you have to pass another written and singing evaluation, then you graduate into the real choir.

Also, as for odds...
Our guy in the choir (Nathan) said that they usually get anywhere from 400-500 applications to fill around 20 seats annually.

He knew one lady who auditioned 4 times before getting in.

Other things I found interesting:
~The choir president was encouraging members to join the recording association, so that they can vote on who wins the Grammys!
~The choir has it's own record label and puts out 2-3 CDs a year and usually one DVD for Christmas.

Here's a link if you want to learn a whole lot more about the audition process:
http://www.mormontabernaclechoir.org/pages/PointingTheWay

Oh, also, I thought it was really interesting (if you aren't a member of the church, you may not appreciate this fact, however...)
Once you are in the choir, you are set apart as a musical missionary and it becomes your calling! I thought that was so cool.
That just shows what a big time commitment it is.

Awesome-ness!

I attended the Choral Conducting Academy at BYU last week and it was great fun and a little depressing. The depressing thing to me is that there are soooo many things in which it would help to be an expert and it would sure take time and effort to become one. Singing takes a lot of effort to do it well and there are so many subtlties to being a great conductor, and not to mention analyzing music! I'd rather be the pianist that can transpose at the drop of a hat, but..... that takes so much more time and a different kind of effort.

Anyway...

One very fun highlight of the week was taking a bus (with the other academy attendees) to Salt Lake City to attend a rehearsal of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. But, that was not all, no, we actually got to fill in the empty seats and rehearse with them!!!
I think the excuse was so that we could have a good view of the conductor, Mack Wilberg.

The choir was preparing for a concert coming up that weekend, so we sped through a lot of music.
It was pretty hard for me to follow foreign language words with totally unfamiliar music. I think Hebrew was the hardest to follow, but the Chichester Psalms by Leonard Bernstein, was sure neat music.

The first song we rehearsed was in French, but it was a familiar tune, Habañera, from Carmen by Bizet, so that wasn't too hard to follow, even though I had never sung that arrangement before. (I've only sung the melody with Charlotte Church in my car.)

Then, we sang in Latin. Requiem - Sanctus, by Verdi. It was arranged for 2 choirs, so that was really interesting trying to follow along. The director said that it is an opera without costumes or scenery.

Next up, was the Triumphal Chorus from Aida, also by Verdi. If I remember correctly, this one was in Italian. The director said he was letting the choir get away with a lot tonally, because "It's an opera, it'll sound funny if we sing it too refined. It needs some spa-GHET'ti to it!"

Finally, we sang some in English:
'Going Home' based on Dvorak "New World Symphony" (much easier to sing in English!)
Danny Boy, arr. by Joseph Flemmerfelt (I think they had to memorize this one to sing as an encore)
Shenandoah, arr. by Mack Wilberg
An American Songbook, written for the Tabernacle Choir for the 2002 Winter Olympics
God Bless America (they also had to memorize this for the encore)

All those songs were for the Sun Valley, Idaho, benefit concert ($250-$500/ticket!).
Then, they rehearsed a couple for the Deer Valley concert the same weekend:
Psalm 86, by Gustav Holt
Amazing Grace, arr. by Wilberg
and the Chichester Psalms (that I already mentioned).

On the bus back to Provo, our tour guide, Nathan, told us about the choir.
It was really interesting.
He said that there are currently 397 members and 363 seats in the choir loft at the Conference Center.
There were emptly seats, because there is only a 75% attendance requirement.
Nathan said he goes for 3 weeks and then takes a week off.

I'll write about the audition process in another entry.