Oh, the times we had...

Indianapolanus is no more. I've switched over to adamidwest, so go there for your Adamian updates from now on. As for Indianapolanus, we had a good run. It's hard to believe it all started with Dean at my side, two buddies driving through the mysteries of Albany, Buffalo, and Cleveland, just to get to some strange land called Indiana. Moving into an apartment with someone I hardly knew, entering a totally new music program, and yet things turned out so great. I am truly grateful for my years at Butler, they were beautiful in so many ways. Obviously I've grown a lot since I first arrived there, but I will never forget all my friends and professors who changed me for the better. It's nice to know I'll be back in Indy to take my oral exams sooner or later, and to see all my buddies, but now I'm a Chicagonite. An Illinoiser. A midwesternian. Ok, I'm done. See ya later Indy!

You can't be serious...

Here's the bombshell folks: I just moved to Chicago. It's amazing. Don't get me wrong, I loved Butler, and I especially loved all the people I met, but Indianapolis just wasn't for me. Ever since I got back from El Salvador (check previous post) I've been couchsurfing a.k.a. living the dream, but enough is enough. School is now back in session, and I had been looking for apartments in Chicago, then out of the blue I got a response from a great listing. One thing led to another, and after a couple phone calls and a video chat, the dude said I was perfect. He found an amazing apartment in Logan Square, and needed a roommate until his fianceé moves in next summer. I was in disbelief, but every day brought more emails that confirmed that he actually wanted to live with me, and had space in his rental truck to pick me up and bring all my junk along with him. I still can't believe it worked out so well. His name is, get this, Nathan Cool. No joke. It's legit. And it's true. He's super nice, super chill, and we instantly got along great. Now I'm in a gorgeous apartment, surrounded by the city life I have been missing for years, ready to explore and hunt for jobs. We spent our day driving/talking/sharing stories, followed by lugging all of our crap up four flights of stairs, and then eating (what else) deepdish pizza. What a day. We don't have internet just yet, so for now I'm stealing someone else's wireless. Oh yeah, here's my address:
2812 N Whipple Street, Apt 3
Chicago, IL
60618
I'll put up some pictures real soon.
One last thing: seeing as I am no longer in Indianapolis, I have to retire one of my favorite titles, "Indianapolanus." I will be switching over to "Adamidwest" pretty soon, unless someone comes up with a better name. Don't worry, I'll make the transition easy as π

What a trip

El Salvador was amazing. That will be the theme of this post. Some of you have already seen Ben's pictures, which are better than mine. But I'll try to recount some of the best times we had visiting Gabbo in Central America.
Where to begin? Even on the drive from the airport to Gabe's community, all we saw was trees and mountains for miles and miles and miles. Unfortunately, once we hit the more urban areas we found KFCs and Burger Kings and such, which sucks, but whatever. Gabe's area is beautiful, basically one long dirt road filled with wandering dogs and chickens, and houses/farms on either side. And everybody there loves him for some reason. Probably because he's the only guy blasting tunes that aren't Eminem or reggaeton. We got to meet all of his neighbors, the cute kids, cool men, welcoming women, they were all so nice to us. One night Gabe was supposed to cook dinner for Tonito, but he turned the tables and invited us to a feast at his house. It was honestly some of the best food I'd eaten in years.
We spent a night in a cabin in the mountains. Hiked to a waterfall, and even rode some ziplines. I was terrified at first, but they start you off slow, and gradually you go faster and over higher valleys. The views were perfect.
We also spent a couple nights at the beach. Once again, it was perfect. Tons of international surfers, and families on vacation just having a good time by the beautiful water. We climbed enormous rocks, swam in the ocean, had underwater swimming contests, met lots of other chill people, played pool and pingpong, and even had jam sessions outside of our room.
Doesn't get much better than that. We just did so many things that I thought I'd never do. Lots of hitchhiking, and riding in the backs of pickup trucks cruising down the highway. Jumping off waterfalls, and then navigating underwater tunnels to find other waterfalls. Swimming in public pools that cost a quarter, and then getting attacked by rain on the way back, standing unprotected in the back of a truck. Eating delicious street food that you know isn't sanitary, but the taste and price are too good to turn down. Visiting Lauren's site, hiking to a lake surrounded by trees on all sides. Seeing Jimbo's site, a natural shower, eating choco-bananas for 7 cents, hiking up a mountain to see a view of San Salvador at night. Walking around the Centro, a sketchy part of the capital with lots of pickpockets and great deals on clothes. I think the only part I did not enjoy was the roosters in Gabe's yard waking me up at 4am. I never wanted to kill something with my bare hands so much.
Honestly, I know I've left out so much in this little summary, because amazing things were happening every day. Like I said, the country was beautiful. Our trip was perfect. It was great just hanging with my brothers, going on adventures we'll be remembering for decades. I put up some more pictures on my flickr page, so check em out. And look at Ben's if you haven't yet. And if you can, VISIT GABE. You won't regret it.
Oh yeah, yesterday was my thesis defense. Not nearly as exciting. A bunch of professors gave me some pointers on my paper, and how to make my composition look better. Now I'll do some revisions, and once that's done I'll schedule my oral exam. Next week I'm trying to move to Chicago, and start a lease on September 1. Without a job. Exciting! I'll keep updating everyone as crazy life-altering events keep happening.

