Nights of Music

Alright, it's time to reflect on my third week.  In Band of Blue, we got back to work on "Soulsville" so it's ready for the Troy game (See "Saturday Night Lights").  Last Wednesday, the percussion studio, Fork's Drum Closet, and Zildjian Cymbals presented Keith Aleo, who works with Zildjian and is an educator and performer himself.  He presented two cymbal masterclasses last Wednesday, one at day and one at night.  I went to the night masterclass since I had class during the day.  He went over technique and execution and presented many of Zildjian's Cymbals along with someone from Zildjian's advertising department.  The Zildjian is a family owned business and has been around since the 1600's in Turkey when it was still the Ottoman Empire.  Zildjian did move to the United States in the 1900's and is the oldest family owned business in America.  It has a unique history.

Friday was one of my MTSU related highlights, it was the day that preceded Constitution Day.  In the Keathley University Center Knoll (KUC Knoll), there was a reading of the United State Constitution.  My history class had be in line to read it for attendance credit to that class.  I liked the idea of reading the Constitution.  A lot of people were walking by, and the President of MTSU stopped by to see the event.  Reading the US Constitution wasn't hard, everyone read a sentence or two, and the Constitution had some short sentences and some really long sentences.

Later that Friday night, I had my first gig with the MTSU Salsa Band.  That Friday was Mexican Independence Day, and a celebration was being held at the Discovery Center in Murfressboro.  Professor Davila told me about this the day before.  Professor Davila's Steel Drum band also performed at the Discovery Center.  We met at the campus at around four o'clock.  I went and had my keyboard ready.  I also helped load, unload, and load with the instruments.  This was a good opportunity to really get to know the rest of the Salsa Band.  I knew most of the percussion from being in the studio with them, as well as high school.  We had planned to play three peices of music, but during our sound check Professor Davila says, "Hey, let's play something we didn't rehearse.", and we were cool with that.  It was a good warm up for both the crowd and the band.  To get a taste of what we were in for later.  We played a piece called "Pa Gozar" (as oppose to the video, our group has two trumpets, two saxes, a trombone, a drumset player, three/four percussionists, a bassist, a guitarist, Professor D is the singer, and then there is me, the keyboard player.  We officially began later that evening.  There was a nice sunset, not much wind was blowing, and there was a moderate temperature where it wasn't too hot or too cold.  We settled under or around a tent in the corner of the outdoor courtyard.  We opened with "Yumbambe", followed by Professor D's arrangement "Maria", and last was "Co Co May May".  (There is some difference in how we play it and how the people in the video play it).  It was a great experience playing in front of the crowd, while it wasn't my first time playing keyboard playing in front of a crowd I don't know, it was still a good thing to be with these other really good musicians.  They really enjoyed the music, and some people even began dancing to the music.  With this kind of music who can't dance to it?  There were a lot of kids running around our set up.  They wanted a close up of us.  It was a good time.  After us came the Steel Band, and they did their arrangements as well.  We stayed after we performed for the rest of the program events and had some good food as well.  Some people left early, others stayed.  After the program that night we put up all of the equipment.  The night was still young so most of us headed to Old Chicago in Murfreesboro.  Old Chicago has some really good food, I was told.  We had a good time that night, had conversation, talked about other stuff, and I can't remember exactly though since it was at night and I was tired through most of it.  It was good to get to know some other people in the percussion studio. 

The following Saturday, my high school hosted the annual Williamson County Exhibition of Bands.  It is where the 8 Williamson county high school marching bands and the various middle school bands perform in the stadium.  A lot of RHS alumni from MTSU, Belmont, and even Ole Miss and other people on the band's staff from MTSU were there.  I left that Saturday morning with another student from here who works with the Ravenwood Band.  Before the exhibition and while the band was practicing I managed to get some practicing done as well as spend time with my family.  That night I helped people get to where they needed to go, and I saw some of the bands perform that night including Ravenwood, the band I'm from.  The mass performances at the end featured all of the bands in williamson county.  It was a good night for music.

This week was pretty good, Friday and Saturday were definite highlights of the week.  I wonder what this next week will bring when we go to Troy this weekend for football with the band, as well as my high school's homecoming.  This next week will be interesting.  Regardless, I liked how this past week turned out to be, it was a fun week.