Happy Birthday Mozart! This is the cadenza that I wrote for his 21st piano concerto. The cadenza is where the soloist shows off their virtuosity and skill. Sometimes they are even improvised on the spot! My cadenza is not really in the classical style because it’s quite heavy and romanticize. I manipulate the themes from the concerto itself to delve into a quasi fantasy. I actually didn’t write a lot of it down, so when the conductor asked for it, I told him that I would just cue him in. This particular performance had a single rehearsal the morning of the concert in Perugia, Italy.
Category: Uncategorized
Study Hal: Week 32 – Workout Routine
Staying physically active is hard, especially being at home all the time, and especially with all this snow. Being so sedentary sparked Hal to make a change! He found a workout game to follow and started off strong… But, he didn’t consider how hard it would get after just a few minutes! He’s still resting. He says he’ll sleep it off.
In spite of online classes, I hope you’re taking time to move your body. Don’t be like Hal, though – start small and make some little changes! Even if it’s an extra trip up the stairs, it makes a difference when you spend all day at a desk. And don’t forget to stretch! It’s helpful even if you haven’t done so many squats that you fell over.
If you’re new here, welcome! Hal is back every week with his experiences studying at U-M from home his senior year. Check back next Tuesday for a new video, or check out the Study Hal tag for the archives.
Pottery Wheel
If the clay was smooth,
Your
desires
Could seep through
But bowls, plates, and vases
Could not chip
At your thoughts.
If the clay was smooth,
Toothpicks would serve as utensils
For fine details
Knives would easily trace
Straight lines
Spoons would remove excess.
If the clay was smooth,
You would question
If water seeps out
You would wonder
If by taking the mostly molded cup,
You could stain your white hands.
If by taking a sip,
Do you risk tasting the brown?
If ghosts of past mistakes could fade away,
Rolled into a ball and smoothed out.
©SKETCHES BY MAKO: @10心
Bones of an atom, moments from a Euclidean matrix. Unpolished skeletons of a past once shared, digital remnants of an organic wasteland. For the words left unsaid, excavated bone from the deepest brinks of my heart, I bring to you a casket of love And lay in it too.
Songwriting Resources
Hello, all! This week I figured I would share a few of my favorite websites/resources that have helped me with my music throughout my own artistic journey. Hopefully they’ll be able to inspire/instruct a few people just as they inspired and instructed me.
The big one: Ultimate Guitar. This is the place I find the majority of my chord sheets for different songs I cover. Users are able to upload and edit chords and tabs, and each sheet is able to be rated by other users so you can see what kind of quality the particular version is.
https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/
Chordify is another cool site. It takes youtube videos and mp3 files and turns the audio into chords on the spot. It’s not always 100% accurate or reliable, but it’s definitely a cool idea, and I’d say it’s worth checking out.
https://chordify.net/
For anyone who does any Christian religious music, SongSelect is my website of choice. This is a database of worship songs and other religious material which works great for printing out materials for church bands/worship nights/etc.
https://songselect.ccli.com/
Musescore is a great resource but you do have to have an account to gain access to its full features. This is a database of PDFs and sheet music available to purchase or download. It also allows you to create your own sheet music. I don’t have a lot of experience with this particular resource, but I have friends who swear by it.
https://musescore.org/en
If you write music note by note on a staff, Noteflight is the place for you. I’ve used it mostly for arranging for a cappella ensembles in the past, but I know people who arrange/write for choirs, piano, orchestras, bands, etc. on this site. It’s easy to use for the most part, and really allows for you to create whatever you can possibly think up: an A+ resource in my opinion.
https://www.noteflight.com/
OTHER TOOLS:
If you need an online guitar tuner, Fender has your back! I often forget my tuner when I bring one of my guitars somewhere, and this online tool has really helped me.
https://www.fender.com/online-guitar-tuner
The Ultimate Guitar mobile app also has a built in chromatic tuner, brain tuner, metronome, chord library, chord progression database, and much more. Honestly just download it right now. I use it almost every day.
RhymeZone is another big one for me. When I’m writing lyrics I often find myself stuck in a situation where I have one super strong line and nothing to pair it with. RhymeZone allows you to search for perfect rhymes, near rhymes, synonyms, descriptive phrases, and much more, It also displays single word results and entire phrases that may match your rhyme scheme as well.
https://www.rhymezone.com/