Let's get ready to rumble!!

How quickly the summer goes by. 4th of July was amazing. I think this is the best way to explain it:
Other than that, just giving lessons, hanging with friends, working on my thesis, and looking for jobs/apartments in Chicago. More importantly, Ben and I leave for El Salvador this Sunday! It'll be tough to say goodbye to some of the young guys who won't be here when I get back, but it looks like I'll be hanging around through August anyway so I'll get more time to tie up all the loose ends. Plus I'll be able to start a lease on September 1st, instead of trying to find something that starts in the middle of a month. I'll just couchsurf for a week or two as all of my stuff gets sorted out, and then it's on to the great unknown: Chicago!

Quick Update

Just wanted to update people on what I've been doing. Basically my thesis is coming along well, it looks like my self-imposed deadline of July 31st will work out fine. I've also been applying to jobs everywhere, mostly in Chicago, but also places like Portland, Maine and NYC. Other than that, I've been continuing guitar lessons with a teen-aged beginner, as well as an older guy who's been playing for a couple years. Both are just fun people.
I've also been hanging with buds, watching movies, and always listening to music. For example, last week I watched Puccini's Tosca, which I enjoyed. But today, I watched the Met's live version of La Bohéme from 2008, which just blew me away. It was so good that I was literally crying by the end of it, which explains why it's such a hit. This was this first piece of music to actually make me weep, which I was not expecting at all. Nowadays my eyes might water at the end of great movies (like the Life Aquatic), at the end of a great book (like For Whom the Bell Tolls), and even the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra's performance of Ravel's La Valse almost had me there, but this was the real deal, and I am not the least bit ashamed. I highly recommend it to everyone.
Lastly, Ben and I bought our tickets for El Salvador! I fly to El Sal via Atlanta on August 2nd, and come back on the 11th. Our lease runs up soon after that, so it'll give me a few days to say goodbye to everybody and move to my next location! Craziness.

Holy Moley!

