Another first

It has been a busy November with business and personal travel and the first two weeks of December seem to have flown by as well. 

Now that the rains in Chennai have stopped and things are returning to normal slowly, that is weighing less on our mind. That didn't mean things came to a halt here in Cupertino. It has been an interesting week here. 

The little one has been learning the violin recently. However, she is very shy and reluctant to go on stage. Her message to us has been "I want to learn because I like it. Not because I want to perform. So if you force me to go on stage, I will quit". 

With a lot of encouragement from her teacher and us, she participated in the annual recital.

The best part of this for me was to watch her recover even if she made a mistake and smile through the whole thing. Now that she knows she can do it, she seems to be more confident. 

Hopefully this brings out the Violinst 2.0 in her! Given that she saw the other kids from the school perform for the first time, she is definitey inspired to practice more. 

Funny thing is that Jr. now wants to learn violin too and has been making a stong case on why she should learn Violin asap. We are now mulling that over.. 

Another year rolls by..

This weekend was Jr.'s Dance school annual day performance. We rushed in and out of it because of the cold weather. She did make me proud by doing her best. Given that we push this kid to do Classical dance, music, saxophone, etc. etc. I was happy with the fact that she does all this with a smile!

The 5D Mark II usually takes shots seamlessly while taking a video, but this time there are gaps in the video where the snaps were taken. Managed to Collage all her still poses. 

Here is the video of her performance! I am sure the folks in India will be critiquing her dancing. For now, I am happy that her interest in Classical dancing is increasing over time. As long as she keeps at it, she will only get better..

and yes, she is going to be pulled with me to Yoga class soon. That should help her with the one leg balancing for sure!

One more year has gone by so fast!

RaRa VeNu Gopala - An Alto Saxophone performance

Jr. has been practicing RaRa VeNu Gopala on her Alto Sax on and off now. It started first week of October as an attempt to peform at Navarathri golus, but she got busy and never got past the first half.

Today she practised the whole thing and did it after 35 minutes of takes and retakes. 

She made me very proud today because she stuck to it and got it done. She had first given up on this because she learns Carnatic music (south Indian classical) with the Indian notation and all her Saxophone lessons are in sheet music and western notation! There is a big conflict in her head when she reads the notation because even the Indian notation is written in the English alphabet for her. When I was a kid used to learn with the notes written in Tamil alphabet.

So what happens? 

Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Da Ni Sa gets written in her book as S R G M P D N S

When I translate the carnatic notes for her to Western, I have to go with a G to G scale and write it as 

G A B C D E F G and the problem is G and D are there is both the representations.. poor thing had to practice it many times to get things going.

Now she is on a roll. Going to get some of her other favorite Tamil Songs converted to her notation so she can play it. 

For what it is worth see the pics of the notes made for her. 

 

We will definitely have a few songs ready by next Golu! 

ps. On a side note, this is part of the basic Carnatic music lessons. Some guy is trying to claim Copyright to Raravenu Gopala and is claiming this is infringing on his copyright! Have filed a dispute. These days it is getting ridiculous.

A busy day in the life of Jr.

It was a case of bad planning. Daddy committing to take Jr. to a parade in Los Gatos with the school band without knowing that her dance school annual day program was on the same day!

She insisted on going to the parade inspite of the rain. Really didn't want to take a chance with the rain and get sick again, but you cannot deny a 10 year old when she begs. So off we went, and got wet in the rain and I had the added pleasure of walking back a mile and a half with a camera and saxophone hanging from my neck!

She thought it was worth it!

 This position of neck down and playing an alto-sax within a poncho had consequences for the second part of the day..

 The place was colorful and it was nice for folks who were sitting in shelter watching the parade.. not so for the kids or parents running alongside taking pictures!

 Came back home and had exactly one hour to get ready for her dance performance. We had a lot of help in the dressing up from our family friend and the end result was ?

Daddy tearing up seeing Jr. all grown up. This is the first time she is wearing the traditional dance dress instead of a paavaadai!

Had to rotate the picture by 15 degrees to make her look straight. She could not hold her neck straight..

She looked great. Just had to dance well..

She did all the steps well. The hands were good. The feet did their job, but...

She went through the motions. There was simply no smile. Even hindi movie heroines who are forced to dance in front of villains before the climax have better smiles than Jr.'s and that got her to face mommy's wrath for a good hour!

and daddy's advice session as well.. Daddy learnt early on in his ballroom dancing days that even if you falter with your footwork, a smile goes a long way with the judges! Granted this was not a competition and there were no judges but when your parents and extended family get to watch it in photos and video... there has to be a smile!

Next year, there will be a calendar system in the house that avoids such conflicts and doesn't push the kids to such extremes.. 

and we will have a smile before, at and after the performance! 

Sometimes I think we push our kids too much but then again, we got a lot more excercise compared to Jr. and the little one because we played outdoors all the time instead of sit in front of an iPad.

All said and done.. she did break our heart being sooo cute.

Jr. plays the Sax

Jr. has been learning the Alto Sax this year. They had their first performance for parents.

It is an expensive but beautiful instrument. Thankfully they allow us to rent on a monthly fee and if we rent for enough months we get to buy it! (Reminds you of Bama Vijayam, doesn't it?)

Took this HDR picture of the Alto Sax a few months ago..

Here is a video of her practicing at home after her first two classes..

Considering that we don't get to see her practice at home often (San's complaint that the thing is too loud!) and are limited to once a week, she did very well!

The plan is to encourage her better going forward...

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