A Long Hiatus

My first post in a really long time, during which a lot has transpired!

In June of last year, I made my first trip to Bonnaroo, which was held at Manchester, Tennessee. Then in September, I made my first trip to The Burning Man at the Black Rock Desert in Nevada. Both turned out to be very interesting experiences, far removed as they were from everything one gets to see while being part of the mainstream in a place like the Bay Area. The things that stood out for me at these events were the sheer creativity, imaginativeness and an all round sense of tolerance and inclusiveness among those that showed up. For the curious, The Burning Man Image Gallery has a very good collection of photographs taken by various people over the years. I’d love to go back to Bonnaroo and The Burning Man some time.

In November, I took time off from work to spend a week by myself in the Santa Barbara wine country. I stayed in Solvang, a small Danish town north of Santa Barbara. Looking back, I realize that a week of vacation is a long time if you don’t plan ahead, paradoxical as it may sound. I hadn’t even made a hotel reservation, literally “stopping by” with only my Casio Keyboard and enough clothes to last a week.

It was refreshing to befriend the locals and discover from them which places to go to or which wineries to visit; often, they even accompanied me to show me around. I was surprised to discover that Solvang was at the heart of the Wild West, evident in the way some restaurants and pubs still display the cowboy culture. Coexisting with the ranches and the horses, though, are some of the finest wineries in all of California. My taste in wine has gone up a couple of notches after tasting the wines of the Santa Ynez Valley and the adjoining areas. While there, I also visited Los Olivos, a charming community north of Solvang, renowned as much for its art galleries as for its wineries. I don’t have the kind of money to afford most of what was on sale but I bought what was within my means and merely appreciated the rest.

My poor prose cannot capture most of what I experienced (as couldn’t my camera either), so I’ll be content with just saying that the trip would always remain memorable to me in more than a few ways.

Then in late November last year, I auditioned for CAPMT, the California Association of Professional Music Teachers, and passed, following which I was invited to play at the Northern Festival recital in Danville this January. I played Bach’s Prelude in C Minor.

During this time I’ve also been composing a little bit, and although I’ve written down some of it, I haven’t recorded anything yet. I’m currently preparing for my piano evaluations due in May. Later in June, it will be two years since I began taking lessons and I’m quite happy that I’ve already started playing Level 6 solos. But I can’t wait to get to Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy and more of Bach in the coming years, and composing more of my own stuff.

And on that note, I’d like to sign off. A much belated Happy New Year to everyone!

In praise of Saturday (and Malbec)!

What a wonderful day today (a Saturday) has been! For as long as I can remember, Saturday has had a very special place in my heart! It seems to me to be very providentially placed by the Gods between Friday (a day spent in anticipation of the unwinding of a long week) and Sunday (a day spent in dread of the approaching week — a mental condition that has been aptly given the name The Sunday Neurosis by Viktor Frankl). And yet, despite such contrasting emotions that these two days elicit in me, Saturday always seems to be gloriously ensconced between the two, steadfastly refusing to take on the character of either of them! Instead, it invariably seems to be securely imbued with the color of the here and the now — and is, in fact (even literally so!), a bridge from the past to the future. And by this very nature of epitomizing the present, it is gleefully fulfilling to me and is consistently capable of inspiring great feats of transcendence of the human condition.

Today was one such day for me! Having spent the morning enjoying an almost perfect cup of cappuccino at Cafe Del Doge in downtown Palo Alto, and later working on my next week’s Piano assignment, I ended up going to the beach on Highway 1 in Santa Cruz. Although my intention was to soak in the beautiful sunset, it turned out to be extremely foggy there. Fortunately, though, I came across this very nice part of the coast that was set in the midst of a hilly region — one had to actually walk down a trail to get to the beach. Once down there, the fog actually seemed to elevate the place and time to an unusually surreal degree; and so, it turned out to be a very enjoyable and carefree couple of hours! On the way back, my friend suggested we eat at Castro in downtown Mountain View. There, we discovered this really nice Italian place called Pasta?, and I’ve to admit, the food there was surprisingly good! So much so, it makes me want to go back there more often to explore their other offerings.

There, I also tried, for the first time, a 2006 Malbec from the Mendoza region of Argentina. I found it very impressive — it was medium bodied, had a juicy flavor and left a mildly tannic aftertaste. I’m nowhere near to being an oenophile, so that is as far as I can go in terms of describing it. But it was one of those wines that you know you’re going to remember for a long time and not lose an opportunity to recommend to friends and random strangers alike. After researching a little bit, I found, among other things about it, that it is named after a Hungarian peasant who introduced it to France; that Argentina is currently the chief exporter of wine of this varietal; and that it is commonly used, along with Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, in preparing the exquisite and elegant Bordeaux blend. I want to recommend this excellent wine to everyone and am waiting to taste more of it myself the next time I get a chance to do so!

I think this has been one of my longer posts! Time to call it a day and prepare myself for the impending Sunday Neurosis while I wait for another glorious Saturday next week!