All the craziness is over! I can't believe it! What an insane month.
First off there were tons of recitals by my fellow composers. Josh had a great recital, and so did Matt Smart, and then Zane's was epic, and then mine! Ensemble 48 played a lot of great music along the way, helping out whenever we can, and it all came off great. Then the whole Boston crowd came for my recital weekend, which was tons of fun. Going out to nice restaurants, walking around in the nice weather, and me trying not to freak out about anything. Then Sunday came, and I was really happy with all the rehearsals, and the concert went off perfectly! Even Dean and Ross came down from Chicago to show their support, so I had to invite them on stage for my encore.
I've put some of my music on my myspace page, check it out if you can.
Once that was over and done with, we had a little shindig at my apartment as I shared my newest homemade brew, an Irish Stout that was simply delectable. After that a group of Ensemble 48 members went to Columbus, Ohio to do another live soundtrack gig. Here's a cool article written about us. After that I had a couple papers left and a presentation on Roy Harris' Third Symphony, which went surprisingly well actually.
Then last weekend was graduation, so Mom and Ellie and even Betsy came by. We all had a great time, even though graduation was predictably quite tedious, but hey, at least I got to wear a pink hood thing.
After that, Ensemble 48 put on it's second annual Defenestration BBQ, this time with the E48 Skills Challenge, which is like the Olympics for stupid things we do sometimes. After throwing some great stuff out of Scott's window and eating too many hamburgers, we had arm wrestling, leg wrestling, the hot sauce eating contest, the white bread eating contest, the gymnastics, etc. It was a blast.
Here are the four hot sauce competitors, and you can see the wild combination of sauces which were mixed together, along with some crazy peppers Brian had lying around his house. Josh gave up eventually because he couldn't feel his fingers anymore, but the rest of us persisted through the numbness and tingling and gagging and eventually hit a stalemate. It was beautiful.
That basically leaves us to where I am right now. No classes, just working on my thesis, looking for jobs anywhere and everywhere, and hanging out with all the cool kids who are staying around this summer. We're off to see an Indianapolis Indians game tomorrow night which will be awesome, but other than that, I gotta get my head in the game!

Welcome to Recital Overload!

Spring Break was great, working on compositions, hanging with friends, brewing my beer, I can't complain. Our Purim party was a great success, involving many unique retellings of the story of Esther. Let's just say mine liberally infused the original tale with some plot elements from Aladdin and the Duck Tales Movie, so it was awesome. Me, Scott and Zane even spent a night in Columbus with Scott's buddy Tony, but now we've entered into the notorious end-of-the-year recital season.
Of course very few people can plan ahead enough to have their recital before spring break, so it's a mad rush for good spots from now until the end of the semester. We've already had a couple undergraduate composition recitals (for Max and Brooks) which were really great, and it made me think of just how different this place is from Bowdoin. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely loved Bowdoin, but there are so many talented/passionate composers here it just boggles my mind. I love it. And then there are bassoon recitals and harp recitals and piano recitals and so on, it never ends, which I equally love. We go to as many as we can, and I really learn something new from each one.
I had a craving for green beans recently, so I asked for mom's meat/green bean recipe. For a first try, it turned out great!
And let me remind you that this was taken after I served myself an ample first helping. Maybe next time I'll use less green beans, or just a bigger pan. Man it was good though.
Then yesterday was another huge event. The American Pianists Association holds a competition every three years looking for new musicians to parade around, and we've been fortunate enough to have seen most of their concerts over the past year. Don't ask me how, but they commissioned me and nine other Butler composition students, as well as our very own Professor Felice, for 11 3-minute piano pieces, which were performed last night. My piece, entitled "Asiatic Cobra Dance," was played by Igor Lovchinsky, who just blew my mind. Not only did he memorize my entire piece, he played it super fast, and super amazingly. I almost cried. Here's a review from the Indianapolis Star, and here's a nice picture of 9 of us 'posers:
And the obligatory crazy photo:
So yeah, we're all still trying to calm down from last night's craziness. In other news, we've got some graduate composition recitals coming up these next few weeks, and then Schelle himself is having one shortly after mine, which is going to rock. Oh yeah, I put most of the video up from our last Composers Orchestra concert, check it out on youtube.
I think that's it for now. I'm still working on my thesis, and job-hunting, but there's a good chance I'll just hang out here until I'm done with everything and can get my shit together. Can't wait to see everybody in a few weeks!

Spring Break!

