Friday Festitivies -- Update

Sniff. Casey has left the building. The Big J Building that is.

Casey is, as expected, AWESOME and gracefully put up with my getting us lost in the Big J hallways (it's still a construction site), my ramblings, and babblings etc. She also helped me remember why the Big J is so cool. You spend time there and you forget, as you get caught up in the administrative details of making an institution this size work, and the rush of one concert/event to the next. It's really the staff and the students, from the crazy security guards, to the Dance and the Drama staff that let you duck onto stages and into rehearsal rooms, and the students practicing away in little rooms, dancing their feet off in studios while strangers lurk in doorways, and or just going about their lives. The music can be a cacophony of vocalises, scales, percussive drills, timpani, combined with the sounds of rip saws, or wonderfully familiar classical melodies floating around corners or across the vastness of empty recital halls.

Once upon a time, coming to the Big J as a musician was more than a few people's dream for me. At the time I couldn't convey why I just knew, in my heart of hearts, that being a concert pianist wasn't to be my path. Somehow I was aware even then, that you didn't have to BE an artist to be in the service of Art. It may have taken more than a decade or more, some rebellion, and different career explorations, but ultimately my current journey has merged paths with that other, older one. I'm at the Big J, but just in a way that no one could have imagined back when I started piano lessons as a 7-year old.

Hey Casey? Thanks for helping me remember why the Big J is such a special place. Glad I could help you check off something on "the list." You actually helped me do the same and to keep a resolution or two for the year. Travel safe. Be Well. Be Happy.

Much love to you, Cody, and the Moosh.

Xo Auntie Nettie