Day 497, July 27, 2021

Tuning 

Tonight's soundtrack: Jeff Beck, Crossroads Guitar Festival, 2007

Teaching online is a strange environment. Sometimes students are active and engaged and everything feels vibrant and alive. Other times it feels like pulling teeth as you wait for someone to speak up and answer a question or share a piece of writing.

Today's class was a little of both. The beginning of class seemed to start off pretty well, and the small groups were clicking and made use of the allotted time in a productive way. But after we returned to the large group, we ran out of steam. Perhaps we were all talked out.

In hindsight, I think I should have broken up the work into smaller bites and allowed for more opportunities for breakout rooms in smaller groups opposed to larger breakout rooms of 4. Perhaps 2 people working on a smaller part of the assignment would have been more fruitful. The students have asked for more opportunities to get to know each other better, so that would help with that as well.

This week we are working on first drafts of the methods, results, and discussion sections. So maybe I will break them into groups for each section with one or two questions to focus on for each. Thursdays are always focused on peer feedback and go faster anyway, so hopefully that will redeem today's slow end of class.

This weekend I got to go to my first Tanglewood concerts of the season. It was incredible to see so many people out and eager to see music again. I grew up on the Tanglewood grounds and visiting there feels like a returning home of sorts. 

When I was little, there were several shallow pools with fountains tucked in among the maze-like gardens, trellises, and a great curved bench. It was a marvelous place to hide and explore. My friend Robert and I spent whole summers tucked in among the bushes where we devised traps for the tourists with branches bent into sprung whips that we imagined catching the face or rear end of a snooty New Yorker. I don't think we ever really managed to catch anyone with our traps, but it was great fun imagining.  I'm sure we made a mess with the fountains as well. How could a child not find their way into the pools when left to their own devices for a summer morning rehearsal or afternoon concert?

My father says that he could hear the yells and screams of his son all the way across the grounds and onto the stage at Tanglewood. 

One of my favorite sounds of summer, like the first peepers that come out in the spring, is the sound of an orchestra tuning before the conductor comes out to the stage.

First, there is a gentle cacophony as the musicians settle into their seats and stretch a little with their instruments. Mostly, they are adjusting and testing, but occasionally you hear a measure of something. A little snippet of melody. Then, the concertmaster stands and plays an A and the orchestra tunes to that note in a swelling and centering wave. It is both pure and cleansing. There is a moment of quiet, and then the conductor emerges to the audience's applause. 

It is something I appreciate almost as much as the performance itself because it is a constant of almost every summer of my entire life. Hearing the orchestra tune is soothing. It lulls me into a sense of peace, calm, and quiet. It is the bottom of a breath before the inhale. It is the moment after a wave breaks. It is that moment you remember something that happened a long time ago.

Take care and be well,
Leo