The past week and a half has been insane. So many awesome concerts, here's a glimpse of what my life is like:
Thursday, 2/26-Zane, Professor Felice and I perform downtown at IUPUI during their electronic music concert. We perform our Ebow pieces again, my wonderful 'Contracurrency' and Felice's 'Seven by Three.' The performance space was really beautiful:
Plus there was a good crowd, and some other really cool pieces on the program. One piece involved four of the students using wii-controllers as musical instruments, as they were hooked up to a laptop program and creating some really cool loops/sounds.
Friday, 2/27-Zane and I saw the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra downtown. The program included some Copland, Bernstein, Rhapsody in Blue, and a new compostion by a current composer. We enjoyed some pieces better than others, but all in all it was great.
Saturday, 2/28-My roommate Josh and our friend Meredith performed downtown at the Indy Convergence, putting together a show of modern dancing, acting, and even an operetta based on Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater. It was very cool.
Sunday, 3/1-The Romantic composition professor, James Mulholland, had a massive concert of only his pieces. Seriously, it was 2.5 hours of pure Romanticism. Every single piece was about love, no joke. He had some cool moments, but we got the idea after the first 10 minutes. For the big finale, he had the Butler Orchestra, a huge organ, the Butler Choir, Butler Chorus, Kentucky Chorale, and Indianapolis Children's Choir singing his version of America the Beautiful. Jesus Christ it was the biggest thing I've ever seen.
Monday, 3/2-A bunch of Butler composers performed downtown in front of some unsuspecting old people who don't really "get" new music, but are open to the idea of it. Here's Josh on stage as the MC tries to explain why people shouldn't give up on new music, and Professor Felice on the right helps describe why our music is just as valid as anything from two hundreds years ago.
Tuesday, 3/3-Kate Boyd, a piano professor, gave her faculty recital. It included some Beethoven, another Mulholland piece (kill me), and some Chopin. She's great though.
Thursday, 3/5-Composers Orchestra concert, which included my piece for Ensemble 48 called 'Re-Hearse,' which I will try to put on youtube as soon as I transfer the tape to my computer. It also included our improvisation for one guitar, two performers. It was basically me and Zane playing one guitar at the same time, doing some improvisations, then molding into the solo from Stairway to Heaven, then dissolving into more improv, doing the solo from Freebird, then ending with more improv. It was awesome.
We look like an Indian goddess.
There was also a piece we all co-wrote that involved our interpretation of the fourth movement of Ruth Crawford Seeger's famous string quartet, which involved three of us coming on stage with pillowcases over our heads, and duct tape over our mouths and wrists. It was great. And at the end we did our rendition of 'Andy' by Frank Zappa. What a great concert.
Friday, 3/6-Ensemble 48 performed downtown at this big artsy/hipster warehouse. We improvised a soundtrack to 'The Man with the Movie Camera' again, and it was awesome.
Now it's spring break, time to focus on my thesis, my recital, and whatever the hell I'm gonna do after graduation. I brewed my newest batch of beer yesterday, this one's an Irish Stout. It's so dark and scary!
That'll be ready in about a month, hopefully by the time everyone comes for my recital! Oh yeah, and there's our annual Purim Party coming up! I can't wait.

Just doin ma thang

Hey folks, how's everybody feelin' tonight? Good crowd, good crowd.
Since the inauguration I've just been in music mode (big surprise) and it's awesome (another shocker). I've been composing, working on my music theory for class, and seeing tons of concerts. It's beautiful.
First off, there was the obligatory superbowl party. Here's my dip!
Mmm, so good. We had so much food that I still had about a third left over, but I was afraid the guac would go bad so I ate it for breakfast the next morning. And then lunch. That was crazy. Once again, thank you Benjamin for the original recipe. Oh yeah, and during a recent composers salon at my place I once again changed people's lives with the broccoli casserole. It's such a crowd-pleaser.
So we had an Elektronik Musik concert Sunday which went really well. Me, Zane, and Professor Felice created an electric guitar trio that performed a couple pieces utilizing this cool gadget called an EBow. It's basically a little gadget with a 9-volt battery inside that you hold in your right hand. When you touch one of your guitar strings to it, it magnetically vibrates the string and causes it to sound, so basically it makes a steady noise without using a guitar pick, similar to a violinist drawing a bow across their strings. Felice wrote a piece for us, and I wrote a piece called "Contracurrency" that I composed in about 5 minutes that created these crazy sounds bending up and down and going crazy. It was awesome.
Then Thursday night was another Composers Orchestra concert. Ensemble 48 performed a piece written by our friend and fellow composer Dace, which involved Josh as Terence McKenna reading off a bunch of his writings, and the rest of us grooving along, speaking in tongues, dancing, doing tai chi, it was glorious.
So yea, that's a good summary. Ben and Jamie have been helping me with my resume and a little Chicago hunting, which is amazing considering how little sleep they're getting these days. Even so, I'm planting the seeds of my thesis, and already getting excited for my recital in April. Can't wait to see everybody!

