Germany: That piece of information I’ve been waiting for to begin this post? Kevin’s exchange partner. Meet Lisa:
It’s going to be an interesting two weeks…messages flying back and forth on Facebook. Lisa’s English is way better than Kevin’s German, which will cause him more than a few problems I’m sure when he goes there (he is the youngest of the OHS group going; the only sophomore as I understand it….ironically, all of the Germans are Kevin’s age..)
I can’t even begin to imagine how strange it will be to have a teenage girl in a house full of boys. I shudder to think how we’ll add in another person and activities to what will be going on at that time (Kevin-Musical, Matthew-Soccer, Cpher-Lacrosse)
Many more updates on this over the upcoming months. The German experience begins April 9th.
Music: Man, where to start here? Lots of ground to cover.
All-State: Way back when we were in Arizona the All-State results were posted…and the organization that runs the auditions apparently lost (in the mail!) all of the high school violin and viola results. This meant that everybody had to re-audition right after break, and, if you were three time zones away from your viola that week, well, you might be a little behind.
So, we get back on Friday….and Kevin waits until Sunday to tell us that his viola is at school (we could have gone down on either Friday or Saturday and retrieved it). And, well, it’s no big surprise that he is not one of the 16 violas chosen; he is honorable mention. Kevin says his re-audition was the worst he had ever performed those pieces. Parents mention that might be because he COULDN’T EVEN TELL US HE DIDN’T EVEN HAVE HIS VIOLA AT HOME FOR TWO DAYS.
Grrr.
Luckily, for Kevin, one viola decided not to participate, and he was able to go and perform with the orchestra. That concert was about a month ago, we just received the CD this week. Dad very happy with the selections; Copland and Rimsky-Korsakov are clearly in Dad’s Top 5 composers.
Solo and Ensemble: The other event in viola-world is the performance at the District Solo and Ensemble competition. Shocked SHOCKED when I hear the piece that Kevin is doing….it’s very different from what I usually see him gravitate to….I mean, this piece has the very fast intricate passages, but, the first two minutes are slow, long drawn out notes that tend to emphasize your musical interpretation and expression, and man I don’t think those are Kevin strengths.
First week of February is the performance….I completely missed it (we were doing the boy-basketball thing…Kevin drove himself) and arrived right as we finished. Didn’t get the I rating he hoped for, got a II. Judge was very harsh; said his bow wasn’t in good condition (which sent Dad into orbit…Kevin knew it needed work soon and we could have done that before his big performance of the year!). But, learned later that this particular judge was very ‘difficult’ as the day wore on, and more than a few very talented kids from the high school walked away with II’s, not I’s for very suspect reasons.
Random Rescued From Facebook Photo 1: Kevin (and boys) after the performance of Much Ado about Nothing. Kevin was not in the play, but the girl in the center, Maya, was/is. We’re good friends with Maya and her family through soccer (Matthew and Christopher have played with Maya’s brother Aidan).
Musical: Anything Goes is the show this year; Kevin, I think, has indicated that he may have some German-exchange conflicts and while he is in the show he again has a role that’s mostly in the chorus. There may be some dancing, may even be some tap dancing, involved in this though. Rehearsals start in earnest this week.
Random Rescue #2: the kids from the neighborhood, from left to right, Matthew (with cast), Nick, Kevin, Julia, Ashton, Tyler
Academics: Not going as well as his parents would like. Of course, that’s all relative; most kids would kill for his grades.
Not quite sure how to pull Kevin out of it, and we’re not quite willing to say that “well, that’s a teenager for you”, but, Kevin has a general malaise going on that seems to be affecting just about everything. One event would be an aberration, multiple events are a trend, and, junior varsity in tennis, honorable mention for All-State, second division in solo and ensemble, and then this shift in grades from high A’s to low A’s with an A- and B+…well, it’s disappointing. Hope he gets off of his butt soon; don’t like that word….disappointing.
Random Rescue #3: Kevin studying AP World History with Enya and Drew
Driving: you know, we’ll save this for another post…it probably deservers more than the 2 paragraphs that I feel like typing now.