I know, it's been a while

Where do I begin? Last semester ended with a bang, our Modernist History final asked us to argue against everything we learned the entire semester. It was quite terrifying, actually. But we all survived, and we're stronger because of it. My piano jury went ok as well, so my third semester concluded in fine form.
From Indy I took a bus to Chicago to spend time with Dean and Ross. It was cold, dark, and snowy when I got there, and for that reason it felt more like home than Indy has in a long time. We pretty much just stayed in the South Side, where Dean and Ross reside, because going outside meant dealing with the blistering cold. One nice find was Dean's roommate's advent calendar. I honestly didn't know what these were until Bad Santa.
Other than that, just the standard shenanigans ensued, with some wii, lots of cool music, and a hipster party mixed in. Take a peek into our lives:

Yeah, that was great. Then I took the train to the airport, waited in a crazy long line, and found out my flight outta Chicago was delayed so much I'd have to spend a night in Atlanta. No thank you! Instead I took the train back to Dean's, we ate some Chinese food, watched Once Upon a Time in the West, and then I flew out the next morning.
Coming back to Boston was wonderful. Christmas Eve-Eve with Momma and Ellie and Ben and Jamie, Christmas Eve with the Ozonoff's, Christmas with the Artertons followed by the Englands, good times as usual.
The other big news way Jamie's exploding belly. I was expecting her to pop around January 6th, so I went to NYC to see some buddies for a weekend, only to find out my little niece was born the night after I left! I hopped on another bus back to Boston to show my support, only to find out she was in the ICU having tests done. Regardless, I got at least one good picture out of the trip:
So I headed back to NYC for New Years in Brooklyn, which was crazy as expected. Then I went back to Boston again to see my niece for reals. It was crazy. Here's the happy/tired/crazy stressed out family:
Then I got my wisdom teeth out. Here's the before shot:
And the after:Obviously you can't see the top ones, but I'll let your imaginations take care of that. The whole process was surprisingly easy, very little pain at all. Do I miss my old teeth? Yeah, maybe a little. Is it weird having several little trenches in your mouth? Sure. But every day is a struggle to forget, and to move on, and I know that my heart will go on.
After a week of soft foods and tv, aka healing, it was back to Butler! I give a guitar lesson once a week, then I've got Composition Lessons with my main man Dr. Schelle, Analysis of Music since 1900, Composers Orchestra, Ensemble 48, my thesis, my graduate recital (Sunday, April 19th at 8pm), and then working on finding some existence outside of the academic world after graduation! It's a lot, but I can handle it.
To pass the time, I hang with my fellow musicians and talk about the important things in life, like baseball and It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. For example, we had a big Inauguration Party on January 20th, showcasing the togetherness and unity of our new era as people of all groups got together to share in the celebration. Some people even wore ball room gowns, and of course Josh had to try one on.
Needless to say, this is going to be a great semester. Stressful, but still great. My graduation is Saturday May 9th, and Ensemble 48 will definitely be having a concert either the day before or that day after, so if you can't make my graduate recital in April, I would love to see everyone in May. Let the healing begin!